Books

Showing 1–16 of 29 results

  • “Inyanah shel ha-Hasidut” (“The Matter of Hasidism”)

    by Rabbi Bezalel Naor

    In this groundbreaking essay, the author presents Beshtian or East European Hasidism as an attempt to reintroduce the charismatic or prophetic dimension to Jewish life. The optic is very much that of Rav Kook, although the author’s perspective is also influenced by the historiography of Rav Kook’s fellow kabbalist, Rabbi Pinhas Hakohen Lintop of Birzh, Lithuania. The reader will also note some common ground shared with Rabbi Kalonymos Kalmish Shapira of Piaseczna (known as the Rebbe of the Warsaw Ghetto). The departure point for the entire discussion is a pithy remark by Rabbi Shelomo Zalman Schneerson, Rebbe of Kopyst, at the Simhat Beit ha-Sho’evah, Sukkot of 1890. (Rav Kook’s maternal grandfather was a Kopyster Hasid.)

     

    The endnotes contain fascinating discussions:

    • Did Hasidism intend prophecy for the masses?
    • How the Vilna Gaon democratized ru’ah ha-kodesh (divine inspiration).
    • What was the mystical practice of the Ba‘al Shem Tov?
    • The clairvoyance of the Mezritcher Maggid.
    • Hasidism, Romanticism and the Enlightenment.
    • Rabbi Isaac Hutner’s allusion to the Letters of Rav Kook.
    • Clarification of Maimonides’ position on Prophecy and Halakhah.
    • The relation of the Kotzker Rebbe to the Vilna Gaon.

     

    Downloadable PDF link available upon purchase.

  • Tsimtsum (contraction) and hitpashtut (expansion).

    These two kabbalistic terms aptly describe the thought of Bezalel Naor. Though diametrically opposed, they come together in this unique moment. The author is at once a “hedgehog” and a “fox,” in the usage of Isaiah Berlin. Naor brings to the table both the intense focus, the razor-sharp analysis of Rav Soloveitchik of Boston, and the synthetic, unitive perception of reality, of Rav Kook (whose bon mot was “kelaliyut,” “universality”).

    This dialectic thought, constantly “zooming” in and out, forever shifting gears from “micro” to “macro,” is unleashed on the entire process of Judaism: Torah, Talmud, the challenge of Christianity and Islam, Maimonides, Kabbalah, Hasidism, Messianism, and the specialty of the house—Rav Kook.

    The final section of Book Reviews includes a wide array: Kozhnitser Maggid, Kafka, Paul Celan, Leonard Cohen, Yehudah Don Yahya, Meshulam Rath, and Rabbi Nahman of Breslov.

    The reader is invited to embark on this enchanted intellectual and spiritual journey, as the author attempts “navigating worlds.” (One of the chapters of the book is entitled “Rav Kook’s Space Odyssey.”)

    Hardcover Binding, in 2 Volumes

  • Tsimtsum (contraction) and hitpashtut (expansion).

    These two kabbalistic terms aptly describe the thought of Bezalel Naor. Though diametrically opposed, they come together in this unique moment. The author is at once a “hedgehog” and a “fox,” in the usage of Isaiah Berlin. Naor brings to the table both the intense focus, the razor-sharp analysis of Rav Soloveitchik of Boston, and the synthetic, unitive perception of reality, of Rav Kook (whose bon mot was “kelaliyut,” “universality”).

    This dialectic thought, constantly “zooming” in and out, forever shifting gears from “micro” to “macro,” is unleashed on the entire process of Judaism: Torah, Talmud, the challenge of Christianity and Islam, Maimonides, Kabbalah, Hasidism, Messianism, and the specialty of the house—Rav Kook.

    The final section of Book Reviews includes a wide array: Kozhnitser Maggid, Kafka, Paul Celan, Leonard Cohen, Yehudah Don Yahya, Meshulam Rath, and Rabbi Nahman of Breslov.

    The reader is invited to embark on this enchanted intellectual and spiritual journey, as the author attempts “navigating worlds.” (One of the chapters of the book is entitled “Rav Kook’s Space Odyssey.”)

  • Legends of Rabbah bar Bar Hannah with Commentary of Rav Kook

     

  • Orot, Inc. together with Ramhal Institute, Jerusalem, just released this new work by Bezalel Naor, Shod Melakhim, a collection of studies in Maimonides’ Mishneh Torah. 176 pages. Hebrew. Contains tribute to Rabbi Joshua Hoffman zt”l.

    Available from Orot, Inc. (USA) or Ramhal Institute (Israel).

    Price: $21.95 + $8.55 shipping US Priority Mail.

    We do not ship outside of the USA

     

  • Edition: Second Edition
    Publisher: Kodesh Press
    Published: December 20th, 2016
    Pages: 264
    Binding: Hardcover
    Price: $27.95

  • Edition: Second Edition
    Publisher: Kodesh Press
    Published: December 20th, 2016
    Pages: 264
    Binding: Paperback
    Price: $21.95

  • Pages 382
    Language English
    Binding Paperback
  • Pages 592
    Language Hebrew/English
    Binding Hardcover
  • Mahol la-Tsaddikim/Dance Circle for the Righteous explores the divine design in the creation of the universe. Although Maimonides (Guide of the Perplexed) shied away from this conversation, deeming the question illegitimate, the Kabbalists produced not one, but two responses to the question: a philosophic approach which centers on God’s ultimate goodness (Luzzatto), and a mythic approach which pivots on God’s “self-actualization,” as it were (Zohar, Luria). The departure point of our book is a fundamental mahloket or controversy between Rabbi Moshe Hayyim Luzzatto (Ramhal), on the one hand, and Rabbi Pinhas Elijah Hurwitz (Sefer ha-Berit) and the great Habad thinker Rabbi Eizik of Homel, on the other.

    To order the book in Israel, click here: Mahol La-Tsaddikim

    CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE

  • Rabbi Nachman of Breslov (1772-1810), great-grandson of Israel Ba’al Shem Tov, founder of the East-European Hasidic movement, is considered by many the “genius of Hasidism.” His mysteriously allusive lessons and stories have invited numerous studies, both by his followers, the Breslov Hasidim, and by academic scholars of various stripes. Needless to say, modern spiritual teachers such as the late Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan and the contemporary Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz have written commentaries to Rabbi Nachman’s stories. Somehow, until now, the one poem from the hand of Rabbi Nachman —ShirNa’im, translated as Song of Delight— has escaped notice.

  • Between the two world wars, there roamed the streets of Jerusalem a man who made a nuisance of himself, pestering the populace that he was the Messiah.
    Finally the “Messiah” was brought to the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem. Rav Kook asked to meet with the deranged man alone. After a few moments with Rav Kook, the “Messiah” never again boasted his claim.
    Sometime later Rav Kook revealed what produced such a wondrous effect. “I told him: ‘The truth is, there is a spark of Messiah in every Jew. You obviously have received an especially large endowment. But the quality of the spark is such that it works only as long as one does not speak of it to others.’”

    Unlike many Orthodox thinkers, Rabbi Abraham Isaac Hakohen Kook did not shy away from the subject of Sabbatianism. His published works reveal a more than fleeting interest in the entire Sabbatian phenomenon, from the initial impetus of Messianic activity surrounding the person of Shabbetai Zevi, to the Hayyon and Emden-Eybeschütz controversies, to that Polish offshoot of Sabbatianism, Frankism. This interest extends to both the external, historical, as well as internal, philosophical and psychological aspects. Rav Kook is even willing to rebut the author of ‘Or la-Yesharim ‘s comparison of Herzlian political Zionism to Sabbatianism.

Showing 1–16 of 29 results