Overview

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.

Full Product Details

Author:   Eli Rubin
Publisher:   Stanford University Press
Imprint:   Stanford University Press
Edition:   New edition
ISBN:  

9781503642072

ISBN 10:   1503642070
Pages:   446
Publication Date:   25 March 2025
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  College/higher education ,  Professional & Vocational ,  Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Out of stock  
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Table of 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

Reviews

""Rubin's book offers an exciting new way of thinking about Jewish modernity, making this one of the most original and interesting books in Jewish Studies of our time."" —Susannah Heschel, Dartmouth College ""Chabad's rich intellectual history and its place in the broad existential currents of modernity finally get their due with Rubin's stupendous book, which like its author, is a wonder of erudition, insight, and humility."" —Yehudah Mirsky, Brandeis University ""Eli Rubin's book is the first full-length statement of Chabad's philosophical program for an American audience. It makes the remarkable—and defensible—assertion that Jewish thought, and specifically the sixteenth-century Kabbalah of Isaac Luria, opens possibilities for modern science that are closed to the old determinism of pre-quantum science.""—David P. Goldman, Law & Liberty

""Rubin's book offers an exciting new way of thinking about Jewish modernity, making this one of the most original and interesting books in Jewish Studies of our time."" —Susannah Heschel, Dartmouth College ""Chabad's rich intellectual history and its place in the broad existential currents of modernity finally get their due with Rubin's stupendous book, which like its author, is a wonder of erudition, insight, and humility."" —Yehudah Mirsky, Brandeis University

Author Information

Eli Rubin is a contributing editor at Chabad.org. He received his PhD from the Department of Hebrew and Jewish Studies, University College London.

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