Avodah Zarah, which I have defined as the formal recognition or worship as God of an entity that is in fact not God, has played an important role in this book. I have argued that Chabad theology utilizes language capable of leading to avodah zarah, which is possible even in the context of an essentially monotheistic theology, and that this step has in fact been taken by people who function in the central institutions of the movement. While I hope that the fundamental points were established in the body of the work, they demand a more careful treatment that will do at least some justice to their delicacy and complexity.

I noted in Chapter 1 that very early in the Rebbe's tenure, he asserted on a single occasion that a rebbe is ‘the Essence and Being [of God] placed into [areingeshtelt in] a body’ and that once the expression came to public attention at a much later date, it led Rabbi Schach and others to level the accusation of avodah zarah. It was in response to these attacks that Avraham Baruch Pevzner published Al hatzadikim (On the Righteous) in 1991, where he compiled and analysed an imposing list of mainly hasidic sources to defend this formula. As far as I can determine, the work, published by the House of the Union of Chabad Hasidim (Beit Agudat Ḥasidei Ḥabad) in Kfar Chabad, emerged out of circles at the heart of the Lubavitch community, where it is widely respected as a standard explication of the Rebbe's remarks. In addressing its theology, then, I will be engaging a mainstream work of considerable influence. This excursus is by no means a diversion into the exotic byways of Chabad.

Since any discussion of ‘the Essence and Being of God placed in a body’ and what this might mean must take place against the background of the Jewish rejection of the Christian doctrine of the Incarnation, we must first look at the standing of that belief in Jewish law and theology. Classical Christianity affirms that the second person of a triune God took on flesh in Jesus of Nazareth.