Jewish Spirituality and Social Transformation: Hasidism and Society

What does lived religion look like in the 21st century? Against the polarizations of old and new, religion and secularism, theory and practice, a cadre of internationally renowned scholars interrogate the ways spiritual ideas and practices remain transformative in contemporary society. Concepts of self, community, education, aging, love, law and morality, of inner and outer modes of action and experience, abound. The Jewish mystical tradition, especially the contemporary movement of Habad Hasidism, embodies an intersection of the particular and the universal that speaks to wider crises in the governing assumptions of western culture and scientific disciplines. These essays exemplify the kind of radical interdisciplinarity that can move through these crises and beyond them, militating against academic hegemonies through the inclusion of indigenous Hasidic voices who speak with equal authority.