Falling in Love with Scripture
Intellectuality and Emotionality in Lithuanian Haredi Torah Study
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3158869 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Yair Berlin (0000-0001-9888-9730, Bar-Ilan University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 16 |
| Issue | 5 |
| Pages | 613 |
| Publication date | 2025-05-12 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Religions (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2077-1444 • E-ISSN: 2077-1444 |
| Publisher | MDPI AG (PUBLISHER • IT) |
| DOI | 10.3390/rel16050613 |
| OpenAlex | W4410287161 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 22 |
This article examines the emotional and intellectual dimensions of Torah study in contemporary Lithuanian Haredi Judaism in Israel by analyzing the cultural construction of ahavat ha-Torah (love of Torah). While scholarly discussions of religious love have traditionally focused on interpersonal love or love of God, this study highlights a unique form of love directed toward a textual object-the Torah. Drawing on discourse-analytic approaches and engaging both high and popular cultural sources within the Lithuanian Haredi world, the article explores how the ethos of this tradition constructs the Torah as an object of emotional attachment. To understand the nature of this distinctive form of love, the article develops three interrelated conceptual lenses: (1) love of Torah as love of wisdom, (2) the perception of Torah as an entity capable of emotional relationship, and (3) the ethos of toil (amal ha-Torah) as a practice of devotional attachment. These categories serve to unpack how Lithuanian Haredi discourse constructs a model of love that fuses intellectual rigor with emotional intensity. The article concludes by suggesting that within Lithuanian Haredi Judaism, while God is often depicted as transcendent and distant, the Torah takes on an emotionally immanent role-serving as a locus of sacred attachment, identity, and even revelation
Emotionality · Judaism · Linguistics · Lithuanian · Sociology · Theology · Torah · Families in Therapy and Culture · Humor Studies and Applications · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies · Philosophy · Psychology · Social Psychology
A Tear Is an Intellectual Thing
The Gaon of VilnaThe Man and His Image
From Passions to Emotions
The Managed Heart
Carnal Israel
Solving the Emotion Paradox
The Routledge Handbook of Love in Philosophy
The Emotions
Jewish Political Theology
The Making of Romantic Love
Intellectual and Other Nonstandard Emotions
Are Emotions a Kind of Practice (And Is That What Makes Them Have a History)? A Bourdieuian Approach to Understanding Emotion
Emotional Liberty
Voices around the Text
Anthropology and emotion
Emotion Work, Feeling Rules, and Social Structure
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |