Monday
Spinoza and Mendelssohn
Haskela
Wed.
• Rise of Reform:
• Reformers: know why you are reforming...
– Goals.
– Questions will be asked…
• Everyone else: plan your responses!
Friday:
• Early Orthodox response.
Mysticism and Messiah
• Isaac Luria 1534-1572
• taught that a saintly teacher could redeem
a generation
• Revolutionary Messiah replaced by
Heroic messiah
Lurianic Kabalah
• Tzimzum:
Ein Sof (GOD)
contracts to open a space for creation
remnant of divine light preserved in jars.
Lurianic K.
• Breaking the vessels
Light cannot be contained.
Shards of vessels are root of evil
Light scattered and surrounded by
matter
Lurianic K.
• TIKKUN: Repair.
Separating divine sparks from shards.
Obedience to torah etc:
Elevating world to original purity
Luria:
Gradual redemption.
Acts of righteousness prepare the way for
Messiah
Jews have special obligation to help bring
Messiah
Breslauer, p. 100
• Torah a secret code
– Open to any interpretation outside of Oral Torah
• Prayer has magical power
– New prayers will replace the old
• Disorder is fundamental to nature
– Descent into disorder necessary to restore
cosmos
• Leader is essential to salvation.
– Small step to Messiah
1648 “Messiah will come…”
• Eastern European Kabbalists determined
that Messiah will come in 1648
1648-1649 Ukraine / Poland
• Slaughter
• Cossack rebellion
• 300,000 Jews left dead?
New prediction:
• Messiah in 1666
Sabbatai Zevi 1626-1676
• 1648 Claimed to be Messiah.
• Overturned traditional Halakhah
• Turks forced conversion to Islam.
• Died in prison as an apostate
• Many followers saw his “descent into sin”
part of mystical repair of the universe.
17th -18th century
• Increasing violence against Jews in East
Europe
• Jewish economy falters
• Considerable poverty
Jacob Frank (1726-1791)
•
•
•
•
•
•
Polish
Claimed to be Messiah
Overturned sexual ethics.
Rejected by Rabbinic leadership,
Converted to Christianity.
Speaks against Judaism
– Incites further violence.
Jewish classes differences
• Poor Jews feel they are made to bear the
burden of supporting the wealthy and the
rabbinical schools.
• Rabbinical schools not providing spiritual
leadership for the larger community:
– Elitist
Alternative religion
• Many Askenazi Jews in Poland
• Turn to mystically influenced religious
teachers
astrology
magic
• Miracle-workers manipulate divine name.
• Belief in demons, spirits etc grows.
Amulet to protect baby
Baal Shem Tov
1700-1760
• Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer
• Massive legendary material
• Herbal Doctor “Baal Shem”
Good Name
• Distinguishes him from magicians.
Simple teacher
Stories / Parables
Appealed to the uneducated.
Studied Kabbalah
Teachings
Emotion over intellect
Intuition more important than even Talmud
God’s immanence
“sparks of holiness”
In nature
&
simple objects
Joy in life and worship
antidote to bigotry
Songs, dancing drinking
Folksongs seen as religious allegories.
BeshT (B. Shem Tov)
Prayer
• Clinging: continual awareness of God’s
presence
• Ecstasy / Enthusiasm: Traditional prayer
regulations ignored
spontaneous.
BeshT on Messiah: 2 theories.
• His teachings were a prelude to
redemption by Messiah.
• Downplays “eschatology”
(end of the world)
•
Reaction to false messiahs
Sees eschatology as allegory of
personal transformation.
Legend
• 1747 BeshT sees Messiah
“When will you come?”
• “When every Jews is as spiritual as you”
• Mission: to bring the Messiah.
Modern Denominations
Is Messiah a person
or
Is there only a “messianic period” when
justice will prevail?
Successors
• Tzaddik “righteous”
• Rebbe
• Disciples of BeshT who form their own
schools.
• Became dynastic
Hasidic Jews
R. Zalman of Ladi
1745-1812
• Habad (Chabad)– Lubavitch Hasid
• Integrated Mysticism with renewed
emphasis on Oral Torah
Backlash
• Rabbinic Elite challenges Hasids
• “Mitnagdim”
• Elijah ben Solomon Zalman 1720-97
“Gaon of Vilna”
Modernity
• Hasidic Judaism: anti-modernist in many
respects.
• Return to tradition, and Judaism as a
special people
• Rejected rise of modern “citizenship”
Irony
• Mitnagdim taught Hasidism was a
dangerous innovation
• Hasidism rejected modernity and became
a force for orthodoxy.
sources
• http://www.williams.edu/library/citing/styles
/chicago1.html
• http://www.arts.ualberta.ca/axismundi/The
_Rise_Of....htm#anchor596778