Hasidim

Hasidim or Chassidim [Heb.,=the pious], term used by the rabbis to describe those Jews who maintained the highest standard of religious observance and moral action. The term has been applied to movements at three distinct times. The first Hasidim, also called the Assideans or Hasideans, were an ancient Jewish sect that developed between 300 BC and 175 BC They were the most rigid adherents of Judaism in contradistinction to those Jews who were beginning to be affected by Hellenistic influences. The Hasidim led the resistance to the hellenizing campaign of Antiochus IV of Syria, and they figured largely in the early phases of the revolt of the Maccabees . Their ritual strictness has caused some to see them as forerunners of the Pharisees. Throughout the Talmudic period numerous figures were referred to as Hasidim. During the 12th and 13th cent., however, there arose in Germany a specific group known as the Hasidei Ashkenaz. Influenced by Saadia ben Joseph and with messianic and mystical elements, it held as its central ideology the unity of God, the application of justice in all situations, social and economic equality, and martyrdom at the hands of the crusaders rather than compromise of any kind. The chief ethical work that derived from the group was the Sefer Hasidim (tr. Book of the Pious, 1973). The third movement to which the term Hasidim is applied is that founded in the 18th cent. by Baal-Shem-Tov and known as Hasidism .

Bibliography: See S. Lieberman, Hellenism in Jewish Palestine (1962); S. G. Kramer, God and Man in the Sefer Hasidim (1966); A. L. Lowenkopf, The Hasidim (1973). See also bibliography under Hasidism.

Hasidim Persons characterized by hesed, loyalty, especially to God, in the community of the faithful. They are ‘the holy ones in the land’ (Ps. 16: 3, NRSV), ‘his faithful ones’ (Ps. 30: 4; Prov. 2: 8, NRSV). At one time the fact of belonging to the people of Israel was equivalent to being one of the Hasidim, but later they were ethically and spiritually ‘the righteous’ contrasted with the ‘wicked’, as is implied by the parallelism of Ps. 37: 28–9.

In the 2nd cent. BCE the Hasideans were a group of Jewish zealots for the Law who were opposed to the spread of Hellenistic culture (1 Macc. 2: 42; 2 Macc. 14: 6). As students of scripture they gave intellectual support for a time to Judas Maccabaeus. A self-portrait of a member of the group may be drawn by Ben Sirach in Ecclus. [= Sir.] 38: 34c–39: 5. They are thought by some to have been forerunners of the Pharisees.