Aleph The first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, which also represents the realm of infinity or of Ein Sof.
Assiyah The World of Manifestation; the fourth of the four worlds that Kabbalists say exist in the universe; refers to our physical world.
Atzilut The World of Emanation; the first of the four worlds, and the closest to God.
Baal Shem Tov Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer, the founder of modern Hassidism in the eighteenth century, who adapted many of Kabbalah's concepts to Orthodox Judaism.
Bet The first letter of the Book of Genesis and the second letter of the Hebrew alphabet.
Binah The third circle on the Tree of Life.
Briyah The World of Creation; the second world in the universe.
Drash The allegorical level of meaning of the Torah.
Ein Sof The Kabbalist name for God; means “without End” in Hebrew.
Ein Sof Or The light that emanated from God or Ein Sof in the process of creating the universe.
Elohim One of the ten names for God used in the Hebrew Bible.
Ezekiel A Jewish prophet who was exiled to Babylonia around 597 B.C.E. and who wrote about his encounter with God in the Book of Ezekiel.
Gematria A numerology method for obtaining deeper meaning of the Bible by substituting the letters of the alphabet for their numerical equivalent; numerical values are added and words with equal value are compared to discover deeper meanings in their relation to each other.
Gevurah “Strength”; fifth sefira on the Tree of Life.
Hebrew Bible The Old Testament, which includes the Books of Moses (the first five books of the Bible) as well as the books of the prophets and the psalms.
Heh The second and fourth letter of the sacred name of God, which propels the second and fourth levels of Creation.
Hesed “Lovingkindness”; fourth sefira on the Tree of Life.
Hochma “Wisdom”; second sefira on the Tree of Life.
Hod “Splendor”; eighth sefira on the Tree of Life.
Keter “Crown”; first sefira on the Tree of Life.
Malkhut “Majesty”; tenth sefira on the Tree of Life.
Merkavah mysticism A genre of mysticism, which emerged around the first century B.C.E. and continued to the tenth century, that sought to understand the nature of God and the heavens and the means to break through to the spiritual world.
Mishnah The oral interpretations passed on by Moses to the people at Sinai, which became the essence of Jewish law; written down around the second century C.E.
Netzach “Victory”; seventh sefira on the Tree of Life.
Pardes “Orchard” in Hebrew; refers to the realm of the divine as well as the different levels of meaning in the Torah.
Peshat The simple or literal level of meaning of the Torah.
Rabbi Akiva ben Yoseph A mystic who lived in Palestine from 40 to 135 C.E. and was head of the Sanhedrin council, the top Jewish legal council.
Rabbi Isaac Luria The scholar who refined and shaped Kabbalah in the sixteenth century; it is mainly his ideas and concepts that are taught today in a system known as Lurianic Kabbalah.
Rabbi Isaac the Blind The first modern Kabbalist, who lived in twelfth-century Provence, coined the word Ein Sof, and developed a theory of Creation as a process — from divine will to thought to the utterance of words — through which the world was created.
Rabbi Moshe Cordovero A Kabbalist who lived in Safed in the mid-1500s and who wrote a major compilation of Kabbalah and many original works of his own.
Rabbi Moshe de Leon Author of the Zohar.
Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai A second-century Jewish sage and protagonist of the Zohar.
Remez The metaphorical level of meaning of the Torah.
Safed A center for Kabbalah in northern Palestine in the sixteenth century; still survives today.
Sefer Ha Bahir (“Book of Brilliance”) A manuscript written between 1150 and 1200 that was a collection of mystical interpretations of the Bible; known as the first Kabbalist text.
Sefer Ha Zohar (“Book of Splendor”) The seminal work of Kabbalah, written around 1280 in Spain; covers topics such as the creation of human beings, the nature of good and evil, and the destiny of the soul.
Sefer Yetzirah (“Book of Creation”) A short essay written between the third and sixth centuries C.E.; lays out a theory of Creation and the order of the universe. Much of Kabbalah's vocabulary comes from this work, including the naming of the sefirot, the elemental energy forces behind Creation.
Sefira/Sefirot The ten vessels through which the energy of God flows in the ongoing process of Creation, which are depicted as circles on the Tree of Life; from the Hebrew “to count.”
Shabbetai Zvi A person of erratic behavior, born in Turkey in 1626, who claimed to be the Messiah and gained a large following of believers before being forced to convert to Islam by the Turkish authorities; his distortion of many of Kabbalah's concepts led to widespread mistrust of Kabbalah for many years thereafter.
Sod The secret or esoteric level of meaning of the Torah.
Talmud The book containing the Mishnah as well as legends, homilies, and commentaries on the Torah.
Teshuva Hebrew word meaning “repentance” and “return.”
Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom The ten sefirot plus the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet.
Tiferet “Beauty”; sixth sefira on the Tree of Life.
Tikkun ha olam Hebrew phrase meaning “repair the world.”
Torah Word meaning “law” or “teaching” in Hebrew; refers usually to the Books of Moses, the first five books of the Bible, but also can refer to all the writings of the Old Testament.
Tree of Knowledge The Tree in the Garden of Eden from which Adam and Eve were forbidden to eat.
Tree of Life The main symbol of Kabbalah; contains ten circles and twenty-two paths connecting them; depicts the forces of Creation.
Tzimtzum The “contraction” of Ein Sof, the first act of Creation, in which Ein Sof withdrew from Himself to create a finite space to begin Creation.
Vav The third Hebrew letter of God's name; propels the third level of Creation.
Yesod “Foundation”; ninth sefira on the Tree of Life.
YHWH The sacred four-letter name for God, which is composed of the past, present, and future tenses of the Hebrew verb “to be”; the name is vocalized as Elohim or Adonai; no one knows how to pronounce the name, though some people have translated it as “Yahweh” or “Jehovah.”
Yud The first Hebrew letter of God's name; also the energy that propels the first level of Creation.