THE BESHT seems to have spread the message of hasidism while travelling through towns and villages and in the course of such activities as healing the sick. It was only under the leadership of R. Dov Ber, ‘the Great Maggid’ of Mezhirech, that the institution of zaddikism was properly established, with the zaddik now staying at home and a community gathering round him. Among the many disciples who came together in the school of the Maggid, there may have been circles of more restricted membership which were formed by people drawn to each other by spiritual and personal affinity. Undoubtedly one of the most important personalities among them was R. Menahem Mendel b. Moses of Vitebsk. It will be recalled that in the Vilna ḥerem of 8 Iyar 5532 (1772), R. Menahem Mendel alone is mentioned as an example of a person who ‘had the reputation of being one of the greatest among their company, the companies of evil’. Equally, when the hasidim sought to send a representative to R. Elijah, the Gaon of Vilna, to explain the doctrine of hasidism and to prevent a further outbreak of opposition to the new movement, they turned to R. Menahem Mendel to fulfil this mission. Tactically this may have been somewhat imprudent, even if R. Menahem Mendel was accompanied by so great a Torah scholar as R. Shneur Zalman of Lyady, for, as we have seen, it was R. Menahem Mendel who was the target for the attacks; nevertheless, the nomination itself shows clearly what an important position he occupied in the nascent world of hasidism. Around him there gathered a group who were at once his close associates and his disciples, although they were people of varying stature and abilities.

R. Shneur Zalman of Lyady came to the Maggid of Mezhirech as a young man of 25. R. Menahem Mendel was some fifteen or twenty years his senior. There is no doubt that what brought them together was not merely their common geographical origin but their spiritual affinity. It appears that R. Menahem Mendel attracted people of a particular type, and in one of his letters he refers to the great influence he had in the provinces of Volhynia, where he acquired a considerable following although he lived in that region for only a short time.