DOV BAER OF LUBAVITCH (The Mittler Rebbe). Bi’urei HaZohar [commentary to the Zohar according to the doctrine of Chabad].

(CHASSIDISM).

Israel Jaffe

Kopyst

1816

FIRST EDITION. Printer’s device (Yaari, no. 183) on title. Printed in double columns on blue/green tinted paper. A wide-margined copy.

Vinograd, Kopyst 53; Habermann, Sha’arei Chabad (in Schocken Festschrift) 15

The publication of Bi'urei HaZohar by R. Dov Baer was part of a multi-faceted literary campaign designed to prove his rightful claim to the spiritual mantle of his father R. Shneur Zalman of Liadi (deceased 1813), which was hotly contested by R. Aharon Halevi of Starosselje, the disciple who studied under R. Shneur Zalman for more than thirty years. The advertisement on the title, whereby R. Dov Baer had been designated by his father to transcribe the interpretations of the Zohar imparted every Friday night to his sons, sent a transparent message to the chassidim that none other than R. Dov Baer was the rightful spiritual heir and not his father’s principle disciple. See M. Rosman, Founder of Hasidism (1996) pp. 189-209, especially p. 202.