T'MIDI'UT: The Conceptual Prism Through Which Ze'ev Wolf of Zhitomir Read the Torah

Abstract:The book, Or haMe'ir, by Ze'ev Wolf of Zhitomir (d. 1800), a student of the Maggid of Mezheretz, clearly stands out from among other Hasidic texts of the same period, and this study seeks to define the seer's non-conventional understanding of the basic Jewish sacred text.The author, who viewed the natural world as but a thin garment barely cladding Divinity, defined his central core-conception, t'midi'ut ([inline-graphic 01]) from the word, [inline-graphic 02] always and true of all time) as the understanding that the events of the biblical narrative, properly understood, refer not to any particular point in the past but rather to every person and to all of time. To the mind of Ze'ev Wolf, with spiritual perception the Divine can be 'seen' within everything at all times, while the seemingly timebound stories in the Torah are a concession to those whose more limited understanding is unable to grasp the Torah's more sublime level. Even the manna which, in the Torah is said to have fallen to earth from the heavens, is understood as a continuous and even contemporary happening.[inline-graphic 03], understood in that sense, refers also to the author's radical understanding of [inline-graphic 04] ('avodah). The Zhitomir sage understood the cultic worship commanded in the Torah in a way that clearly transcends a physical tabernacle or temple or even time itself. In his interpretation of the cult, the author understood the real meaning of the cultic sites and practices not in a literal, concrete way, but rather as the realization of the ideal spiritual psyche of the Jew in all facets of life and in every point-in-time.