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ooks with the aim of refuting the anthropomorphism applied
by Frankists to the basic concepts of Kabbalah. From 1761 he
had started to collect from learned authorities their written
commentaries on the manuscripts of his books. However, it
was only in 1854 that they were actually printed in Czernowitz:
(1) Yesod ha-Emunah, on the Pentateuch and miscellanies;
(2) Ammud ha-Avodah, on the basic questions of Kabbalah,
including “a lengthy introduction to explain the essence of
the spiritual entities.”
Bibliography: A. Yaari, Meḥkerei Sefer (1958), 453–4; I.
Tishby, in: Zion, 32 (1967), 24–29.
[Samuel Abba Horodezky]
BARUH, BORA (1901–1941), Yugoslav painter. After studying
law, he devoted himself to painting, moving to Paris in
1938. On returning to Belgrade in 1941, he joined the partisan
movement in Serbia but was captured and executed. He
painted landscapes, portraits, and Spanish Civil War scenes,
mainly in oils.
BARUK, HENRI (1897–1999), French psychiatrist. In 1931
he was appointed chief physician at the Charenton mental
institution, and in 1946 became professor at the Sorbonne.
His early scientific studies concentrated on psychiatric disorders
caused by tumors on the brain. He succeeded in creating,
by artificial means, aggression psychoses in animals. This
led him to study the connections between psychiatric illness
and defective moral awareness in human beings, and he subsequently
displayed a tendency to extend psychiatry into the
area of general anthropology. In 1957 he became chairman
of the French Neurological Society. Baruk compared biblical
medicine with that of Greece and wrote studies on religious
belief and medical ethics. He opposed scientific experiments
on the human body and all methods of psychiatric treatment
which suppress or diminish the personality. Deeply linked
to Jewish tradition and texts, Baruk was active in Jewish affairs
in France, as chairman of the Society for the History of
Hebrew Medicine in Paris and of the French Friends of the
Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His works include Hebraic
Civilization and the Science of Man, 1961 (originally a lecture
in Edinburgh in 1960); Le Test Tzedek, le jugement moral et la
délinquance (1950); Psychiatrie morale, expérimentale, individuelle
et sociale; Psychoses et neuroses (1965); La Psychanalyse
devant la médecine et l’idolâtrie (1978); La Psychiatrie et la crise
morale du monde d’aujourd’hui (1983); and La Bible hébraïque
devant la crise morale du monde d’aujourd’hui (1987). He also
published his memoirs: Des hommes comme nous,mémoires
d’un neuropsychiatre (1975; Patients are People Like Us: The Experiences
of Half a Century in Neuropsychiatry, 1977).
[Joshua O. Leibowitz / Dror Franck Sullaper (2nd ed.)]
BARUKH (Heb. ְ ךּור ּב), ָ initial word of the *berakhah pattern
of prayer. Barukh is conventionally translated “blessed,” but
the etymology is disputed. The root (ךרב) seems to have meant
originally “bend (or fall) upon the knees (berekh = knee)” in
barukh she-amar
prayerful obeisance (Ps. 95:6; Isa. 45:23). Cassuto maintains,
however, that it meant originally “bestow a gift” (Gen. 24:1,
35; 33:11, et al.). Barukh is a homonym expressing a reciprocal
relationship: man can address God as barukh by expressing
feelings of thanksgiving, reverence, love, and praise, while
he is barukh by God who bestows His material and spiritual
gifts. The person upon whom the divine blessing rests is called
berukh Adonai, “blessed of the Lord” (Gen. 24:31, 26:29). Barukh
Adonai, in the sense of man blessing God, occurs 24
times in the Bible.
The pattern barukh Attah Adonai (“blessed art Thou,
Lord”) occurs only twice in biblical literature (Ps. 119:12;
I Chron. 29:10). This second person form attained currency
no earlier than about the fourth century B.C.E. There is, however,
no substantive difference between the second and third
person forms. As applied to God “blessed” is identical with
“praised” and the formula of blessing viz. benediction is, in
fact, one of praise.
The prototype of the classical berakhah is to be found
in the biblical formula, barukh Adonai… asher… (e.g., Gen.
24:27; Ex. 18:10), in which he who has experienced the marvelous
or miraculous expresses adoration and awe. This pattern
persisted for centuries and was eventually adapted for liturgical
use as the Jew’s response to “the miracles of every day.”
But the insertion of the pronoun Attah (“Thou”) was slow in
gaining exclusive acceptance. Some of the variant forms of the
berakhah persisted until the third century C.E. when the standard
pattern was fully established (Ber. 40b). In third-century
Babylonia, Rav and Samuel were still debating whether Attah
was required in the formula (TJ, Ber. 9:1, 12d). Rav’s pattern,
barukh Attah Adonai, became the standard opening phrase;
but the old biblical formula in which barukh (Attah) Adonai
was followed by the characteristic phrase, asher (“who,” i.e.,
“performed some beneficent act”) remained in use. This juxtaposition
of direct address to God and a sequel in the third
person created a syntactical paradox which has exercised
commentators and theologians down to the present. Many
commentators explain the juxtaposition of second and third
person homiletically as indicating both God’s nearness and
transcendence. The second person address is referred to in
traditional sources as nigleh (“revealed”) and the third person
as nistar (“hidden”).
Bibliography: Blank, in: HUCA, 32 (1961), 87–90; Bamberger,
in: Judaism, 5 (1956), 167–8; M. Kadushin, The Rabbinic Mind
(19652), 266–70 (theological aspect); J. Heinemann, Ha-Tefillah bi-
Tekufat ha-Tanna’im re-ha-Amora’im (19662), 29–77 (textual criticism).
[Herman Kieval]
BARUKH SHE-AMAR (Heb. רַמָ אֶׁ ש ְ ךּור ּב; ָ “Blessed be He who
spoke”), benediction opening the section of *Shaḥarit called
“passages of song,” i.e., the morning psalms (Pesukei de-Zimra
or Zemirot). In the Ashkenazi rite the benediction is placed at
the beginning of the whole section, while in the Sephardi and
other rites some verses and psalms are recited before Barukh
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 3 191