The ethnographic article focuses on the current “renaissance” of Hasidism in the US. As an exemplary site of study serves the Chicago Congregation Friends of Refugees of Eastern Europe. There, the article draws attention to the specific role of the recent Russian Jewish Migration for the Hasidic revival. As “returnees” to religion Russian Jews deceisively reshape traditional Hasidic social hierarchies and thus contribute to a modernization of current Hasidism in the US