Abraham Joshua Heschel (January 11, 1907 – December 23, 1972) was a Polish-Americanrabbi and one of the leadingJewish theologians and Jewish philosophers of the 20th century. Heschel, a professor ofJewish mysticism at theJewish Theological Seminary of America, authored a number of widely read books onJewish philosophy and was a leader in the U.S.civil rights movement.^[1][2]

Abraham Joshua Heschel
Heschel in 1964
Personal life
Born	(1907-01-11)January 11, 1907 Warsaw,Congress Poland
Died	December 23, 1972(1972-12-23) (aged 65) New York, New York, U.S.
Spouse	Sylvia Straus ​ (m. 1946)​
Children	Susannah
Alma mater	University of Berlin Higher Institute for Jewish Studies
Religious life
Religion	Judaism
Denomination	Orthodox,Conservative
Profession	Theologian, philosopher

Abraham Joshua Heschel was born in Warsaw in 1907, the youngest of six children of Moshe Mordechai Heschel and Reizel Perlow Heschel.^[3] He was descended from preeminent Europeanrabbis on both sides of his family.^[4] His paternal great-great-grandfather and namesake wasRebbeAvraham Yehoshua Heshel ofApt in present-day Poland. His mother was also a descendant of Avraham Yehoshua Heshel and otherHasidic dynasties. His siblings were Sarah, Dvora Miriam, Esther Sima, Gittel, and Jacob. Their father Moshe died ofinfluenza in 1916 when Abraham was nine. He was tutored by aGerrer Hasid who introduced him to the thought of RabbiMenachem Mendel of Kotzk.^[5]

After a traditionalyeshiva education and studying for Orthodox rabbinical ordination (semicha), Heschel pursued his doctorate at theUniversity of Berlin and rabbinic ordination at the non-denominationalHochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums. There he studied under notable scholars includingHanoch Albeck,Ismar Elbogen,Julius Guttmann, Alexander Guttmann, andLeo Baeck. His mentor in Berlin was David Koigen.^[6] Heschel later taughtTalmud at the Hochschule. He joined aYiddish poetry group, Jung Vilna, and in 1933, published a volume of Yiddish poems,Der Shem Hamefoyrosh: Mentsch, dedicated to his father.^[4]

In late October 1938, while living in a rented room in the home of a Jewish family inFrankfurt, Heschel was arrested by theGestapo and deported to Poland in thePolenaktion. He spent ten months lecturing onJewish philosophy andTorah at Warsaw'sInstitute for Jewish Studies.^[4] Six weeks before theGerman invasion of Poland, Heschel fled Warsaw for London with the help ofJulian Morgenstern, president ofHebrew Union College, and Alexander Guttmann, an eventual colleague at the Hebrew Union College, who secretly re-wrote Heschel's ordination certificate to meet American visa requirements.^[4]

Heschel's sister Esther was killed in a German bombing. His mother was murdered by theNazis, and two other sisters, Gittel and Devorah, died inNazi concentration camps. He never returned to Germany, Austria or Poland. He once wrote, "If I should go to Poland or Germany, every stone, every tree would remind me of contempt, hatred, murder, of children killed, of mothers burned alive, of human beings asphyxiated."^[4]

Heschel arrived in New York City in March 1940.^[4] He soon left forCincinnati, serving on the faculty ofHebrew Union College (HUC), the main seminary ofReform Judaism, for five years. In 1946 he returned to New York, taking a position with theJewish Theological Seminary of America (JTS), the main seminary ofConservative Judaism. He remained with JTS as professor ofJewish ethics andMysticism until his death in 1972. At the time of his death, Heschel lived near JTS at 425 Riverside Drive inManhattan.^[7]

Heschel married Sylvia Straus, a concert pianist, on December 10, 1946, in Los Angeles. Their daughter,Susannah Heschel, became a Jewish scholar in her own right.^[8]

Heschel explicated many facets of Jewish thought, including studies on medievalJewish philosophy,Kabbalah, andHasidic philosophy. According to some scholars^[who?], he was more interested in spirituality than in critical text study; the latter was a specialty of many scholars at JTS. He was not given a graduate assistant for many years and he was mainly relegated to teach in the education school or the Rabbinical school, not in the academic graduate program. Heschel became friendly with his colleagueMordecai Kaplan. Though they differed in their approaches to Judaism, they had a very cordial relationship and visited each other's homes from time to time.

Heschel believed that the teachings of theHebrew prophets were a clarion call for social action in the United States and, inspired by this belief, he worked forAfrican Americans'civil rights and spoke out against theVietnam War.^[9]

He also criticized what he specifically called "pan-halakhism," or an exclusive focus upon religiously compatible behavior to the neglect of the non-legalistic dimension of rabbinic tradition.^[10]

Heschel is notable as a recent proponent of what one scholar calls the "Nachmanidean" school of Jewish thought - emphasizing the mutually dependent relationship between God and man - as opposed to the "Maimonidean" school in which God is independent and unchangeable.^[11] In Heschel's language, the "Maimonidean" perspective is associated withRabbi Yishmael and the "Nachmanidean" perspective withRabbi Akiva; according to Heschel neither perspective should be adopted in isolation, but rather both are interwoven with the other.^[12]

Heschel describedkabbalah as an outgrowth of classical rabbinic sources that describe God's dependence on man to implement the divine plan for the world. This contrasts with scholars likeGershon Scholem who saw kabbalah as reflecting the influence of non-Jewish thought.^[11] While Scholem's school focused on the metaphysics and history of kabbalistic thought, Heschel focused on kabbalistic descriptions of the human religious experience.^[13] In recent years, a growing body of kabbalah scholarship has followed Heschel's emphasis on the mystical experience of kabbalah and on its continuity with earlier Jewish sources.^[11]

Heschel is a widely read Jewish theologian whose most influential works includeMan Is Not Alone,God in Search of Man,The Sabbath, andThe Prophets. As a representative ofAmerican Jews at theSecond Vatican Council, Heschel persuaded theCatholic Church to eliminate or modify passages in its liturgy that demeaned Jews, or referred to an expected conversion of the Jewish people to Christianity. His theological works argued that religious experience is a fundamentally human impulse, not just a Jewish one. He believed that no religious community could claim a monopoly on religious truth.^[14] For these and other reasons,Martin Luther King Jr. called Heschel "a truly great prophet."^[15] Heschel actively participated in the Civil Rights movement, and was a participant in the thirdSelma to Montgomery march, accompanying Dr. King andJohn Lewis.^[16]

• The Earth Is the Lord's: The Inner World of the Jew in Eastern Europe. 1949.ISBN 1-879045-42-7
• Man Is Not Alone: A Philosophy of Religion. 1951.ISBN 0-374-51328-7
• The Sabbath: Its Meaning for Modern Man. 1951.ISBN 1-59030-082-3
• Man's Quest for God: Studies in Prayer and Symbolism. 1954.ISBN 0-684-16829-4
• God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism. 1955.ISBN 0-374-51331-7
• The Prophets. 1962.ISBN 0-06-093699-1
• Who Is Man? 1965.ISBN 0-8047-0266-7
• Israel: An Echo of Eternity. 1969.ISBN 1-879045-70-2
• A Passion for Truth. 1973.ISBN 1-879045-41-9
• I asked for Wonder: A spiritual anthology. 1983.ISBN 0-824505-42-5
• Heavenly Torah: As Refracted Through the Generations. 2005.ISBN 0-8264-0802-8
• Torah min ha-shamayim be'aspaklariya shel ha-dorot; Theology of Ancient Judaism. [Hebrew]. 2 vols. London: Soncino Press, 1962. Third volume, New York: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1995.
• The Ineffable Name of God: Man: Poems. 2004.ISBN 0-8264-1632-2
• Kotsk: in gerangl far emesdikeyt. [Yiddish]. 2 v. (694 p.) Tel-Aviv: ha-Menorah, 1973. Added t.p.: Kotzk: the struggle for integrity (A Hebrew translation of vol. 1, Jerusalem: Magid, 2015).
• Der mizrekh-Eyropeyisher Yid (Yiddish:The Eastern European Jew). 45 p. Originally published: New York: Shoken, 1946.

Man Is Not Alone: A Philosophy of Religion offers Heschel's views on how people can comprehend God. Judaism views God as being radically different from humans, so Heschel explores the ways that Judaism teaches that a person may have an encounter with the ineffable. A recurring theme in this work is the radical amazement people feel when experiencing the presence of the Divine. Heschel then explores the problems of doubts and faith, what Judaism means by teaching that God is one, the essence of humanity and the problem of human needs, the definition of religion in general and Judaism in particular, and human yearning for spirituality. He offers his views as to Judaism being a pattern for life.

The Sabbath: Its Meaning for Modern Man is a work on the nature and celebration ofShabbat, the Jewish Sabbath. It is rooted in the thesis that Judaism is a religion of time, not space, and that the Sabbath symbolizes the sanctification of time. For Heschel, "Technical civilization is man's conquest of space. It is a triumph frequently achieved by sacrificing an essential ingredient of existence, namely, time.” While he wrote that “to enhance our power in the world of space is our main objective,” he also warned that while “we have often suffered from degradation by poverty, now we are threatened with degradation through power."^[17]

God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism is a companion volume toMan Is Not Alone in which Heschel discusses the nature of religious thought, how thought becomes faith, and how faith creates responses in the believer. He discusses ways people can seek God's presence and the radical amazement we receive in return. He offers a criticism of nature worship, a study of humanity's metaphysical loneliness, and his view that we can consider God in search of humanity. The first section concludes with a study ofJews as a chosen people. Section two deals with the idea ofrevelation and what it means for one to be a prophet. This section gives us his idea of revelation as an event instead of a process. This relates to Israel's commitment to God. Section three discusses his views on how a Jew should understand the nature of Judaism as a religion. He discusses and rejects the idea that mere faith (without law) alone is enough but then cautions rabbis against adding too many restrictions to Jewish law. He discusses the need to correlate ritual observance with spirituality and love and the importance ofKavanah (intention) when performingmitzvot. He discusses religious behaviorism—when people strive for external compliance with the law, yet disregard the importance of inner devotion.

This work started as Heschel's PhD thesis in German, which he later expanded and translated into English. Originally published in a two-volume edition,The Prophets studies the books of the Hebrew prophets. It covers their lives and the historical context of their missions, summarizes their work, and discusses their psychological state. Heschel puts forward a central idea in his theology: that the prophetic (and, ultimately, Jewish) view of God is best understood not as anthropomorphic (that God takes human form) but as anthropopathic—that God has human feelings.

InThe Prophets, Heschel describes the Jewish prophets' unique aspect compared to similar figures. Whereas other nations have soothsayers and diviners who attempt to discover the will of their gods, Heschel asserts, the Hebrew prophets are characterized by their experience of what he calls theotropism—God turning towards humanity. Heschel argues for the view of Hebrew prophets as receivers of the "DivinePathos," of the wrath and sorrow of God over his nation that has forsaken him. In this view, prophets do not speak for God so much as they remind their audience of God's voice for the voiceless, the poor, and the oppressed.

He writes:

Prophecy is the voice that God has lent to the silent agony, a voice to the plundered poor, to the profane riches of the world. It is a form of living, a crossing point of God and man. God is raging in the prophet's words.^[18]

Many consider Heschel'sTorah min HaShamayim BeAspaklariya shel HaDorot, (Torah from Heaven in the mirror of the generations) to be his masterwork. The three volumes of this work are a study of classical rabbinic theology andaggadah, as opposed tohalakha (Jewish law). It explores the views of the rabbis in theMishnah,Talmud, andMidrash about the nature ofTorah, the revelation of God to humankind, prophecy, and the ways that Jews have used scriptural exegesis to expand and understand these core Jewish texts. In this work, Heschel views the 2nd-century sagesRabbi Akiva andIshmael ben Elisha as paradigms for the two dominant world-views in Jewish theology

Two Hebrew volumes were published during his lifetime bySoncino Press, and the third was published posthumously by JTS Press in the 1990s. A new edition, including an expanded third volume, due to manuscripts that were found and edited by Dr. Dror Bondi, was published by Magid Press in 2021. An English translation of all three volumes, with notes, essays, and appendices, was translated and edited by RabbiGordon Tucker, entitledHeavenly Torah: As Refracted Through the Generations. It can be the subject of intense study and analysis, providing insight into the relationship between God and humans beyond the world of Judaism and allmonotheisms.

Here, Heschel discusses the nature and role of man. In these three lectures, originally delivered in somewhat different form as The Raymond Fred West Memorial Lectures atStanford University in May 1963, Dr. Heschel inquires into the logic of being human: What is meant by being human? What are the grounds on which to justify a human being's claim to being human? The author says, “We have never been as openmouthed and inquisitive, never as astonished and embarrassed at our ignorance about man. We know what he makes, but we do not know what he is or what to expect of him. Is it not conceivable that our entire civilization is built upon a misinterpretation of man? Or that the tragedy of man is due to the fact that he is a being who has forgotten the question: Who is Man? The failure to identify himself, to know what is authentic human existence, leads him to assume a false identity, to pretend to be what he is unable to be or to not accepting what is at the very root of his being. Ignorance about man is not lack of knowledge, but false knowledge.”

Heschel wrote a series of articles, originally inHebrew, on the existence of prophecy in Judaism after the destruction of the HolyTemple in Jerusalem in 70 CE. These essays were translated intoEnglish and published asProphetic Inspiration After the Prophets: Maimonides and Others by the American Judaica publisherKtav.

The publisher of this book states, "The standard Jewish view is that prophecy ended with the ancient prophets, somewhere early in the Second Temple era. Heschel demonstrated that this view is not altogether accurate. Belief in the possibility of continued prophetic inspiration, and belief in its actual occurrence existed throughout much of themedieval period, and it even exists in modern times. Heschel's work on prophetic inspiration in the Middle Ages originally appeared in two long Hebrew articles. In them, he concentrated on the idea that prophetic inspiration was even possible in post-Talmudic times, and, indeed, it had taken place at various schools in various times, from theGeonim toMaimonides and beyond."

1970:National Jewish Book Award in the Jewish Thought category forIsrael: An Echo of Eternity^[19]

Five schools have been named for Heschel: in Buenos Aires, Argentina the rabbinical school of theSeminario Rabinico Latinoamericano; on theUpper West Side of New York City, the A J Heschel School; in California the Abraham Joshua Heschel Day School is located inNorthridge, while the Heschel West Day School is located inAgoura Hills; and The Toronto Heschel School inToronto,Ontario, Canada.^[20]

In 2009, a Missouri highway was named "Dr. Abraham Joshua Heschel Highway" to subvert the plans of aSpringfield, Missouri-area Neo-Nazi group who cleaned the stretch of highway as part of an "Adopt-A-Highway" program. Heschel's daughter, Susannah, has objected to the adoption of her father's name in this context.^[20]

Heschel's papers are held in theRubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library atDuke University.^[21]

On 17 October 2022,John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin inaugurated the Abraham J. Heschel Center for Catholic-Jewish Relations, attended by Catholic and Jewish figures, including RabbiAbraham Skorka, Susannah Heschel,Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem ArchbishopPierbattista Pizzaballa, andArchbishop Stanisław Budzik of Lublin.Pope Francis has welcomed the establishment of the Heschel Center.^[22][23]

• List of peace activists

• Abraham Joshua Heschel: Prophetic Witness &Spiritual Radical: Abraham Joshua Heschel in America, 1940–1972, biography by Edward K. KaplanISBN 0-300-11540-7
• "The Encyclopedia of Hasidism" edited by Rabinowicz, Tzvi M.:ISBN 1-56821-123-6 Jason Aronson, Inc., 1996.
• Kaplan, Edward K.; Samuel H. Dresner (1998).Abraham Joshua Heschel: Prophetic Witness. Yale University Press.ISBN 978-0-300-07186-3.
• Kaplan, Edward K. (2007).Spiritual Radical: Abraham Joshua Heschel in America, 1940–1972. Yale University Press.ISBN 978-0-300-13769-9.

• Guide to the Abraham Joshua Heschel Papers, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.
• Heschel's role in Vatican II and his advocacy of interreligious respect
• Alan Brill Review of Heavenly Torah
• Arnold Jacob Wolf Review of Heavenly Torah
• David Blumenthal review of Heavenly Torah
• About Rabbi A. J. HeschelArchived November 16, 2017, at theWayback Machine The Heschel Center for Environmental Learning and Leadership