Time in the Teachings of Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi

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Time in the Teachings of Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Wojciech Tworek 
UCL
 
Department of Hebrew & Jewish Studies 
September 2014 
A dissertation submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 
University College London 

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I, Wojciech Tworek, confirm that the work presented in this thesis is my own. Where 
information has been derived from other sources, I confirm that this has been 
indicated in the thesis. 

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BSTRACT
 
This thesis concerns the teachings of Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi (known by the 
acronym of his title and name as Rashaz; 1745-1813), founder of the Habad 
movement, which remains to this day one of the largest and most influential schools 
of Hasidism. It focuses on his concept of time, which features in various contexts in 
both his mystical and his legal writings. 
The thesis challenges the commonly held view that Rashaz’s teachings form 
primarily a mystical doctrine concerned with supra-temporal transcendence. It begins 
with a description of his teachings as an integration of the philosophical definition of 
time into his kabbalistically informed worldview. Next, it analyses the 
historiosophical underpinnings of these teaching, claiming that messianic redemption 
played a key role in Rashaz’s model of spirituality. His messianic awareness is 
further explored in a critical discussion of his view of the imminence of the 
messianic advent, the role of the messianic figure, and the various ways in which the 
redeemed world will be experienced in the future-to-come. By focusing next on the 
significance that Rashaz ascribed to setting regular times for normative Torah study, 
the thesis demonstrates his keen awareness of the crucial role of time in the service 
of the divine, an insight which enabled him to turn Habad into a movement that 
attracted not only the spiritual-intellectual elite but also many ordinary, non-
scholarly Jews. Finally, the thesis explores the nexus of time and femininity in 
Rashaz’s teachings, attempting to establish whether the significance he attached to 
the kabbalistic female aspect of God in the world to come entailed the prospect of 
any actual change in the position of women within his own community, either before 
or after the anticipated redemption. 

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