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TheTanya (Hebrew:תניא) is an early work ofHasidic philosophy, by RabbiShneur Zalman of Liadi, the founder ofChabad Hasidism, first published in 1796. Its formal title isLikkutei Amarim (ליקוטי אמרים,Hebrew, "collection of statements") but is more commonly known by its first word (tanya), which in Aramaic means "it has been taught". Zalman is referring to abaraita in"Niddah" chapter 3 in the word’s first usage. TheTanya is composed of five sections that define Hasidic mystical psychology and theology as a handbook for daily spiritual life in Jewish observance.
TheTanya is the main work ofChabad philosophy and the Chabad approach toHasidic mysticism, as it defines its general interpretation and method. The subsequent extensive library of the Chabad school, authored by successive leaders, builds upon the approach of theTanya. Chabad differed from mainstream Hasidism by its philosophical investigation and intellectual analysis of Hasidic Torah exegesis. This emphasised the mind as the route to internalising Hasidic mysticaldveikus (emotional fervour), in contrast to general Hasidism's creative enthusiasm in faith. Consequently, Chabad Hasidic writings are typically characterised by their systematic intellectual structure, while other classic texts of general Hasidic mysticism are usually more compiled or anecdotal.
As one of the founding figures of Hasidic mysticism, Schneur Zalman and his approach in theTanya are revered by some other Hasidic schools, although they tend to avoid itsmeditative methods. In Chabad, it is called "theWritten Torah of Hasidus", with the subsequent Chabad corpus being the analogicalOral Torah. In it, Zalman brings the new interpretations ofJewish mysticism by theBaal Shem Tov, founder of Hasidism, into philosophical articulation and definition. This intellectual form synthesises Hasidic concepts of divine omnipresence and Jewish soulfulness with other historical components ofRabbinic literature, embodied in theTalmud,Jewish philosophy,Musar (ethical) literature andLurianic Kabbalah. TheTanya has therefore been seen in Chabad as the defining Hasidic text and a subsequent stage of Jewish mystical evolution.[1]
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TheTanya deals withJewishspirituality,psychology andtheology from the point of view ofHasidic philosophy and its inner explanations ofKabbalah (Jewish mysticism). It offers advice for each individual on how to serve God in his daily life.
The first few generations of the Hasidic movement established the various approaches of its different schools. The third generation great students ofDov Ber of Mezeritch, who spread out across Eastern Europe, became the leaders ofHasidism in Ukraine, Poland, Hungary and Russia. Among them, Schneur Zalman articulated a different approach to Hasidic philosophy from general Hasidism. The founding Hasidic mysticism of theBaal Shem Tov, and subsequent Hasidic Masters, emphasised the emotions ofdveikus to cleave to the Omnipresent Divine. The intellectual ("Chabad") approach of Schneur Zalman, continued by successiveLubavitchRebbes, emphasised the mind as the route to the inner heart. The Chabad school requires knowledge of Godliness, drawn from Hasidic philosophy, to establish Hasidic mystical faith. This enabled Schneur Zalman to take Hasidus toLithuanian Jews from nearbyWhite Russia, and aroused the opposition of their early leaders. In this, Chabad is a separate offshoot of general Hasidism, and to its students is the profound fulfillment of systematically articulating its inner depths. Therefore, in Chabad, the Baal Shem Tov and Schneur Zalman, who share the same birthday, are called the "two great luminaries" (after Genesis 1:16, according to theMidrashic account, before the moon was diminished), representing heart and mind.
The historical development ofKabbalah from the 12th century, and its new formulations in the 16th century, explained the subtle aspects and categories of the traditional system of Jewishmetaphysics.Hasidic spirituality left aside the abstract focus of Kabbalah on the Spiritual Realms, to look at its inner meaning and soul as it relates to man in this World.[2] The founder of Hasidism, the Baal Shem Tov, brought the Kabbalistic idea of OmnipresentDivine immanence in Creation into daily Jewish worship of the common folk. This enabled the popularisation of Kabbalah by relating it to the natural psychological perception and emotionaldveikus (fervour) of man. The mystical dimension of Judaism became accessible and tangible to the whole community. Outwardly this was expressed in new veneration of sincerity, emphasis on prayer and deeds of loving-kindness. The unlettered Jewish folk were cherished and encouraged in their sincere simplicity, while the elite scholars sought to emulate their negation of ego through study of Hasidic exegetical thought.Hagiographic storytelling about Hasidic Masters captured the mystical charisma of thetzaddik. The inner dimension of this mystical revival of Judaism was expressed by the profound new depth of interpretation of Jewish mysticism in Hasidic philosophy. Great scholars also followed the Baal Shem Tov as they saw the profound meanings of his new teachings. The Baal Shem Tov's successorDov Ber of Mezeritch became the architect of the Hasidic movement, and explained to his close circle of disciples the underlying meanings of the Baal Shem Tov's explanations, parables and stories.
Mind versus heart. Among Dov Ber's disciples, RabbiSchneur Zalman of Liadi formed Hasidic philosophy into a profound intellectual system, called "Chabad" after the Kabbalistic terms for the intellect, that differs from mainstream Hasidic emotional approaches to mystical faith. This seeks inward Jewish observance, while seeing charismatic Hasidic enthusiasm as external and downplaying it. The mysticism of Schneur Zalman did not seek cold intellectual investigation. In common with all of Hasidism, it awakens joy and negation of self-awareness, from the Jew's perception of the Divine in all things. But Chabad, later to be called after its Russian village of Lubavitch, sees external emotional expression as superficial if devoid of inner contemplation. In this vein, it is related that the second Lubavitch Rebbe,Dov Ber Schneuri, would pray motionless for hours. Emotional expression was replaced with inner, hidden emotional ecstasy from his intellectual contemplation of Hasidic philosophy during prayer. At the end of praying, his hat and clothing would be soaked in perspiration. Typically, he wrote one of the most personal mystical accounts in Judaism, his "Tract on Ecstasy", that instructs the Chabad follower in the levels of contemplation. This explains his father's concept of the Chabad articulation of Hasidism. While the Baal Shem Tov stressed the heart, Schneur Zalman stressed the mind, but it was a warm, fiery mystical intellectualism.
Intellect versus faith. By giving Hasidus philosophical investigation, the Chabad school explained the inner meanings of the "Torah of the Baal Shem Tov". Its systematic investigation enables the mind to grasp and internalize the transcendent spirituality of mainstream Hasidism. If the mind can bring the soul of Hasidism into understanding and knowledge through logic, then its effects on the person can be more inward. The classic writings of other Hasidic schools also relate the inner mysticism of Hasidic philosophy to the perception of each person. The aim of the Hasidic movement is to offer the Jewish mystical tradition in a new, internal form that speaks to every person. This would awaken spiritual awareness and feeling of God, through understanding of its mystical thought. Mainstream Hasidism relates this mystical revival through charismatic leadership and understanding based faith. The path of Schneur Zalman differs from other Hasidism, as it seeks to approach the heart through the development of the mind. Chabad writings of each generation of its dynasty, develop this intellectual explanation of Hasidic mystical ideas, into successively greater and more accessible reach. In recent times the last two Rebbes expressed the spiritual warmth of Chabad in terms of daily reality, language and relevance, in the Yiddish translations and memoires ofYosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, and especially theLikkutei Sichos ofMenachem Mendel Schneerson.
Chabad Hasidus and other dimensions of Jewish thought. Because the approach of Chabad explains Hasidus in intellectual form, it can incorporate into its explanation the other aspects of historical Jewish thought. Complimentary or initially contradictory explanations of Jewish thought fromRabbinic Judaism,Jewish philosophy andKabbalah can become synthesised into one unity. It can connect the different disciplines of mysticism (Kabbalah) andJewish philosophy (Hakira), by relating to a higher, essential unity in Divinity, that harmonises diverse ideas. This approaches classic questions of theology from a different route than Hakira. The Jewish philosophers of the Middle Ages, such asMaimonides, reconciledJudaism withGreek philosophy. Their explanations of the nature of the Divine, are related from man's independent understanding from first principles. Hasidic thought looks to the inner meaning of Kabbalah, a conceptual system ofmetaphysics from mystical encounters withrevelation. The insights it brings to theological questions, brought out in its Chabad explanation, are related from a mystical, higher reality "from above". When Hasidic thought addresses traditional questions, such asDivine Providence,immanence andtranscendence, it offers "Inner Torah" explanations of spirituality, that can also be harmonised with the explanations of the "Revealed Torah". It is the ability of Hasidic thought to bring the abstract, esoteric systems of Kabbalah into conscious perception and mystical faith, by relating them to man's inner psychological awareness. The ideal of the Chabad approach is to articulate this spiritual perception in terms of man's understanding and knowledge.[3]
According to legend, Rabbi Shneur Zalman published hisLikkutei Amarim anonymously in 1797. Later editions incorporated additional writings by Shneur Zalman. The latest version of this work, dating from 1814,[citation needed] consists of five parts:
In general, the first book is a universal Jewish guidebook toavodah, everyday Divine service, through Schneur Zalman's innovative system, applyingJewish mysticism step-by-step to the internal drama of human psychology. As a formative approach guidebook in Judaism, the English translator of the first section, in his introduction, compares its position with Maimonides'Guide for the Perplexed, but contrasts the spiritual guidance aim of Tanya with the philosophical aim of Maimonides. The second section's philosophical exposition of Hasidic mysticalPanentheism is the underlying foundation forcontemplation methods in the first part, and gives the theoretical definition of Hasidism's theology of God. The third section guides individuals in a Habad Hasidic approach torepentance, to be able to prepare more deeply for the first part's guidance. The last two added sections give more complicated and in-depthHasidic exposition ofKabbalistic concepts, the author uniting abstract ideas with the importance of everyday service and an emotion that must accompany it. These discourses are similar to the exegetical commentaries of Schneur Zalman in his other works, though here they sometimes take the form of letters to his followers, with more direct advice.
Most of the work's first part, "The Book of the Average Man", thebeinoni, serves as a fundamental and basic guide to the spiritual service ofGod.
Unlike other early Hasidic works, this book is not a collection of sermons or stories, but rather asystematic exposition of Shneur Zalman'sphilosophy. Lubavitcher Hasidim are enjoined to study from this work each day as part ofChitas - an acronym forChumash,Tehillim and Tanya. The Rebbes of Chabad taught that it is a sacred duty to publish and distribute this book as widely as possible.
The Tanya seeks to demonstrate to the "average" Jewish man or woman that knowledge of God is there for the taking, that spiritual growth to ever higher levels is real and imminent, if one is willing to engage in the struggle.[5] Although many view the Tanya as a work of explanation on Kabbalah or Jewish mysticism, its approbations make clear that Tanya is first and foremost a book of advice in the practical service of God.
The Tanya describes five levels:
TheTanya's hypotheses that every Jew has two souls and that the souls of non-Jews are fundamentally different from those of Jews (with non-Jewish souls originating from the realm of evil) have been controversial. More precisely, theTanya states that Jewish people have two souls: thenefesh elokis (or divine soul) and thenefesh behamis (or animal soul), which is not inherently evil but basic. It states that non-Jews have only the latter. InIsrael Shahak's bookJewish History, Jewish Religion: The Weight of Three Thousand Years, he states that many Orthodox communities today hold this belief, and gives various examples of where they get this belief from. In reference to Gentile intercourse, theHalakha says that Gentiles have the "flesh of asses(donkey)" and whose "issue(semen) is like that of horses". This attitude of treating Gentiles and their behavior as animalistic is furthered upon in the Talmud tractateBerakhot, where it's stated that sex between a Jewish person and a Gentile is the same asbestiality.[9] Another prominent example is inMaimonides's bookThe Guide for the Perplexed, which is regarded as the greatest work of Jewish religious philosophy ever by most Orthodox communities. There is a passage near the end of the third book that clarifies who is and is not capable of reaching the true worship of God. Some of those who aren't capable are:
Some of the Turks [i.e., the Mongol race) and the nomads in the North, and the Blacks and the nomads in the South, and those who resemble them in our climates. And their nature is like the nature of mute animals, and according to my opinion they are not on the level of human beings, and their level among existing things is below that of a man and above that of a monkey, because they have the image and the resemblance of a man more than a monkey does.[10][11]
Shahak explains in his bookJewish Fundamentalism in Israel, that several of the most revered people in Orthodox communities confirmed this belief.Abraham Isaac Kook, the founder ofReligious Zionism, once stated:
“The difference between a Jewish soul and souls of non-Jews – all of them in all different levels – is greater and deeper than the difference between a human soul and the souls of cattle.”[12][13]
Kook was heavily influenced byIsaac Luria, who is the founder of the Lurianic school of Kabbalah, which is the most influential school of Kabbalah. Israeli scholar Isaiah Tishby quoted Luria's chief interpreter in his bookThe Theory of Evil and the (Satanic) Sphere in Lurianic Cabbala, who explained that Gentile souls are evil because:
“Souls of non-Jews come entirely from the female part of the satanic sphere. For this reason souls of non-Jews are called evil, not good, and are created without [divine] knowledge.”[14]
Also in Shahak's bookJewish Fundamentalism in Israel,Menachem Mendel Schneerson, who was the seventh head Rebbe of the Chabad-Lubavitch dynasty and one of the most influential Jewish leaders of the 20th century, is quoted as saying:
The difference between a Jewish and a non-Jewish person stems from the common expression: “Let us differentiate.” Thus, we do not have a case of profound change in which a person is merely on a superior level. Rather, we have a case of “let us differentiate” between totally different species. This is what needs to be said about the body: the body of a Jewish person is of a totally different quality from the body of [members] of all nations of the world ... The Old Rabbi explained that the passage in Chapter 49 of Hatanya: “And you have chosen us” [the Jews] means specifically that the Jewish body was chosen [by God], because a choice is thus made between outwardly similar things. The Jewish body “looks as if it were in substance similar to bodies of non-Jews,” but the meaning ... is that the bodies only seem to be similar in material substance, outward look and superficial quality. The difference of the inner quality, however, is so great that the bodies should be considered as completely different species. This is the reason why the Talmud states that there is an halachic difference in attitude about the bodies of non-Jews [as opposed to the bodies of Jews]” “their bodies are in vain.” ... An even greater difference exists in regard to the soul. Two contrary types of soul exist, a non-Jewish soul comes from three satanic spheres, while the Jewish soul stems from holiness. As has been explained, an embryo is called a human being, because it has both body and soul. Thus, the difference between a Jewish and a non-Jewish embryo can be understood. There is also a difference in bodies. The body of a Jewish embryo is on a higher level than is the body of a non-Jew.[15]
Writers such as Shahak and Raphael Josep have asserted that this idea has the potential to develop into or to provide support for racism[16][17], and Rabbi Geoffrey Dennis explains that it endorses a kind of "metaphysical racism".[18] Some Orthodox Jews have spoke against and protested the teaching of the Tanya, such as the community of the Hampstead Garden Suburb Synagogue in London, England.[19]
In Chabad, theTanya is said to be theWritten Torah of Hasidic philosophy, for it is the first work of Hasidic philosophy recorded by its own author, in contrast to the works of theBa'al Shem Tov and theMaggid of Mezritch, whose words were transcribed by their disciples.[20] This implies that the teachings of Hasidic philosophy in general are all an exposition of theTanya, just as theTorah teaches that the entire purpose of theOral Torah is to elucidate theWritten Torah.
In his preface to theTanya, the author writes that anyone with questions about the meaning or application of theTanya's guidance should approach "the great ones in his city." In Chabad Hasidic parlance such a guide is known as aMashpia. Such a person is trained by his predecessors in correct application of theTanya.
Many works have been written explaining theTanya, in particular: the Lubavitcher Rebbe'sReshimos on theTanya,HaLekach VehaLibuv,Shiu'rim BeSefer HaTanya (in its English translation, known as "Lessons in Tanya"),[21]Maskil Le'Eisan,Biurei Ha'Tanya, and "Opening TheTanya", "Learning theTanya", and "Understanding theTanya" byRabbi Adin Steinsaltz.
The Tanya had a great influence upon RabbiKalonymus Kalman Shapira of Piaseczno who quotes it many times in his works. In his "Mevo HaShearim" he contrasts the approach of the Tanya to that of Karliner Hasidism.
TheTanya's negative statements aboutgentiles are controversial in contemporary Jewish scholarship due to their alleged conflict with modern moral concepts.[19][better source needed]
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