Thunder in the Soul
To Be Known By God
by Abraham Joshua Heschel
This title was previously available on NetGalley and is now archived.
Send NetGalley books directly to your Kindle or Kindle app
1
To read on a Kindle or Kindle app, please add kindle@netgalley.com as an approved email address to receive files in your Amazon account. Click here for step-by-step instructions.
2
Also find your Kindle email address within your Amazon account, and enter it here.
Pub Date Mar 02 2021 | Archive Date Mar 02 2021
Plough Publishing | Plough Publishing House
Talking about this book? Use #ThunderInTheSoul #NetGalley. More hashtag tips!
Description
Abraham Joshua Heschel, descended from a long line of Orthodox rabbis, fled Europe to escape the Nazis. He made the insights of traditional Jewish spirituality come alive for American Jews while speaking out boldly against war and racial injustice.
Heschel brought the fervor of the Hebrew prophets to his role as a public intellectual. He challenged the sensibilities of the modern West, which views science and human reason as sufficient. Only by rediscovering wonder and awe before mysteries that transcend knowledge can we hope to find God again. This God, Heschel says, is not distant but passionately concerned about our lives and human affairs, and asks something of us in return.
This little book, which brings together Heschel’s key insights on a range of topics, will reinvigorate readers of any faith who hunger for wonder and thirst for justice.
Plough Spiritual Guides briefly introduce the writings of great spiritual voices of the past to new readers.
Advance Praise
From Robert Erlewine’s introduction to Thunder in the Soul:
Abraham Joshua Heschel is a singular figure in American Jewish history and modern Jewish thought. His life and work defy easy categorization, bringing together an array of seemingly contradictory tendencies. While rooted in traditionalist Judaism, he is attendant to the forces of modernity. A religiously observant Jew, he nevertheless insists that creative dissent is essential for the vitality of tradition. Deeply learned in Talmud, and in traditional Jewish learning more generally, he is also fluent in philosophy and modern biblical criticism. His most significant works address a popular audience, with prose accessible and often quite beautiful, and yet their premises are sophisticated and complex. Additionally, he is the rare modern Jewish thinker whose work reflects a profound knowledge of all genres of Jewish expression: Bible, Talmud, Midrash, medieval philosophy, Kabbalah, Hasidism, and modern thought. Even the language in which he composed his works varied; he wrote eloquent prose in four languages: Hebrew, German, English, and Yiddish.
Heschel offered a galvanizing vision of Judaism that was at times sharply critical of the status quo, while remaining deeply anchored in tradition. He rejected the notion that worship and religious practice were private matters, arguing instead that they have vital relevance for addressing the most pressing concerns of society. And he insisted this was the case even if it meant giving voice to views that were unpopular or controversial. Heschel’s theological commitments undergirded his courageous efforts on behalf of the civil rights movement, his protests against the war in Vietnam, and his work to improve Jewish-Christian relations. Not adhering to any particular denomination of American Judaism, he engaged them all.
Marketing Plan
Feature in Plough Quarterly magazine, circulation 10,000.
Promotions on Plough social and email channels, combined reach over 100,000
Significant social media campaign
Advance reader copies mailing
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9780874863512 |
| PRICE | $12.00 (USD) |
| PAGES | 152 |
Links
Available on NetGalley
Featured Reviews
Eric G, Educator
A great new resource to add to the library of Rabbi Heschel’s essential teachings. Rabbi Heschel was one of the most important teachers not only of Judaism but of human morality and living in this broken world.
Words, Images, & Worlds (, Reviewer
A highly informative book about a fascinating theological figure — well-researched, accessibly written, and recommended.
Bob T, Reviewer
Summary: A collection of the writings of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel concerning the life of knowing and being known by God.
The Plough Spiritual Guides are a great little series collecting the thoughts of some of the great spiritual thinkers of the last century. This latest is no exception. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel was truly one of the great spiritual figures of the twentieth century. He escaped to London from Poland trying to get family members visas before the coming Holocaust. Before he could succeed, they died. He went on as a Conservative Jewish leader whose life and works transcended his own faith community. I was in a seminar just the other day where his book The Sabbath was extensively referenced. He wrote towering works bringing spiritual insight to Jew and Christian, believer and skeptic alike: Man is Not Alone, Man’s Quest for God, God in Search of Man, and The Prophets. After the assault on Blacks at Selma in March 1965, he joined Dr. King in the march to Montgomery, earning himself a place on an FBI watchlist. He was close friends with Reinhold Niebuhr and delivered the eulogy at his funeral in 1971, following him in death a year later.
This little book collects excerpts of his writing that read as a seamless whole, a tribute to Robert Erlwine’s editing. These come under twelve headings:
1. Every Moment Touches Eternity
2. The Only Life Worth Living
3. In the Presence of Mystery
4. The Prophets Show us God Cares
5. God Demands Justice
6. Modernity Has Forfeited the Spirit
7. Prayer is Being Known by God
8. A Pattern for Living
9. The Deed is Wiser than the Heart
10. Something is Asked of Us
11. Faith is an Act of the Spirit
12 Not Our Vision of God but God’s Vision of Us
Reading the headings alone offers material for extended reflection. Often I like to select a quote or two from a book. This was a book where nearly every sentence could be a quote pull, and occasion to stop and think before one moves on. One of the big ideas that run through this selection is that we search for God only to discover that God seeks us. Heschel writes:
“When self-assertion is no more; when realizing that wonder is not our own achievement; that it is not by our own power alone that we are shuddered with radical amazement, it is not with our power anymore to assume the role of an examiner of a subject in search of an object, such as we are in search of a cause when perceiving thunder. Ultimate wonder is not the same as curiosity. Curiosity is the state of a mind in search of knowledge, while ultimate wonder is the state of knowledge in search of a mind; it is the thought of God in search of a soul.“
This search of God for us is the source of our worth. Heschel observes:
“We must continue to ask: What is man that God should care for him? And we must continue to remember that it is precisely God’s care for man that constitutes the greatness of man.”
Another key idea is that of faith as faithfulness, a response in every moment in how we live our life to the reality of God. Faith is not centered around the doctrine or dogmas of prior generations, which he considers “spiritual plagiarism.” Faith moves beyond our own reason and wisdom. “In faith, we do not seek to decipher, to articulate in our own terms, but to rise above our own wisdom, to think of the world in terms of God, to live in accord with what is relevant to God.” The life of faith is shaped by the law and the prophets. “The good is not an abstract idea but a commandment, and the ultimate meaning of its fulfillment is in its being an answer to God.”
Finally, Heschel talks about the paradigm shift of knowing God. We do not so much think about God as think within God. He explains:
“His is the call, ours the paraphrase; His is the creation, ours a reflection. He is not an object to be comprehended, a thesis to be endorsed, neither the sum of all that is (facts) nor a digest of all that ought to be (ideals). He is the ultimate subject.”
Some speak of God as Ultimate Reality. Often this sounds like an abstraction, but what I think Heschel would say is that God is the most Real, the really Real, by whom all else is understood.
This is a taste of what you will find here. Strong stuff. J. B. Phillips wrote a book titled Your God is too Small. I think Heschel would agree and this little book is a gateway to his thought. What is troubling to me is how rarely I encounter writing like this coming out of Christian publishing houses or in Christian media. This deceptively little book is, as the Wardrobe in C.S. Lewis, much bigger on the inside than the outside. Read slowly and be filled.
________________________________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
Susan M, Reviewer
In this collection of his writings, one realizes that Heschel was a profound and influential man. Heschel was a professor, a theologian, a philosopher, and civil rights activist. He was a person who escaped the Holocaust though his family died in the camps. His writings show how he thought that modern man believe in science and human reason more than God. He believed that man needs to rediscover God. He enabled man to do more practical good doing good. During the 1960’s racial oppression, he wrote that inaction was bad in a civilized society as all is responsible to what happens or not happens. I myself was inspired by his writings and will be rethinking about what God is to me. It an excellent book that reading will perhaps give the reader some insight he didn’t have before.
Angelia S, Reviewer
Abraham Heschel was a Jewish Rabbi and civil rights activist whose writings on faith and religion still resonate today, almost 50 years after his death. His writing is concise, yet poetic. And his words stay with you long after you read them. Although over 50 years old, his writings on racism are as relevant today as they were then. When he calls out the "evil of indifference," it makes you examine your own soul and own up to your own apathy towards your fellow man.
There is something on every page of this book that will make you a better person, whether you're Jewish, Christian, Muslim or none of the above. Read this book. It will change your life for the better.
Thank you Plough Publishing for giving Rabbi Heschel's words new life.
Miriam J, Reviewer
In “Thunder in the Soul”, Abraham Joshua Heschel, a leading Jewish theologian and philosopher of the 20th century, makes traditionalist Jewish spirituality come alive for American Jews. He spoke out boldly and bravely against war and racial injustice.
As an inspired intellectual, Heschel brought the great spiritual fervor of the Hebrew prophets to his role as a theologian. He challenged the sensibilities of the modern West, which views science and human reason as sufficient.
To find God in our lives, we must rediscover wonder and awe before mysteries that transcend knowledge. Heschel firmly believes that God is passionately concerned about our lives and human affairs.
Thunder in the Soul presents Heschel’s profound insights on a wide range of important topics, to challenge, inspire and invigorate readers who hunger for childlike wonder and thirst for justice.
“Thunder in the Soul” aptly describes Heschel’s extremely intelligent state of mind and crystal clear mental framework. He spoke his mind fearlessly without mincing words. He sounds like a solitary voice in the wilderness, crying out against the injustices of our time.
Heschel had a profound social consciousness that made him a great civil rights leader. He was considered “one of the truly great men” of his day and a leading prophetic voice of our time. Heschel reminded American Jews that they had a profound moral responsibility for each other’s liberation and for the plight of all suffering people around the world.
I highly recommend “Thunder in the Soul” to all readers who wish to hear the prolific wisdom of Abraham Joshua Heschel. This book will appeal greatly to readers of our time and day.
Rebecca Brenner G, Educator
In American Jewish history and Jewish studies, Abraham Joshua Heschel embodied a distinctive combination of commitment to Jewish laws and rituals and an openness to change. He was an approachable figure who criticized the “status quo” and guided American Judaism into the “public sphere” through accessible, often beautiful writing. His daughter Susannah, who penned a forward to this collection, remains a reliable presence at American Jewish studies conferences.
Readers who liked this book also liked:
