Subchapter of ‘Hasidic Tradition’ in Blumenthal, David R. (ed.) Understanding Jewish mysticism: a source reader, ii: The Philosophic-Mystical Tradition and the Hasidic Tradition (Ktav, 1982) Originally published in Louis Jacobs, Hasidic Prayer (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1972), 82-91. Introduction (Blumenthal) Hasidism did not develop in a vacuum. It had at its disposal what…