Abraham Joshua Heschel

Elegant, passionate, and filled with the love of God's creation, Abraham Joshua Heschel's The Sabbath has been hailed as a classic of Jewish spirituality ever since its original publication-and has been read by thousands of people seeking meaning in modern life. In this brief yet profound meditation on the meaning of the Seventh Day, Heschel introduced the idea of an "architecture of holiness" that appears not in space but in time Judaism, he argues, is a religion of time: it finds meaning not in space and the material things that fill it but in time and the eternity that imbues it, so that "the Sabbaths are our great cathedrals."

The Sabbath

Probes the nature of God, revelation, and response in an investigation of the teachings, attitudes, and spiritual needs which led to the development of Judaism. Bibliogs

A Philosophy of Judaism

God in Search of Man

A Philosophy of Religion

Man Is Not Alone 

Gathers essays by the Jewish scholar, activist, and theologian about Judaism, Jewish heritage, social justice, ecumenism, faith, and prayer

Essays

Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity

The excerpts in this book have been grouped around the major themes of Heschel's spiritual vision, God, Prayer, Sabbath, Religion, and so on.

A Spiritual Anthology

I Asked for Wonder

Insecurity of Freedom

Adin Steinsaltz

Short essays on parashat hashavua Talks on the Parasha recreates the warm, intimate atmosphere of a personal encounter with Rabbi Steinsaltz. While providing insights that are meaningful for the Jewish collective, it speaks to every individual as well. To Rabbi Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz, the Torah contains within it many worlds. The themes, the language, the myriad ways in which to understand and interpret it all of these are worlds that both exist independently and are connected to one another, inextricably linked from within and from without. What emerges from the totality of the Torah's manifold shades of meaning is that the Torah is essentially "the book of the chronicles of man." The Torah addressing, in particular, the Jewish people and the individual helps the reader understand not only what happened in the past and what ought to happen in the future, but also the meaning of his or her own life.

Talks on the Parasha

It is comparatively easy to preach joy and fervor, but to demand Truth is like shaping marble without tools. And so the Kotzker] went looking for a few surging people and called loudly upon their souls to bend their conceit and see the Truth beneath the soil.... This was not a philosophical inquiry into the nature of Truth but a scrutiny of men s lives in relation to Truth. Religion, the Kotzker maintained, was not simply an act of adopting a system of beliefs and certain modes of conduct; test and trial were needed, and one had to ascertain through introspection whether one s beliefs were genuine or not, and whether one acted out Truth or lived a life of pretense.... Kierkegaard made it his task to reintroduce Christianity into Christendom. The Kotzker sought to reintroduce authenticity to Jewish life. Kierkegaard s posthumous impact has been powerful. But has the Kotzker affected Jewish self-understanding? from "A Passion for Truth"

A Passion for Truth

A powerful and eloquent statement on the meaning of Israel in our time.

An Echo of Eternity

Israel

Ilya Schor

Powerfully and beautifully portrays a bygone Jewish culture. An eloquent masterpiece, originally published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Includes woodcut illustrations by Ilya Schor.

The Inner World of the Jew in Eastern Europe

The Earth is the Lord's

Like the Hebrew prophets before him, the great American rabbi and civil rights leader reveals God's concern for this world and each of us. Abraham Joshua Heschel, descended from a long line of Orthodox rabbis, fled Europe to escape the Nazis. He made the insights of traditional Jewish spirituality come alive for American Jews while speaking out boldly against war and racial injustice. Heschel brought the fervor of the Hebrew prophets to his role as a public intellectual. He challenged the sensibilities of the modern West, which views science and human reason as sufficient. Only by rediscovering wonder and awe before mysteries that transcend knowledge can we hope to find God again. This God, Heschel says, is not distant but passionately concerned about our lives and human affairs, and asks something of us in return. This little book, which brings together Heschel's key insights on a range of topics, will reinvigorate readers of any faith who hunger for wonder and thirst for justice. Plough Spiritual Guides briefly introduce the writings of great spiritual voices of the past to new readers.

Thunder in the Soul: To Be Known by God

Selected passages from the writings of the prophetic Polish-born Jewish scholar and thinker provide an introduction to his thought and a survey-commentary on twentieth-century human needs, problems, struggles, and potentials

The Wisdom of Heschel

An Interpretation of Judaism

Between God and Man

Israelite prophets is well known, his studies of prophetic inspiration among Jewish scholars of the Middle Ages is not, in part because it exists in article form and in part because these articles were written in Hebrew. The standard Jewish view is that prophecy ended with the ancient prophets, somewhere early in the Second Temple era. Heschel demonstrated that this view is not altogether accurate. Belief in the possibility of continued prophetic inspiration, and in its.

Maimonides and Other Medieval Authorities

Prophetic Inspiration After the Prophets

Elegant, passionate, and filled with the love of God's creation, Abraham Joshua Heschel's The Sabbath has been hailed as a classic of Jewish spirituality ever since its original publication-and has been read by thousands of people seeking meaning in modern life. In this brief yet profound meditation on the meaning of the Seventh Day, Heschel introduced the idea of an "architecture of holiness" that appears not in space but in time. Judaism, he argues, is a religion of time: it finds meaning not in space and the material things that fill it but in time and the eternity that imbues it, so that "the Sabbaths are our great cathedrals."

Susannah Heschel

Abraham Joshua Heschel was one of the great religious teachers and moral prophets of our time. This title provides selections from the writings of the leading Jewish theologian and philosopher, edited by his daughter.

Essential Writings

"Abraham Joshua Heschel, descended from a long line of Orthodox rabbis, fled Europe to escape the Nazis. He made the insights of traditional Jewish spirituality come alive for American Jews while speaking out boldly against war and racial injustice"--

To Be Known by God

Thunder in the Soul

Although Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972) is well-known today-as a philosopher, a Jewish theologian and a social activist-Heschel the poet is not. Nevertheless, those who have read his writings in English, spiritual classics like The Sabbath and Man is Not Alone, and have been moved by the power of his prose and the subtlety of his expression, will not be surprised to find that in his youth he had actually published a volume of Yiddish poetry in the heyday of Yiddish literature before the Holocaust. The 66 precious poems of Der Shem Ham'forash-Mentch, published by Indsel Verlag in Warsaw in 1933, remained close to Heschel's heart all of his life, though few people knew of their existence. It was more than a decade after his passing before most of his admirers learned of them, being treated to a few tantalizing snippets in Samuel Dresner's anthology, I Asked for Wonder (a line taken from the dedication of Der Shem Ham'forash-Mentch). But what was unknown to most of Heschel's readers was that a complete translation of his poetry in English already existed in his lifetime; and still more amazing, it had been made by his younger contemporary, Zalman Schachter-Shalomi (b. 1924), who would himself become a towering figure in Jewish and world spirituality, but who at the time was just coming into his own and looked to the older Heschel as a mentor. As we learn in the introduction, the first drafts of these translations were given as gifts to Heschel after his heart attack in 1969 to cheer him through his convalescence (sometimes accompanied by recordings of Schachter-Shalomi reading both the Yiddish originals and the English translations!) Schachter-Shalomi notes that Heschel was satisfied with some of these early drafts and unsatisfied with others. The poems were deeply personal to him and the translations would need to be revised. Unfortunately, Heschel died before he and Schachter-Shalomi could come together to discuss a revision and the translations were put on a shelf. But now, in honor of the 40th anniversary of Heschel's passing, Schachter-Shalomi has taken them down again and completed his own revision for the modern reader of sacred poetry. Thus, we have in this volume something truly unique-the combined work and vision of two of the 20th century's greatest Jewish spiritual luminaries and master's of Yiddish!

Human---God's Ineffable Name

his most ambitious scholarly achievement, his three-volume study of Rabbinic Judaism, is only now appearing in English.

As Refracted Through the Generations

Heavenly Torah

This first collection of Heschel's essays - compiled, edited and with an introduction by his daughter Susannah Heschel, is a stunning reminder of the virtuosity of one of the most well respected minds in Judaic studies.

Abraham Joshua Heschel

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