Few luminaries in Jewish history, particularly in modern times, have made as lasting and profound a contribution to our spiritual heritage as Rabbi Shneur Zalman. His works embrace the entire spectrum of Jewish thought – mysticism, philosophy, psychology, ethics and law – and represent an expression of unparalleled creative genius.
The Early Years
The rise and growth of the chassidic movement was rapid. Under the slogan of “G-d wants your heart” (Rachmana liboh boey), the leaders of this genuine renaissance recaptured the happiness and bliss of the Jewish faith for the common man.
In and through it, even Jewish peasants, traders, laborers and craftsmen found themselves in the warm haven of the Torah universe from which they had been excluded because of their limited scholarship. No longer forced to consider their religion a “Paradise Lost,” they eagerly absorbed the inspired message of the Torah on the emotional level upon which chassidism projected it for them.
One of the greatest chassidic personalities was Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, later famous as the Rav (teacher), or Alter Rebbe. This saintly man became the founder of Chabad chassidism, a movement that developed into one of the strongest and most dynamic branches of chassidism.
This movement, founded in Lithuania in 5533 (1773), grew far beyond the boundaries of this once mighty center of Jewish life and gained enthusiastic adherents throughout the world.
Rabbi Shneur Zalman was a direct descendant of the Maharal of Prague. His great-grandfather later lived in a village in Posen. The family moved eastward, wandering through Galicia and Poland, and finally settled in Vitebsk, then a flourishing center of Torah and Talmudic scholarship.
It was there that Rabbi Shneur Zalman’s father, Rabbi Baruch, was born and reared in the spirit and tradition of Torah learning. Later, he moved to Liozna, near the town of Lubavitch, which was to become famous as the origin city of the dynasty of the Alter Rebbe’s descendants.
Here, Shneur Zalman was born. Here, too, he received his first instruction, and from his earliest youth, he showed unusual brilliance, diligence and devotion to his studies.
To develop further his son’s scholarship, Rabbi Baruch took him to a renowned teacher of the time, Rabbi Yissachar Ber of Kobilnik, who lived in the town of Lubavitch. Under Rabbi Yissachar Ber’s tutelage, the young scholar traversed the “sea of the Talmud” in all directions and familiarized himself with Kabbalah, the esoteric side of traditional Torah wisdom.
Before long, Rabbi Yissachar Ber sent for Rabbi Baruch and told the overjoyed father of his student: “There is nothing more that I can teach your son; he has grown beyond me.”
Rabbi Baruch now took Shneur Zalman to Vitebsk. The 12-year-old boy won immediate recognition and fame as a genius, and he was accepted as an equal by the great scholars of the city.
Marriage
In later years, a wealthy man selected Rabbi Shneur Zalman as a son-in-law and supported him so that he could devote his undivided attention to the exclusive study of Torah.
Numerous tales of those years attest to the unquenchable thirst for knowledge of Rabbi Shneur Zalman. His sagacity and proficiency as a scholar won the admiration of everyone who came into contact with him.
At the age of 20, this brilliant young man, with his wife’s consent, left his home and family to search for the fulfillment of a yearning in his soul. Despite all his knowledge, he felt he was missing an element of Jewish religious experience that could not be captured in the solitude of the four walls of his own study.
Two centers of Jewish learning and leadership competed for his attention: Vilna, the main seat of Talmudic scholarship and the fortress of the opposition to the young yet rapidly growing chassidic movement, and Mezritch, the seat of Rabbi Dovber, the famed Maggid of Mezritch, heir to the ideology of Rabbi Yisroel Baal Shem Tov and to the leadership of the chassidic movement.
From the outset, Rabbi Shneur Zalman realized that the sober, rationalistic atmosphere of Vilna and its scholars could not offer him what he was searching for. Already an acclaimed Torah scholar, Rabbi Shneur Zalman felt that his need was not for Talmudic scholarship but for guidance in the service of G-d (“avodah”). Therefore, he decided to try Mezritch, where a new world called. A world, it was said, that taught its people how to daven.
And so, the Alter Rebbe was on his to Mezritch.
(To be continued)
*Excerpted from Challenge.
