ABSTRACT
Orthodox Judaism is not a ‘rigid conception of Judaism’, although some people view it that way because of its name. It actually has multiple streams, from deeply traditionalist (Haredi) streams to those which try to respond to the modern world and scientific knowledge without diluting Judaism or making it more superficial (which is precisely what Orthodox rabbis accused reformist currents and the Jewish Enlightenment of doing). The ‘modernization’ of the traditional Orthodoxy occurred in the nineteenth century, and it was carried out by religious authorities such as Azriel Hildesheimer (1820–1899) or Samson Raphael Hirsch (1808–1888). Among the younger generations of rabbis who developed the modern Orthodoxy (although each developed it in his own way), we could certainly include Avraham Yitzhak Ha-Kohen Kook (1865–1935; see the chapter about him) and Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, also known simply as ‘the Rav’. The latter was a descendant of the famous Lithuanian Soloveitchik rabbinic dynasty, whose founder is considered to be (his namesake) Rabbi Joseph Dov Soloveitchik (1820–1892), who is also referred to by the name of his pivotal work Beit Ha-Levi (‘Levi's House’). His son, Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik of Brisk (1853–1918), was the founder of the so-called Brisker Derech – the ‘Brisker method’ of studying the Talmud, which, unlike the traditional synthetic approach, is characterized by an analytical and conceptual approach. 1
