History: Devotionist Textual Scholarship and Historical Consciousness in Early Modern Responsa

We often think of the historical approach as the ultimate critical outlook. But this is only true of certain kinds of historicism. There are different ways in which scholars have embraced historical perspectives that were compatible with devotionist outlooks. This chapter presents one such example in the responsa (rabbinic answers to concrete questions of Jewish religious law) of Rabbi Yair ?ayim Bacharach, who lived in the German lands 1638-1702. One of R. Bachrach’s responsa exhibits his approach to the Zohar. While R. Bacharach wholeheartedly considers the work sacred, he nevertheless recognizes and engages with its historical context. R. Bacharach’s approach suggests an early modern historical attitude that need not be opposed to a devotionist stance. This attitude is then compared to the tools employed by early modern humanists and antiquarians, which were similarly critical yet not necessarily opposed to devotionism. The chapter suggests that our assumptions about the incompatibility of historical criticism and devotion stem from a very specific school of nineteenth-century historicism. These early modern models present a different way.