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"There is nothing more whole than a broken heart."Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk

Poster design:Michael Peters

Commentary

by Erica Brown

Many experiences in life try to break us: illness, loneliness, the death of those we love, rejection, insecurity, loss. But such experiences also make us more whole as human beings. They expand our range of consciousness and compassion. They enlarge our capacity for inclusion. They make us stronger and help us reach out to others with greater empathy and concern. When we acknowledge that we are broken, we enter a universe where we are not measured by perfection but by our willingness to repair ourselves and the world. We stop judging others only when we can recognize our own inadequacies.

Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk (1787–1859), the Kotzker Rebbe, was one of the most enigmatic figures in the Hasidic world. Born Menachem Mendel Morgensztern to a non-Hasidic family in the south of Poland, the Kotzker Rebbe found himself attracted to Hasidic teachings. He was regarded as a sharp-witted, profound thinker with stern views on ignorance and falsehood. He had little patience for foolishness, which is best illustrated by one of his most famous aphorisms: "All that is thought should not be said, all that is said should not be written, all that is written should not be published, and all that is published should not be read."

The Kotzker mysteriously spent the last 20 years of his life in seclusion. Perhaps his own brokenness overwhelmed him; he separated himself from the life of community that so often characterizes Hasidic living. But he gave the world an earnest and profound set of teachings, aptly summarized by his enduring statement of spiritual living: “God is found wherever He is given entry.” God is found in the broken places.

Conversation Guide

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

The commentary to this quotation reflects upon challenging life experiences that seem to “break” us, but end up strengthening each of us as a person. In a similar vein, Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk celebrates the completeness of a broken heart. This oxymoron requires our attention and clarification.

How can the same heart be both “broken” and “whole”?

Can you think of examples of people who grew and became more “whole” through life experiences that appeared to “break” them?

Have you ever been in a similar situation? How did you move from brokenness to growth and wholeness?

Does this quotation about brokenness say the same as does the quotation of Rabbi Nachman of Breslau, “if you believe breaking is possible, believe fixing is possible”? How are the statements similar—and different?

WHAT DO YOU SEE?

Each image calls out to us to examine it, to note our thoughts and feelings, and relate these impressions to the quotation. Often clues in the artwork suggest meaning and invite interpretation.

Designer Michael Peters conveys the meaning of the rabbi’s quotation by using a single image on a solid-colored background.

How does the image present the quotation? Was this how you interpreted the quotation without the image?

Why do you think Peters uses two bandages to create the heart, and not a single heart-shaped bandage?

Compare this image with the one depicting the quotation of Rabbi Nachman of Breslau, “if you believe breaking is possible, believe fixing is possible.” What message does each poster convey about the themes of brokenness, healing, and fixing?

Please use this guide creatively in your programs. We’d also love to see what you’re doing and share it with others, so please post on our website using the Share button in The Exchange.

Credits

Harold Grinspoon Foundation, West Springfield, MA

Author

Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk

1787–1859

Lived in Poland

Hasidic rabbi

About

Menachem Mendel of Kotzk generated a new form of Hasidism, roughly a century after the movement took hold in Eastern Europe.

By the first half of the 19^th century, a religious practice based primarily on a “simple awareness of God” had taken on other baggage—fierce dynastic allegiances, idiosyncratic imitation of leaders, particular dress and prayer behaviors, mass belief in miracle working and intensified study of kabbalistic sources.

The Kotzker Rebbe led a personal crusade against all of these acquired forms, calling for a stripped-down Hasidism, authenticity and a vigilant battle against pretense. In the Kotzker’s circle, study was simplified, ecstasy was tempered and self-scrutiny was seen as the key to ethical behavior and religious integrity.

He was known for his sharp, critical, intense personality. He wrote various manuscripts, but burned them all. (His words live on through several posthumously published collections of sayings.) He cut off all human contact for the last 20 years of his life—rather frightening to imagine, but not inconsistent with the sort of person he was and the spiritual demands he placed on himself and others.

Links

More on Menachem Mendel of Kotzk

Credits

Image Credit: Grave of Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk, Public Domain

Artist

Michael Peters

New York

Graphic designer

• • •

About

Designer and strategist Michael Peters is a pioneer of the design industry, demonstrating that design is a means to increased profitability. He has consistently emphasized the importance of aesthetic quality applied to the highest standards of creative thinking. His work has revolutionized the relationship between design and business.

Peters studied graphic design and typography at the London College of Printing. He later won a European scholarship to the School of Art and Architecture at Yale, where he studied under the famed Paul Rand and Josef Albers, graduating with a master’s degree in fine arts. He subsequently worked for CBS television in New York before returning to London to set up the design department for the advertising agency Collett Dickenson Pearce.

In 1970, at the age of 29, he established his own company—Michael Peters and Partners—which revolutionized the role of packaging in the marketing of consumer products. In 1983, he changed the perceptions of design by leading the company onto the London Stock Exchange. By 1989 the company’s annual turnover exceeded £45m, with clients including the BBC, British Airways, the Conservative Party, Redland, ITV, United Distillers and Unilever. In November 1990 he was awarded the OBE (the Order of the British Empire) for his services to design and marketing.

In 1992, Peters founded The Identica Partnership, which today is part of the Cossette Communication Group.

He has now left Identica and works as a brand consultant.

Links

More design by Michael Peters

Quote

"There is nothing more whole than a broken heart."Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk

Context

One cannot draw close to God unless one has been broken... Certainly, we are all in need of God's wondrous healing. And while we prefer not to have to take this path toward the sacred, illness awakens us to the world and the reality of living... We will all confront illness in our lives - whether it is a serious illness of our own or the illness of someone we love. And we will be forced to confront the Divine as a result... The Kotzker Rebbe has taught: the only whole heart is the one that has been broken.

Source

Source of quote: Bergman, Shmuel Hugo (1991)/ Dialogical Philosophy From Kierkegaard to Buber; (translation by Gerstein, Arnold A.). Albany: SUNY Press.

Hebrew

"אין דבר שלם יותר מלב שבור."

-רבי מנחם מנדל מקוצק

R.O. Blechman	Ivan Chermayeff	Seymour Chwast	Tom Geismar	Bob Gill	Milton Glaser
Carin Goldberg	Mervyn Kurlansky	Art Paul	Alan Peckolick	Michael Peters	Dan Reisinger
Paula Scher	Daniel Bennett Schwartz	Arnold Schwartzman	Henry Steiner	George Tscherny	Yarom Vardimon

Baal Shem Tov	Ben-Zoma, Pirke Avot 4:1	Louis Brandeis	Martin Buber	Benjamin Cardozo	Adapted from Deuteronomy 20:19
Deuteronomy Rabbah 1:10	Blu Greenberg	Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel	Rabbi Hillel (Pirke Avot 1:14)	Maimonides	Benjamin Mandelstamm
Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk	Rabbi Nachman of Breslau	Adapted from Song of Songs 8:6	Susan Sontag	Talmud, Taanit 23A	Rabbi Tarfon, Pirke Avot 2:21

"All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware."	"A community is too heavy to carry alone."	"From every human being there rises a light."
"The heroic hours of life do not announce their presence by drum and trumpet."	"A human being is like a letter of the alphabet: to produce a word, it must combine with another."	"I found a fruitful world, because my ancestors planted it for me. Likewise I am planting for my children."
"If I am not for myself, who will be for me? But if I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, when?"	"If you believe breaking is possible, believe fixing is possible."	"It is not your responsibility to finish the work of perfecting the world, but you are not free to desist from it either."
"Love is stronger than death."	"Man's life depends on the trees of the field."	"A miracle cannot prove what is impossible. It only confirms what is possible."
"Most of the things worth doing in the world were declared impossible before they were done."	"Once I had tasted the fruit of the tree of knowledge, there was no going back. "	"Silence remains, inescapably, a form of speech."
"There is nothing more whole than a broken heart."	"When I marched in Selma, I felt my legs were praying."	"Who is wise? One who learns from all people. Who is honored? One who honors everyone."

R.O. Blechman	Ivan Chermayeff	Seymour Chwast
Tom Geismar	Bob Gill	Milton Glaser
Carin Goldberg	Mervyn Kurlansky	Art Paul
Alan Peckolick	Michael Peters	Dan Reisinger
Paula Scher	Daniel Bennett Schwartz	Arnold Schwartzman
Henry Steiner	George Tscherny	Yarom Vardimon

Baal Shem Tov	Ben-Zoma, Pirke Avot 4:1	Louis Brandeis
Martin Buber	Benjamin Cardozo	Adapted from Deuteronomy 20:19
Deuteronomy Rabbah 1:10	Blu Greenberg	Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel
Rabbi Hillel (Pirke Avot 1:14)	Maimonides	Benjamin Mandelstamm
Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk	Rabbi Nachman of Breslau	Adapted from Song of Songs 8:6
Susan Sontag	Talmud, Taanit 23A	Rabbi Tarfon, Pirke Avot 2:21

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