הגיוגרפיה בקונטקסט: ספר שבחי הבעש"ט ותהליך עיצובה של החסידות

Shivhei haBesht , first published in Kopost, White Russia in late 1814 – fifty-four years after the death of Israel Baal Shem Tov – is a decidedly complicated work. It contains close to two-hundred and fifty praise tales, ranging from wondrous to shocking, about R. Israel Baal Shem Tov and many figures around him. In Shivheiha Besht we find stories about the Besht as aba'al shem, magician, and folk healer –alongside typical miracle tales – and also as a mystic who involved himself with his fellow men. The book includes early traditions about the Besht and his companions (some of them certainly recounted in his lifetime) interspersed with others that had previously been told about other figures but which were then retold with the Besht as the hero. This article analyzes the tales of praise within the historical contexts in which they were created, edited, and printed, and of the function they fulfilled in each one of those stages. It sets aside the question of the historicity of any given tale and its reliability as a source for the historical Besh t(however important such a question may be) and, moreover, to expand our attention beyond the printed book as we now have it. This will make it possible not only to ask new questions but also to describe a historical and textual reality that was exceedingly fluid across its developmental stages. Specifically, it addresses three such stages: its composition by Dov Ber of Linits, its first printing by Israel Yaffeof Kopost, and its second printing by a press in Berditchev. These developmentalstages occurred in parallel with various stages in the formation of Hassidism as it developed from a cluster of individuals, connected in various ways to the Besht, to fellowships and courts founded in his name and then to a true mass movement. The outlines of such a study have already been drawn by a number of scholars, but new sources – among them a hidden manuscript of sermons composed by Judah Leibthe son of Dov Ber of Linits, an additional manuscript prepared by Israel Yaffe, and rare editions newly discovered in the St. Petersburg archives – make it possibleto present a more precise and complex historical picture than before