Small Chasidic Insights into God

Why has God created the world and mankind, and for what purpose? Why has the soul descended into the body? (The preexistence of the soul was assumed in Chasidism.) Is there a more ideal world than the divine world in which the soul previously existed? Is there a greater joy than when man rejoices in God?

-Paul Philip Levertoff
as published in "The Love of God"
Messiah Journal issue 107

I previously reviewed Love and the Messianic Age written by early 20th century Chasidic sage Paul Philip Levertoff and as I am sure you can tell, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Levertoff's insights into the teachings of the Jewish Messiah as written in the Gospels and filtered through Chasidic mysticism are fascinating. I am pleased that Vine of David is publishing installments of Levertoff's classic study Die religiose Denkweise der Chassidim (Leipzig: J.C. Hinrichs 1918) translated into English.

However, a plain reading of Levertoff isn't always sufficient to comprehend the underlying concepts and history swimming below the surface of his text. In the footnotes to this very brief section of Chapter 1 of Levertoff's work, we discover several things that might not be apparent, including the association between the "birth pangs of the Messiah" (Matthew 24:8), the present age being like a pregnancy, the unborn child being like the "congregation of God", and the Messianic Age being the day of the child's birth.

We also get a glimse in the footnotes, of "Moses the Mystic":

The Prophet Isaiah saw God, when he was being ordained as a prophet (Isaiah 6), yet only according to his revelation of himself in the creation, but not in his true essence (how God actually is in himself, independent of his creation). Only Moses had a vision of God's essence.

We don't normally think of Moses in mystic terms, but he did see God in His "glory" in a manner no other man has beheld (Exodus 33:12-23). Also, in the mystic view of the Chasidim, we see that God's greatest ability is His being able to lower Himself to the level of a human being. This is no more evident than in the projection of the Divine Presence into the existence of the Jewish Messiah among men (John 1:1-18).

This brief taste of Levertoff and the equally fascinating footnotes accompanying the article, are only one small sample of the spring issue of First Fruits of Zion's (FFOZ's) Messiah Journal.

Over the course of the next week or two, I'll post other reviews and comments about Messiah Journal, which includes a special supplement on Isaiah's Exalted Servant in the Great Isaiah Scroll. I've read everything in the current issue except the special supplement and I haven't been disappointed yet.

The road is long and often, we travel in the dark.