The Image of Rebbetzin Rivkah Schneersohn (1834-1914) and the Remaking of Chabad’s Literary Tradition

• In Event: Reading Against the Grain: New Approaches to Jewish Literary Studies

Abstract

The death of Rebbetzin Rivkah Schneersohn in 1914 heralded the end of Chabad Hasidism’s 19th century “golden-era.” Soon World War I would break out, and the village of Lubavitch, the movement’s seat for more than a century, would be abandoned in the face of the German advance into Russia. Rebbetzin Rivkah had spent nearly all of her eight decades in Lubavitch, outlived her husband by 34 years, and played a prominent leadership role in the Chabad-Lubavitch court until her very last days. Amid the dislocations, challenges, and troubles suffered by Chabad in the decades following her passing, her grandson—Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn (“Rayatz,” 1880-1950)—wielded his pen to preserve his memories of her, and his memories of the memories that she had passed down from earlier generations. She figures prominently both as a character in his own writings, and as a source of inspiration for a set of highly experimental literary projects that participate in—and compete with—the rise of modern Jewish literature in general, and in particular neo-Hasidic literature. Chabad’s literary tradition had always intertwined hasidic exegesis, mystical theology, and prescriptions for devotional praxis. Rayatz’s narrative writings, characterized by “a subtle, and not unconscious, blurring of generic categories,” served to both perpetuate this tradition and remake it in a new form. As the late Ada Rapoport-Albert noted, Rayatz’s “eager” reliance on “tales about the Hasidic past” transmitted by his grandmother reflects “his equally novel project of integrating ‘the wives and daughters of the hasidim’ into his Habad constituency.” More recently, Wojciech Tworek has highlighted the imbrications of nostalgia, ritual, and messianic renewal in Rayatz’s literary oeuvre, and several scholars have discussed methodological questions relating to the historiographic value of his writings. But apart from a few comments here and there, the image of Rebbetzin Rivkah both as a historical figure, and as the literary personification of Chabad’s collective memory, has not been studied. This paper intends to bring her persona and legacy into clearer focus. Her portrayal in Rayatz’s writings will be critically examined and contextualized through reference to a larger body of memoir literature and other documentary sources.

Author

• Eli Rubin, Chabad.org