Articles in Honor of Abraham Joshua Heschel

A sermon for Kol Nidre 5768
By Rabbi Burt Jacobson

My fiancé Diane and I set aside the last Sunday in July as a day to spend together. Our plan was to drive to Marin County, and to hike on Mt. Tamalpais. It was a lovely sun-drenched morning. After I woke up, meditated and prayed, and had eaten my breakfast, I turned my cell phone on. There was a message from my brother Stuart who, with his wife Jean, were vacationing in Colorado, staying in a cabin in the mountains.

"Hi! Just calling to say I love you. This morning I was sitting on the porch looking out over the valley a few hundred feet below, and a butterfly came up and landed on my hand. I watched as the butterfly scoped out my hand with his tongue -- for about two to three minutes. Then, it flew away. Within seconds a bee flew up to me, about two feet away and, hanging in the air, wings flapping in a blur, directly facing me, looked at me for a minute or longer, turned maybe 150 degrees and looked into the window of our cabin for another minute or so, turned back to me for another minute or two and then flew off. Well, I love you. Take care . . ."

By Rabbi Joshua Levine Grater,
Pasadena Jewish Temple & Center
January 5, 2007

On the 25th anniversary yartzheit of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, in 1997, I had a life-changing experience. I had just met and befriended Heschel’s daughter and only child, Susannah, and she took me with her to all of the various memorial services that were happening around New York City in her father’s memory.

I was in the Heschel home, meeting his relatives, great rebbes and leaders of various Orthodox sects, who, regardless of the fact that their famous family member left Orthodoxy, came to pay their respects and honor his memory. I remember an intense ma’ariv service, at the Heschel School, one in which Susannah taught a Mishnah, a selection of law, in honor of her father, using the chanting and pronunciation of another world, another time.

Or N. Rose/ Thursday, January 04, 2007/ Forward

The 1965 photograph of Abraham Joshua Heschel walking arm in arm with Martin Luther King Jr. through the streets of Alabama in support of African American civil rights is a source of great pride in the Jewish community. It represents a shining moment in our recent history, when thousands of young Jews, along with a smaller number of prominent religious leaders, participated in the most celebrated liberation movement of the 20th century.

While Heschel‚s name, his „prophetic" countenance ˜ the flowing white hair and bushy beard ˜ and his close association with King are familiar to many, the broader story of his life (particularly his early life) and thought remain unknown to most of his admirers within and beyond the Jewish community. In honor of the 100th anniversary of Heschel‚s birth (January 11), we offer the following brief retrospective on the man and his works.

Dear Friends,

The centenary of Abraham Joshua Heschel's birth is January 11, 2007. His yohrzeit (18 Tevet, the 34th anniversary of his death) falls on January 7-8.

Both come during the week of reading Parashat Sh'mot, the first portion of Exodus (chapters 1-4), in which midwives resist through nonviolence the murderous commands of Pharaoh; we experience the renaming of God; and our liberation from slavery begins. A perfect week to celebrate Heschel.

Heschel's theology –- e.g his book God in Search of Man –- and his spiritually rooted social action, standing alongside Dr. Martin Luther King not only against racism but also against the Vietnam War, have had a deep effect on Jewish and Christian thought and action. His lustrous book on The Sabbath nourished the emergence of Eco-Judaism.

A Tribute to William Sloane Coffin (1924-2006)
By Or N. Rose *

The Rev. William Sloane Coffin died on April 12th, 2006. He was 81.

The first time I heard William Sloane Coffin speak was at a memorial service for Abraham Joshua Heschel at B’nai Jeshurun in Manhattan. As I listened intently to Coffin’s address, I thought to myself, “That is the kind of rabbi I want to be someday.” Of course, Coffin was not a rabbi, but a renowned Presbyterian minister. Nevertheless, his eloquence, humor and chutzpah all greatly impressed me. I quickly realized why he had been dubbed “the greatest white preacher in America.”

Abraham Joshua Heschel:
Love or Truth?

By Rabbi Burt Jacobson *

The Besht’s Embrace

In 1998 Edward K. Kaplan and Samuel Dresner published Abraham Joshua Heschel: Prophetic Witness, [Footnote: published by Yale University Press, New Haven and London] the first volume of a planned two volume work on Heschel’s life and achievements. Heschel’s life fascinated me; of course I was especially drawn to what the authors had to say about my teacher’s relation with the Ba’al Shem Tov.

Abraham Joshua Heschel was born and grew up in a Hasidic family in Warsaw, Poland. His father, Moshe Mordecai of Pelzovizna, had been a rebbe, a Hasidic spiritual master. During his childhood Reb Moshe Mordecai charmed Avrumele -- as his family called the boy -- with tales that centered around the small town of Mezbizh, where the youngster’s grandfather and namesake, Avraham Yehoshua Heschel of Apt, had served as rebbe.

Passages from Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, 12/28/2004

HESCHEL HAFTARAH YOHRZEIT 32 FOR RABBI ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL

Rabbenu Heschel died on 18 Tevet. Especially when his yohrzeit falls in the week of Shemot (as it usually does), there are some powerful connections between his work and the Torah portion.

We urge individuals and congregations to take some time to explore these passages and especially on the Shabbat when we read the story of the midwives, to place them in the context of these women who "invented" nonviolent civil disobedience.

Rabbi Arthur Waskow, 12/1/2004

The following words of Torah, of Wisdom, were written by Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel in 1943.

E M B L A Z O N E D O V E R the gates of the world in which we live is the escutcheon of the demons. The mark of Cain in the face of man has come to overshadow the likeness of God. Ashamed and dismayed, we ask: Who is responsible?

History is a pyramid of efforts and errors; yet at times it is the Holy Mountain on which God holds judgment over the nations. Few are privileged to discern God's judgment in history. But all may be guided by the words of the Baal Shem: If a man has beheld evil, he may know that it was shown to him in order that he learn his own guilt and repent; for what is shown to him is also within him.

Let Fascism not serve as an alibi for our conscience. We have failed to fight for right, for justice, for goodness; as a result we must fight against wrong, against injustice, against evil. We have failed to offer sacrifices on the altar of peace; now we must offer sacrifices on the altar of war

Indeed, where were we when men learned to hate in the days of starvation? When raving madmen were sowing wrath in the hearts of the unemployed?

Tanks and planes cannot redeem humanity. A man with a gun is like a beast without a gun. The killing of snakes will save us for the moment but not forever. The war will outlast the victory of arms if we fail to conquer the infamy of the soul: the indifference to crime, when committed against others.

God will return to us when we are willing to let Him in-into our banks and factories, into our Congress and clubs, into our homes and theaters.

8/5/2003

The Jewish Publication Society
Creating a Shared Literary Heritage, Since 1888

Or N. Rose <rose_or@hotmail.com>
Foreword by Susannah Heschel

Abraham Joshua Heschelriter, social activist, rabbi, and teacheras one of the most influent