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God in Search of Man : A Philosophy of Judaism
Abraham Joshua Heschel

Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1976 - 437 pages

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   highly recommended  highly recommended





The God In Search of Man - Truly.

It's a masterpiece for body and soul! One ought to read it to understand more about us before life. Carlito


"Wherever we let God in"

The general assumption of people of the modern era has been that we must look for and search for and wait for God. The image is of Beckett's 'Waiting for Godot'. God has disappeared and is not part of our lives and we have to wait for God to return. Or if we are real searchers we would not wait, but would make the effort ourselves looking in various aspects of our experience to find the ultimate religious meaning.
But Heschel's premise here is the opposite one. God is actually looking for us. God wants us. I remember speaking with one of the most loving teachers of Hasidism of modern times, the late David Herzberg of blessed memory. When I asked him about the meaning of the religious concept 'Avodat Hashem' service of God' His answer surprised me because it was different from anyone else's. He said it was God's service, God's work what God does to help and connect with us. This is very much like what Heschel is saying here. God is calling out to us ,God is Present as the Kotzker Rebbe says 'wherever we let God in'.
Heschel was a great poetic and religious soul , who feels and teaches God's searching for , and connecting with us.
This is a tremendously inspiring and thought- provoking work.
I will only say one more word. That as a ' poetic thinker' Heschel's meaning is something suggested and sublime, something we cannot be sure we understand.
What we can understand is the underlying tone of holiness throughout this work.



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A good man with great wisdom

Plato wrote that virtue is knowledge and knowledge is virtue. If Plato's Republic was to succeed, society needed all of its citizens to be like Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. This, of course, was not the case in Plato's time - and most definitely not the case today. The wisdom of Heschel, as he so eloquently expresses in this timeless book, is needed now more than ever.

Heschel did not wait for God to give him grace, because he knew that his actions were more important than words. Heschel felt compelled to act upon his commitment as a citizen and as a Jew. The result being that Heschel's spiritual life set an example for his generation and generations to come.

In Heschel's own words: "Religion becomes sinful when it begins to advocate the segregation of God, to forget that the true sanctuary has no walls. Religion has always suffered from the tendency to become an end in itself, to seclude the holy, to become parochial, self-indulgent, self-seeking... ."

Each page and every word in this great work gives us important wisdom. Heschel challenges us to strive for the ideal but insists that we never forget the realities and injustices that surround us. (Jerry Marcus is the author of three novels: "Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Zev," "The Salvation Peddler," and "The Last Pope.")


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A classic - but as timely as ever

When originally published, this book was seen as a breath of fresh air; it doesn't "analyze" religious thougt. Rather, it forces the reader to examine his own feelings towards G-d.

Heschel, often though of as an academic with a Hasidic background, was rather a Hasidic Rebbe with university training. This work, along with his other popular books (as opposed to the scholarly ones) is written in the form of a series of Hasidic discourses at a comfort level to the reader as if he were sitting with the Rebbe at the Third Sabbath Meal and absorbing his wisdom.

The central theme, the centrality of belief in and devotion to G-d, is often overlooked in contemporary Jewish literature; many veiled (and no so veiled) jibes of contemporary religious practice and life are meant to drive home the point that "it's about G-d and man", not about buildings, organizations or other agendas or programs.

Like the Kotzker Rebbe, Heschel's hero and spiritual father, Rabbi Dr. Heschel was able to cut through the gloss, fluff, and veneer to get to the root of man's belief in and relationship with G-d.


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Abraham Joshua Heschel was one of the most revered religious leaders of the 20th century, and God in Search of Man and its companion volume, Man Is Not Alone, two of his most important books, are classics of modern Jewish theology. God in Search of Man combines scholarship with lucidity, reverence, and compassion as Dr. Heschel discusses not man's search for God but God's for man--the notion of a Chosen People, an idea which, he writes, "signifies not a quality inherent in the people but a relationship between the people and God." It is an extraordinary description of the nature of Biblical thought, and how that thought becomes faith.


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