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'A Thread Ofblue': Rabbi Gershon Henoch Leiner of Radzyn and His Search for Continuity in Response to Modernity

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'44144'44 44444144;. q; '44C4h..;4(Qh¾41'4h'44 'A Thread ofBlue': Rabbi Gershon Henoch Leiner of Radzyn and his Search for Continuity in Response to Modernity SHAUL MAGID HISTORIANS of eastern European Jewish culture have for the most part viewed hasidism as a response to crisis. 1 Following Dubnow, many scholars have con­ ceived of the late eighteenth century, up to 1815, as the great period of hasidic creativity. 2 Hasidism in the inter-war period has also attracted scholarly attention recently, specifically with regard to traditional responses to Zionism and the infiltrationof modernity into hasidic communities ii But the majority of studies on hasidism overlook a fertile period of hasidic thought in the mid- to late nineteenth century, viewing this period as a time of stagnation for hasidism precisely because of the movement's success, and implying that hasidism could only be a creative force in the face of crisis and opposition. Only a few studies, like that of Raphael Mahler, take the nineteenth century seriously as a creative period in the history of hasidism.4 This essay will argue that the mid- to late nineteenth-century hasidic dynasty of Izbica-Radzyn constitutes an intellectual renaissance in hasidic creativity. Its originality was much more subtle than simply being a critique of non-hasidic rabbinic culture. By the middle decades of the nineteenth century Polish hasidism was speaking to an educated audience which looked for its spiritual sustenance to the rich literary tradition of medieval Jewish mysticism and pietism. Its 1 Emmanuel Etkes, 'Hasidism as Movement: The First Stage', in Bezalel Safran (ed.), Hasidism: Continuity or Inno,•alion? (Cambridge, Mass., 1988); 1-26; Rachel Elior, 'Spiritual Renaissance and Social Change in the Beginning ofHasidism·, Alei Sejer(1990), 29-.io, 2 See e.g. Mendel Piekarz, Biyemei tscmihat hahasidut: 1Hega11101 ra 'ayoniyol hesifret derush 11111us11r ('When Hasidism was Flourishing') (Jerusalem, 1978). " See J\1endel Piekarz, Hasidut po/in: lr!egamot ra 'ayoui)'ol bein shetei h11milh11111ot ('Polish Hasidism between the Wars') (Jerusalem, 1990). Cf. Nehemiah Polen, Hof)' Fire (Northvale, NJ, 1993); Alan Nadler, 'The War on Modernity of R. Havyim Elazar Shapira of Munkacz', Modern Judaism, 14/3 (1994), 223-64; Shaul Magid, 'Modernity as Heresy: The Introvertive Piety ofFaith in R. Areleh Roth's Shomer Emunim',Jell'ishStudies Quarterly, 4·1 (1997), 74-104. " Raphael Mahler, Hasidisn1 and the Jen'ish Enligh1c11111ent (Philadelphia, 1985). 32 Shaul Magid Gershon Hc11od1 �- SearclzfiirContinuif)' 33 constituency included those who were deeply engaged in the literary tradition of In order to bring the intellectual biographies of hasidic thinkers out of the the past, an.d who wanted to see the ways in which hasidism could deepen their realm of hagiography and into the domain of history, biographical details have to understanding of that tradition. Nineteenth-century hasidism was not addressing be set in a multiplicity of contexts.8 Previous works on Rabbi Mordecai Joseph the 'uneducated masses' as much as well-trained young Jews looking for an Leiner of lzbica have largely viewed the lzbica tradition as an extension of the alternative to either non-hasidic Orthodoxy or to the Jewish Enlightenment Przysucha-Kotsk (Kock) tradition from which it emerged. When speaking (which, in their eyes, included Zionism). specifically about Mordecai Joseph Leiner, this is largely correct. However, The canonical tradition of medieval philosophic, kabbalistic, and pietistic Gershon Henoch represents a shift in this hasidic community, shared by his con­ literature emerged in mid-nineteenth-century hasidic discourse, specifically in temporary Rabbi Zaddok Hacohen Rabinowitz of Lublin among others, whereby Congress Poland, with surprising regularity. Rabbi Gershon Henoch of Radzyn the hasidic master began to engage with the broader intellectual environmcn�. (1839-91), student of his illustrious grandfather Rabbi Mordecai Joseph Leiner Although these masters were unique individuals in their own right, they were also of lzbica (1800--54), revisited medieval Jewish philosophy and kabbalah and products of a changing Poland, an environment which was being inundated with attempted to represent this rich tradition within the ideological framework of modern ideas and technology. Gershon Henoch could not ha,·e educated himself hasidic spirituality. His project seemed to have numerous goals, none of which so widely in modern languages and natural sciences, for example, if he had not was explicitly developed in his writings. First, he apparently sought to root been the product of a Poland where cultural persecution was abating and eco­ hasidism in medieval philosophical and kabbalistic tradition in an attempt finally nomic barriers against Jews were being removed. His concern with unifying to put to rest the criticism that hasidism departed fromnormative Jewish practice diverse traditions of Jewish learning was equally a response to trends in the wider and ideology." Second, Rabbi Gershon Henoch's entire programme was founded Jewish world outside his hasidic community. Setting Gershon Iknoch in these on an overt messianic impulse. His attempt to unify and synthesize the disparate contexts-the secular histor� of Congress Poland and the wider intellectual his­ philosophic and mystical traditions in Judaism should be seen in the light of his tory of contemporary Polish Jewry-enables us to achieve a new appreciation of underlying belief that redemption hung on the success of his enterprise.6 This nineteenth-century hasidism. programme, including his attempt to reinstitute the lost tradition of tekhelet, Rabbi Gershon Henoch is particularly interesting because of the wav his should be seen as representing a mid-nineteenth-century hasidic response to thought combined messianic and mystical strains with a sophisticated u�der­ modernity. This is not to suggest that Gershon Henoch had a sophisticated or standing of science and medicine. He is best known for his discoverv and advo­ even an informed notion of modern advances in philosophy, science, and litera­ cacy of a species he claimed was the l1ila.::,n11, or 'tint-fish', for making ;he blue dye ture (although he did read German, it is unlikely that he read general philosophi­ called tekhe!et described in Numbers 15: 38 as the colour of one of the ritual cal works). When I speak of his response to modernity I am referring specifically fringes worn on the corners of garments, and especially of prayer-shawls.8 to the modern Jewish attempt to historicize the tradition, creating sharp However, his work on reinstituting this ancient lost custom is not distinct from dichotomies between philosophy and kabbalah, in an attempt to reconstruct a his other literary projects; all his efforts were driven hy an underlying messianic 7 critical history of Jewish literature and ideology. For Gershon Henoch, this impulse founded on his family's tradition that his grandfather had initiated the attempt to highlight the disparity between authentic Jewish ideological trends heginning of the messianic era. Beforedeveloping these points further, two issues was not only false; it was also destructive, in that it perpetuated and deepened need to be addressed. First, briefly to survey the poiitical and ideological changes Israel's experience of separation from the divine. Drawing on the kabbalistic that were taking place in the Kingdom and which affected its hasidic communities tradition of the Zohar and sixteenth-century kabbalah, unity, in all its mani­ in the mid-nineteenth century. Second, to consider more closely the split between festations, was Gershon Hcnoch's primary goal, as only unity would serve the Rabbi Menahem Mendel Morgenstern of Kotsk and Rabbi Mordecai Joseph redemptive end. Leiner oflzbica in T839, which resulted in the birth oflzbicer hasidism. The province of Radom, where the Przysucha hasidic tradition developed, was .-, Sec Rahhi Gershon Hcnoch of Radzyri, Hal11d:damah rcl111pe1ihah, repr. as Sha 'arei emunah t't'J't'.wd hal,asidut (Henei 13erak, 1996). In this lengthy introduction to his father's treatise Beil part of the Russian-controlled Kingdom of Poland. At the Congress of Vienna in Ya 'akor, Rabhi Gershon Henoch attempts a synthesis hetween Maimonides' Guide o{the Perplexed s and the 7.ohar,respcc tivelv the classic philosophical and kabbalistic texts of the Middle Ages. , On this sec Ada Rapoport-Albert, 'Hagiography with Footnotes: Edifying: Talcs and the " Sec Morris Faicrstein, .111 is iu the Hands"{Hc,ffen (Hoboken, NJ, 1989), n-8+ Faierstein's Writing of History in Hasidism', in A. Rapoport-Albert and S. Zipperstein (eds.), Fssa.rs iu Jcn•ish u-eatmcnt ofRahbi Gershon Hcnoch's messianism does not focus on his notion of unity. Hist11ri11grt1pl,y(.'\,tlanta, Ga., 1991) 1 HJ-59- e ' See Gcrshom Scholcm, 'The Science of Judaism: Then and Now', in The Messianic Id a in ,, Sec Rabbi Isaac Heroz, Tl,, Roy,,! Blue Thread ,111d the Bibliwl Blue: Arg,//uau and TeMelet ]uJ,11su1 (New York, 1971 ), 304--13. (Jerusalem 191l7), esp I q-19. Cf. Rabbi ZYi Cohen, T,i1siit 1etcUtclc1 ( 1993), ch. 21. 34 Shaul Magid Gershon Ifrnoch 's Searchfi11· Colllinuit}' 35 181 5 the major European powers had divided Poland amongst themselves, and problems of modernity systematically. This initiated the formation of hasidic the central part of Poland, called Congress Poland, was controlled by Russia. political organizations, which ultimately led to the creation of Agudas Yisro'el in While we often think of Congress Poland as culturally backward compared to Warsaw in 1916. Other hasi<lic institutions also formed in the urban centres to other regions, Romanticism took hold there in the 1820s and 18 30s as it did in the deal with security issues and to establish a policy on Zionism and secular Polish rest of Europe, and hoth the movement for Polish independence and the hasidic Jewish culture. These new conditions explain the (rather limited) attention to movement were based on Romantic ideology.Just as literary figureslike Ksawery political life in hasidic biographies published in the inter-war period.
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