RT Article
T1 Sacramental Existence and Embodied Theology in Buber’s Representation of Ḥasidism
JF The journal of Jewish thought & philosophy
VO 25
IS 1
SP 131
OP 161
A1 Shonkoff, Sam Berrin
LA English
PB Brill
YR 2017
UL https://www.ixtheo.de/Record/1561996521
AB Martin Buber denied consistently that he was a theologian because he repudiated abstract discourse about God. However, he did affirm that intersubjective events in the world express theological truth, even if that truth cannot be possessed or professed thereafter as noetic content. In this paper I introduce a concept of “embodied theology” to elucidate this nuance in Buber’s religious thought, and I show how his Ḥasidic writings shed unique light on these matters. Through hermeneutical investigations of his Ḥasidic tales vis-à-vis the original sources, I illuminate Buber’s conviction that genuine sages convey theological meaning through the very spiritual-corporeal dynamics of their lives—or what Buber calls their “sacramental existence.”
K1 Martin Buber : embodied theology : Ḥasidism : sacrament : narrative
DO 10.1163/1477285X-12341282