ABSTRACT
By the middle of the eighteenth century, the Jewish community had suffered numerous waves of persecution and was deeply dispirited by the conversion of Shabbatai Zevi. Following the massacres of the previous century, many Polish Jews became disenchanted with rabbinic Judaism and through Hasidism sought individual salvation by means of religious pietism. Hasidim initiated a profound change in Jewish religious pietism. In the medieval period, the Hasidei Ashkenaz attempted to achieve perfection through various mystical activities. For some Hasidim cleaving to God (devekut) in prayer was understood as the annihilation of selfhood and the ascent of the soul to divine light. A central feature of this new movement was the institution of the tzaddik (or rebbe) which gave expression to a widespread disillusionment with rabbinic leadership. The founder of the Hasidic movement was Israel ben Eliezer, known as the Baal Shem Tov or Besht.
