The Besht: Magician, Mystic, and Leader

1 | Magic and Miracle Workers in the Days of the Baal Shem Tov

chapter one Magic and Miracle Workers in the Days of the Baal Shem Tov B locking the way forward for the historian who seeks to examine the place and role played by magic in the figure of the Baal Shem Tov, is the distorted picture of the baalei shem (the sorcerers or miracle workers) that has taken root within Hasidic historiography.1 According to this conception, magic and its practitioners are contemptible phenomena inherently associated with the broad masses, the ignorant and superstitious public. This picture has its origins in the literature of the Jewish enlightenment movement—the Haskalah—which set itself the goal of banishing from Judaism’s domains any semblance of belief or behavior it regarded as expressing superstition and ignorance. Pride of place in this campaign was assigned to the phenomena of magic and the baalei shem.2 Characteristic of the Haskalah literature’s battles against magic and baalei shem was its identification of these with Hasidism and Hasidic leaders. This identification did much to serve the Haskalah’s aims in its confrontation with Hasidism. To the maskilim of eastern Europe, Hasidism represented the very incarnation of all that was degraded and atrophied about traditional Jewish existence. Hasidism, furthermore, was seen as the chief obstacle in the path of the “proper reformation” of Jewish society. Given this perspective, the maskilim found it convenient to have Hasidism be associated with the ignorant masses, who wallowed in beliefs about demons and spirits and the powers of incantations and amulets. The maskilim found it equally convenient to have the leaders of Hasidism be closely associated with the baalei shem, who deceived and preyed upon the simple people for their private gain.3 Under the influence of the Haskalah literature, the conception of the baalei shem as inferior and contemptible beings made its way into Hasidic historiography as well. It thus comes as no surprise that even those scholars who were sympathetic to the Hasidic movement (at least in its early stages) felt themselves obliged to clear the Besht of the disgraceful stain of having been a baal shem.4 This trend in the scholarship was sharply condemned by Gershom Scholem. Scholem cited evidence that left no room for doubt that the Besht indeed plied his clients and supplicants with amulets, and in this respect was no different from the other baalei shem.5 Yet with the Besht now liberated from  etkes.qxp 11/23/2004 3:28 PM Page 7 the chains of rationalistic apologetics—which had struggled to decouple the founder of Hasidism from the remainder of the baalei shem—the time has come to liberate these other baalei shem as well from the loathsome reputation imposed upon them by the authors of the Haskalah and the historians who followed their lead.6 It is not my purpose here to discuss the evolution and status of magic in Jewish society in earlier generations.7 I do not, consequently, intend to compare the salient characteristics of Jewish magic to those that were to be found in the surrounding society. These issues deserve treatment by themselves. The purpose of this chapter is, as said, to present a more balanced picture of the status and role of magic and baalei shem in Jewish society in and around the time of the Besht. This picture will then serve as a background and framework for my examination of the magical underpinnings of the world of the Besht and the origins of Hasidism. Magic in the Lives and Perspectives of Contemporaries The phenomenon of the baalei shem in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century central and eastern Europe must be understood, first and foremost, against the background of the beliefs and ideas then prevailing as regards the demonic powers and their ability to affect the fates of mortals. This general background was universal: it was unlimited by the bounds of geography, religion, and nationality. Naturally there were discernible differences between the demonologies of Jews and Christians, just as there were differences in texture and emphasis between the different regions and across the different periods. The common factor linking all these systems of belief, whatever their differences of degree or kind, was the supposition that demonic powers have a vast potential for impairing the health and welfare of human beings. As if that did not suffice, it was further believed that magical means could be used to mobilize these demonic powers and press them into the service...