The Study of Hasidism: Past Trends and New Directions

This chapter evaluates past trends and new directions in the study of hasidism. One question which has dominated the study of early hasidism is what factor or factors may account for the emergence and rapid spread of the movement. The mere fact that this question has occupied so many minds for so long needs no justification, in so far as the endeavour to discover the causal relationships between phenomena and events is a sine qua non of historical thinking. Nevertheless, what has lent this question its particular poignancy is the extraordinary speed with which hasidism gained acceptance throughout eastern Europe, and the persistence of this process despite the vehement opposition encountered by the new movement. The most influential attempts to answer this question have been those of Simon Dubnow, Benzion Dinur, and Raphael Mahler. All three historians sought to explain the emergence of hasidism and its rapid dissemination against the background of what Dubnow called the ‘historical framework’, that is to say, the political, economic, and social circumstances of eastern European Jewry during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Another important trend in the study of hasidism is represented by the work of Gershom Scholem and his followers. The crucial question for Scholem was the religious and spiritual identity of the new movement.