Judaism as we know it is incomparable to the one that was, when Hashem communicated through prophets and dwelt among Yisrael. How are we to relate to this absence? Can we consider our religion complete in its current, diminished state?
No, we cannot, says Rabbi Yehuda HaLevi, and this incompleteness must always inform our religious feeling. In his monumental work, The Kuzari, HaLevi gives a magical sense of the Judaism of old. Prophecy, the Holy Land and the nation of Yisrael are central to this theology of yearning; we, today, have mere impressions of a divine system unlike anything familiar, glimmers of godliness, and our spiritual focus must be centered on recovering this lost glory.
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