Abstract
Hasidism is a religious movement with a predominant mystical aspect, and was founded in Eastern Europe in the 18th century by Israel ben Eliezer. Nowadays, the members of this movement, who live heavily in New York city of the USA, attract the attention of the world, despite all the charm of modern life, with their efforts to maintain their way of life and their understanding of religiosity, especially with their distant stance against the fashion industry with the use of technology and internet. In the 18th century, the reformist thought manifested with Haskala, The Jewish enlightenment movement, on the one hand, a new understanding of religiosity emerged, on the other, very different from the reformists, and it was developed rapidly and this new religious way of life started to shake the religious understanding of the Rabbinic Judaism in the religious lives of the Jews. This movement, which will eventually be called “Hasidism”, has transformed rituals and religious understanding, which have been believed and practiced for hundreds of years. Instead of living a life adhering to the framework driven by the “halakha” by doing Bible and Talmud studies, which are the basic dynamics of traditional Jewish religious life, Hasidism has adopted a new understanding in which its own new priorities are at the center of religious life, such as a charismatic leader called “tsaddik” or “rebbe”, faith, love, religious enthusiasm, dance, religious storytelling. Although Hasidism evokes the fundamental role played by Protestantism in Christianity in the context of its approach to rituals and traditional religiosity and its discourses, due to the practical consequences of Hasidism, and different religious stance emerged as a typology contrary to modern society, and it gained support, especially among ordinary people. In this study, we will present our findings about how Hasidic Jews lived their unique lives among modern societies in modern times, after explaining the new practices that the Hasidism has revealed and comparing their differences from the traditional line.