This first collection of Heschel's essays - compiled, edited and with an introduction by his daughter Susannah Heschel, is a stunning reminder of the virtuosity of one of the most well respected minds in Judaic studies. “One of the truly great men of our day and age, a truly great prophet.” ― Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. “This essential collection captures the best of a leading thinker and doer who influenced many contemporaries with an ancient prophetic tradition that he made new.” ― Kirkus Reviews Dr. Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-72), one of the foremost Jewish savants of our time, was internationally known as scholar, author, activist, and theologian. In his lifetime Heschel spoke and published widely. Arriving in the United States in flight from the brutalities of Nazi Germany, he never forgot that the search for the divine and for human spirituality is inseparable from the search for a just society. As a revered and beloved teacher, he impressed on his students, first at the Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati and then during his many years as Professor of Ethics and Mysticism at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, the spiritual imperatives of prayer, of ecumenism, of social decency. This first collection of Dr. Heschel's essays is arranged in five groups: "Existence and Celebration", "No Time for Neutrality", "Toward a Just Society", "No Religion Is an Island" (on ecumenism), and "The Holy Dimension". The essays include a tribute to Reinhold Niebuhr and a discussion of Father Bernard Haring, the moral theologian. The appendix contains Carl Stern's famous television interview with Dr. Heschel, recorded shortly before his death. The book also includes an introduction to Dr. Heschel's life and thought by the editor, his daughter, Susannah Heschel, who holds the Abba Hillel Silver chair in Jewish Studies at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. She is also the editor of the landmark collection On Being a Jewish Feminist. Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972) was internationally known as a scholar, author, activist, and theologian. He was Professor of Ethics and Mysticism at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. Susannah Heschel is the Eli Black Professor of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College. She is the daughter of Abraham Joshua Herschel. Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity Essays By Abraham Joshua Heschel Farrar, Straus and Giroux Copyright © 1997 Abraham Joshua Heschel All right reserved. ISBN: 9780374524951 Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity I EXISTENCE AND CELEBRATION To Be a Jew: What Is It? THERE IS A HIGH COST of living to be paid by a Jew. He has to be exalted in order to be normal in a world that is neither propitious for nor sympathetic to his survival. Some of us, tired of sacrifice and exertion, often wonder: Is Jewish existence worth the price? Others are overcome with panic; they are perplexed and despair of recovery.The meaning of Jewish existence, the foremost theme of any Jewish philosophy, is baffling. To fit it into the framework of personal intellectual predilections or current fashions of our time would be a distortion. The claim of Israel must be recognized before attempting an interpretation. As the ocean is more than what we know about it, so Judaism surpasses the content of all philosophies of it. We have not invented it. We may accept or reject, but should not distort it.It is as an individual that I am moved by an anxiety for the meaning of my existence as a Jew. Yet when I begin to ponder about it, my theme is not the problem of one Jew but of all Jews. And the more deeply I probe, the more strongly I realize the scope of the problem. It embraces not only the Jews of the present but also those of the past and those of the future, the meaning of Jewish existence in all ages.What is at stake in our lives is more than the fate of one generation. In this moment we, the living, are Israel. The tasks begun by the patriarchs and prophets, and carried out by countless Jews of the past, are now entrusted to us. No other group has superseded them. We are the only channel of Jewish tradition, those who must save Judaism from oblivion, those who must hand over the entire past to the generations to come. We are either the last, the dying, Jews or else we are those who will give new life to our tradition. Rarely in our history has so much been dependentupon one generation. We will either forfeit or enrich the legacy of the ages.  JUDAISM IS NOT a chapter in the history of philosophy. It does not lend itself to be a subject of reflection for armchair philosophers. Its understanding cannot be attained in the comfort of playing a chess game of theories. Only ideas that are meaningful to those who are steeped in misery may be accepted as principles by those who dwell in safety. In trying to understand Jewish existence a Jewish philosopher must look for agreement with the men of Sinai as well as with the people of Auschwitz.We are the most cha