photo by JYT

One of the people that the greatest influence gave to the U.S. religious world was Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972) who represented Judaism. He was born in Warszawa, Poland on January 11, 1907. Later, he went to Berlin University in 1928.

After acquiring a PhD degree in 1935, he worked as a lecturer at Jewish Adult Education Center" where Martin Buber was its director.

Buber nominated Heschel to his successor when he emigrated to Palestine in 1937. However, Heschel too escaped from the oppression of Nazis next year, and moved to London. Heschel arrived at the United States in spring 1940.

　　He taught at the Hebrew Union Collage (abbreviation HUC) of Cincinnati during 1940-1945. From 1945 until his death in 1972, he taught at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (abbreviation JTS) in New York.

　　When his second book "Man Is Not Alone" came out in the world in 1951, the people began to know Heschel because this was highly praised by Reinhold Niebhuhr, one of the leading Protestant theologians.

　　His scholastic activities went into rabbinical research, Biblical study, theology, philosophy and ethics and the large area.

In the field of rabbinical research, "Maimonides"- 1938- and "Theology of Ancient Judaism (Torah min Hashamayim b'Ispaklariah shel Hadorot) "- vol. 1, 1962 & vol. 2, 1965 - are most important works.

　　The latter is two volumes magnum opus profiling the foundation of the rabbinical theology with comparing the various opinions of Rabbis in the Mishna and Talmud. Its third volume was not yet published, though he almost finished it in manuscript.

By the way, a similar book was written by Ephraim Urbach of Hebrew University, "The Sages, their Concepts and Belief" (Hazal-Pirkei Emunot v 'De'ot) which deals the rabbinical idea in the full scale in 1966. It was the result that he was stimulated with Heschel's "Theology of Ancient Judaism."

　　Heschel left his thesis "Die Prophetie" in the field of a study of the Bible. This is now available in the English translation and widely read by students.

His major writings in the field of theology are the above-mentioned "Man Is Not Alone" and "God in Search of Man."

"The Insecurity of Freedom" is the collection of his various lectures on the social ethics and the problems of humanity today.

　　He often gave lectures on Jewish education, too. Today there is the network of the Jewish schools, "Abraham Joshua Heschel School" in major cities in USA, which was developed by the educators who supported his idea of education.

Heschel was not only a scholar of Judaism but also a man of deed. His strong concern in the social justice was demonstrated in action at many occasions. That drive particularly caused the people's respect even non-Jewish people.

　　For example, he got trust from the cardinal Bear of the Roman Catholic Church, who introduced him to the Pope, Paul VI in 1964. Heschel's presentation made the Pope to delete the Church's long ambition of converting the Jews to Christianity. The Roman Catholic Church withdrew missionary work clauses to the Jews at the Second Vatican Councils as this result.

　　The meeting of the Rev. Martin Luther King and Rev. Andrew Young, the black civil right movement leaders in 1963, developed into the big march at Selma in Alabama in 1965 and the formation of anti-Vietnam War movement.

He was invited as the first Jewish visiting professor at the Union Theological Seminary, which is in front of the JTS across the Broadway, in 1965-66.

This became possible through the recommendation of Niebuhr and John Bennet.

　　During the fall of 1972, he was busy in writing his last work on the life of Rabbi of Kotzk, one in Yiddish and another in English. He finished the Yiddish edition first, before November. Once he asked me which title is good for his book either "A Passion for Sincerity" of "A Passion for Truth."

　　It was the heavy snow days of December 17 or 18, 1972; Heschel went to welcome Rev. Philip Berrigan and Jimmy Hoffa, anti-Vietnam War activists, who were going to be released from the prison. He was waiting them in front of the gate for many hours in freezing cold air. 　On December 19, he returned to New York, I saw him very tired and completely exhausted.

Three days later, Abraham Joshua Heschel passed this world silently before dawn of the Sabbath on December 23, 1972. In the morning of the previous day December 22, he finished the manuscript of his last book "A Passion for Truthﾓ and handed it to the publisher.

Heschel was not only a man of the scholastic memory and wisdom but also a man of the social actions. Why was he so devoted to the social issues? We must know from his background to untie this doubt.

　　He was a descendant of the saintly Hasidic dynasty. His fathers' ancestor goes back to the first Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (1748-1825), called the Apto Rebbe. The supreme leader of the Hasidic dynasty is called "Rebbe". He was one of the excellent students among the fourth generation since Rabbi Israel, the Baal Shem Tov (1700-1760) the founder of Hasidism (1). He helped many distressed people and was called "Ohev Israel" (the one who loves the children of Israel).

　　Heschel lost his father Moshe Mordecai (1873-1916) at age 10. The influence of his mother Rivka (1874-1942) and the uncle, Rabbi Alter Israel Perlow (Rebbe of Novo Minsk 1847-1933) was big for the education of Heschel in the boyhood.

In the advice of Novo Minsk Rebbe, Heschel learned under the tutor, Betzalel Levi, whose academic approach is sharp and critical succeeded form the tradition of the Kotzk School. After Bar Mitzvah, he received the rabbinical discipline by Rabbi Menahemm Zemba and was conferred as a Rabbi around 1916.

　When his father passed away, disciples asked his mother the boy Heschel to be heir Rebbe and not Heschel's older brother Jacob (1903-1970) who had already finished the Bar Mitzvah. However, Rivka refused their request. This is an episode how Heschel's character and ability were distinguished already in the childhood.

　　It was some time after Heschel moved to New York from Cincinnati, his cousin, Abraham Joshua Heschel (1888-1967), Rebbe of Kopycznic in Brooklyn requested him to succeed the chair of Rebbe. But, Heschel refused that request firmly. After all, his nephew, Moshe Heschel (1927-1975), succeeded it.

　　As for his life, Heschel sternly observed the tradition of Hasidism to the end though he was active as the professor of JTS, the institute of the conservatives Judaism. When a party was held at his home, his Hasidic relatives were invited, and he too visited relatives in Brooklyn.

Why did Heschel attend the secular world, leaving the holy society of Hasidism?

As for his odyssey from Hasidic world, the reader may find the detail of his footprints in Edward Kaplan's critical biography 'Abraham Joshua Heschel' (2).

　　I studied under him at JTS from September 1970, and he allowed me to become his doctor's student in September 72. Every evening when he returned home from JTS, I carried his bag from Broadway on the 122 Street to his home on the Riverside Drive at the corner of the 115 Street.

　 One particular cold November day on the way back from the Seminary, I dared to put my question to him, and asked,

"Why did you not become the Rebbe of the Kopiczinicz Hasidim who once urged you to succeed the chair of their crowning spiritual leader? I heard that your cousin, Abraham Joshua Heschel of Brooklyn, the Kopicziniczer Rebbe, several times urged you to succeed him."

Hearing my bold question, my teacher, Abraham Heschel, stopped his walk a moment and again took a deep breath to think a while.

He said,

"Listen, Yaakov, there is a story in the Midrash. When Moses saw the burning bush at Sinai, he saw also the divine palace burning in a blaze. He wondered why there was no one to take care of the palace. He volunteered to extinguish the fire. Then God appeared to him, saying, 'Moses, Moses, the palace is under my charge. I do take care of it. I shall be very pleased if you could help me to take care of the palace, which is nothing other than the world where you live.' So, since then Moses became the faithful partner of the Lord."

"This story gave me a lesson when my cousin invited me to his Hasidic chair. I thought that there were many other people who could take the leadership of the Kopicziniczer Hasidim because they have been brought up under the divine care to be gifted, pious and holy.

But who should take care of the world? They are too busy in keeping their own holy life to share the holiness with the world.

As you know, Judaism has a lot of precious values and meanings, such treasures that the rest of the world does not even know exist. I thought that if I did not introduce them to the other people, those things should be kept unknown forever. So I decided to leave the care of the Kopicziniczers to the hand of someone else. It is my duty to care for the world outside of the Tabernacle. It is the duty of a person who has experienced holiness to redeem the world through the act. He should not keep it with himself but share it with people."

In that afternoon, Heschel came to be absorbed in the early days of his story and walked in Broadway to the corner of the 112th Street.

　

Heschel gave me a bibliography of basic books of Hasidism and advised me to read the following 6 books with care: "Toldoth Yaakov Yosef", the first Hasidic theological claim written by Yaakov Yosef, the first disciple of the Baal Shem Tov; "Magid Devarav leYaakov", a collection of discourses told by Dov Baer, the successor of the Baal Shem Tov; "Kedushath Levi" written by Levi Yitzhak, the student of Dov Baer; "Or HaMeyir" by Zeev Wolfe; "Noam Elimelkh" by Elimelkh of Lezensk; his disciple's book "Emeth v'Emunah".　Heschel referred also to "Liqutim Yekarim", a collection of Baal Shem Tov's words and "Degel Mahaneh Efraim" edited by Nahman of Cherin, a grandson of Baal Shem Tov.

　　The writing of Rebbes usually takes the form of the exegesis on the Torah (the five books of Moses). In their exegesis, they actually present their Hasidic belief rather than the commentary of the Torah. All those books are very good resource to learn the early Hasidic movement in their rich quotation from Baal Shem Tov and the Maggid (i.e., Dov Baer the Preacher). 　"Emeth v'Emunah" was useful for the understanding of the idea of Rebbe of Kotzk,Menahem Mendel, who gave Heschel a great influence through his mentor, Menahem Zemba. 　

　　Parables are often used in the discourses of Rebbes. Among the parables used rather frequently is the story of King and his son. I will show you an example.

A king sent his son to other countries to find a lost treasure. The son had to change his royal costumes in order to conceal himself. He disguised himself, and went out to a remote country, and eventually succeeded to find it out, and delivered the treasure to the king safely. As a result of this experience that he missed his father and remembered him wit love in the remote land, the son became more faithful to the King, his father. (4)

The influence of Lurianic Kabbalah is strong in the idea of Hasidism. According to the Lurianic Kabbalah, the world is supported by the divine power that flowed out from God.

　　However, if the world is supported only by God's power、it must be good in keeping the law and order. Yet, there is a conflict with good and the evil in the reality. Why is it so?

　　According to the Lurians, the dishes transmitting the divine power were broken down at the very beginning of the creation of the universe. Consequently, the divine power was crushed by itself and scattered all over the world in the form of sparks, even to the depth of the darkness, and the order of the world was fallen. Moreover, God's spark was captured in the world of darkness in the bottom of the universe. And it became the power of the evil itself.

　 Following this Kabalistic idea, Hasidism teaches that men should take the duty to return the divine sparks to the upper world from the world through the good deeds and worship.

　 The prince in the above parable is the role of man. The lost treasure is the divine sparks scattered over the end of the world. A prince disguises himself as the figure of the vulgar, and escapes from the royal palace of God, and he must go to the remote place of the world to fulfill his duty of collecting the sparks.

　 Heschel's departure from the Hasidic society in Warsaw to the secular world in Vilna at the age 18 was probably his own decision to test himself whether he is qualified for this mission or not.　It seems to me that he had a doubt to remain himself in the unadulterated life wearing the holy lobes of Hasidism. His elder brother Jacob who was involved in Zionist movement at that time also influenced him.

Heschel told me that he was penniless and always had difficulty in the living in the days of Gymnasium in Vilna and the university in Berlin until he got a teaching position in the United States.

　　There was a crisis to lose identity as a pious Jew in the days in Berlin. Heschel himself mentioned the detail of those days inner conflict in his book. (5)

He was awakened to the piety of Judaism before he was assimilated to the secular thinking as Frantz Rosenzweig reconfirmed himself as the spirit of Jewish faith during the attendance to the prayer in the Yom Kippur.

　　He told its memory to us in the course on Hasidism at JTS in autumn 1971,

"I discovered Judaism again with the fresh emotion as if I came back from the remote country to my own home at that time."

This remark corresponds to the conclusion of the above prince story.

　　It is the noble mission to the Jew to return God's spark to the upper world. Hasidism teaches that a sage should go down to the secular world which is impure and full of temptation, and intercourse with the vulgar people in order to draw their heart to the worship and the Torah and connect them to God. For example, Yaakov Yosef, the first disciple of Baal Shem Tov, said thus:

He must leave the stage of the devequt (cleaving) with God and go down to the mass to practice love for humanity to the people who lacked the perfection of the Creator. This is the act to love the Creator and to bring them closer to the Torah. (6)

How can he bring them to the Father in the heaven? ?

For this task, he should take off his holy gown, which is the cleaving to God, and wear the lesser clothe before he tell them of the precepts of the Torah and lessons. Only then he can reach to their heart. Thus they become bound to the Father in the heaven. (7)

　　Although HUC and JTS are rabbinical academies, they are more or less secular institutes from the standard of Hasidism.

　　When Heschel moved from HUC to New York in 1945, he received the invitation both from JTS, the rabbinical institute of the Conservative Judaism, and the Yeshiva University, the Orthodox one. What I heard from Sylvia Heschel after his death, the Yeshiva University offered him a higher salary than JTS. Heschel eventually chose JTS because JTS was more devoted to the edification of the Jews and held many distinguished scholars such as Louis Finkelstein, Louis Ginsberg and others.

　He hated religious exaggeration in outlook, and preferred to intersect with the people with the ordinary clothes.

In the very afternoon of the day before his sudden death, December 22, 1972, Heschel told me on the way to his home.

"While I am absorbed in the writing of a book, I forget myself, engulfed in the overwhelming presence of God. But as soon as I step out of the study room, I can hardly bear the burdens of the world around me. Oh, what a tragic world it is...., mah la'asot?" (8)

As for the formation of his philosophy, Heschel received a deep influence from the idea of Hasidism. For example, his emphasis on the importance of the deed was developed from the Hasidic notion of "the elevation of the divine sparks" (ha'alat hanitzotzot).

"A Jews is asked to take a leap of action rather than a leap of thought. He is asked to surpass his needs, to do more than he understands in order to understand more than he does. In carrying out the word of the Torah he is ushered into the presence of spiritual meaning. Through the ecstasy of deeds he learns to be certain of the herenesee of God."(9)

As for "deeds" in Heschel's term, it means various practices commanded by Judaism. It includes not only the religious precepts but also other social practice, too. Rather, by means of the social actions it becomes possible to man to respond to the will of God.　

　Dov Baer the Maggid, the successor of the Baal Shem Tov taught about this as follows.

　　"It is impossible to the world to receive the radiation of the divine power from the upper world without the vessel which can transmit it. Man cannot stand this because the supreme holiness greatly shines and radiates. It is possible to a man to stand and receive it only through the vessel, which is the 'ma'asei mitzvoth' (literally, ﾔpractices of the preceptsﾕ), because the practice of the Mitzvoth contains the supreme light within." (10)

The divine power, which sustains the world, still flows out from God now. Man must employ this power properly for the sake of the world. The practice of the Mitzvoth is the very act to control the high energy from the upper for the benefit of the world.

　 Though the word "mitzvoth" is usually translated as "religious precepts", its real meaning is God's commandments, which includes the act of justice, life rescuing or other wider actions of humanity.

　　 Heschel's usage of the word "deeds" in a plural form implies us that he was aware of the concept "ma'asei mitzvoth" (the deeds of the commandments) in his mind.

By the phrase "to understand more than he does", Heschel meant that man became aware of his connection to God through the deeds, to feel the effluence of the power from God to him and to recognize his mission to partake the restoration of the order in the world.

The experience to feel God's existence near to man was expressed by Heschel with the phrase "the sense of the ineffable." (11)

This is a similar experience of encounter with "the holy" described by Rudolf Otto, which causes the feeling of "mysterium tremendum" in man's mind (12)

Heschel described, "it ... fills us with awe rather than curiosity." (13).

　　However, in Heschel, the sense of the ineffable is nothing but the experience of awe. On one side, he defines that "awe is a sense for the transcendence."(14) And on the other side, he declares, "the sense of the ineffable is a sense of the transcendence." (15)

We do not know why he used the two expressions. It seems to me that he used the phrase "the sense of the ineffable" for the people who are not yet familiar to the religious experience, while "awe" is addressed to the people who already have religious experience. However, awe is the stage of the establish faith", rather "awe precedes faith; it is at the root of faith. We must grow in awe in order to reach faith." (16)

　　Hesche distinguished awe from fear strictly. "Fear is the anticipation to and expectation of evil or pain as contrasted with hope which is the anticipation of good." (17)

　　Heschel's statement, "Awe rather than faith is the cardinal attitude of the religious Jew," (18) was developed from the teaching of Hasidism.

　　Although the Book of Proverbs declared, "The beginning of wisdom is the awe of God"(1:7), there was rare to discuss on "fear" or "awe" in the Talmud or Mishnah. Heschel too did not make a discussion on awe in his magnum opus, "Torah min HaShamayim", a book of ancient rabbinical theology.

　　Awe, even in the Jewish piety movement of16th century, was the result or post condition achieved after meditating the greatness of God and not a precondition of the worship. So it was in the early Hasidim, awe was always mentioned as a part of the complexity of "awe and love" (yirah v'ahavah).

Only from the fourth generation of Hasidism, they began to use the expression, "yirah v'avodah" (awe and worship), and to emphasize the significance of the awe.

The first Abraham Joshua Heschel the Apto Rebbe, taught as follows:

"The means to keep all power and virtue is awe without which man goes to filth and downfall. Without the awe of the heavens, all his wisdom and intelligence, and all his powers and virtues shall perish into naught. While, the man whose heart was stricken with the awe of the heaven accepts the yoke of the heavenly government in fear and piety before he fulfills the mitzvoth." (19)

Worship without awe is merely superficial. A man who senses the awe of God voluntarily attends to worship. Thus Hasidic masters began to emphasize the significance of awe in religious life.

This was the background that Heschel taught the significance of the awe, which he succeeded from the edification o the mass by Hasidic masters.

Heschel declares, "There is thus only one way to wisdom."

How could man reach awe? He gives a mysterious answer to this question. "Forfeit your sense of awe, let you conceit diminish your ability to revere, and the universe becomes a market place to you." (20) While he explains us the meaning of awe in one hand, at the same time he admonish us not to sense awe in another hand.

He also declares: "The sense of mystery is not a product of our will." (21) That is to say, it is possible to us to sense awe when we face the transcendence of God, yet awe is not a thing that we intentionally can sense it.

Within my narrow knowledge of Hasidism, I found a reference that suggests this notion of Heschel only in the teaching of the Kotzker Rebbe in "Emeth v'Emunah", a collection of his sayings.

Our Rabbi (Rabbi Menahem Mendel, the Rebbe of Kotzk) asked a Hasid whether he has ever seen a wolf. The Hasid answered, "Yes, I have once seen it."

The Rabbi asked again. "When you saw the wolf, did you fear?" " "Yes, I feared."

The Rabbi asked him further, "When you feared the wolf, did you realize the fear within you?" The Hasid answered, "No, I did not remember anything because of the fear."

Then the Rabbi advised him, "Exactly in the same manner you should have the fear towards the heaven. You should not sense the awe in yourself at the worship in front of the blessed Holy One in fear." (22)

Dov Baer Schneersohn, the second Rebbe of Lubavich Hasidism and others warned Hasidim against the religious pretence or the self-produced ecstasy in "Toldoth Ya'akov Yosef" by Ya'akov Yosef and "Tania".

However, it was only the Kotzker Rebbe who referred to the way of awe.

The works of Martin Buber and Gershom Scholem are plausible in the point that they introduced some aspect of the world of Hasidism and Jewish mysticism to the Western Europe.

However, they were not the members of Hasidic society but merely its observers. Buber drew Hasidism as he saw it from his eyes. Scholem analyzed Hasidism according to the picture sketched by him.

Heschel was born and grown up in the royal family of Hasidism. He continued to keep the Hasidic heart and ask the world an eternal echo voiced over his head.

In his last wrings, "A Passion for Truth" as well as his last Yiddish work, "Kotzk", he confessed, "my heart was in Mezbizh (where the Baal Shem Tov lived), my mind in Kotzk."(23)。

Heschel was a man of the noble sensitivity nurtured in Hasidic world and the ingenious intelligence thoroughpaced by Hasidic discipline. He completed his 65 years of life in the strain of these two poles.

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Heschel and JYT, 1971

Notes:

(1) Usually, Baal Shem Tov is translated as "the Master of the Good Name." This is a wrong translation because ﾔbaal shemﾕ was the Hebrew technical term for the profession of magical amulet writer. Tov in Hebrew means "good." Rabbi Israel was called the Baal Shem Tov since his amulets showed obvious magical power of protection to the holders. See ﾒBaal Shemﾓ in The Jewish Encyclopedia (New York, 1902), vol. 2, 382-83.

(2) Edward K. Kaplan & Samuel H. Dresner, Abraham Joshua Heschel, (New Haven, 1998).

(３) JYT、"My Teacher," No Religion Is an Island, ed. Harold Kasimow & Byron L. Sherwin (Maryknoll, 1991) pp.63-67.

(4) Meshullam Phoebus, ed., Liqqutim Yeqarim, (Jerusalem, 1974), folio 63b, sec. 213.

(5) Abraham Joshua Heschel, Manﾕs Quest for God, (New York, 1954), pp.96-98.

(6) Ya'akov Yoseph Hacohen of Plonnoye, Toledoth Ya'akov Yoseph (Jerusalem, 1973), vol. 1, p.197.

(7) Ibid., p. 199.

(8) JYT, "My Memory of Professor Abraham Joshua Heschel,ﾓ CONSERVATIVE JUDAISM 28 (Fall 1973), pp.78-80.

(9) Abraham Joshua Heschel, God in Search of Man, (New York, 1955), p. 283.

(10) Levi Isaac of Berdichev, ed., Maggid Devarav Le-Ya'akov by Dov Baer of Mezhirich (Jerusalem, 1971), folio 97b, sec. 267.

(11) God in Search of Man, pp.104f.

(12) Rudolf Otto、The Idea of the Holy, (Oxford, 1970) pp.12-13 & p.26.

(13) God in Search of Man, p. 105.

(14) Ibid. p. 75.

(15) Ibid. p.105.

(16) Ibid. p. 77.

(17) Ibid. p. 77

(18) Ibid. p. 77

(19) Meshullam Zusya of Zinkov, ed., Ohev Israel by Abraham Joshua Heschel of Apt (Jerusalem, 1962), p. 258.

(20) God in Search of Man, p. 78.

(21) Abraham Joshua Heschel, Man Is Not Alone (New York, 1951) p. 27.

(22) Israel Yaakov & Mordecai Arten, ed., Emeth Ve-Emunah by Menahem Mendel of Kotzk (Jerusalem, 1969), p. 52. See also p.84.

(23) Abraham Joshua Heschel, A Passion for Truth (New York, 1973) pp.xiii-xv; Abraham Joshua Heschel, Kotzk, 2 vols. (Tel-Aviv, 1973) p.10.