The Age of Philosophy and Mysticism

The fourth great epoch in the history of Judaism, extending from the Early Middle Ages (sixth-seventh centuries ce) to the Early Modern period (sixteenth-seventeenth centuries ce), can be thought of as the Age of Philosophy and Mysticism.

As the Palestinian Jewish community dwindled in numbers and prestige in the course of the sixth and seventh centuries, the center of Jewish intellectual life shifted to Babylonia and to the principal rabbinic academies of Sura and Pumpeditha. And it was Sura, in the early tenth century, that gave rise to one of the major figures in Jewish philosophy: Rabbi Saadiah ben Joseph (882-942). One unavoidable challenge faced Saadiah during his career—one from outside the Jewish community: the advent of an entirely new religion.

The Encounter with Islam

The emergence of Islam in the early seventh century (Chapter 13) posed a significant problem for Jews of Arabia and eventually throughout the Middle East. The founder of Islam, Muhammad (5702-632 ce), claimed to have received a new work of scripture—the Qur’an— that was in the form of oral communications from the Angel Gabriel, and that he saw as a more reliable revelation than that given to either the Christians or the Jews.

When it became apparent that the Jews of Mecca would accept neither him nor his new Torah, Muhammad turned his full attention to his pagan audience, whom he found more receptive to a new monotheistic faith. Muhammad’s success in propagating his religious message was matched by his military success in defeating many of his more powerful enemies (which included some of the prominent Jewish tribes of Arabia), and after his death the faith of Islam spread rapidly throughout many of the lands in which Jews had settled centuries before. Although Muhammad’s attitude toward the Jews, as expressed in the Qur’an, remained understandably ambivalent, from the eighth century on Jews were accorded a degree of tolerance within Muslim societies that they rarely encountered in Christian lands.

Like many Jewish scholars of his generation, Saadiah had learned a great deal from reading Muslim philosophical literature of the ninth and tenth centuries. Foremost among Saadiah’s concerns, therefore, was the need to present Judaism to an educated Jewish audience already familiar with the teachings of both Islam and Greek philosophy, and to do so in a way that did not contradict Jewish Scriptures.

The result of this investigation, which Saadiah published as The Book of Beliefs and Opinions (933), is the earliest example of scholasticism in Jewish thought—that is, a systematic attempt to reconcile faith and reason by relating mainstream religious beliefs to contemporary philosophical arguments. Thus, Saadiah sought to prove the unique character of God’s revelation to Israel, as well as the rational character of many (though not all) biblical commandments, and thereby strengthen Jewish belief in the uniquely trustworthy nature of Judaism’s Scriptures.

Maimonides

The tradition of philosophical inquiry produced at least one more intellectual giant during this period: Moses ben Maimon, better known as Maimonides (1135-1204). In Maimonides, Judaism found one of its supreme philosophers; much of Orthodox Jewish theology derives directly from his writings. Maimonides, the son of a respected rabbinic scholar, was well prepared for this role by both his background and early education. When his family was forced to flee their native city of Cordoba, Spain, to escape the tyrannical rule of a militant Muslim regime, they found refuge in Egypt under the more tolerant rule of the celebrated Muslim ruler Salah ad-Din (c. 1138-1193). Maimonides was better known to his Muslim hosts as a physician than as a philosopher, though it is the latter role that concerns us here.

Maimonides’s passion for logic and intellectual clarity is evident in all of his writings. In his Mishneh Torah, for example, he listed every single one of the 613 biblical commandments, revealing (even to the casual reader) that many of these mitzvot could no longer be fulfilled in the absence of the Temple in Jerusalem. Similarly, in his Commentary to the Mishnah, Maimonides clearly describes what he believed to be the thirteen essential “articles” of Jewish belief, thereby creating a dogmatic framework for any subsequent discussion of Judaism as a faith system.

Though not universally acceptable, even during and after Maimonides’s lifetime, this compact statement of belief still serves as a useful reference point in any discussion of what today is called “Torah-true” (or “Orthodox”) Judaism.

Ironically, Maimonides’s most celebrated work, The Guide for the Perplexed, evoked considerable controversy when it finally became public, though Maimonides had not intended it originally for widespread publication. In this philosophical treatise, Maimonides attempted to grapple with some of the more problematic philosophical issues of his day: the existence and attributes of God, the nature of creation and prophecy, the problem of evil, divine providence, and the purpose of human existence.

Like many of his Jewish contemporaries, Maimonides looked forward with some eagerness to the advent of the Messianic Age, though he was shrewd enough not to assign a date to that hoped-for event. Interestingly, however, Maimonides’s view of both the Messiah and the era of his arrival is largely naturalistic, and it contrasts sharply with the more supernaturalist traditions that both preceded and followed him:

The “days of the Messiah” refers to a time in which sovereignty will revert to Israel and the Jewish people will revert to the land of Israel. Their king will be a very great one, with his royal palace in Zion.... All nations will make peace with him, and all countries will serve him out of respect for his great righteousness and the wonders which will occur through him.... However, except for the fact that sovereignty will revert to Israel, nothing will be essentially different from what it is now.

—Helek Sanhedrin, Ch. 10

This demythologized version of messianic Judaism was Maimonides’s principal legacy to future generations of acculturated Jews. But one important segment of the Jewish community, those drawn to mystical thinking, rejected Maimonidean scholasticism and its celebration of reason and sought to restore to Judaism some of its rich mythological past.

The Kabbalah

Collectively, the many diverse traditions that make up the world of Jewish mysticism are sometimes referred to as Kabbalah, but when historians use that term they are thinking primarily of a school of mystics whose beginnings can be traced to twelfth-century France and thirteenth-century Spain. Common to all these writers was an acknowledgment that the hidden “essence” of YHWH—as Maimonides taught—cannot be fully grasped, and certainly never directly perceived or represented.

Maimonides’s Thirteen Articles of Jewish Belief

1.

2. God is uniquely “one.”

3. God is incorporeal (and therefore all scriptural images of a divine “body” are mere figures of speech).

4. God is eternal.

5. God alone is worthy of worship and obedience.

6. The teachings of the biblical prophets are true.

7. Moses is the chief of all prophets.

8. The Torah comes directly from God (through Moses).

9. Both the Written and the Oral Torah represent the authentic word of God, and nothing can be added or taken away from either.

10. God is omniscient.

11. God rewards the good and punishes the wicked.

12. The Messiah will undoubtedly come (though no exact date can be known for his coming).

13. The resurrection of the dead will occur in the World-to-Come.

In a late thirteenth-century work many regard as the “bible” of Kabbalah—the Zohar—this entire structure of divine qualities and emanations is laid out in the form of a biblical midrash, that is, an extended interpretation of select passages from the book of Genesis. Central to this form of mystical thought is the idea that however imperfect the human race may be, we are still capable of interacting with, understanding, and even influencing God. This theology of immanence—or, more precisely, of divine-human interaction—is quite obviously at odds with Maimonides’s view of a profoundly transcendent Creator. Consequently, the kabbalists felt free to evoke the Creator in explicitly anthropomorphic language (i.e., portraying God in very human terms).

By the sixteenth century, the kabbalistic system had matured to the point that a powerful and highly imaginative cosmology emerged, mainly through the teachings of one man: Rabbi Isaac Luria (1534-1572). The Ari (or “holy lion”), as he was known to his disciples, left no writings at the end of his short life, but his followers disseminated his thought throughout much of the Jewish world, and of all the many variants of Kabbalah, the “Lurianic” system is at once the most influential and the most complex.

The potential danger—as well as the enormous appeal—of Lurianic Kabbalah became quite apparent a century after the Ari’s death in the sensationalistic career of a messianic pretender, Shabbetai Tzevi (1626-1676). A Turkish Jew of obviously unstable temperament, Shabbetai became convinced early in life of his extraordinary spiritual powers after studying Lurianic texts. At the encouragement of one of his most fervent disciples (a self-styled prophet named Nathan of Gaza, whom he had met on a visit to Palestine), Shabbetai declared himself the “King Messiah.” In 1666, he presented himself before the Sultan of Turkey, asserting his messianic credentials and his “royal” right to the historic land of Israel. The Turkish response to this would-be savior was, first, to imprison Shabbetai for a year and then to offer him a minor position at court following his conversion to Islam. Shabbetai’s acceptance of this offer not only exposed him as an apostate, but it also sent shockwaves throughout the Jewish world, particularly among those who had firmly believed that Shabbetai was indeed the messianic deliverer he claimed to be.

The Rise of Hasidism

Shabbetai Tzevi was neither the last nor even the most important religious figure to base his teachings on Lurianic thought. Within two generations of Shabbetai’s death, yet another mystical teacher arose, this time in Poland. The Baal Shem Tov (c. 1700-1760) also taught the necessity of releasing the sparks of holiness within, thereby hastening the approach of the Messiah. His given name was Israel ben Eliezer, but his disciples commonly referred to him as the “Master of the Good Name” (Hebrew, Baal Shem Tov), a title that conveyed to contemporaries the belief that he possessed secret “names” of God that he could use in incantations. Orphaned as an infant, the Baal Shem Tov was given a rudimentary education, and at no time during his career as a spiritual guide was he regarded as a great scholar. Instead, his fame derived from his faith healings and exorcisms. In time, the Baal Shem Tov gave up the life of an itinerant healer and began to attract a growing number of disciples who were drawn by his reputation for wisdom and spirituality.

At the heart of the Baal Shem Tov’s teachings was a profoundly immanental vision of God’s omnipresence. For the Baal Shem Tov and his followers—who were soon called Hasidim (Hebrew, “pious ones”)—God could be found everywhere, and everyone was at least potentially capable of spiritual communion with the Creator. To worship God properly, the Baal Shem Tov taught, one need not be a master scholar; the most ordinary of everyday acts, he insisted, if performed with an awareness of God’s nearness and in a spirit of joy and love, become acts of spiritual devotion and serve to make everyday life sacred. No one was too humble or too depraved to turn (or return) to God, who required only a burning desire to perform his will.

Compare the Baal Shem Tov with the Buddha. How are their teachings alike, and how are they different?

At the communal level, the key to success within this system of mystical devotion lay with its leadership, and the Baal Shem Tov urged his disciples to choose a spiritual guide, or tsaddik (meaning “righteous one”), to provide a living example for themselves and the rest of the community of what it is like to live a life of intense religious commitment and intimacy with God. After the Baal Shem lev’s death, the Hasidic movement he helped to create spread rapidly throughout Russia and much of eastern Europe. In each major geographical center of Hasidic activity, tsaddikim appeared to carry on the teachings of the Baal Shem Tov. Each of these leaders formed a “court,” or spiritual circle of followers. In time Hasidic dynasties appeared, as one generation followed another and as the loyalty to the father was transferred to the son. Many of these dynasties, formed in the nineteenth century, still exist today, with the result that virtually all Hasidic communities are centered around the personality and religious leadership of one man—often referred to in Yiddish as the Rebbe—whose authority in all things is largely unchallenged.

A young Israeli Hasid with curled sideburns, commonly worn by men in his community.

Opposition to the Hasidic movement arose soon after the Baal Shem Toy’s death, and for the next two generations established rabbinic authorities in Russia and Poland sought to stifle popular interest in Hasidic teachings. Their principal fear was that Hasidism would lead to a revival of a messianic cult like the one that had formed around Shabbetai Tzevi. Yet, despite the determined opposition of the rabbinic establishment, Hasidism flourished, and by the mid-nineteenth century official opposition to Hasidism waned as Europe’s rabbinic leadership realized that it faced a far more formidable opponent in the Jewish reform movements that suddenly emerged in response to Enlightenment values during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.