“Revelation in Concealment: Toward an Embodied Post-Holocaust Spirituality”

This essay develops a revolutionary post-Holocaust theological framework that moves beyond the intellectual limitations of traditional responses to Auschwitz toward what I term an “anti-theology of embodied absence.” While engaging critically with major post-Holocaust thinkers—Jonas, Levinas, Celan, Levi, Rubenstein, and Fackenheim—this work demonstrates that their intellectual approaches, however sophisticated, remain trapped within theological categories that the Holocaust has rendered fundamentally problematic.
Drawing on suppressed currents within Jewish mystical tradition, particularly the radical theology found in Rabbi Jonathan Eybeschutz’s “Va-avo ha-Yom el ha-’Ayin,” this study shows how Jewish tradition itself contains resources for transcending conventional theological discourse. However, the Holocaust presents qualitatively different challenges that require evolution beyond even the most radical historical precedents toward forms of spiritual practice that can engage ultimate reality without requiring theological explanation.
The methodology is experiential rather than textual, grounding theological insight in embodied experiences—personal loss, observing dancers unknowingly performing on sacred ground, inheriting epigenetic imperfection from a Holocaust survivor father. This “somatic hermeneutics” reveals that authentic divine encounter occurs not through intellectual resolution of theological paradox but through sustained embodied presence to the dialectical tensions that constitute human existence after Auschwitz.
The work articulates practical frameworks for post-Holocaust Jewish life, including liturgical practice that operates through “dialectical davening,” community formation based on “interrogative solidarity,” and spiritual pedagogy that cultivates comfort with theological uncertainty. Medical practice emerges as a paradigmatic space for “dialectical presence” where healer and patient encounter mystery together without requiring intellectual mastery.
This anti-theology concludes not with systematic doctrine but with invitation to embodied practice that can sustain authentic Jewish spiritual life while remaining fully present to irreparable historical trauma. The approach demonstrates how genuine theological innovation emerges not from abandoning Jewish tradition but from engaging tradition’s most radical possibilities in response to unprecedented spiritual challenges, providing therapeutic resources for communities seeking authentic Jewish existence in a post-Holocaust world.

Keywords: Post-Holocaust Theology, Anti-Theology, Dialectical Divine, Embodied Spirituality Jewish Mysticism, Radical Kabbalah, Divine Absence, Hester Panim, Therapeutic Theology, Mystical Transgression.