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384 THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA

Ba'al Shem-Tob

contact with the peasants, Besht learned how to use plants for healing purposes and to effect wonderful cures. In fact, his first appearance in public was that of an ordinary Ba'al Shem. He wrote amulets and prescribed cures. To his credit be it said that he was far from practising the quackery of his fellows in the craft. In treating, for instance, those who suffered from melancholy, or the insane, he sought to influence their minds. After many trips in Podolia and Volhynia as a Ba'al Shem, Besht, considering his following large enough and his authority established, decided (about

expound

1740) to

He

his teachings.

Appear-

chose for the place of his activity the ance little city of Miedzyboz and the peoas Zaddik. pie, mostly from the lower classes, came to listen to him. His following gradually increased, and with it the dislike, not to say hostility, of the Talmudists. Nevertheless, Besht was supported at the beginning of his career by two prominent Talmudists, the brothers Mei'r and Isaac Dob Margaliot. Later he won to his side Baer of Meseritz, to whose great authority as a Talmudist it was chiefly due that Besht's doctrines (though in an essentially altered form) were introduced into learned circles. The antagonism between Talmudism and Hasidism was apparent to the representatives of each at Besht's first appearance but the open breach did not come about until later. In fact, Besht took sides with the Talmudists in the Prankist disputes, and was even one of the three delegates of the Talmudists to a disputation between the two parties held at Lemberg in 1759. It was only in keeping with Besht's character that he felt keenly upon the acceptance of baptism by the Prankists, for it is related that he said " As long as a diseased limb is connected with the body, there is hope that it may be saved but, once amputated, it is gone, and there is no hope." The excitement consequent upon the Prankist movement undermined his health, and he died shortly after the conversion of many Prankists to Christianity.







for the cabalistic commenascribed to him (Jitomir, 1804), "Sefer mi-Rabbi Yisrael Ba'al Shem-Tob," is hardly genuine. In order to get at his teachings, it is therefore necessary to turn to his utterances as given in the works of the old Hasidim. But since Hasidism, immediately after the death of its founder, was divided into various parties, each claiming for itself the authority of Besht, the utmost of caution is necessary in judging as to the authenticity of utterances ascribed to Besht. The foundation-stone of Hasidism as laid by Besh is a strongly marked pantheistic conception of God. He declared the whole universe, mind and matter, to be a manifestation of the Divine Being that this

Besht

left

tary on Ps.

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cvii.,



manifestation is not an emanation from God, as is the conception of the Cabala, for nothing can be separated from God all things are rather forms in which He reveals Himself. When man speaks, said Besht, he should remember that his speech is an element of life, and that life itself is a manifestation of God.

This seeming contradicevil exists in God. tion is explained on the ground that evil is not bad It is wrong in itself, but only in its relation to man.

Even

384

with desire upon a woman but it is divine admire her beauty it is wrong only in so far as man does not regard beauty as a manifestation of God, but misconceives it, and thinks of it in reference to himself. Nevertheless, sin is nothing posi tive, but is identical with the imperElements fections of human deeds and thought. of Besht's Whoever does not believe that God Doctrines, resides in all things, but separates Him and them in his thoughts, has not the right conception of God. It is equally fallacious to think of a creation in time: creation, that is, God's activity, has no end. God is ever active in the changes of nature: in fact, it is in these changes that God's continuous creativeness consists. This pantheism of Besht, of the consequences of which he was not at all conscious, would have shared the fate of many other speculative systems which have passed over the masses without affecting them, had it not been for the fact that Besht was a man of the people, who knew how to give his metaphysical conception of God an eminently practical to look



to



significance.

The

was a remarkable Since God is immanent in all things, all things must possess something good in which God manifests Himself as the source of good. Por this reason, Besht taught, every man must be considered good, and his sins must be explained, not condemned. One of his favorite sayings was that no man has sunk too low to be able to raise himself to God. Naturally, then, it was his chief endeavor to convince sinners that God stood as near to them as to the righteous, and that their misdeeds were chiefly the consequences of their folly. Another important result of his doctrines, which was of great practical importance, was his denial " Whoever mainthat asceticism is pleasing to God. tains that this life (ntfl D71JJ) is worthless is in error: only one must know how it is worth a great deal From the very beginning Besht to use it properly. " fought against that contempt for the world which, through the influence of Luria's Cabala, had almost become a dogma among the Jews. He considered care of the body as necessary as care of the soul since matter is also a manifestation of God, and must not be considered as hostile or opposed to Him. In connection with his struggle against asceticism, it is natural that he should have fought also against the strictness and the sanctimoniousness that had gradually developed from the strict Talmudic standpoint. Not that Besht required the abrogation of any religious ceremonies or of a single observance. His target was the great importance which the Talmudic view attached to the fulfilment of a law, while almost entirely disregarding sentiment or the growth of man's inner life. While the rabbis of his day considered the study of the Talmud as the most important religious activity, Besht laid all the stress on prayer. "All that I have achieved," he once remarked, " I have achieved not through study, but through prayer." Prayer, however, is not petitioning God to grant a request, though that is one end of prayer, but ffipi^ ("cleaving") the feeling of oneness with God, the state of the soul when man gives up the consciousness of his separate existence, first

result of his principles

optimism.



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