"Learning From the Tanya":
Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz, prominent authority on Jewish mysticism, offers authentic look at classic work of Kabbalah

By Amara Levine-Reich

Photo: Rabbi Adin Even Israel Steinsaltz is a recipient of Israel's highest civilian honor, the Israel Prize. "If the Bible is the cornerstone of Judaism, then the Talmud is the central pillar, soaring up from the foundations and supporting the entire spiritual and intellectual edifice. In many ways the Talmud is the most important book in Jewish culture, the backbone of creativity and of national life."

Amid a frenzy of New Age and pop-culture spirituality symbolized by red strings and bottled water with magical healing powers, renowned scholar, Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz offers an authentic look at the ancient wisdom of the Kabbalah in his latest book, LEARNING FROM THE TANYA: Volume Two in the Definitive Commentary on the Moral and Mystical Teachings of a Classic Work of Kabbalah (Jossey-Bass: A Wiley Imprint, August 2005, $24.95 cloth, 384 pages, ISBN 0-7879-7892-2). Rabbi Steinsaltz is the author of numerous books on mysticism and Kabbalah, including the critically acclaimed Opening the Tanya, the first volume in his series of companion guides to the Tanya, and the modern classic The Thirteen Petalled Rose.

The Tanya was written in 1797 by Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, one of the most influential leaders and scholars in the Hasidic community of White Russia (now Belarus). Steinsaltz calls Tanya, so named for the Hebrew word meaning "it has been taught," a "lucid and systematic articulation of the fundamentals of Hasidic teaching."  LEARNING FROM THE TANYA, along with its predecessor Opening the Tanya, is Steinsaltz's response to a concern that much of modern society is unprepared to tackle difficult source texts on spirituality like the Tanya. He endeavors to bring the universal ideas of the Tanya to a level which every human being can grasp and bring into his/her own life.  The Tanya's significance in Jewish philosophy can be primarily attributed to its main character - the intermediate man, or beinoni. "The aim of the mussar (moral teaching) books, and the ideal to which they strive to elevate the human being, is the ideal of the tzaddik, 'the perfectly righteous individual,'" he writes. "In contrast, Tanya was written for intermediates...Not everyone can achieve [being a tzaddik], and not everyone is expected to. Instead, the beinoni is presented as the ideal that everyone can and must attain." It is the Tanya's realistic approach to character growth and its recognition of natural human shortcomings that gives it the universal appeal Steinsaltz builds upon in his commentary.


Photo :Opening the Tanya:  Discovering the Moral and Mystical Teachings of a Classic Work of Kabbalah