Chabad-Lubavitch
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Origins in Russia, Ukraine, Poland
Main publications/writings
The Tanya
- Tanya: Formally titled Likkutai Amarim but universally known as “Tanya” (“The Sages Taught”) it is the magnum opus of Chasidic master Sh’neur Zalman of Laydi and the central text of the CHaBaD branch of Chasidism. Tanya is a large, sprawling fusion of medieval philosophy with Zoharic and Lurianic Kabbalah . It has many teachings regarding the Pleroma, the soul, and reincarnation, among other things. Its most radical teaching is that of “acosmism,” that the world is an illusion (Tanya 320). Its most problematic concept is its endorsement of a kind of metaphysical racism, for it teaches that non-Jewish souls emanate from the Sitra Achra, the realm of evil, and are fundamentally different from Jewish souls.[1]
The move to New York
Kahane
Crown Heights - 1991
In 1991, a car accompanying Schneerson's motorcade accidentally struck two Guyanese-American children while attempting to catch up to Schneerson's vehicle. One of the children was killed. The incident triggered the Crown Heights riot.
In Palestine
Safed
Hebron
Cohen writes:
- In the nineteenth century, Hebron was the center of Chabad Hasidism in the Holy Land. Most of the members of the sect who lived in Palestine were in Hebron, and they constituted a majority of the city’s Ashkenazi Jewish population. That had not always been the case.
- As the Hasidic movement became consolidated in Eastern Europe in the second half of the eighteenth century, small numbers of its devotees began arriving in the Holy Land. In 1777 several of the movement’s leaders arrived there, with a number of followers and hangers-on. Numbering about 200 in all, they settled in the Galilee and established the Hasidic community in the Land of Israel. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, Chabad found itself in conflict with the rest of the Hasidic community for both religious and financial reasons. As a result, some fifteen Chabad families left Safed in the Galilee and settled in Hebron alongside the Sephardi community, which had arrived and integrated itself into the city following the Spanish expulsion in 1492 (Yaari 1960). This took place while the founder and leader of the Chabad movement, Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, author of the philosophical and mystical work Tanya, was still alive. In the generation that followed, his son and successor, Dov-Ber, known as the Mittler (middle) Rebbe, sent more of his followers to Hebron, and in 1845 his daughter, Menuha Rachel Slonim, arrived and came to be known as the “mother of the Ashkenazi Yishuv in Hebron.” Chabad had become the largest Ashkenazi community in the city. And, as in Europe, it stood at the forefront of the fight against Zionism.[2]
However, its relationship with Zionism was complex and became more so.
- To advance the fight against Zionism and maskilim —the advocates of Jewish enlightenment inspired by the secularizing and rational trends in Western European culture —the admor of Chabad ordered, on the eve of World War I, the establishment of a Chabad yeshiva in Hebron —in Hebron and not in Jerusalem (Ratzabi 1996, 84; Landau 1985). The yeshiva opened its doors in 1912 in a building known as the Romano House, after the wealthy Turkish-Jewish family that had built it forty years previously. The family had come on hard times and put the property up for sale. Competition for the house was intense —interested buyers included the house’s Arab neighbors, Christian missionaries, and the Alliance Française, which wanted to open a modern school there. But the Chabad community beat the others and celebrated its victory over the gentiles and, in particular, over Zionist and secular Jewish influence. This brings us back to our core question: if the Jewish community in Hebron opposed Zionism, why were the Arabs so upset?[3]
The Hebron 'massacre'
According to Heilman and Friedman:
- When Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak returned in August 1929, he was convinced that Palestine was not going to work out as a place to locate a Temimim yeshiva, since Arab riots had broken out in Hebron on August 23 and 24 in which nearly seventy Jews, among whom were students of the newly established Slobodka Yeshiva in Hebron, were murdered—all this shortly after he had visited this city of the forefathers... Indeed, there were some suggestions that the Lubavitcher rebbe’s visit to Hebron may have been a precipitating factor in the subsequent rioting there... There is no hard evidence that the riots were in reaction to the visit. However, the fact that Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak managed to enter holy places inside the mosque over the burial cave of the patriarchs, which at the time were off-limits for Jewish visitors, and thus jar the status quo in the place would surely have antagonized Muslim zealots in Hebron. The 1929 Arab rioters claimed that their actions were precipitated by what they saw as Jewish efforts to disturb the delicate status quo around holy places in the Holy Land.[4][5]
Schneerson 'departed the Holy Land on Thursday, August 22', a day before violence erupted.[6]
Kfar Chabad
Yitzhar
- Itzhak Ginzburg is the head of Od Yosef Chai Yeshiva in Yitzhar, the most extreme rabbinical institution in the West Bank. Officially Ginzburg is a Chabad rabbi, however, most of his followers are known as the “hill dwellers,” young adults of a unique spiritual agenda that combines an ascetic and tough lifestyle with neo-Chassidic tendencies.[7]
- Rabbi Yitzhak Shapira, who was detained for questioning by the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) in connection with the burning of a mosque in Yasuf, a village near Nablus, is head of the Od Yosef Chai Yeshiva in Yitzhar, and is a disciple of Rabbi Yitzhak Ginsberg, who lives in Kfar Chabad.
- Some of the guidelines mentioned at the back of the book in a section entitled "Conclusions - Chapter Five: The Killing of Gentiles in War," include the following: "There is a reason to kill babies [on the enemy side] even if they have not transgressed the seven Noahide Laws [to believe in God, not to commit idolatry, murder, theft or adultery, to set up a legal system, and not to tear a limb from a live animal] because of the future danger they may present, since it is assumed that they will grow up to be evil like their parents."[8]
Kahanism in Palestine
Leading up to the 2009 elections, the Jewish National Front (known as Hayil after its Hebrew acronym), headed by a long-time Kach party activist Baruch Marzel, allied with Eretz Yisrael Shelanu, a new party founded by Chabad Rabbi Shalom Dov Wolpo. The joint list ran as part of the National Union, with Michael Ben-Ari, its representative, taking the fourth spot on the alliance's list. The National Union won four seats, allowing Ben-Ari to enter the Knesset.[9]
In the UK
In Ukraine
- Shmuel Kaminetsky, a Chabad rabbi born in Israel, rebuilt the local Jewish community according to a simple motto: Whatever it takes. Sometimes he borrowed, convincing 10 rabbis-in-training from Morristown, N.J., and Montreal to come to Dnipro for a year. Sometimes he charmed, such as when he persuaded Jews from Boston, London, Miami and elsewhere to commit millions of dollars to programs for the sick, the poor and the young in a city they barely knew, in a region the world had given up on. Sometimes he brokered, like when he secured medical treatment for a local crime boss in return for a hands-off policy toward Jews.
The miraculous results are visible today at the Menorah Center, a marble-clad collection of kosher restaurants, communal and religious buildings, a luxury hotel, and a youth hostel. Its boosters say that it is the largest multifunction Jewish complex in Europe. [10]
In Russia
A JTA report in 2008 states[11]:
- The mayor of Moscow recognized the president of a Chabad-led umbrella group for his efforts developing the city. Alexander Boroda, the head of the Federation of Jewish Communities, developed a sprawling complex in the Marina Roscha district that includes the largest synagogue and Jewish community center in Eastern Europe, a medical and charity center, and an educational complex. Plans call for a Museum of Tolerance in the district dedicated to Jewish history with a focus on Russia.
- Mayor Yury Luzhkov noted Boroda’s “great contribution to the development of the construction industry in Moscow and many years of dedicated work,” according to the federation’s Web site. Luzhkov has deep connections to the booming real estate and development industries of Moscow. His wife, Yelena Baturina, Russia’s only female billionaire, heads one of the largest construction companies in the capital. Real estate analysts say it is nearly impossible to gain ground for any major development project without the city government’s blessing.
Baturina features at 160 in the Sunday Times Rich List 2022 with a reported wealth of £1.133 billion.
- Berel Lezar – Chabad Rabbi, Moscow… https://www.torahcafe.com/torahcafemobile/video/ca01bcba8
- ‘we are the Jewish establishment in Russia. There’s no Jewish Federation. We are the Jewish Federation. There’s no ADL, |We are the ADL. There’s no AJC, we are the AJC. Judaism in Russia is run 98% by Chabad.’ Rabbi Dovid Eliezrie.[12]
- Many former Soviet oligarchs, some who have been drawn back to Judaism through Chabad, have become supporters and donors including Mikhail Mirilashvili of Georgia, Ukrainian billionaire Gennadiy Bogolyubov, Alexander Granovsky from Ukraine and Alexander Mashkevich. Although he is not Jewish, Tevfik Arif, a Kazak-Turkish real estate investor and partner in Doyen Group, has become one of the largest single donors to the Chabad Center of Port Washington in Long Island, the community where he owns a residence.
- The religious movement has also found supporters among the most successful American business leaders. Ronald Perelman, American billionaire and philanthropist of Revlon fame, has become a close friend and follower of Rabbi Avrohom Shemtov, the director of the Philadelphia Lubavitcher Center. Perelman has made numerous donations to Chabad and has a building dedicated in his name at the University of Pennsylvania, the Ronald O. Perelman Center for Jewish Life-Lubavitch House. Other prominent American Chabad donors include: American investor and billionaire Michael Steinhardt, heir to Estee Lauder Companies Ronald Lauder and Shaya Boymelgreen.
- Globally, Australian tycoon Joseph Gutnick, South African billionaire Nathan Kirsh, and Eduardo Elsztain, Argentina's largest real-estate developer, are all well-known supporters of Chabad.[13]
Involvement in fake antisemitic attacks
Winnipeg
A CBC report, from October 2020, stated that the Chabad community in Los Angeles provided support to a Jewish couple who faked an antisemitic attack on their cafe in Winnipeg, Canada. In April 2019, the Cafe had allegedly been vandalized with anti-Semitic graffiti the night before Passover but 6 days later the Police said that they "believed the whole event was staged and the family members were charged." Records of the trial show that the Cafe had mounting financial pressure but the couple who owned the Cafe denied staging the crime. The defence said that the family had since lost their business and home and were "ostracized in Winnipeg in general and within the Jewish community as well." The family remained in America due to the Covid-19 pandemic. [14]
People
Rebbes
- Shneur Zalman of Liadi (Alter Rebbe) 1745-1813
- Dovber Schneuri (Mitteler Rebbe) 1773-1827
- Menachem Mendel Schneersohn (Tzemach Tzedek)1789-1866
- Shmuel Schneersohn (Maharash) 1834-1882
- Sholom Dovber Schneersohn (Rashab) 1860-1920
- Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn (Rayatz) 1880-1950
- Menachem Mendel Schneerson (the Rebbe) 1902-94
Hebron
- Menucha Rochel Slonim (1798–1888) was a daughter of Rabbi Dovber Schneuri, the second Rebbe of Chabad.
- Her husband's last name was originally Griver, a descendant of Rabbi Moses Isserles
- Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneersohn, brother-in-law of Menucah.
- Rabbi Mordechai Dov Slonim, Rabbi Yehuda Leib Slonim both sons of Rabbi Ya’akov Slonim and Rebbetzin Menucha Rochel Slonim
- Rebbetzin Moshke Devora Epstein - daughter of Yehuda Leib Slonim.
- Rabbi Yaakov Yosef Slonim/Jacob Joseph Slonim was the chief Ashkenazi rabbi during the 1929 Hebron 'massacre'.
- Eliezer Dan Slonim, spoke fluent Arabic, was a member on the city council and a director of the Anglo-Palestine Bank.
- Shlomo Slonim (1928-2014) was the grandson of Rabbi Yaakov Yosef Slonim and son of Eliezer Dan Slonim. Shlomo Slonim went on to join the Irgun Tzvai Leumi, the Haganah, and the Israel Defense Forces. He worked for Bank Leumi for almost 50 years,
Shluchim
Others
Global presence
Resources
- https://newvoices.org/2008/09/23/0001-4/
- http://en.hebron.org.il/history/520
- https://www.yu.edu/sites/default/files/2018-09/Berger_David-1.pdf
- https://www.chabad.org/news/article_cdo/aid/3898647/jewish/Rabbi-Zev-Dov-Slonim-83-Leading-Rabbi-in-Jerusalem.htm
- https://s3.amazonaws.com/ou.org/publications/ja/5763/5763fall/JUSTBETW.PDF
- https://jewishaction.com/letters/13648/
- http://holywar.org/jewishtr/micsam.htm
- 1988 documentary https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFSVAueBY9U
- Reviewed by Allan C. Brownfeld https://www.wrmea.org/000-march/book-review-jewish-fundamentalism-in-israel.html
See also
Books and articles
- Berger, David The Rebbe, the Messiah, and the Scandal of Orthodox Indifference The Littmann Library of Jewish Civilization. 2001, Pages 195.
- Berman, E. (2009). Voices of outreach: The construction of identity and maintenance of social ties among Chabad‐Lubavitch Emissaries. Journal for the scientific study of religion, 48(1), 69-85.
- Bilu, Y. (2020). With Us More Than Ever: Making the Absent Rebbe Present in Messianic Chabad. Stanford University Press.
- Blondheim, M., & Katz, E. (2016). Religion, communications, and Judaism: the case of digital Chabad. Media, Culture & Society, 38(1), 89-95.
- Bloom, S. G. (2000). Postville: A clash of cultures in heartland America. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
- Cohen, Hillel, 1929: Year Zero of the Arab-Israeli Conflict. Waltham, MA: Brandeis University Press, 2015.
- Cohen-Almagor, Raphael, Limits to Freedom of Speech : The Case of Incitement Les certitudes du droit Certainty and the Law, Les Editions Themis. Universite de Montreal Faculti de draft Centre de recherche en droit public
- Dein, S. (2001). What really happens when prophecy fails: The case of Lubavitch. Sociology of religion, 62(3), 383-401.
- Dein, S., & Dawson, L. L. (2008). The ‘Scandal’of the Lubavitch Rebbe: Messianism as a response to failed prophecy. Journal of Contemporary Religion, 23(2), 163-180.
- Ehrlich, A. M. (2004). The Messiah of Brooklyn: understanding Lubavitch hasidism past and present (Vol. 3). KTAV Publishing House, Inc..
- Elior, R. (1998). The Lubavitch Messianic Resurgence: The Historical and Mystical Background 1939-1996. In Toward the Millennium (pp. 383-408). Brill.
- Etkes, I. (2014). Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liady: The Origins of Chabad Hasidism. Brandeis University Press.
- Ferziger, A. S. (2013). From Lubavitch to lakewood: the Chabadization of American orthodoxy. Modern Judaism, 33(2), 101-124.
- Fishkoff, S. (2005). The Rebbe's army: Inside the world of Lubavitch-Chabad. New York: Schocken.
- Friedman, R. I. (1990). The false prophet: Rabbi Meir Kahane; from FBI informant to Knesset member. Hill.
- Katz, M. B. (2010). The visual culture of Chabad. Cambridge University Press.
- Hirschhorn, S. Y. (2017). City on a hilltop: The participation of Jewish-American immigrants within the Israeli settler movement, 1967–1987.Harvard University Press.
- Limonic, L. (2021). The Role of Transnational Actors in the Growth of Chabad-Lubavitch among Argentine Jews. Contemporary Jewry, 41(4), 843-857.
- Meadvin, G. B. M. (2021). The Counterculture to Chabad Lubavitch: The Search for Truth (Doctoral dissertation) Yeshiva University, January.
- Mezvinsky, N., & Kolb, J. (2013). Eyes Upon the Land: Chabad Lubavitch on Israel. Religious Studies and Theology, 32(1), 7-21.
- Pace, E. Extreme messianism: the Chabad movement and the impasse of the charisma Horiz. antropol. 13 (27) • June 2007 • https://doi.org/10.1590/S0104-71832007000100003
- Ravitzky, A. (1994). The contemporary Lubavitch Hasidic movement: Between conservatism and messianism. Accounting for fundamentalisms: The dynamic character of movements, 4, 303-327.
- Rigg, B. M. (2004). Rescued from the Reich. New Haven, CT:Yale University Press.
- Russ, S. M. (1981). The'Zionist Hooligans': The Jewish Defense League. City University of New York.
- Satherley, T. (2014). ‘The Simple Jew’: The ‘Price Tag’Phenomenon, Vigilantism, and Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh’s Political Kabbalah. Melilah: Manchester Journal of Jewish Studies (1759-1953), 10(1), 57-91.
- Satherley, T. D. (2015) Unity and opposites in Israel’s settler movement: Rabbi Tzvi Yisrael Tau & Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh Submitted in total fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, August, School of Historical and Philosophical Studies, The University of Melbourne
- Shahak, I. and Norton Mezvinsky Jewish Fundamentalism in Israel London: Pluto Press,1999, 176 pp.
- Tworek, W. (2017). Between hagiography and historiography: Chabad, scholars of Hasidism, and the case of the portrait of Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liady. East European Jewish Affairs, 47(1), 3-27.
Notes
- ↑ https://publicism.info/religion/jewish/20.html
- ↑ Cohen, Hillel, 1929: Year Zero of the Arab-Israeli Conflict. Waltham, MA: Brandeis University Press, 2015. p. 137.
- ↑ Cohen, Hillel, 1929: Year Zero of the Arab-Israeli Conflict. Waltham, MA: Brandeis University Press, 2015. p. 138.
- ↑ Heilman, S., & Friedman, M. (2010). The Rebbe: the life and afterlife of Menachem Mendel Schneerson. Princeton University Press. p. 108.
- ↑ The latter claims are supported by the following sources: Letter to Judge Gad Frumkin, who had accompanied Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak in Palestine, in Gad Frumkin, The Way of the Judge in Jerusalem (Tel Aviv: Dvir, 1955), 308–11. Ehud Ein-Gal, “Ten Days before the Massacre,” Haaretz Musaf, August 20, 2004.
- ↑ Chabad, Cause and Effect.
- ↑ Inbari, M. (2012). Messianic religious Zionism confronts Israeli territorial compromises. Cambridge University Press. P. 118.
- ↑ Matthew Wagner Shapira's distinction between Jewish, gentile blood: Shapira, who grew up in Kedumim, learned in religious-Zionist yeshivot, first in Merkaz Harav's High School and later in Merkaz Harav's yeshiva for older students. Jerusalem Post. JANUARY 28, 2010 04:36
- ↑ Knesset Member, Michael Ben Ari.
- ↑ Larry Tye [1] LA Times, 3 April 2022.
- ↑ https://www.jta.org/archive/the-mayor-of-moscow-recognized-the-president-of
- ↑ https://www.torahcafe.com/torahcafemobile/video/9a436e160 / https://archive.ph/dz1dQ
- ↑ https://newswire.net/newsroom/pr/00108133-ronald-perelman-lev-leviev-and-tevfik-arif-among-wealthy-donors-to-the-chabad-movement.html
- ↑ Kelly Geraldine Malone, Warrant issued for Winnipeg family charged with staging hate crime at café, CBC, 6 October 2020, archived on 11 April 2021