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The Theology ofAbraham Joshua Heschel
Reuven Kimelman
Judaism is not a doctrine but a lifethe continua
tion of the lives of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Or
so Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972) often
said. To learn Jewish theology, then, is to relive the his
tory of God's encounter with the Jewish people, for
theology and history are inseparable. What God
revealed to Israel through the prophets, the sages, and
the mystics is the "bold and dangerously paradoxical
idea" that God needs man.
Much of academic Jewish scholarship finds con
flicts between biblical Judaism and the rabbinic
Judaism of late antiquity as well as between rabbinic
Judaismand later kabbalistic-hasidic teaching. The aca
demic consensus sets up dichotomies between the legal
and the spiritual and between the rationaland the mys
tical. Heschel instead integrates biblical, rabbinic, and
kabbalistic sources into a unified vision of God's con
tinuing dialogue with the people of Israel. Indeed, Hes-
chePs scholarship, righdy understood, is inseparablefromhis theology, forhis scholarship seeks to re-create
the dialogue of the Jewish people with God.
While much of this was obvious to readers of Hes
chePs account of the classic rabbinical material in his
three-volume Hebrew treatiseTorahMin HaShamay-
im BeAsphqariahShelHaDorot, it only now becomes
available to Englishreadersthrough the translation and
REUVENKIMELMANisaprofessorof ClassicalJudaicaat Bran-dis University. He is the authoro/TheMystical Meaning ofLekhah Dodi and Kabbalat Shabbat,and the audiohooksThe
Moral Meaning of the BibleandThe Hidden Poetry of TheJewish Prayerbook.
abridgment titled Heavenly Torah as Refracted
Through the Generations.This presents an opportuni
ty to reflect on the role ofthistreatise within HescheFs
oeuvre and its place in HeschePs approach to theology.
HeschePs oeuvre traces the continuum of Jewish
religious consciousness from the biblical and rabbinic
periods through the kabbalistic and hasidic ones.
Despite their differences, Heschel argued that the
teachings of all these periods are unified by the theme
of God's concern for humanity. The different expres
sions of Judaismare not mutually exclusive but, rather,
moments in the dialectic of man's encounter with God.
Where others saw dichotomies, Heschel saw polarities.
Our inclination to understand Judaism or to approach
the divine through only one of the poles leaves us,
according to Heschel, with partial understandings of
Judaism and fragmentary visions of the divine. In con
trast, HeschePs theology offers a historical as well as
conceptual framework for maintaining the dialecticwithout reducing one pole to the other.
In this regard, Torah Min HaShamayim BeAs-
pUqariah Shel HaDorot qualifies as HeschePs mag
num opus. It guides the reader through the woof and
warp of the classic textsMan Is Not Alone and God
inSearchofManu&X.informhis writings on contem
porary theology. These books that made Heschel such
an insightful writer for the Jewishand, to a great
extent, for the Christianaudience restate his histori
cal-theological vision of Judaism. He presented this
visionfirstinThe Prophetsand subsequendy and more
extensively inTorah Min HaShamayim. This vision,which involves tracing the thread of God's interest in
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36 FIRST THINGS
man throughout the fabric of Judaism, is reflected
throughout his writing.
So much of HeschePs work is of one cloth.Man Is
Not Alone is subtitledA Philosophy of Religionwhile
God in Search of Man is subtitled A Philosophy of
Judaism.For Heschel, manisnot alone because God isin search of man. By virtually beginningGod inSearch
of Manwith the statement "Religion is an answer to
man's ultimate questions," Heschel underscores his
thesis that the philosophy of Judaism is an answer to
problems in the philosophy of religionindeed, its
ultimate problems. Not only do these two works on
contemporary theology fit together, theyalsoconverge
with his two major works of historical scholarship in
his statement that theideaof pathos inTheProphetsais
an explication of the idea of God in search of man."
Chronologically, The Prophets, based on hisGerman dissertation of the early 1930s, came
first, albeit published in its English form only
in the early 1960s. It was followed in the 1950s by his
two classic texts on theology. In the early 1960s, the
first two volumes of Torah Min HaShamayim were
published. Nonetheless, it is clear that his major schol
arship was conceptually first. For Heschel, scholarship
and theology are one.
Much of HeschePs work seeks to free Jewish theol
ogy from the constraints of Maimonides' philosophical
concept ofanabsolutely transcendent God whoisinde
pendent of humanity. Tothis,Heschel counterposes the
concept of divine pathosthatis,ofaGod who search
es for man, who, indeed, is in need of man. It empha
sizes the interdependency of the divine and the human.
To underscore the continuity ofthisunderstanding
from biblical to rabbinic to kabbalistic thinking, Hes
chel states:
In the phrasewe needeachotheris embedded inthe concept of Israel's power to diminish orenhance God's might This opinion, which servedas a cornerstone of kabbalistic teaching, is alreadyalluded to inahomilyinSifre(319):"Youneglected the Rock that begot you" P e u t 32:18). Thewordteshi("neglected")canbe understood in relation to the wordteshishut("feebleness"), whencethe interpretation "You weaken the power of the
One above "This approach achieved its classicformulationin themouth of R.Judahb.Simon, anamora of the third to fourth generation of EretzIsrael: "As long as therighteouscomply with theDivine will they augment the Power above, as itsays 'And now,Ipray Thee, let the strength of theLord be enhanced' (Num. 14:17). But ifnot,then,asit were, Tou enfeebledtheRockthatbegot you'
(Deut 32:18)." Similarly: "As long as Israel complies with the Divine will they augment the Power
above, as it says: 'In God we shall make [create]power' (Ps. 60:14); and if not, as it were, say, "andthey [i.e., Israel] are gone without strength beforethe pursuer" (Lam. 1:6). According to the Zohar(2:33a), this idea is intimated in the verse "GivepowertoGod"(Ps.68:35).
Both the ancientrabbis andthe medieval kabbalists,
contends Heschel, held that human compliance with
the divine will augments divine power. One might
think of the divine-human relationship as analogous to
that ofageneral and soldier where the power lies with
the general and the soldier merely follows orders. In
reality, every command implemented by the soldier
extends the general's power. The growth of the power
of the general thus corresponds to the increase in com
pliance by the soldier, and vice versa. An order that
commands no compliance isavoice in the wilderness.
Judaism is so commandment-oriented preciselybecause God's kingshipisrealized onearththrough the
fulfillment of the commandments. In fact, according to
the Midrash, God gave Israel so many commandments
because Israel had made God king first. Even more
striking is the rabbinical concept that it is human wit
ness that makes God real. Heschel often cites the
midrashic gloss to Isaiah 43:12, "So you are My wit
nessesdeclares the Lordand I am God," to wit:
"When you are my witnesses, then I am God, but
when you are not my witnesses, then I am, as it were,
not God."
The concept of divine-human partnership,
according to Heschel, weaves the thinking of
the prophets, the rabbis, and the medieval kab
balists into the whole cloth of Israel's historical rela
tionship with God. This distinguishes his scholarship
categorically from that of many ofhiscontemporaries.
Unlike Gershom Scholem and Martin Buber, who saw
in Kabbalah a gnostic phenomenon that deviated from
the biblical and rabbinic traditions, Heschel saw in this
body of medieval mysticism a reformulation of the
rabbis' concept of God's dependence on man.In the transcript ofatalk entitled "Jewish Theolo
gy," Heschel summarized his reading of the Jewish
sources: "Godisin need of man. The idea of God being
in need of man is central to Judaism and pervadesallthe
pages of the Bible and of Chazal [the rabbinic sages of
talmudic literature], and it is understandable in our
own time In the light of this idea, of God being in
need of man, you have to entirely revise all the clichs
that are used in religious language." Heschel then
referred to his workTorahMin HaShamayim, saying:
In volume I there is an entire section dealing withthe Tart Hashekmah.Without the principle of
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Godinsearch of man, the whole idea ofshekinahisnot intelligible It permeates rabbinic literatureand post-rabbinic thought in Judaism, and it ismissing in our discussion and in Maimonides's listof dogmas. Actually the idea ofpathos,which Iconsider to be the centralidea inprophetic theolo
gy, contains the doctrine oftheshekinah... Without an understanding of the idea ofshekinahwe failcompletelytounderstandthefieldofJewishtheology or the theme of God in search ofmanwhich Iconsider to be the summary of Jewish theology.
God's indwelling on earth is the fulcrum of Hes-
chel's theology. Man's capacity to approach God arises
from God's indwelling in his people Israel, in the form
of a divine presence that Israel re-creates through the
performance ofthe mitzvot.
In the same lecture, Heschel protested that the con
cept ofshekinahbecomes "so terribly Hellenized" inthe hands of scholars who fail to see its foundation in
divine pathos. The "Hellenized," or rationalist, preju
dice of mainstream academics tends to deprecate the
medieval Jewish mysticism characterized by the term
Kabbahh. In doing so, scholars betray a radicallydif-
ferent reading of rabbinical Judaismandthe Bibleitself.
The Jewish mystics, Heschel wrote,
are inspired by a bold and dangerously paradoxicalideathat not onlyisGod necessary to man butman is also necessary to God, to the unfolding of
his plans in this world. Thoughts of this kind areindicated and even expressed in various rabbinicsources In the Zonarthis idea isformulated inamore specific way.... The Holy One,as itwere,said: "When Israel is found to be worthy below,my powerprevails inthe universe; but whenIsraelis found to be unworthy, she weakens my powerabove,andthe powerorsevere judgment predominates intheworld."
The mystics, Heschel emphasizes, stated the bibli
cal-rabbinic implication of divine pathos in an even
more specific way. Nothing could be further from the
prevailing view in academic Jewish scholarship, beginning with the great researcher and founder of the
Jewish Theological Seminary, Solomon Schechter
(1847-1915). Schechter treats Kabbalah as a body of
work alien to the rabbinical Judaism of the Talmud,
even though occasional insights in his own writings
show that he sometimes saw a connection. He writes,
for example:
He (God) needs us even as we need him" was afavorite axiom with certain mystics. In the language of the rabbis we should express the samesentiment thus, "One GodthroughIsrael,andone
Israel through God. They are his selected people,andhe is their selected portion.
This is exactly Heschel's point of emphasis.
Schechter, despite being a careful student of Kabbalah,
could not see with Heschel's degree of clarity that kab
balistic theology is a flowering of a branch of rabbinic
theology.
Themidrashimcited by Heschel above also appearjuxtaposed in Ephraim Urbach's classic monograph
The Sages.Urbach, who until his death in 1991 was
Israel's preeminent scholar of classical Jewish sources,
cites many of the same texts that undergird Heschel's
reading, but from a very different standpoint. With
regard to the comment in Sifrei Deuteronomy quoted
above by Heschel, Urbach writes, rather apologetically:
This dictum is directed against oversimplifiedfaith. The non-manifestation of God's power isnot indicative of the absence of that power, andone must not come to God with the complaint
"where is Thy power?" but there is a nexusbetween the revelation of this power and theactions ofhumanbeings.
Elsewhere, Urbach writes in a manner reminiscent of
Heschel without, however, the linkage to Kabbalah:
Evil deedsandtransgressionscanbanish theshekinah,as itwere,fromtheworld.In theview of theSages, the ethical and religious conduct of mandetermines both the manifestation of God's presence in this world and the revelation ofhispowerand might.
Perceiving a chasm between rabbinic and kabbalis
tic thought, neither Schechter nor Urbach could see
what for Heschel was obvious, namely, that with
regardto the divine-human relationship Kabbalahrep
resents a "more specific" statement of the rabbinic
perspective.
Heschel's work on rabbinic thought continues
his work on biblical thoughtwhat Heschel
called "God's anthropology." Both focus on
the category of pathos in the divine-human relationshipand on how revelation involves the interaction of the
divine and human. Although Heschel's biblical com
mentaryisconcerned with the prophetic understanding
of the divine,and hisrabbinic scholarshipdealswith the
rabbinic understanding of Torah andshekinah,the two
presentations overlap. In a sense, Heavenly Torah
serves as the sequel toThe Prophets.The latter and the
first two volumes of the original Hebrew edition of
Heavenly Torahwere published in 1962.The Prophets
concludes with a chapter entitled "The Dialectic of the
Divine-Human Encounter." The third volume of
Heavenly Torahopens with the chapter "It Is Not inthe Heavens"; its opening subsections are "Without
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38 FIRST THINGS
Sages There IsNo Torah,"and "The Sages Are theFinishing and theCompletionto theTorah."Thislast volumeoHeavenlyTorah,inshort,begins just whereThe
Prophetsends, identifyingthe sages asthe successors oftheprophets. This supports Heschel's overarching the
sis that, as prophecy emerges from the encounterbetween prophet and God, so rabbinic Judaismemerges from theencounterbetween sageand Torah.
HeavenlyTorahdiffers frommainstreamacademicapproachesin itscontentaswellas itsmode of presentation. Where the academics seek to summarize rabbinic thinking, Heschel draws the reader inside it,exegeting it from within, as it were. Not only doesHeschel condense the crucial debates over immanenceand transcendence into sharp juxtapositions; he composes histreatisein rabbinicHebrewandemploysreligious categories native to it. The subsections of the
treatisefrequentlyaretitledwith rabbinic quotations.Unlike the academics, who stand outside rabbinicthinking to comment onit,Heschel's exegesis remainsin dialogue with the sages of late antiquity.HeavenlyTorahisnotacommentaryon the rabbinic sourcesbutrather anextensionof them. Justastheologyandscholarship are cutofonecloth,the language andthoughtofthe classical Jewish sourcesareinseparablyunited.Heorganizes his presentation according to rabbinic categories so that the language and structure of the bookenable the reader to engage the mindsof the sages.
AresultofHeschel'sdaring procedureisthe discovery that the Jewish sages rarely were of one mind. Onthecontrary,on most theologicalissues there areat leasttworesolutions,frequentlyat odds with eachother.
Heschel portrays this characteristic oppositionof two schools of thought under the rubricsof Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Ishmael. These
oftenareused historically, but,atother times, Heschelemploys them typologically. The heaven-boundschool of Akiva, with its emphasis on theshekinah,stands in contrast to the more mundane school ofIsh
mael. The Akivan perspective was mystical, possiblyeschatological, unbounded,andoften paradoxical. TheIshmaelite perspective was more critical, rationalistic,restrained, and pellucid. Together, according toHeschel,they form adialectic,not just a dyad, in whichplays outthe humanencounter withthedivine.
A case in point is Akiva's focus on the biblicalinstances of God's immanence and Ishmael's focus onthose of God's transcendence.Thepointisnoteither-or,butbotb-and;as Heschel says, "the dichotomy oftranscendence and immanence is an oversimplification," for "God remains transcendent in his imma
nence,and related in histranscendence."By contrasting the sides of an issue under the
rubrics of Rabbi Ishmael or Rabbi Akiva, the readerworks throughadebaterather than adoctrine.Sometimes whole chapters are in dialectical relationship.Forinstance,chapter2of volume2,"Moses' Ascent toHeaven," contains the subsections "Rabbi Akiva's
View: Moses Was in Heaven," "Moses Ascended toHeaven," "Moses Did Not Ascend to Heaven," and"How Could a Person Ascend to Heaven?" On amore mundane level, chapter5of volume3contains asubsection called "Against Those Who Are Stringent," whereas chapter 6 begins with "Beloved AreProhibitions."
Heschel's perspective is expressed in the terminology of polarity. Fritz Rothschild, in hisintroductiontoa collection of Heschel's writ
ings titledBetween God and Man,called such terms
"scissors words," since they only cut together, like apair of scissors, and not singly, like a knife. AlthoughHeschel's pedagogy speaks of "a covenant betweenopposites"or a"melding of opposites,"he isnonetheless quite cognizant of the impossibility of holdingboth ends of a stretched rope. For Heschel, "there isalwaysapolarity oftwoprinciples."Neitherthepractical, this-worldly pole represented by the school ofIshmael nor the mystical sense of God's need for manrepresented by the school of Akiva can be reduced totheother.Nor can they be fullyintegrated.Itis thelimitation ofhumanvision that causes us to see God andthe world intwo different waysatdifferent times.
The goalof Heschel's presentationisnot to summarize Jewish theology butratherto re-create the experience of God's encounter with the Jewish people byreliving thedebatesof the sages. Heschel's theology ultimately is Akivan, responding to a God who searches forman because he is in needofman.But thisGodmay beapproached only through an encounter in which manconsiders his dependence on the absolutely transcendentGod propoundedbyIshmael.Eachpole needstheother to correctitself.Only together do they embrace
thefull reality oftheencounterwith thedivinea gateto Godthat always swings on twohinges.The third volume ofHeavenly Torahis subtitled,
and chapter 36tided,"Both TheseandThose Are theWords of the Living God." Sometimesadifferent perspectiveindeed, a competing onecan supplementone's understanding of the truth. Since the fullness ofthe divine wordcannotbecontainedin a singlehumanperspective,aplurality of understandings is needed tofill out the human grasp of divine truth. The wholetruth remains elusively human, exclusively divine.Accordingly, the rabbis designated truthasGod's sig
naturethatis,a uniquecharacteristic ofdivinecognition that exceeds the human grasp. In fact, since any
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human perspective is necessarily limited to part of thetruth, the whole truth may not be humanly accessiblewithout contradiction.
This underlying insight allowed Heschel to understand the Jewishclassics from the inside, in contradistinction to the conventional assertions of modernscholarship. Italsoexplainshisgenerosity toward alternative theological viewpoints. Itwasnot so much thatthe various scholars were wrong in their analysis ofbiblical, rabbinic, kabbalistic, or hasidic theology asthat they saw only part of the picture. Rather thanfaultingthemforpartialvision, Heschel soughttocorrect their understanding by providingthemissing partsofthepicture.
Advent Carol
Hush that anguished hymn you're humming:
"Come, O Come, Emmanuel."
TrumpetChristmas!Fix his coming
firmly at "The First Nowell."
He'salreadycome in glory!
Why plead, "Savior, come at last"?
Let's talkChristmas!Tellastorysafely in the distant past.
Drown out John the Baptist. Edit
out"Prepare!Make straight the way!"
Cut to Christmas! Buy on credit.
Square things up another day.
Advent's dreary. Let's start living
ChristmasnowlWearred and green!
While we're at it, skip Thanksgiving!Deck the halls at Halloween!
Then, when the Incarnate Verb
overnight becomes pass,
carry Christmas to the curb.
Pack the Prince of Peace away.
Heschel'sconcept of theology as participation in theunfolding ofrevelation has aninherent affinity for collaborative pluralismwhich contributed to his opennessto Jewish-Christiandialogue.For a pluralismto becollaborative, however, the convergence of ends mustexceed the divergence of means. Heschel's pluralism isfirmly boundedbytheclassicalJewishtexts:Heunderstandstradition itselftobe an aspect ofGod'sencounterwith the people of Israel. His pluralism reflects hisunderstanding ofboth thedialectic of the traditionandthe divine-humanrelationship.Heschel asksusto relivetherevelation recordedin thehistory ofJewishtheologizing, which epitomizes God's conversation withhumanity. EI
Julie Stoner
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