Kabbalah and the Rupture of Modernity : An Existential History of Chabad Hasidism / Eli Rubin.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Rubin, Eli, 1988- author.

Series:

Stanford studies in Jewish mysticism.

Stanford Studies in Jewish Mysticism Series

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Habad--History.

Habad.

Hasidism--History.

Hasidism.

Cabala--History.

Cabala.

God (Judaism)--History of doctrines.

God (Judaism).

Jewish cosmology--History.

Jewish cosmology.

Mysticism--Judaism--History.

Mysticism.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (471 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Stanford, California : Stanford University Press, [2025]

Summary:

Kabbalah and the Rupture of Modernity provides a comprehensive intellectual and institutional history of Chabad Hasidism through the Kabbalistic concept of ṣimṣum. The onset of modernity, Eli Rubin argues, was heralded by this startling idea: existence itself is predicated on a self-inflicted "rupture" in the infinite assertion of divinity. Centuries of theoretical disputations concerning ṣimṣum ultimately morphed into religious and social schism. These debates confronted the meaning of being and forged the animating ethos of Chabad, the most dynamic movement in modern Judaism. Chabad's distinctive character and self-image, Rubin shows, emerged from its spirited defense of Hasidism's interpretation of ṣimṣum as an act of love leading to rapturous reunion. This interpretation ignited a literal conflagration, complete with book burnings, denunciations, investigations, and arrests. Chabad's subsequent preoccupation with ṣimṣum was equally significant for questions of legitimacy, authority, and succession, as for existential questions of being and meaning. Unfolding the story of Chabad from the early modern period to the twentieth century, this book provides fresh portraits of the successive leaders of the movement. Innovatively integrating history, philosophy, and literature, Rubin shows how Kabbalistic ideas are crucially entangled in the experience of modernity and in the response to its ruptures.

Contents:

Front Cover

Half-title

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Contents

Note on Citation and Transliteration

Preamble: Conflagration and Cosmic Rupture

Part I: Being as Rupture (1572-1801)

Introduction: What Does Ṣimṣum Mean?

1. The Ari as a Herald of Modernity

2. Love and Rupture in Early Hasidism

3. "Due to This, the Known Book Was Burned"

4. Ṣimṣum, Soul-Knowledge, and the Function of Parable

Epilogue: Ṣimṣum and the Institutionalization of Chabad

Part II: Being as Nothing (1792-1866)

Introduction: Does the World Exist?

5. Cosmic Construction as Cosmic Effacement

6. The Chabad Sermon: Articulating Singularity

7. Being, Nothing, and Chabad's First Succession Controversy

8. Rereading Rashaz, Rereading Reality

Epilogue: Opening and Closing the Door on Acosmism

Part III: Being as Infinity (1865-1884)

Introduction: A Tale of Two Brothers

9. Dynastic Rupture and Cosmological Recalibration

10. The Hemshekh: A New Literary Collage

11. The Finite Trace of Unruptured Infinity

12. Chabad's Internal Ṣimṣum Split

Epilogue: History and the Metaphysics of Materialism

Part IV: Being as Innovation (1882-1915)

Introduction: The Ruin and Renaissance of Lubavitch

13. Rediscovering Malkhut, the Cosmic Womb

14. Why? Innovation and the Purpose of Ṣimṣum

15. Desire, Pleasure, and the Transcendence of Sense

16. Three Paths to Essential Originality

Epilogue: Rashab, Freud, and the Meanings of Modernity

Part V: Being as Humanity (1915-1994)

Introduction: Undergoing and Overcoming Dislocation and Catastrophe

17. Letter Writing and the Soviet Ṣimṣum

18. Bati Legani and the Triumph of Humanity

19. Wissenschaft, Ṣimṣum ,and Midcentury Succession

20. Messianic Faith in the Shadow of the Holocaust

21 "Many-Worlds" and "Uncertainty" in Ṣimṣum and Science.

Epilogue: Living for the Sake of Ṣimṣum

Postscript: the Art of Being

Acknowledgments

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Series Page

Back Cover.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781503642096

1503642097

OCLC:

1500764143