Abraham Joshua Heschel

Radio Programs on Heschel 

The Spiritual Audacity of Abraham Joshua Heschel

From Speaking of Faith with Krista Tippet - June 5, 2008 - American Public Media

Abraham Joshua Heschel insisted that the opposite of good is not evil, it is indifference. Born into an esteemed Hasidic family in Poland in 1907, he was a mystic who wrote transcendent, poetic words about God. At the same time, he marched alongside Martin Luther King Jr. and organized religious leadership against the war in Vietnam, embodying the social activism of the biblical prophets he studied. We explore Heschel's teachings and his prophetic legacy - his "spiritual audacity" - for people in our time.

Cornel West Commentary: Heschel and King

The Tavis Smiley Show, January 14, 2004 - NPR

Commentator Cornel West pays homage to Abraham Joshua Heschel, former professor of Jewish ethics and mysticism at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. Heschel had a major impact on the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s thinking on non-violence, race and human rights.West discusses the friendship and alliance between Heschel and King with NPR's Tavis Smiley.

Articles from The Centenary of Abraham Joshua Heschel 

60th Anniversary of Seelisberg Conference

Heschel's View of Religious Diversity

By Harold Kasimow, Grinnell College

"....Much like the Dalai Lama's perspective on Buddhism vis-à-vis other religions, Heschel's distinctive Jewish approach to religious diversity transcended the categories created by Christian scholars."

Professor Kasimov introduced me to Rabbi Heschel

Abraham Joshua Heschel: Witness to God in Word and Deed

By John C. Merkle, College of Saint Benedict/Saint John's University, Minnesota

"There are no proofs for the existence of the God of Abraham," said Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972). "There are only witnesses." For countless Jews and Christians, Heschel was, in both his words and his deeds, one of the preeminent witnesses to God in the twentieth century...."

Abraham Heschel and the Catholic Heart

By Padraic O'Hare, Merrimack College, North Andover, MA

"This essay associates the deep abiding influence of Rabbi Heschel on Christians with his unique expression of an incarnational religious imagination, appealing to all Christians with a "Catholic heart..."

Heschel's Monotheism vis-à-vis Pantheism and Panentheism

By John C. Merkle, College of Saint Benedict/Saint John's University, Minnesota

"The foundation of Abraham Joshua Heschel's theology is the most hallowed claim about God in the Jewish tradition: "Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One" (Dt. 6:4). Heschel echoes the tradition in claiming that this means not simply that there is only one true God, but also that God possesses inner unity, which is the necessary precondition for unity in the world. Pantheism is one way of explaining unity in the world, and though there a few passages in Heschel's writings that have a pantheistic ring to them, this article shows that Heschel clearly espouses a monotheistic perspective as opposed to a pantheistic one...."

More Links on Heschel 

Abraham Joshua Heschel: Our Generation's Teacher

From Cross Currents

"Our teacher, Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972), served as Professor of Jewish Ethics and Mysticism at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America from 1945 to 1972. No title could be more fitting. He was Professor of Ethics and Mysticism not only by lecturing on the principles of ethics and mysticism but also by professing ethics and highlighting the mystery of being.

A Rabbi of His Time, With a Charisma That Transcends It

From the New York Times
By EDWARD ROTHSTEIN Published: December 24, 2007

"...This year's centennial of Heschel's birth, commemorated by the new biography and a conference this month at the Center for Jewish History in Manhattan, takes place in a very different world. Surely no one today could write, as he did in his landmark 1955 book, "God in Search of Man," that there is an "eclipse of religion in modern society." If anything, there is no escape from talk about faith. Nor is the relationship between religious convictions and political activism as simple as it might have once seemed."

Praying with their Feet: Remembering Abraham Joshua Heschel and Martin Luther King

By Susannah Heschel

"The photograph of Abraham Joshua Heschel walking arm in arm with Martin Luther King, Jr., in the front row of marchers at Selma has become an icon of American Jewish life, and of Black-Jewish relations. Reprinted in Jewish textbooks, synagogue bulletins, and studies of ecumenical relations, the picture has come to symbolize the great moment of symbiosis of the two communities, Black and Jewish, which today seems shattered."

A commentary on Abraham Joshua Heschel's book 'Who is man?'

From 1000 Ways to the Real You

"Having thought about human nature and about spiritualization and about perennial philosophy teachings in undisciplined ways for forty years, and having thought about Holistic Education for some five or ten years, in a somewhat more disciplined way, I found that Who is Man by Abraham Joshua Heschel was like having a great poet-seer at your shoulder who had captured essential vision and set it down, in powerful, profound simplicity."

Links to Other Barry Krost Web Activities 

Some other things I'm doing on the web.

Healing Family Constellations

I am now offering individual sessions and workshops in Family Constellations, a powerful form of energy healing that discovers the sources of suffering. Family Constellations reveal the hidden dynamics in family systems. They create a living model of the family that begins an exploration of the deeper reasons for emotional distress, trauma, illnesses and spiritual confusion. Sessions available in Chicago, Los Angeles and San Antonio.

Krost Therapy

Learn about Ortho-Bionomy®, Lymph Drainage technique and Family Constellations. My biggest specialty is working with the Psoas muscle.