When R. Shmuel Aba was informed that R. David of Tolna had mentioned that the rebbes were smitten to cause them to become rebbes, he replied, “I am uncertain if they struck us to make us rebbes, but I do not doubt that we will indeed be smitten for becoming rebbes.”
Y.F.
Pinchas Landau
Late Hasidism was perceived and presented in research as a movement of institutionalization and entrenchment that lost the initial Hasidic renaissance, and even degenerated. Recently there have been changes in research and more complex methods and approaches have been introduced that find characteristics unique to late Hasidim.
