Modern Judaism

More than 250 years after its birth under the light-blue sky of Podolia, Hasidism is still the single greatest resource for any Jewish attempt at spiritual renewal. As the first Jewish “revival” movement displaying significant modern characteristics, Hasidism offers, to the modern and postmodern spiritual seeker, a range of theological structures, religious practices, and ethical frameworks suited for interpretation and adoption. It is no accident then that since the early twentieth century we find important elements of Hasidism used and elaborated upon in the works of almost any Jewish thinker, observant or non-observant, set out to enliven her or his tradition.

As such, a significant part of the modern appropriation of Hasidism is what is called, both by the participants themselves (emically) and by those who research the field (etically), Neo-Hasidism. Defining Neo-Hasidism as the deliberate and conscious attempt to draw inspiration, tools, and cultural capital from early Hasidic texts and practices in order to bring about a contemporary spiritual revival, it is crucial to notice the exact way in which these elements are arranged anew in the contemporary arena. As I will attempt to show, these will usually coalesce around patterns in line with the modern expressivist, self-conscious utilitarian self, a phenomenon that is predominant in parallel Contemporary Spirituality circles, such as the New Age cultic milieu.¹

The study of contemporary spiritual movements has been greatly broadened since the 1990s, with monographs devoted to both the sociological and the ideological aspects of what can be called “The New Age Movement.”² A substantial social phenomenon, the New Age has been defined as a religion of its own, with its idiosyncratic theological and social characteristics and typical modes of operation. Although some works have been devoted to the study of the New Age phenomenon in Israel,³ no such study has been devoted to the Neo-Hasidic phenomenon. Such an academic cavity is wanting, as the phenomenon is not only rich, diverse, and complex, but it also carries a significant impact on contemporary Jewish culture. [End Page 287]

I aim in the words below to analyze Neo-Hasidism, expounding its ideational and sociological birth, briefly reviewing its development and history, and elaborating on its current place and importance in the efforts being made to “renew” Jewish religiosity and to “modernize” (i.e. de-mythologize, individualize, and psychologize) the Jewish tradition by its contemporary well-wishers and popularizers in Israel. The lion’s share of the article will be the examination of three examples taken from the Neo-Hasidic field in Israel, test cases which differ in a structural way one from the other, and as such will allow us to decipher their common underlying principals.

Neo-Hasidism began with the turn of the twentieth century. Answering a spiritual and ideological hunger among Jewish elite in Europe, Martin Buber (1878-1965) published his book, Legend of the Baal-Shem (1908), in which he proposed to introduce “a movement in which myth purified and elevated itself - Hasidism.”⁴ Through presenting the processed tales of the Hasidic master, Buber was emphatically determined to cause a spiritual revival in European Judaism, proclaiming explicitly that “The Hasidic teaching is the proclamation of rebirth. No renewal of Judaism is possible that does not bear in itself the elements of Hasidism.”⁵

Buber wished to continue the divorce of modern Judaism from Jewish Law (Halacha), but to fill anew the spiritual lack that had arisen as part of the aforementioned proceedings. Hasidism for him was a Jewish tradition contrasted with the rest of Judaism, being concentrated more on the individual’s feelings, intentions, and states of consciousness then the meticulous compliance with and performance of Halacha. Out of the Hasidic spirit, Buber wished to secure traditional legitimacy for letting go of the Law, while benefiting spiritually from its emphasis on inner transformation.

In the years following Buber’s Neo-Hasidic popularization of Hasidism, we can find the development of Orthodox Neo-Hasidism. In contrast to Buber’s antinomian version of Judaism, Menachem Ekstein (1884-1942) and Kalonymus Kalman Shapira (the Rabbi of Piaseczno, 1889-1943) presented a pietistic and Halacha...