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The Russian Dissenting Sects and Their Influence on Israel Baal Shem Tov, Founder of Hassidism*

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The Russian Dissenting Sects and Their Influence on Israel Baal Shem Tov, Founder of Hassidism* THE RUSSIAN DISSENTING SECTS AND THEIR INFLUENCE ON ISRAEL BAAL SHEM TOV, FOUNDER OF HASSIDISM* By YAFFA ELIACH Judaism was never a self-containedreligion; throughoutthe centuries it maintained a constant exchange of ideas with the various cultures with which it came into contact. Judaism al- ways absorbed foreignideas, tales, customs and laws, shaping them in accordance with its specificneeds, theories,and world- view. The influenceof foreigncultures is evident in the firstpages of the Bible and throughoutJudaic literature. The ancient myths, epics and tales of Sumer and Akkad found their way into the pages of the Bible, but theirpagan originbecame only a faintecho., Later, when Judea came into contact with non-Semiticcul- tures, it continued its conscious borrowingand adaptation of foreignideas.2 During the period of the Mishnah and Talmud, it was Hellenism and Roman Law that left its mark on Jewish literatureand jurisprudence. "Greek Wisdom" was well known to the outstanding rabbis and this knowledge was applied to the exegesis of the Biblical narrative.3The brillianceof Hellen- ism attracted large segments of the Jewish urban and rural populations of Palestine; it resulted in the abandonment of *I would like to thank Mr. Joel B. Wolowelsky forhis help in preparingthis paper for publication and ProfessorAbraham Ascher of Brooklyn College for his guidance. I See, for example, U. Cassuto, MeAdam Va'ad Noach (From Adam to Noah [Hebrew] (Jerusalem: UniversityPress, 1944), pp. 1-37. 2 Of course, Judaism made very significantcontributions to both Eastern and Western cultures; it is not within the scope of this paper to discuss these contributions. 3 Saul Lieberman, Greekin JewishPalestine (New York: Philipp Feldheim, Inc., 1965), pp. 37-43. 57 This content downloaded from 166.66.48.38 on Mon, 22 Apr 2013 13:19:50 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 58 YAFFA ELIACH [2] Jewishlaw and constituteda threat to the very existence and survival of Judaism. The rabbis could not countermand the stronghold that these foreigncustoms had on the Jewishmasses and thereforetook the only alternativeopen to them: the "Juda- ization" of the foreignelements. "The Rabbis were compelled to tolerate the practice,but they succeeded in endowingit with Jewishcharacter. They had to adapt a Gentile custom adopted by the ignorantmasses so as to suit Jewishrequirements."4 The tendency to incorporateforeign elements into a Judaic frameworkwas not limited to a few localities. The dispersed Jews throughoutthe world were continuallyexposed to a wide rangeof Westernand Eastern cultures. For example,in medieval Moorish Spain, Maimonides (1135-1204) wrote his major phil- osophical work, The Guide of the Perplexed--a Jewish phil- osophical treatisewritten for Jews by one of the leading Jewish authoritiesof the period. The specificJewish nature of the Guide is obvious, yet Maimonides systematicallyborrowed foreign - chieflyAristotelian - philosophicalsources.s Likewise, it is now quite evident that, contraryto current theories,the founderof the Hassidic movementof Judaism - the Baal Shem Tov (1700?-1760) - was inspired by non-Jewish sources. Until now, it has been generally accepted that in founding the Hassidic movement,the Baal Shem Tov drew exclusively fromancient Jewish sources: the mysticwritings of the Kabbala, the Bible and its various commentaries,later Rabbinical writings and - to a lesser extent- the Talmud. However, the Rabbini- cal authorities at the time of the beginningof the Hassadic movementcertainly did not see Hassidism as part of normative Judaism, for they foughtviolently against it. Today, a close examinationof Hassidic sources,its customs,dances, songs, and dress shows that Hassidism indeed drew heavily on sources for- eign to Judaism: the Russian Schismaticsand Dissenters of the seventeenthand eighteenthcenturies. 4 Ibid., p. 92. s For the philosophical sources of the Guide, see Leo Straus' introductory essay, M. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1963), Shlomo Pines, trans., second edition, pp. Ivii-cxxxiv. This content downloaded from 166.66.48.38 on Mon, 22 Apr 2013 13:19:50 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions [3] RUSSIAN SECTS AND THEIR INFLUENCE ON THE BESHT 59 In 1652, about half a centurybefore the birth of the Besht,6 Nikon became Patriarch of Russia; at that time a group of church leaders known as the "Zealots of Piety" (Bogoliubtsy) were working for a "revival" of Russian Orthodoxy. While Nikon had been one of the active membersof the "Zealots," he turned against them after becoming Patriarch, as he feared that their activities would be a threat to the authorityof the Church hierarchyin general and to his own power in particular. Officially,the conflictthat was to lead to the great schism of 1667 arose over re-editingthe missal and changing the ritual. Nikon worked to bring the texts and customs of the Russian churchinto conformitywith those of the contemporaryGreeks. As Nikon himselfdeclared at the Council of 1656: "Although I am a Russian, and the son of a Russian, my faithand convictions are Greek."7 The Zealots, led by ArchpriestAvvakum, advo- cated retainingthe Russian formof the ancient texts and rites; while originallyintroduced into Russia fromGreece, these had acquired a specificnational character after seven centuries of "Russification." Although the conflictoutwardly involved reli- gious issues, it was actually a struggle for authority. Nikon sought the unquestioningsubmission of the Church to the au- thorityof the Patriarch. In this he received the full supportof Tzar Alexis (1645-1676), who desired strongercontrol of the Church by the central ecclesiastic officeswhich in turn would be subservientto the state. The Tzar and Patriarchmet strong opposition: ArchpriestAvvakum and his followers--the Old Believers- representedthe lower clergyand their parishioners who felt that the parish priests and local laity should have a greaterinfluence in churchaffairs. Shcapov and other historians suggest that the schism was basically the result of social conflictand was only superficially a religioussplit. The Raskol, as they saw it, was only superficiallya reli- gious split. Religious issues provided the opportunityfor the expressionof social and political protest:social, against 6 "Besht" is an acronymfor "Baal ShemTov" (Masterof the Good Name). 7 P. Miliukov,Religion and theChurch (New York: A. S. Barnesand Co., 1960),p. 35. This content downloaded from 166.66.48.38 on Mon, 22 Apr 2013 13:19:50 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 60 YAFFA ELIACH [4] the ever-increasingimportations from the West - clothes, customs, institutions;political, against the central fact of seventeenth-centuryRussian history- the legalization in 1649 of the complete enserfmentof the peasants. These historiansobserved that, afterthe firstfew years, the schis- matics were exclusively of lower-class origin--peasants and some of the poorer townspeople--but that, rather than being the ignorantand dark element of Russia, they contained and continued to contain a much higherpercent- age of literatepeople than the Orthodoxpopulation. Hence, the Old Believers representedgeneral popular opinion and its desire to preserve,if nothingmore, popular customs and institutionsagainst the encroachmentof the centralizing and bureaucratizingstate.8 Whatever the cause of the split, the "Old Believers" were eventually forced to leave the established Church.9 The out- lawed group was joined by other non-conformingand dissenting groups--including remnantsof the Judaizers,Molokanye, Du- khabors and the Khlysty.'~ The Raskolniks gained membershipand momentumand soon constituted a significantsegment of the Russian population: fifteenmillion in 1880 and twenty-fivemillion in 1907."' Their sects, numberingabout one hundred and fifty,can be divided into threemajor groups: the Old Believers,the Rationalists and the Mystics.'2 In order to escape persecutionby the Russian authorities,these groups moved close to the borderlands:to the White Sea, Siberia, the Urals, Crimea, Ukraine,and to the West- ern borders. Sometimesthey crossed the bordersto neighboring countries,such as Poland. For example, a sizeable Raskol com- munity was established in Vetka, Poland.'3 These Raskolnik 8 M. Cherniavsky, "Old Believers and the New Religion," Slavic Review, vol. xxv, no. 1, March, 1966, pp. 2-3. 9 At the Council of 1667, Nikon and the other Eastern Patriarchs declared an anathema on Avvakum and his followers. 0oThese groups will be discussed in greater detail below. 11Miliakov, op. cit., pp. 114-121. 22 F. C. Conybeare, Russian Dissenters, Harvard Theological Studies, x (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1921), pp. 1-9. 13 In 1733, the Russians attacked Vetka and captured its population of 40,000. Later, the Raskolniks returnedand rebuiltthe city. See S. Bolshakoff, Russian Nonconformity(Philadelphia: The WestminsterPress, 1951), p. 59. This content downloaded from 166.66.48.38 on Mon, 22 Apr 2013 13:19:50 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions [5] RUSSIANSECTS AND THEIR INFLUENCE ON THE BESHT 61 communitiesnaturally came into contact with their new non- Russian neighbors,and thus it is very likely that they met the Jews of the Polish Ukraine, includingthose of the communities of Volhynia and Podolia, where Hassidism was born. It was about six decades after the schism in the Russian Church that the Hassidic Movement was born. Most historians attributethe riseof Hassidism to the religiousand socio-economic
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