Abraham Joshua Heschel papers, 1880, 1919-1998 and undated 162 Linear Feet — 319 boxes
The Abraham Joshua Heschel Papers span the years 1880 to 1998 and document Abraham Joshua Heschel's personal, academic, and public life, including his long-term involvement and leadership in social activism and other public activities, his reputation as a compelling and sought-after public speaker, and his far-reaching influence as a scholar and religious thinker. Items in this collection include correspondence, writings by and about Heschel, typescripts, clippings, printed material, and a small amount of photographs and artifacts. The materials in the collection provide insight to Heschel's identity as a spiritual leader and how this role was inextricably connected to his personal and professional life.
The collection is organized into the following series: Audio, Correspondence, Personal and Family Materials, Public Activity, Restricted, and Writings. Heschel maintained a meaningful, yet complex filing system. To balance preserving the original order with making the collection as accessible to researchers as possible, several key elements have been added to the collection guide:
•Scope note at the folder level. In many cases folder titles in the collection were reused, abbreviated, in Hebrew, or did not exist. Short descriptions of folder contents have been included not only to provide context for the materials, but also to make distinctions between the varying titles.
•Supplied/enhanced folder titles. In the case of missing or abbreviated titles, supplied titles (in brackets) were created. For folder titles written in Hebrew, the original folder title was documented along with its transliteration and English translation.
•Language extent. There are varying degrees in the amount of language materials in each folder and oftentimes multiple languages are represented in a single folder. To assist researchers, each folder description includes a note identifying the language(s) and their extent in the folder, with the dominant language listed first. The absence of a note indicates that all materials in the folder are in English. The following language categories are used: "A few" indicates that 1-25% of the materials are in another language(s); "Some" 26-65%; "Most" 66-99%; and "All" 100%.
Additionally there was a large of amount of clippings included in the Heschel collection which were generally in fragile condition. Where possible, these clippings were photocopied for preservation purposes and the originals discarded.