Hasidism is the common appellation of a Jewish pietistic movement that developed in eastern Europe in the second half of the eighteenth century, became, before the end of that century, a major force in modern Judaism, and has remained as such. Previous Hasidic movements in Jewish history—mainly the Ashkenazic Hasidism of medieval Germany (twelfth–thirteenth centuries) and the early ḥasidim of the tannaitic period (first–second centuries CE)—will not be discussed here. Rather, the movement at hand is that called, in the writings of the opponents of Hasidism and some historians, "Beshtian Hasidism," a sobriquet that refers to the movement's founder, Yisraʾel ben Eliʿezer, known as the BeSHT (an acronym for Baʿal Shem Tov, "Master of the Good Name").

Roots of the Movement

Hasidism did not emerge, as most other Jewish religious movements did, from the schools of the higher social...