Mysticism in the religious philosophy of Abraham Joshua Heschel

ENThe mass annihilation of Jews in Europe forced Heschel to rethink, and to present a new portrait of the devotee, a concept of Jewish sanctity, of moral and religious principles, and to emphasize the meta-symbolic significance of religious terms. Heschel defines the philosophy of religion not as philosophy of a philosophy, the philosophy of a doctrine, the interpretations of a dogma, but as the philosophy of concrete events, actions, insights, and all things that directly envelop a pious person. He claims that the philosophy of religion must consider not questions of faith, ritual, or religious practice, but the source of all these phenomena, or why a person experiences and accepts them. The question would be: "Why do I and you need religion in our lives?" [p. 138].