Mussar and Chassidus: What separates, what unites?

"Many years earlier in Shanghai. Reb Leib was engaged by the Amshinover Rebbe to teach one of his children.... the Rebbe discussed with Reb Leib the concept that in spiritual growth there are two approaches : one can take  Derech HaNamuch and Derech haGevoah. The first approach is to work from the bottom up, painstakingly one step at a time. The second allows a person to jump many levels a t a time.

After Shabbos, Reb Leib related this to the Mashgiach who, soon after, asked his young talmid to accompany him to the Sassoon Building. The Sassoon building was a beautiful edifice, a skyscraper that was built on one of the most prime pieces of real estate in downtown Shanghai. But the building was sinking into the ground! It seems that many years earlier this plot of land had been the garbage dump and someone has purchased it, covered it and as Shanghai grew in size, sold it a prime property. Mr. Sassoon bought the tract and -unsuspecting- built one of the most beautiful buildings in the city on it. The Mashgiach's point was well understood: outwardly, one's spiritual accomplishments can appear great and exalted, but if he doesn't clean out the garbage - if a solid foundation is not developed one step at the time - then eventually it will collapse. (Reb Chatzkel: Rabbi Yechezkel Levenstein, Guardian of Torah and Mussar, Artscroll, p. 338

Comment: This sensibility is what separates Chassidus and Mussar. I must say that in all fairness, there are strands of thought in both movements that gave credence to the other approach. R. Levenshtein was from Kelm and Kelm held most strongly of the absolute necessity of of detail work on middos; in Slobodka, on the other hand, the concept of Gadlus HaOdom allows some degree of "Kefitsas haMadreigos". Certainly Novarodok made overcoming all boundaries in one leap into the centerpiece of its program. Later, the Mussar of R. Dessler drew a great deal from Kabbolah and Chassidus.

Among the chassidim, there was always, at least lip service paid to the study of mussar works, especially among the branches that stem from Noam Elimelech.

For us, living in the worlds of falsehood, the danger of unbridled immersion in chassidus is self deception and unintended hypocrisy. Chassidus shows the way forward, but it should be coupled with an unceasing effort in mussar, especially in as much as it relates to self-examination and the striving for truth.

see also, http://www.avakesh.com/2006/12/crooked_foundat.html

Comments

[yitz..]

Re: Comment: This sensibility is what separates Chassidus and Mussar.

I don't understand how anyone can see Hassidut and not see that it involves intense introspection.. ..and the sensibility to start at the foundation. All of the Besht's teachings were _foundation_ teachings. Emunah, tefillah, torah, teshuvah, mitzwoth. What else is there??

1. The Tanya forces someone to come to terms with the fact that they would at their very best be no more than beinonim. That it's a fight that will take their whole lives and will never let up, but they have no choice but to keep fighting with all their might or else they will surely lose.

2. Rebbe Nachman insists on you bringing everything under the eye of the intellect and searching out the good points. (implying that the bad points are easier to see with that same intellectual eye)

3. The Notzer Hesed stresses bitul over all else but warns of being lost in fake self-delusional bitul. He also stresses the foundations of Yirah as put forth in Pirkei Avoth (kol sheHochmato kodemet lyirato and vice versa)

4. Meor Eynayim ends on the note of how important it is to attain true yirat shamayim, it's everything. He also champions the Baal Shem Tov's idea of recognising the Godly in every desire (fallen midah) and raising it back to HaShem.

5. The Noam Elimelech learns in Parashath Mishpatim davka that one cannot "rise to the altar in steps" ie. ascend beyond one's pace/level. (or skip steps)

Until this story you quoted today.. I'd never heard of any Chassidut (in my admittedly limited knowledge) encouraging skipping steps in leaps and bounds.. even the Lubavitcher Rebbe's Lechatchila ariber (sp?) is not a free license to get ahead of oneself, only to push forward with all of one's might, transcending difficulties. (At one's current level)

Please enlighten me?

[avakesh]

Part of it is that you may not be familiar with the very intense detail work on middos that proper study of mussar demands, or with the kind of personalities that it can produce after many years of application. It focuses on personality correction to the extent that chassidus, b'shitah, does not.

It is not that Chassidus encourages skipping steps, in fact there are, as you point out warnings against it in chassidic sources, mostly later ones. Earlier sources, which I can't produce right now, do contain statements warning abut the dangers upon Besht's new path. It is more that this danger is the real danger of inspirational charismatic movements in general and Chassidus in particular. It teaches an ecstatic, transcendant spirituality, which is is a lot of fun, but without doing the hard work, it may be built on false foundations.

I started from a mussar background and am coming to chassidus later in life. It is natural to compare and contrast the two in a way that someone else may not do or may not be able to do.

[Micha]

Avakesh,

Your sentiment echoes that of R' Avram Elya (Avraham Eliyahu) Kaplan zt"l, in his essay Shtei Derakhim http://www.aishdas.org/raek/2derachim.pdf . One paragraph, as translated by R' YG Bechhofer:

"Mussar does not disagree with Chassidus. Mussar is often satisfied with the Jewish strength of Chassidus; its capacity not to submit to the environment; its heartfelt openness bein adam l'chaveiro that softens petty superficial European etiquette; its readiness to dedicate itself to a lofty purpose, and so easily sacrifice for that purpose normal conditions of life; its youthful fervor in mitzvos, which extends well into old age. Mussar, however, also has a significant criticism of Chassidus: It sees Chassidus as too external, too theoretical and abstract. The Chasid deludes himself into thinking that he is getting more out of Chassidus than he actually is. Chassidus deals with profound thoughts and great deeds, but it remains outside the essence of the Chasid. Chassidus penetrates the depths of the greatest Torah problems - between both Man and G-d, and between Man and Man - but it penetrates too little the self of a person, so that he might engage in a reckoning as to where he stands in relation to his World and in relation to his obligations in his World... The average Chasid deludes himself into thinking that a nigun that he sings wells up from his heart, and that the dveykus that he experiences has its source in his soul, even though it is entirely possible that these are transient moods, not associated with his true essence. One should not judge hastily. We cannot say even to the simplest Chasid, when he experiences dveykus, that he does not truly cleave to G-d. But that constant self-critique: 'Perhaps I am deluding myself;' the query that should accompany every step in life: 'Have I not strayed in this instance from the path?"; and, finally, all that is encompassed in the thought that serves as a necessary precondition for Shivisi Hashem l'negdi tamid ['I have placed G-d before me always'], namely, the thought, 'I have placed my 'self' before me always,' - all this is more prevalent in Mussar than in Chassidus..."

-micha

[avakesh]

Not all cahssidus disagrees with this either. Gutnick Chumash on the beginning of Naso brings that this is why the avodah of Gershuni, driving out bad middos, precedes that of Kehas, which means gathering in. First one has to fix the middos and only then redeem and gather in the sparks.

Interestingly, when we speak about tenufa of leviim in the beginning of Bahaloscha, it is Kehas who are lifted to Hashem first.

[levi rapoport]

RE: "For us, living in the worlds of falsehood, the danger of unbridled immersion in chassidus is self deception and unintended hypocrisy. Chassidus shows the way forward, but it should be coupled with an unceasing effort in mussar, especially in as much as it relates to self-examination and the striving for truth." There are various schools of thought in chassidus. Chabad Chassidus is invincible to this criticism.

[levi rapoport]

attn. micha,
nothig could be further from the truth. Chassidus trains the mind see be aware of Hashem's presence in all realities, and be aware of his presence in all things.

[kreisrunder haarausfall homöopathie]

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