Eliyahu Eliezer Dessler

Eliyahu Eliezer Dessler (* 1891 in Gomel, Russian Empire, † December 30, 1953 in Bnei Brak, Israel ) was a rabbi, Talmudic scholar, and Jewish philosopher. He played a significant role in the Mussar movement.

Life

Eliyahu spent his boyhood in the shtetl in Gomel, where his father Reuven Dessler Bear ran a business. Later he studied at the bet ha - Talmud ( " Talmud House " ) in Kelmė with his father, who served there as principal, and other representatives of the Mussar movement (literally " moral "), which had been founded by Israel Salanter and the Orthodox Judaism, mainly emphasized among Lithuanian Jews, the value of ethical reflection. Dessler emigrated in 1929 to England, where in London he took his first job as a rabbi in the A Yaakov shul in London's East End, while his wife and two children remained in Lithuania. He later became known as the Talmud philosopher and teacher in England and founded the Kollel of Gateshead. In 1947 he was appointed by Rabbi Yosef Kahaneman, the spiritual head of the synagogue in Bnei Brak Ponewiescher to take over in Israel, where he remained until his death.

Teaching

Dessler teaching was a combination of the " Mussar " principles, as he had learned in Kelme, coupled with concepts of Jewish philosophy, Kabbalah and Hasidism. He comes from an inherent tension in any quest for spiritual and material satisfaction, the importance of the spiritual is incomparably more important. In his famous essay, Kuntras HaChessed, he divides the world in donors and recipients. According to its definition love is "giving without the expectation of getting " and the abolition of self-love prerequisite for any worship. His students published extracts from his manuscripts and his speeches under the title Michtaw me- Eliyahu ( " A Letter from Eliyahu " ) in three volumes 1955-64. The work contains the beginnings of a juxtaposition of Jewish and general philosophy, starting from the questions of his students who had completed a philosophical study.

Works

• Strive for Truth! Vol 1-6. Feldheim, Jerusalem, inter alia, 2004, ISBN 1-58330-688-9.