But I can
assure you that such is the brilliance of Heschel as a writer that he creates a
fascinating and very accessible drama out of the lives and ideas of these two
figures, showing how they were each wrestling with similar religious questions
and issues, though in completely different contexts.
What they
were both aware of – and found themselves battling against – were the ways in
which religious experience becomes institutionalised, how an individual’s
possibility of engaging with the divine becomes bogged down in tradition and
ritual and repetition, how religious formalism and religious institutions can
become a barrier to religious experience, rather than a vehicle for it.
Heschel was
accustomed in his books to divide his thoughts up into short sections, each
with their own ‘headline’. The section I want to share is entitled ‘Against
Trivialization’, and starts as follows:
The Kotzker apparently felt that
overemphasis on strict adherence to patterns of religious behaviour tended to
obscure the individual’s relationship with God. He never questioned the
validity of the traditional pattern and regarded living by the Law as
essential. Observance as a matter of routine, however, he considered odious.
So:
observance of the law and the traditions of Judaism is central, ‘essential’,
for Reb Mendl, but observing as a ‘matter of routine’ is ‘odious’: strong
language from Heschel. Although Heschel stresses that Reb Mendl is halachically
observant, the emphasis of his religious stance is not on mere repetition of
rituals or prayers, but something else.
Let’s see
what else:
What appalled the Kotzker was the
spiritual stagnation of religious existence, the trivialization of Judaism. He
scorned praying by rote. In opposition to the traditional preference for
verbose recitation, he pleaded for brevity, even taciturnity. He dared to teach
that the preparation for prayer surpassed prayer itself in spiritual value and
found a basis for this reformative principle in an ancient tradition: ”One
should not stand up to say a prayer save in a reverent frame of mind. The pious
of old used to wait an hour before praying
in order to concentrate their thoughts upon their Father in Heaven.” (Berachot
5:1). One would expect the phrase “while
praying” to appear at the end of the sentence, since the goal is
concentration in prayer. The intention, however, is to teach us that
concentration should precede the act of prayer. Preparation for prayer is
valuable in itself, perhaps more so than prayer itself.
Let’s unpack
this: first there are the powerful phrases Heschel uses to describe what the
Kotzker set himself against – ‘spiritual stagnation’ and ‘the trivialization of
Judaism’. And what’s an example of that? : ‘prayer by rote’. And then Heschel
illustrates the radical nature of what the Kotzker was teaching by quoting how
the Rebbe used a traditional text from the Talmud as the basis of his
‘reformative’ stance: the tradition of having a period of reflection or
meditation before a service starts, a
quiet personal time before the collective prayers. It’s interesting to see
Heschel describe this as a ‘reformative principle’. Implicitly he is raising the
question: Does our tradition, our prayer life, need “reforming”? Have we got
our priorities wrong? Maybe we have. Because ‘preparation for prayer is valuable in itself, perhaps more so than
prayer itself’, (i.e. the fixed prayers of tradition). How threatening an
idea is that?!
He’s not
saying we can or should dispense with the words of tradition. But Heschel is
saying, following the Kotzker’s lead: maybe we have our priorities the wrong
way round - that what we might do before the formal prayers begin has a
spiritual value in and of itself and maybe, (and this is the radical note),
maybe that quiet time is more valuable ’than prayer itself’. What would our services look like if we
followed that approach? They would surely be different.
Although
he’s focused here on prayer, I just want to note in passing how Heschel’s
greatness as a teacher is evidenced in that subversive phrase he slips in en passant: the phrase ‘the
trivialization of Judaism’. Because in using that language he is inviting you
to think: ‘and what else goes on in Jewish life and practice that is a trivialization? where else do we
concentrate on stuff that misses the point about our religion? that avoids the
essence of religious and spiritual life?’ And I imagine these questions might
resonate too for other religions.
We can each
create our own anthology of things that we might point to as the ‘trivialization
of Judaism’. My list would probably be a
long one but off the top of my head I’d think about: obsessionism about aspects
of kashrut, or frenzied pre-Pesach cleaning, or substituting Zionism for
Judaism as the heart of religious life, or seeing the Bar/Bat-Mitzvah party as
needing more attention than the ceremony itself, or anything that prioritises
ritual obligations at the expense of the ethical vision and inter-personal
dimension of Judaism with its focus on compassion and justice.
He
continues:
In the Kotzker’s synagogue one could
see the disciples with prayer shawls over their shoulders walking up and down
the room, their lips hardly moving. They gave the impression that they had not
begun to pray yet and were still immersed in preparation. They prayed quietly.
Suddenly they would stop, take of phylacteries and shawls, join one another at
the table, and consume a little vodka together…
Heschel
brings to life a lost world, with a charming (and seductive) picture of weekday
prayer - quiet immersion in prayer, each individual alone in community,
together in community, and then: tephillin
off, and time for a different connection to the spirit, sharing a drink
together…
And how does
Heschel bring this theme to a conclusion?
Even piety will not sustain the
tedium of unlimited repetition. To preserve one’s commitment with the intensity
of its first ardour requires more than obedience. Surprise, spiritual
adventure, the search for new appreciation – all these are necessary
ingredients for religious renewal.
Judaism lived because it was both a
religion of finality, conclusive and irrevocable, and a faith of commencement,
of inauguration. To act as a Jew, thought the Kotzker, meant to make a new
start upon the old road. (quotations from ‘A Passion for Truth’, pp.92-3, Farrer, Straus and
Giroux, New York, 1973).
So here’s
the Kotzker’s recipe for religious aliveness, channelled through Heschel.
Another way of saying that might be: here we have Heschel’s 20th
century agenda for religious renewal – but a renewal programme utilising and rooting himself in the spiritual tradition to
which he was an heir. Heschel was of course born into a Hasidic heritage: his
grandfather, Reb Abraham Joshua Heschel, who died in 1825, was the ‘Apter
Rebbe’, the last great Rebbe of Mezbizh on the Polish/Russia border, who was
buried next to Hasidism’s founder, the Baal Shem Tov, who came from that same
village.
In this
paragraph Heschel is teaching us what is required for an enlivened religious
life: ‘Surprise, spiritual adventure, the
search for new appreciation..,’ that is the search for new approaches to
the tradition. These are the ‘necessary ingredients’ not just for one’s own
spirituality and prayer life but for collective ‘religious renewal’. That’s
what Heschel was after: collective and
individual ‘religious renewal’. And what a great trio of ideas he puts together
here: ‘Surprise, spiritual adventure, the
search for new appreciation…’.
Do the
religious services we attend meet that demanding standard? Can they? Is
religion even the best place to look? What is the antidote to what Heschel
calls ‘spiritual stagnation’? That’s a
condition that might afflict any number of people - synagogue-goes, Church
attenders, secularists, alike.
Heschel
speaks directly to some of my own preoccupations, including trying to keep on
guard against the ‘trivialisation of Judaism’; and keeping myself (and others)on
track, focused on, the elements of adventure, of surprise, of new approaches,
in our eternal journey through the wilderness away from spiritual stagnation,
towards spiritual richness, aliveness, new possibilities.
[adapted from a sermon given at
Finchley Reform Synagogue, London, May 5th 2018]
