CHAPTER 6: TORAH STUDY AND MYSTICAL EXPERIENCES IN JEWISH MYSTICISM

1. Bori, L’interpretazione infinita, p. 145.

2. Iser, The Act of Reading, p. 10; Barthes, “From Work to Text,” in Textual Strategies, pp. 75–76; Eco, The Open Work, p. 27; Ricoeur, From Text to Action, p. 54. On experiential reading in the Middle Ages see Stock, The Implications of Literacy, p. 439, and Leclercq, The Love of Learning, esp. p. 73.

3. Fr. 15, analyzed by Walter Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass. 1987), pp. 69, 89–90. See also his “Der Geheime Reiz des Ver-gorgenen: Antike Mysterienkulte,” in Secrecy and Concealment, pp. 79–100, and Angus, The Mystery-Religions, p. 93.

4. See below, chap. 7, note 8.

5. On these forms of arcanization see above, Introduction, par. III.

6. For “secret” and “mystery” as interchangeable terms see Kermode, The Genesis of Secrecy, p. 144.

7. See several cases where “mysterion” does stand for secret topics in early Christianity, in Marsh, “The Use of Mysterion.”

8. Sermo 300, quoted from the translation in Hugo Rahner, “The Christian Mysteries and the Pagan Mysteries,” in Mysteries, ed. J. Campbell (Pantheon Books, New York, 1955), p. 381. See also Guy Stroumsa, “From Esotericism to Mysticism in Early Christianity,” in Secrecy and Concealment, pp. 302–309.

9. Rahner, “The Christian Mysteries,” p. 378. For the nexus between mystery and symbol in Justin Martyr see Marsh, “The Use of Mysterion,” pp. 66–67. See also below, chap. 8, par. V.

10. Rahner, “The Christian Mysteries,” p. 371.

11. See Idel, Messianic Mystics, pp. 3, 34, 148.

12. See Urbach, The Sages, p. 305; Petuchowski, “Judaism as ‘Mystery,’ ” pp. 150–151; Hirshman, A Rivalry of Genius, pp. 17–18.

13. Smith, Clement of Alexandria, p. 181; Petuchowski, “Judaism as ‘Mystery,’ ” pp. 144–148.

14. See Mekhilta’ de-Rashbi on Exodus 19:20, to be compared to the text from Shimmushei Torah discussed above, chap. 5, par. I.

15. Petuchowski, “Judaism as ‘Mystery,’ ” pp. 148–150. Smith, Clement of Alexandria, pp. 181–183, points out the ritualistic aspect of the mystorin as related to circumcision and blurs the distinction between secrecy and mysteriousness; see also Liebes, “The Messiah of the Zohar,” p. 140, note 205; Wolfson, Circle in the Square, pp. 30, 45, 141, note 3.

16. Compare, however, the use of mystery and mysterium, rather than secret o r Geheimnis, sometimes in Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism, pp. 52, 55, and in a rather systematic manner in the German translations of the Heikhalot literature, and in the English translation of Schaefer’s The Hidden and Manifest God, as well as in Swartz’s Scholastic Magic.

17. Cf. Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults, p. 90. On the idea of rebirth, which is crucial for the mystery mentality, see, e.g., ibid., pp. 91, 97–100; Angus, The Mystery-Religions, pp. 95–100, 140.

18. See Schaefer, Synopse, par. 279; Swartz, Scholastic Magic, pp. 33, 62–63.

19. See Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults, pp. 80–81.

20. This does not mean that in the Middle Ages such allegorical or mystical interpretations of the earlier esoteric texts and concepts—a process I call arcanization of another arcanization—were not offered.

21. See Mircea Eliade, Images and Symbols (Sheed and Ward, New York, 1969), pp. 54–55. Later on, such an instant religiosity will emerge under the influence of the Heikhalot literature, as well as in medieval ecstatic Kabbalah; see Idel, “Defining Kabbalah.”

22. Angus, The Mystery-Religions, p. 169.

23. Proverbs 8:14.

24. Charles Taylor, ed., Sayings of the Jewish Fathers (Cambridge, 1897), p. 99. On this text see also David Flusser and Shmuel Safrai, “The Essene Doctrine of Hypostasis and Rabbi Meir,” Immanuel 14 (1982), pp. 47-49; Fishbane, The Garments of Torah, pp. 77-78. On the metaphor of spring see also above, chap. 5, note 74.

25. Taylor, Sayings of the Jewish Fathers, chap. 5, p. 97.

26. On Binah see below, chap. 7, par. II.

27. Seder ’Eliahu Zuta, chap. 1. See also below, the quote from Heikhalot, par. 297, and Jacob Elbaum, “The Midrash Tanna’ De-vei ’Eliyahu and Ancient Esoteric Literature,” Early Jewish Mysticism, pp. 139-150 (Hebrew).

28. A similar phrase occurs also in another text, alluded to later in the chapter, beside note 85.

29. Tzafita.

30. Ga’avah. On this term, which recurs in the Heikhalot literature, see Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” p. 31, note 30.

31. On this term see Gruenwald, Apocalyptic and Merkavah Mysticism, p. 77, note 13, and chap. 7, note 43.

32. Midrash Mishlei, chap. 10, ed. B. Wisotzky (New York, Jewish Theological Seminary, 1990), pp. 84-85; Scholem, Major Trends, p. 71; Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 34-35 and accompanying notes. It is important to stress the huge impact of this passage on a variety of discussions in Jewish mystical literature, especially the contention that God delights in the study of the Torah here below. See, e.g., R. Isaac Aizik Haver, ’Or Torah, in ’Amudei ha-Torah, p. 38. See also chap. 1, note 44.

33. For more on this verb see below, chap. 7, par. IV.

34. See above, chap. 2.

35. See Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 41-42.

36. For more on the Sar ha-Torah in later Jewish mysticism see above, chap. 5, par. I.

37. For a general description of the Sar ha-Torah see Gruenwald, Apocalyptic and Merkavah Mysticism, pp. 169-173; Swartz, Scholastic Magic, passim.

38. Tidreshuhu.

39. Tzofin.

40. Schaefer, Synopse, p. 135, par. 298. The translation largely follows the rendition of Michael D. Swartz, “The Cultivation of the Prince of the Torah,” in Ascetic Behavior in Greco-Roman Antiquity: A Sourcebook, ed. Vincent L. Wimbush (Fortress Press, Minneapolis, 1990), p. 230. See also below, chap. 7, par. IV.

41. One magical formula that is described as the great seal is preserved in Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 252-253, par. 689.

42. Qol. One manuscript has kol, which means “all.”

43. Academies.

44. Malachi 3:20.

45. Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 128-129, par. 289.

46. Ibid., par. 288.

47. Faces of the Chariot, pp. 366-367, 385, 437.

48. The Hidden and Manifest God, pp. 158-166.

49. Sod. Other manuscripts have sar, namely “prince,” or “archangel.”

50. Yidreshuhu. On this verb see below, chap. 7, par. IV.

51. Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 132-133, par. 297. Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 36-37, note 39.

52. Ga’avah.

53. Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 136-137, par. 304; Swartz, “The Culmination,” p. 232; idem, Scholastic Magic, p. 100.

54. Sha’arei mizrah.

55. Galgalei ’eiynai.

56. Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 250-251, par. 678; see also par. 279; idem, The Hidden and Manifest God, p. 115; Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 33-34; Halperin, Faces of the Chariot, pp. 376-377.

57. See also Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 142-143, par. 336, and pp. 214-215, par. 563; idem, Hekhalot-Studien, p. 294. See also the discussion below on ha-tzenu’im.

58. Compare also the phrase “paths of the Talmud” in Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 130-131, par. 292.

59. See the Hebrew book of Enoch, Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 10-11, par. 19. See also ibid., p. 49, par. 102. The encounter between the human look and the divine one has a mystical significance in the Heikhalot literature. The eye is definitively an organ of mystical contemplation, which is deemed to be transformed in crucial spiritual moments.

60. See Joseph Dan, “Hadrei Merkavah,” Tarbiz 47 (1978), pp. 49-55 (Hebrew); Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 218-219, par. 569; Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” p. 38, note 41; Swartz, Scholastic Magic, p. 229.

61. Schaefer, Synopse, p. 210, par. 556.

62. See Origen’s commentary on Psalm 1 and Scholem, On the Kabbalah, pp. 12-13. In general Origen should be considered one of the first and most explicit examples of the strong connection between the exegetical enterprise and the mystical experience in the Judeo-Christian tradition. See McGinn, The Presence of God, 1:110-116. See also Ambrosius’ interpretation of the chambers, ibid., pp. 205-206.

63. See Loewe, “Apologetic Motifs in the Targum to the Songs of Songs,” in Biblical Motifs, Origins and Transformations, ed. A. Altmann (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1966), p. 179.

64. On the similarity between the ascent on high of the Heikhalot literature and Sar ha-Torah see Halperin, Faces of the Chariot, pp. 434, 436-437.

65. See Schaefer, The Hidden and the Manifest God, pp. 165-166; Idel, “Enoch Is Metatron,” Immanuel 24/25 (1990), p. 225, note 18, and the important study of Elliot R. Wolf-son, “Yeridah la-Merkavah: Typology of Ecstasy and Enthronement in Ancient Jewish Mysticism,” in Mystics of the Book: Themes, Topics, and Typologies, ed. R. A. Herrera (Peter Lang, New York, 1993), pp. 13–44; Green, Keter, esp. pp. 49–68.

66. See Green, Keter, pp. 20–41.

67. Hints in that direction can be found in Meir Bar Ilan’s study, “The Idea of Crowning God in Heikhalot Mysticism and the Karaitic Polemic,” Early Jewish Mysticism, pp. 225–226 (Hebrew), who succinctly dealt also with the Sar ha-Torah passages, ibid., pp. 223–226.

68. The phrase ’orah shel torah in a very similar context, but without mentioning the face, occurs in R. Yehudah Barceloni’s Commentary on Sefer Yetzirah, p. 25, discussed in the context of other views of R. Eleazar by Wolfson, “The Mystical Significance,” p. 65. See also below, chap. 12, esp. note 166, in the Cordoverian and Hasidic texts.

69. ’Ateret tzevi.

70. Ecclesiastes 8:1.

71. Printed in R. Eleazar, Perush ha-Torah, I, pp. 31–32. See also Green, Keter, pp. 106–120.

72. See R. Eleazar, Commentary on Liturgy, Ms. Paris BN 772, fol. 84a, adduced by Wolfson, “The Mystical Significance,” p. 61, note 70.

73. Perush ha-Torah, I, pp. 45–46; see also the text from Ms. Oxford Bodleiana 1567, fol. 71b, in the name of Sefer ha-Kavod, printed in Dan, The Esoteric Theology, p. 90; Idel, “Gazing at the Head,” p. 285. The study and recitation of the Torah were conceived of as inducing experiences of light in other Ashkenazi texts as well. See, e.g., Commentary on the Seventy Names of Metatron, printed as Sefer ha-Hesheq (Lemberg, 1865), fol. 196b; Ignaz Goldziher, “La notion de la Sakina chez les Mahometans,” Revue de l’histoire des religions 14 (1893), pp. 7–8, and Ayoub, The Qur’an and Its Interpreters, pp. 8–9; Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 36–37. For the descent of the Torah and the Shekhinah in the heart of the student see the anonymous late-thirteenth-century Gates of the Eldry Man, Ms. Oxford Bodleiana 2396, fol. 34b; R. Hayyim of Volozhin, Nefesh ha-Hayyim, pp. 250–251; R. Moshe Eliakum Beri’ah, Da’at Moshe, fol. 1c.

74. See Peter Schaefer, Hekhalot-Studien (Tübingen, 1988), pp. 118–153, 277–295. On magic and Heikhalot literature see more recently the important study of Shaul Shaked, “ ‘Peace Be Upon You, Exalted Angels’: On Hekhalot, Liturgy and Incantation Bowls,” JQS 2 (1995), pp. 197–219; Michael D. Swartz, “ ‘Like the Ministering Angels’: Ritual and Purity in Early Jewish Mysticism and Magic,” AJS Review 19/2 (1994), pp. 135–167; idem, Scholastic Magic.

75. See Farber-Ginnat, “Inquiries in Shi’ur Qomah,” pp. 380–381.

76. See Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 37–38, note 39. Schaefer apparently was not sufficiently aware of this Hebrew article when offering, later on, his more radical magical reading of the goals of the Heikhalot literature. See, more recently, the important study of Farber-Ginat, “Inquiries in Shi’ur Qomah,” pp. 361–394, esp. p. 380.

77. The Talmud is mentioned only in some of the manuscripts.

78. Ha-tzenu’im. On this term see the discussion below.

79. Lehishtammesh bo. This verb has, in both the rabbinic and Heikhalot literatures, a magical meaning.

80. Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 135–136, par. 303; Swartz, “The Cultivation,” p. 231; Halperin, Faces of the Chariot, p. 433.

81. See Idel, “Defining Kabbalah,” p. 115, note 14.

82. Fol. 30b.

83. Tzanu’a.

84. Maimonides’ version, as translated by Shlomo Pines, in Guide of the Perplexed (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1963), pp. 152–153.

85. See above, note 28.

86. Compare Schaefer, The Hidden and Manifest God, p. 115, note 124, and p. 166.

87. See beside note 60 above.

88. On this expression see Seder ’Olam Rabba’, ed. Neubauer, p. 67; Idel, “Sefirot above Sefirot,” p. 243.

89. Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 70–71, par. 161.

90. For more on this issue see below, chap. 9.

91. See Idel, “Rabbinism versus Kabbalism,” pp. 295–296, and below, Concluding Remarks.

92. See Schaefer, Hekhalot-Studien, pp. 293–294, and below, Concluding Remarks, par. I.

93. See the next paragraph as well as below, chap. 7, note 72.

94. Pereq. On this term see chap. 2, par. V.

95. Namely divine thought and divine will, which correspond to the two highest sefirot.

96. Behinah; this term is characteristic of Cordovero’s writings, and it refers to the reflections of the features of the ten sefirot in each of them. See Bloom, Kabbalah and Criticism, pp. 64–71.

97. Sefer ’Or Yaqar (Jerusalem, 1983), vol. 12, p. 147. Compare the interesting parallel discussion in Cordovero, Shi’ur Qomah, fol. 18.

98. Sha’arei Qedushah, III:3, p. 97.

99. See below, chap. 11, par. VI. The possibility of understanding the term prophet as applied to certain twelfth- and thirteenth-century Ashkenazic authors, as referring to “an ability to derive exegetically the esoteric divine will” was proposed by Ivan Marcus, Piety and Society (Brill, Leiden, 1981), p. 163, note 59.

100. The Besht. The speaker is the Great Maggid.

101. It is not clear whether this legend points to a text that contains Heikhalot treatises or to passages from this literature printed in Sefer Raziel ha-Malakh. See, e.g., the text from Sefer Shi’ur Qomah, in edition Amsterdam, 1701, fol. 35b.

102. Perhaps this is another description of the position of putting his head between his knees. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, p. 78; Paul Fenton, “The Head Between the Knees,” Daat 32–33 (1994), pp. 413–426 (Hebrew), and Revue d’histoire et de philosophie religieuse 4 (1992), pp. 413–426 [French].

103. Ben Amos-Mintz, In Praise of the Baal Shem Tov, p. 83. For the bibliography related to this text see ibid., pp. 323-324; See also Naftali Loewenthal, Communicating the Infinite (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1990), pp. 18-19, 217-218; Emanuel Etkes, “Hasidism as Movement: The First Stage,” in Hasidism: Continuity or Innovation? ed. B. Safran (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1988), p. 13; Joseph Dan, The Hasidic Story (Keter Printing House, Jerusalem, 1975), pp. 127-128 (Hebrew). For another hagiographical version of the Besht’s study of Ma’aseh Merkavah with the Great Maggid, see Mondshein, Shivhei, p. 278; Avraham Rubinstein, Shivhei ha-Besht (Jerusalem, 1991), pp. 128-129, especially the content of note 44 in the name of Isaac Alfasi. See also R. Shlomo of Lutzk’s preface to Maggid Devarav le-Ya’aqov, p. 2, where the divine names are also mentioned in this context.

104. See also the stories related to the enthusiastic recitations of the Song of Songs that were deemed to have induced phenomena similar to that produced by the Besht’s recitation of the “Kabbalah” book above by his grandson, R Barukh of Medzibezh; cf. Simon Dubnov, Toledot ha-Hasidut (Devir, Tel Aviv, 1967), pp. 208-209 (Hebrew).

105. For the mystical implication of this expression see above, par. III.

106. R Meir Harif Margoliot of Ostrog, Sod Yakhin u-Vo’az (Jerusalem, 1990), pp. 41-42.

107. See chap. 2, par. IV.

108. Liqqutei Torah, fol. 29d.

109. On cleaving and Merkavah see below, chap. 11, par. IX.

110. Yosher Divrei ’Emmet, printed together with Liqqutei Yeqarim (Jerusalem, 1981), fol. 122a; R Aharon Kohen of Apta, Keter Shem Tov (Brooklyn, 1987) vol. 1, fol. 31b; see Scholem, The Messianic Idea, p. 218; Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, p. 58; idem, Hasidism: Between Ecstasy and Magic, p. 174.

111. Sefer Ma’or va-Shemesh, cf. the translation by Louis Jacobs, Jewish Mystical Testimonies (Schocken Books, New York, 1978), p. 220. See also R Moses Eliakum Beri’ah, Da’at Moshe, fols. 2b, 127d, 130d.

112. See Ms. New York JTS 1805, fol. 6a; Boaz Huss, “Sefer Poqeah Piqhim: New Information on the History of Kabbalistic Literature,” Tarbiz 61 (1992), pp. 489-504, esp. p. 492 (Hebrew).

113. On the significance of the term “prophetic holy intellect” or intellectus acquisitus, see the Avicennian theory of prophecy analyzed by Fazlur Rahman, Prophecy in Islam (London, 1958), pp. 14-20; Dov Schwartz, “The Quadripartite Division of the Intellect in Medieval Jewish Thought,” JQR 84 (1994), pp. 227-236. See also the expression “holy intellect” in ancient Christianity, cf. de Lubac, Histoire et esprit, p. 295.

114. I.e., of their fast.

115. I.e., Elijah and the garment.

116. Literally, “his own head.”

117. Namely how to receive revelations.

118. Ms. Oxford Bodleiana 1597, fols. 38a–39b; On this passage see Idel, “Inquiries,” pp. 194-195, 240-241, and above, chap. 5, par. I. On causing the descent of the Torah in a less magical manner see the rabbinic texts adduced by Heschel, Theology of Ancient Judaism, 2:6-7.

119. See Elliot Wolfson, “The Secret of the Garment in Nahmanides,” Daat 24 (1990), pp. xxv-xlix; Lorberbaum, Imago Dei, pp. 312-316. On the view of the Qur’an as brought down see Stefan Wild, “ ‘We Have Sent Down to Thee the Book With the Truth . . .’: Spacial and Temporal Implications of the Qur’anic Concepts of Nuzul, Tanzil, and ’Inzal,” in The Qur’an as Text, pp. 137-153.

120. See Idel, “Inquiries,” pp. 261, notes 81. On Moses as copying the preexisting Torah see Nahmanides’ introduction to his Commentary on the Torah, p. 2, and our discussion below, app. 2.

121. Le-ha’atiq.

122. In Hebrew yoshev means “to sit,” but as Scholem pointed out in this corpus this verb can serve as an auxiliary. See Scholem, “The Maggid of Joseph Taitachek,” p. 82.

123. This is an etymology of hofniel.

124. Ms. Oxford Bodleiana 1784, fol. 318a. On the importance of magical formulas for obtaining extraordinary capacities related to writing down Kabbalistic interpretations of the Torah see Amos Goldreich, “Clarifications of the Self-Perception of the Author of Tiqqunei Zohar,” in Massu’ot, pp. 483-487 (Hebrew).

125. See Idel, “Neglected Writings,” pp. 77, 88.

126. See idem, “ ‘Shlomo’s Lost Writings’: On the Attitude to Science in Sefer ha-Meshiv,” Daat 32–33 (1934), pp. 235-246 (Hebrew).

127. See also below, app. 4, par. III.

128. The terms “academy” here and “Holy Academy” later in this passage stand for the celestial academy, the collectivity of the souls of the righteous, the angels, the Messiah, and God Himself, who study the Torah together in a supernal world. The phrase “celestial academy” in connection with revealing secrets from above occurs several times in the introduction to Sefer ha-Qanah, which influenced Molkho’s visions. See A. Z. Aescoli, “Notes on the History of Messianic Movements,” Sinai 12 (1943), pp. 84-89 (Hebrew), and see also Idel, “Inquiries,” p. 237.

129. Thus the supernal academies are involved in both biblical and rabbinic studies.

130. Apparently statements related to rabbinic issues.

131. On instructions from heaven see Isadore Twersky, Rabad of Posquieres (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1962), pp. 296-297.

132. Idel, “Shlomo Molkho as Magician,” pp. 204-205, where the following quotation was printed for the first time. The Hebrew version seems deficient in several instances, but its general meaning is nevertheless clear and corroborated, at least in part, by other texts connected to Molkho.

133. Ms. Moscow-Guenzburg, 302.

134. Cf. J. S. Preus, From Shadow to Promise (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1969), p. 148.

135. Compare a testimony in the same vein written by a Kabbalist at the end of the sixteenth century, who compares Molkho’s ignorance and visionary experiences with those of Joan of Arc; printed in Idel, “Shlomo Molkho as Magician,” pp. 202-203.

136. See chap. 5, par. IV.

137. See above, chap. 3, and below, app. 5.

138. No’am ’Elimelekh, per. Terumah, fol. 47d.

139. For the Safedian sources of this view, which is much earlier in Kabbalistic sources, see, e.g., R. Elijah de Vidas, Reshit Hokhmah, Gate of Holiness, chap. 10; II, p. 247, which was copied in Ha-Shelah, I, fol. 112b; R. Moses Cordovero, ’Elimah Rabbati (Jerusalem, 1966), fol. 132d; Idel, Hasidism: Between Ecstasy and Magic, pp. 215-218.

140. Salomon Maimon, An Autobiography, trans. J. Clark Murray (London, Montreal, Boston, 1888), pp. 164-165. See also Weiss, Studies, p. 80.

141. Jeremiah 23:29. On this verse see also above, chap. 3, notes 50, 80.

142. Liqqutei Moharan, par. 20, I, fol. 28ab. See Green, Tormented Master, pp. 200-201; Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 242, 389, note 204. See also R Nathan of Nemirov’s introduction to Liqqutei Moharan, I, fol. 3a, where he describes R Nahman as bringing down, lehorid, an accommodated version of the supernal secrets. Compare Cor-dovero’s Derishot, p. 70. The existence of all the interpretations in one soul is to be compared to the view that there is one righteous in every generation that possesses the key to the Torah. See above, chap. 2, note 82.

143. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 66-67. The term nishmat ha-kol, which means the universal soul, is found in Jewish writings since the twelfth century, and is already presents in R Abraham ibn Ezra’s writings. See Elliot R Wolfson, “God, the Demiurge, and the Intellect: On the Usage of the Word Kol in Abraham ibn Ezra,” REJ 119 (1990), pp. 89, 91, and esp. p. 107 on the soul of the tzaddiq.

144. See especially R Nahman of Braslav’s Liqqutei Tefillot, I, no. 14, p. 185, and no. 34, p. 501. See also the view that Moses’ soul, which comprises all six hundred thousand souls of the Israelites, also contains all their interpretations, according to R. Isaac Luria, Sefer ha-Kavvanot (Venice, 1620), fol. 53b, and the widespread Sefer ha-Shelah, vol. 1, fol. 10a, of R Isaiah Horovitz.

145. See Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. 170-171, note 87; Lory, Les commentaires esoteriques, pp. 26-27, 59.

146. Psalm 19:8. See also below, Concluding Remarks, par. IV.

147. See Idel, “Types of Redemptive Activity,” pp. 264-265, note 46. See the interpretations of R. Bahya ben Asher, Introduction to the Commentary on the Torah, p. 8, and the Sermons of R Joshua ibn Shu’aib, fol. 36c.

148. Psalm 19:8.

149. Meshiv.

150. R Shema’yah ben Isaac ha-Levi, Sefer Tzeror ha-Hayyim, Ms. Leiden 24, fol. 190b. Compare also the famous mid-thirteenth-century R Yonah Gerondi’s interpretation of the verse from Psalms in Sefer Derashot u-Ferushei Rabbenu Yonah Gerondi, ed. S. Yerushalmi (Wagshel, Jerusalem, 1988), p. 19 (Hebrew), and Gikatilla’s Ginnat ’Egoz, pp. 259, 263, 265.

151. Mordekhai Pachter, “The Concept of Devekut in the Homiletical Ethical Writings in Sixteenth-Century Safed,” in Studies in Medieval Jewish History and Literature, ed. Isadore Twersky (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1984), 2:178, 189; Sack, Be-Sha’arei ha-Kabbalah, pp. 104-105. See also his older contemporary R. Joseph Al-Ashqar, Tzafnat Pa’aneah, fols. 34a, 132b, and R. Abraham Azulai, Hesed le-’Avraham, fol. 1c.

152. See R Hayyim Vital, Sha’ar ha-Mitzvot, per. Ve-ethanan, p. 78, and Luria, Hanhagot; cf. Laurence Fine, Safed Spirituality, p. 68; R Jacob Hayyim Tzemah, Naggid u-Metzavveh, fols. 19b-20a; Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 57 and 300, note 155.

153. Sixtus of Siena, Biblioteca Sancta, fol. 110v: “Est [autem Kabala] secretior divina legis exposition ex ore Dei a Moyse recepta, et ex ore Moysis per continuas successiones non quidem scripto, sed viva voce suscepta quen rursum nos ducat a terrenis ad coelestia.” Kenneth Stow, “The Burning of the Talmud in 1553 in the Light of Sixteenth Century Catholic Attitude Toward the Talmud,” Bibliothèque d’humanisme et renaissance 34 (1972), p. 457.

154. II Samuel 24:19. Interestingly enough, the words following the quoted phrase are two divine names, “Lord God.” This may be an allusion to the transition from the Torah of man to a divine status, as implied by the peculiar interpretation of the verse in Psalm 19. See also the next note and below, chap. 13, par. V.

155. Psalm 19:8. For the interpretation of this verse as referring to the return of the soul to her source, back into Godhead, see above, note 148.

156. Liqqutei Torah, fol. 36a-b. Compare R Leib Sarah’s statement; cf. Buber, Tales of the Hasidim: Early Masters, p. 169. On the identification of the mystic with the Torah see more Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 243-246, and idem, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. 80 and 186, note 233. On the reception of the revelation of the Torah in accordance with one’s preparation see R Ze’ev Wolf of Zhitomir, ’Or ha-Me’ir, fol. 165b.

157. Perush, literally “interpretation.”

158. Degel Mahaneh ’Efrayyim, p. 103; Wolfson, Circle in the Square, pp. 24-25.

159. About the integration of the soul into Godhead see Idel, “Universalization and Integration,” p. 200, note 49.

160. Epistle on the Ascent of the Soul, Shivhei ha-Besht, ed. Y. Mondshein (Jerusalem, 1982), pp. 235-236. See also R Israel of Kuznitz, ’Avodat Israel (Munkacz, 1928), fol. 97a. Compare Louis Jacobs, The Hasidic Prayer (Schocken Books, New York, 1978), pp. 75-77, 97, and R. Menahem Nahum of Chernobyl, Me’or ’Einayyim, p. 161; R Abraham of Kalisk in Peri ha-’Aretz, Epistles, p. 81; R Qalonimus Qalman Epstein, Ma’or va-Shemesh, I, fol. 21ab; R ’Asher Tzevi of Ostraha, Ma’ayan Hokhmah (Podgorze, 1897), fol. 84c, R Yehudah Arieh Leib of Gur, Sefat ’Emmet, IV, fol. 33d and fol. 33bc; R. Isaac Aiziq Safrin of Komarno, Heikhal ha-Berakhah, III, fol. 25c.

161. See above, chap. 4, par. V.

162. See above, chap. 2, par. IV.

163. Or “utters”; literally “speaks.”

164. The righteous.

165. Toledot ’Aharon, I, fol. 18c.

166. See, e.g., ibid., I, fol. 27a.

167. Boletim u-mitztarefim. These verses are reminiscent of the technique of ’urim ve-tummim, which, as in the case of the text of R. Nahman, was characteristic of the kohen or priest. On the experiential nature of this technique in Kabbalah see also Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 105–108.

168. Liqqutei Moharan, I, fol. 47d.

169. See the bibliography on this topic below, chap. 13, note 67.

170. See Liqqutei Moharan, I, fol. 33b; Green, Tormented Master, pp. 319–320; Idel, “Univer-salization and Integration,” p. 45; Fishbane, The Exegetical Imagination, p. 184. See also above, chap. 3, par. 4, the passage from R. Joseph Moses of Zbarov. Compare also R. Mordekhai of Chernobyl, R. Nahman’s contemporary, who contends that “just as the Holy One, blessed be He, is infinite, so too is the Torah infinite, and the worship of Israel is infinite.” Cf. Liqqutei Torah, fols. 14d–15a. On the affinity between the ontic and textual infinities see above, chap. 3. See also R. Nahman’s identification of the tzaddiqim with the Torah, in Liqqutei Moharan, I, fol. 47c.

171. See already ecstatic Kabbalah and the Jewish mystical sources that might have been influenced by it, e.g., R. Nathan Neta’ of Helm, Neta’ Sha’ashu’im, fol. 19c, and Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 84–88, and below chap. 12, note 171.

172. See below, app. 5, par. I.

173. Liqqutei Moharan, I, fol. 98a. For the return of the combinations of letters to their supernal source in Braslav see Piekarz, Studies, pp. 116–117.

174. See Baer, Studies, 1:92–94. According to Urbach, The Sages, pp. 245–248, and the notes at pp. 796–797, the Platonic myth drew from an ancient Asian mythologou-menon, which was a common source for both the Platonic and the rabbinic theories.

175. On the expression mevin davar mitokh davar see below, chap. 7, pars. II–III.

176. See chap. 13, par. V.

177. On the correspondence between the theosophical and anthroposophical realms see Yehuda Liebes, “ ‘Two Young Roes of a Doe’: The Secret Sermon of Isaac Luria Before His Death” and Mordekhai Pachter, “Katnut (‘Smallness’) and Gadlut (‘Greatness’) in Lurianic Kabbalah,” in Lurianic Kabbalah, ed. Rachel Elior and Yehuda Liebes (Jerusalem, 1992), pp. 113–170 and 171–210, respectively (Hebrew).

178. See above, chap. 1, note 3. Compare the midrashic view quoted in chap. 1, note 29.

179. See below, chap. 11, par. VIII.

180. On Sabbatai Tzevi’s marriage to the Torah see Scholem, Sabbatai Sevi, pp. 159–160, 400–401; Wolfson, Circle in the Square, pp. 1–28.

181. Di-devequt.

182. On the source of this passage see the story of R. Isaac of Acre, preserved in the sixteenth century by R. Elijah da Vidas, Reshit Hokhmah, Sha’ar ha-’Ahavah, chap. 4, translated and discussed in Idel, Studies in Ecstatic Kabbalah, pp. 115–119. See also R. Isaac Aiziq Safrin of Komarno, Notzer Hesed, p. 22.

183. Hesheq ’ahavat nashim.

184. Toledot Ya’aqov Yoseph, fol. 45b.

185. See the discussion referenced in note 182 above and my forthcoming “The Transformations of an Idle Man’s Story.”

186. See Reshit Hokhmah, Sha’ar ha-’Ahavah, chap. 4; vol. 1, p. 426. See Mordekhai Pachter, “Traces of the Influence of R. Elijah de Vidas’s Reshit Hockhma Upon the Writings of R. Jacob Joseph of Polonnoye,” Studies in Jewish Mysticism, Philosophy and Ethical Literature Presented to Isaiah Tishby, ed. J. Dan and J. Hacker (Jerusalem, 1986), pp. 569-592 (Hebrew).

187. Toledot Ya’aqov Yoseph, fols. 71d–72a.

188. Cf. M. Idel, “The Beauty of Woman: Some Observations on the History of Jewish Mysticism,” in Within Hasidic Circles: Studies in Hasidism in Memory of Mordecai Wilensky, ed. E. Etkes, D. Assaf, I. Bartal, and E. Reiner (Mossad Bialik, Jerusalem, 1999), pp. 317-334 (Hebrew).

189. ’Etzem me-’atzamav. This phrase may point to the fact that the Torah is one with the essence of God. See above, chap. 2, note 69.

190. Yosher Divrei ’Emmet, in Liqqutim Yeqarim, fols. 113b–114a. See also the comparison of the study of the Torah to the beautiful alien woman who is taken prisoner in war and is “converted” by several rites, in R Qalonimus Qalman Epstein, Ma’or va-Shemesh, 2:604-605. On the experience of delight while studying the Torah see the quote in the name of R Jacob Joseph of Polonnoye, adduced in R Benjamin of Zalisch, ’Ahavat Dodim, pp. 20-21.

191. See Introduction, note 49.

192. See above, chap. 1, note 17.

193. Cf. Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 62-67.

194. For Hasidic discussions influenced by the Zoharic parable of the maiden, or at least in its vein, see Wolfson, Circle in the Square, pp. 23-25. For more on Hasidic views of study of the Torah and sexuality see, e.g., R Ze’ev Wolf of Zhitomir, ’Or ha-Me’ir, fol. 3a.

195. On the matter of plenitude see above, chap. 2, note 82.

196. See Qol Yehudah, fol. 19c. For mystical death in Jewish mysticism see Michael Fish-bane, The Kiss of God: Spiritual and Mystical Death in Judaism (University of Washington Press, Seattle, 1994); Idel, R. Menahem Recanati, the Kabbalist, pp. 142-150.

197. Qin’at ha-Shem Tzeva’ot, p. 126. On the feeling of delight involved in the study of the Torah see the biblical antecedents discussed by Greenberg, Studies, p. 22.

CHAPTER 7: SECRECY, BINAH, AND DERISHAH

1. Cf. Assmann’s paper “Semiosis and Interpretation in Ancient Egyptian Ritual.”

2. See Moshe Weinfeld, “Divine Intervention in War in Ancient Israel and the Ancient Near East,” in H. Tadmor and M. Weinfeld, eds., History, Historiography and Interpretation: Studies in Biblical and Cuneiform Literatures (Magnes Press, Jerusalem, 1983), pp. 142-143, note 119; Lieberman, “A Mesopotamian Background”; Parpola, “The Assyrian Tree of Life”; and claims regarding the origin of some forms of Jewish herme-neutics, similar to those of Lieberman later on, already in Jeffrey H. Tigay, “An Early Technique of Aggadic Exegesis,” in Tadmor and Weinfeld, History, Historiography and Interpretation, pp. 169–188; Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation, p. 464; and more recently in P. Kingsley’s study, mentioned below, note 43. See also Fishbane, The Exegetical Imagination, pp. 41–55.

3. See Gruenwald, From Apocalypticism to Gnosticism, pp. 53–64.

4. On some aspects of esotericism in Qumran see my discussion of Binah, below, and the important remarks of Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism, pp. 3–4. Pertinent remarks on ancient Jewish esotericism can be found in G. A. Wewers, Geheimnis und Geheimhaltung in rabbinischen Judentum (De Gruyter, Berlin, 1975), and Smith, Clement of Alexandria, s.v. “secret, secrecy.” Joseph Dan’s attempt to point out the precise beginning of “Jewish mysticism” does not take into account the possible implications of the existence of esoteric topics in earlier Jewish, sometimes Hebrew, types of literature. See Dan, The Revelation of the Secret of the World: The Beginning of Jewish Mysticism in Late Antiquity (Providence, R.I., 1992).

5. See Michael Stone, “List of Revealed Things in the Apocalyptic Literature,” in Mag-nalia Dei: The Mighty Acts of God, ed. F. M. Cross (New York, 1976), pp. 414–452. Gruen-wald, From Apocalypticism to Gnosticism, pp. 74–76.

6. Gruenwald, From Apocalypticism to Gnosticism, pp. 59–61; Cecil Roth, “The Subject Matter of Qumran Exegesis,” Vetus Testamentus 10 (1960), pp. 51–65; L. Schiffman, “Hekhalot Mysticism and Qumran Literature,” in Early Jewish Mysticism, ed. J. Dan (Jerusalem, 1987), pp. 121–137 (Hebrew); C. A. Newsom, “Merkabah Exegesis in the Qumran Sabbath Shirot,” JJS 38 (1987), pp. 11–30; J. M. Baumgarten, “The Qumran Sabbath Shirot and Rabbinic Merkabah Traditions,” Revue de Qumran (Memorial Jean Carmignac) 13 (1988), pp. 199–213.

7. See Mowinckel, He That Cometh, pp. 385–393.

8. Goodenough, By Light, Light; David Winston, “Philo and the Contemplative Life,” ed. Arthur Green, Jewish Spirituality (Crossroad, New York, 1986), 1:198–231, esp. pp. 223–236; idem, Philo of Alexandria, pp. 21–34. For more on Philo’s interpretation see below, chap. 8, par. IV.

9. One of the major exceptions would be the magical text Sar ha-Panim. See Schaefer, Hekhalot-Studien, pp. 118–153.

10. See also the assumption that there are secrets in texts in Mesopotamian material, cf. Tigay, “An Early Technique,” p. 171, note 4. For the claim that the later Kabbalistic symbolism, which is somehow related to esotericism, is based on the semantic reservoir of Jewish canonical writings see below, chap. 11.

11. See, respectively, the studies of Dan, Marcus, and Idel, mentioned below in notes 94, 95, and 97 and in chap. 11.

12. See studies by Lieberman, Tigay, and Parpola cited in note 2, above.

13. Verse 13. On Binah and interpretation in the Bible see Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation, pp. 108–109.

14. Verse 15.

15. See BT, ’Eruvin, fol. 100b; Rashi on Deuteronomy, 1:13.

16. See E. A. Finkelstein, “Tiqqunei Girsa’ot ba-Sifrei,” Tarbiz 3 (1932), pp. 198-199. See also R. Abraham ibn Daud’s view of R. Isaac al-Fassi, cf. Sefer ha-Qabbalah, The Book of Tradition, ed. Gerson D. Cohen (Jewish Publication Society, Philadelphia, 1967), p. 63 [Hebrew part], a reference kindly pointed out to me by Prof. Israel Ta-Shma.

17. See Sifrei, par. XIII, ed. L. Finkelstein (Jewish Theological Seminary, New York, 1969), p. 22.

18. Ibid., VIII:1.

19. On this verse see Mowinckel, He That Cometh, p. 175. Compare also Proverbs 2:4-5.

20. “Wisdom in Daniel and the Origin of Apocalyptic,” Hebrew Annual Review 9 (1985), p. 377 = Biblical and Other Studies in Memory of S. D. Goitein, ed. R Aharoni. See also Kugel in Kugel and Greer, Early Biblical Interpretation, pp. 58-59.

21. Daniel 8:15. Other interesting uses of this verb are found in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, also of Babylonian background.

22. See Daniel, 9:2.

23. I wonder whether this Aramaic form corresponds to the Hebrew ’amuqot, which occurs in Job 12:22; in both cases the verb galleh occurs. See also Naftali Tur Sinai, Sefer ’Iyov (Jerusalem, 1972), pp. 131-132 (Hebrew), Bacher, Die exegetische Terminologie, 1:149-151, 2:28-35.

24. See especially the view that ’amiqata’ was interpreted as dealing with either ma’aseh merkavah or ’omeq ha-merkavah, namely the depths of the divine chariot. See Seder ’Olam Rabba, ed. Ber Ratner (Vilnius, 1896), p. 150, and Yalqut Shim’oni on Daniel 2:22. Interestingly enough, two traditions that are related to Babylonian sources are equated: that of the book of Daniel and that of the book of Ezekiel. At the beginning of Kabbalah we found this equation also in a text of R Ezra of Gerona, analyzed in Idel, “Sefirot above Sefirot,” p. 243. On the view that there is a profound secret related to the seat of Glory see the text referring to R. Eleazar of Worms and printed by E. E. Urbach, ’Arugat ha-Bosem (Jerusalem, 1963), 4:83 (Hebrew), and the version brought out by and analyzed in Daniel Abrams, “The Literary Emergence of Esotericism in German Pietism,” Shofar 12 (1994), pp. 72-73. Especially interesting from our point of view is the expression found in Abraham Abulafia’s Sefer Shomer Mitzvah, Ms. Paris BN 853, fol. 39a, that ma’aseh merkavah is the depth of the science of divinity, ’omeq hokhmat ha-’Elohut, namely metaphysics. In the same context, this Kabbalist uses the phrase sitrei hokhmot [sic] ha-teva’, the secrets of the sciences of nature; the depth corresponds to the secrets. See also R Hayyim of Volozhin, Nefesh ha-Hayyim, p. 53: ’imqei matzpunei ha-torah. See also above, chap. 3, note 35, and below, notes 48 and 84.

25. Manual of Discipline, IV:22. Ed. Ya’aqov Licht, Megillat ha-Serakhim (Mossad Bialik, Jerusalem, 1965), p. 104; see Gruenwald, From Apocalypticism to Gnosticism, p. 78.

26. Such a use of the verb “haven” is found also much later, in the Middle Ages, in the context of the secret of the divine name. See R. Eleazar of Worms’ preface to his Sefer ha-Shem, as printed in Dan, The Esoteric Theology, p. 75: Gillah lannu setarav, ve-havinenu leyda’shemo ha-gadol.

27. See David Flusser, Judaism and the Origins of Christianity (Magnes Press, Jerusalem, 1988), p. 201.

28. Emile Puech, “Fragment d’un apocryphe de Levi et le personnage eschatologique,” in J. Trebolle Barrera and L. Vegas Montaner, eds., The Madrid Qumran Congress (Brill, Leiden, 1992), pp. 458, 461. Puech has pointed out the nexus to Daniel 2:22. On the affinity between the Qumran esoteric terminology and that of Daniel see also Devora Dimant, “New Light on the Jewish Pseudepigrapha,” in ibid., p. 423. Thanks are due to Dr. Israel Knohl, who alerted me to the possible contribution of material printed in the Madrid conference volume.

29. Ibid., pp. 459, 461.

30. Ibid., p. 464.

31. Binatekha.

32. See Megillat ha-Hoda’yyot, ed. Ya’aqov Licht (Mossad Bialik, Jerusalem, 1957), pp. 42-43, 60-61, 188-189.

33. From Tradition to Commentary: Tradition and Its Interpretation in the Midrash to Deuteronomy (SUNY Press, Albany, 1991), p. 249, note 140; Moshe Weinfeld, “The Prayer for Knowledge, Repentance and Forgiveness in the Eighteen Benedictions: Qumran Parallels, Biblical Antecedents and Basic Characteristics,” Tarbiz 47 (1979), p. 194 (Hebrew).

34. Die Aggada der Tannaiten, 2d ed. (1903), 1:70, note 42.

35. The New Testament and Rabbinic Judaism (Arno Press, New York, 1973), pp. 427, 431.

36. Ibid., p. 428.

37. Mishnah, Hagigah, II:1. On this passage see David Halperin, The Merkabah in Rabbinic Literature (American Oriental Society, New Haven, 1980), pp. 11-12, and the pertinent footnotes, as well as Bacher, Die Aggada der Tannaiten, and Daube, The New Testament and Rabbinic Judaism.

38. BT, Hagigah, fol. 13a.

39. See Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism, p. 58, and below, the quote from Hai Gaon.

40. Hayah mevin.

41. BT, Hagigah, fol. 13a. This incident, which occurs also in an Aramaic form and to which we shall return later, does not occur in the Heikhalot literature. See Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism, p. 19.

42. For more on this issue see below, par. V.

43. On the Hashmal as pointing to a much earlier tradition see Peter Kingsley “Ezekiel by the Grand Canal: Between Jewish and Babylonian Tradition,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 3d ser., vol. 2 (1992), pp. 339-346. See also Gruenwald, Apocalyptic and Merka-vah Mysticism, pp. 77, 209.

44. See Halperin, The Merkabah in Rabbinic Literature, pp. 155-162.

45. Fol. 14b.

46. Ibid. On this issue and its possible sources and parallels see Urbach, The World of the Sages, pp. 486-492; Gruenwald, Apocalyptic and Merkavah Mysticism, pp. 75-76; Liebes, Het’o shel ’Elisha’, pp. 100-103.

47. See above, chap. 6, par. III, the story about the study of important texts by the Besht and the Great Maggid.

48. ’Imqei. Compare also another instance where the concept of the depths of the Torah is indicated in the Heikhalot literature. See Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 250–251, par. 678; see also par. 279; idem, The Hidden and Manifest God, p. 115; Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 33–34. Some of the conclusions drawn in the following have been presented in this study but explicated here on the basis of a greater amount of material. See also Halperin, Faces of the Chariot, pp. 376–377.

49. Hugo Odeberg, ed., 3 Enoch or the Hebrew Book of Enoch (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1928), p. 16, version C.

50. Silence as part of an ascetic path recurs in the Heikhalot literature. It should be mentioned that while in many other cases the recitation of hymns is quintessential, here a quite different approach is offered.

51. Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 142–143, par. 335.

52. See Rachel Elior, “The Concept of God in the Hekhalot Mysticism,” in J. Dan, ed., Early Jewish Mysticism (Jerusalem, 1987), pp. 26–37 (Hebrew).

53. BT, Megillah, fol. 24b.

54. See Halperin, Faces of the Chariot, pp. 11–13, 318–319, 335.

55. Isaiah 29:14.

56. Batei Midrashot, ed. A. J. Wertheimer (Jerusalem, 1950), 2:358. See also ibid., p. 389, and Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” p. 38.

57. Psalms 12:7.

58. Psalms 8:8.

59. Me’at. It may well be that the letters mem and tet, which are part of the word me’at, are understood to be a hint at the number forty-nine. It seems also that the idea of the diminution of Adam, as mentioned in the rabbinic sources, might be relevant for the citation of this verse. See BT, Hagigah, fol. 12a, and note 101 below.

60. BT, Rosh ha-Shanah, fol. 21b, and Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews, 6:284, note 25.

61. Rashi, ad loc.

62. Compare BT, ’Eruvin, fol. 13b; JT, Sanhedrin, IV:2; Midrash Shir ha-Shirim Rabba, ed. S. Dunski (Devir, Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, 1980), p. 58, etc., where forty-nine ways of expounding the Torah are mentioned. The two talmudic texts have been already juxtaposed by Nahmanides in one of his sermons. See Kitvei ha-Ramban, ed. C. D. Chavel (Jerusalem, 1963), 1:134. and our discussion later below, par. IV.

63. BT, Hagigah, fol. 12a.

64. For a description of the content see Gruenwald, Apocalyptic and Merkavah Mysticism, pp. 225–234.

65. Mevinim.

66. Mevonenim.

67. Sefer ha-Razim, ed. Mordekai Margalioth (Yediyyot Aharonot, Jerusalem, 1967), p. 72 (Hebrew).

68. Kevod ha-shamayim.

69. For more on the verb lidrosh see below, par. 4.

70. Ms. Vatican 283, fol. 73a.

71. It may well be that the expounding mentioned here is that of the Merkavah: see the Heikhalot view that R. ’Aqivah “descended” in order “to expound the Merkavah.” Cf. the text in Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 252-253, par. 685.

72. See also the view of R. Abbahu, one of the most mystical rabbinic figures in late antiquity, as adduced in the midrash on Psalms 16:10, which may be translated to the effect that “the Glory rejoiced in the moment the little (children) were pronouncing, in order to use it.” Cf. Midrash Tehillim, ed. S. Buber (Vilnius; rpt. Jerusalem, 1977), p. 123. The text is not very clear, but nevertheless the nexus between mishtammshim, which points to a magical use, and Kavod seems to be rather plausible. In my opinion, this text is related, in a complex manner, to the quotes on the young boy adduced above and below from Hagigah. In the context of those quotes the name of R Abbahu has also been mentioned. It should be stressed that the magical use of Kavod occurs in the Talmud, and probably in the above-quoted midrash, but not in the Heikhalot literature. In the closest parallel to the talmudic passage describing R ’Aqivah as using the divine Glory, found in a Heikhalot text, Heikhalot Zutarti (Schaefer, Synopse, par. 346, pp. 146-147) the version is histakkel bi-khevodi, namely, R. ’Aqivah has contemplated the Glory. This is one of the examples that demonstrates that when a talmudic, as well as a midrashic, passage parallels one in the Heikhalot literature, it is quite possible that the more magical or theurgical stand will be found in the rabbinic versions, while the Heikhalot text may represent a more contemplative stand. See especially par. 335, where different attitudes toward the Glory are mentioned in order to warn the mystic, none of them being the theurgical use, as represented by the verb mishtammesh. See also Scholem, Major Trends, p. 46; idem, Jewish Gnosticism, p. 54; Liebes, Het’o shel ’Elisha’, pp. 90-91. Such a differing attitude may be explained by the different types of theology dominating the different types of literature. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 157-158.

73. See Heschel, The Theology of Ancient Judaism, 1:3-23.

74. The transmission of secrets in a whisper is already mentioned in Bereshit Rabba, III:4, ed. J. Theodor and C. Albeck (Wahrman, Jerusalem, 1965), 1:19-20, and BT, Hagigah, fol. 13a. See also above, note 39.

75. Kelalut. This term is parallel to rashei peraqim, which is sometimes translated as rudiments, in the rabbinic sources. See also the text of R Nathan, a student of Abulafia, the author of Sefer Sha’arei Tzedeq, p. 9, who mentions the kelalim as related to the rudiments.

76. Mevin bahem.

77. On this expression see Isadore Twersky Rabad of Posquieres: A Twelfth-Century Talmudist (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1962), pp. 293-296. See also below, note 125, the quote from Todros Abulafia’s ’Otzar ha-Kavod.

78. Compare the requirement of having an anxious heart for receiving secrets, in BT, Hagigah, fol. 13a.

79. ’Otzar ha-Ge’onim, ed. B. Levin, Hagigah (Jerusalem, 1932), p. 12; Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism, p. 58.

80. Megillat Ahima’atz (Jerusalem, 1964), pp. 1-3.

81. Namely of the Torah.

82. See Daniel Goldschmidt, Mahzor le-Yamim Nora’im, According to the Ashkenazi Rite (Jerusalem, 1970), 1:133.

83. Although scholars consider the following to be a relatively early text in the Ashkenazi literature, its similarity to Hasidei Ashkenaz thought invites, in my opinion, a somewhat later dating.

84. Ma’amiqim. On the relation between this verb and the concept of secret see Dan, Studies, p. 46, note 9; Marcus, Piety and Society, p. 85; and also below, note 133. As Israel Ta-Shma has pointed out, the verb recurs in medieval Ashkenazi nonmystical nomenclature in order to describe a certain kind of legalistic study. See his “An Abridgement of ‘Hovot ha-Levavot,”’ ’Alei Sefer 10 (1982), p. 19 (Hebrew), and Sol-oveitchik’s study mentioned below, note 100, p. 315, note 8. The term ’omeq for secrets occurs also in ecstatic Kabbalah: see Idel, “Maimonides and Kabbalah,” pp. 57, 62. See also an early-fourteenth-century Kabbalistic book whose influence on later Kabbalah was very great, Berit Menuhah (Amsterdam, 1648), fol. 2b, discussed in Daniel Abrams, “The Shekhinah Prays Before God,” Tarbiz 63 (1994), pp. 509-533 (Hebrew). See also below, chap. 10, note 53.

85. The nexus between fathoming and understanding is found also in Sefer Hasidim, ed. J. Wistinetzki (Frankfurt am Main, 1924), p. 242, par. 983: she-ma’amiq be-binah, and in R. Eleazar of Worms’ Sefer Hokhmat ha-Nefesh (Benei Beraq, 1987), p. 96: ’omeq ha-hokhmah ve-ha-binah. On the other hand, in Sefer Hasidim, par. 984, understanding is presented as a condition for fathoming. On the latter paragraph see Peter Schaefer, “The Ideal of Piety of the Ashkenazi Hasidim and Its Roots in Jewish Tradition,” Jewish History 4, no. 2 (1990), p. 17.

86. Sefer ha-Pardes, ed. H. Y. Ehrenreich (Budapest, 1924), p. 229, par. 174. On this text see E. E. Urbach, Sefer ’Arugat Habosem, auctore R. Abraham b. R. Azriel (Meqitzei Nirdamim, Jerusalem, 1963), 4:6, 73 (Hebrew).

87. Sodekha.

88. Namely the angels.

89. Rubbei binatekha.

90. Printed by Yehudah Leib Weinberger, “New Poems from the Byzantine Period,” HUCA 43 (1972), p. 293 (Hebrew). For the date and place of this poet see more recently Ezra Fleisher, “’Azharot le-Rabbi Benjamin (ben Shmuel) the Poet,” Qovez al Yad, n.s., vol. 11 (21) (1985), pp. 3-75 (Hebrew).

91. Compare also another part of this poem, printed in Fleisher, ibid., p. 74, where God is described as compelling men to deal with His secrets, sodeikha.

92. See Weinberger, “New Poems from the Byzantine Period,” p. 296.

93. Bereshit Rabbati, p. 8.

94. On this composition see Dan, Studies, pp. 44-57, esp. p. 48, note 29.

95. Marcus, “Exegesis for the Few,” pp. 1-24.

96. Numerically this word is equivalent to seventy-three, as is the form u-vinah.

97. Ibid., pp. 16-18. See also his Piety and Society (Brill, Leiden, 1980), pp. 69, 119.

98. Proverbs 2:4-5.

99. Namely Binah.

100. Sefer Hasidim, par. 1514, in the edition of J. Wistinetzki (Frankfurt am Main, 1924), p. 369, adduced and discussed by Marcus, “Exegesis for the Few,” p. 22; Haym Sol-oveitchik, “Three Themes in Sefer Hasidim,” AJSR 1 (1976), p. 314, note 7. See also Abrams, “The Literary Emergence,” pp. 67-85.

101. For more on the esoteric aspects of the Torah in Sefer Hasidim see another important passage quoted and discussed by Marcus, ibid., p. 21. The nonexegetical nature of the fifty gates is corroborated by several discussions found in R. Eleazar’s Commentary on Prayer, ed. M. Herschler and Y. A. Herschler (Jerusalem, 1992), p. 149, and in his Sefer ha-Hokhmah, in Y. Klugmann, ed., Perushei Roqeah ’al ha-Torah (Benei Berq, 1985), 1:48, and again in the milieu of R. Eleazar, in a writing of R Abraham ben Azriel, who describes the fifty gates as granted to Adam. See Urbach, Sefer ’Arugat ha-Bosem, 3:53. Thus, it seems that they can be conceived of as a very high form of intellection, but totally unrelated to the contents of the Torah. In my opinion, the attribution of the gates to Adam, found in the sources mentioned above and in many others not adduced here, in lieu of the classical attribution to Moses, represents an earlier tradition that was later shifted to Moses. On this issue I hope to elaborate elsewhere. See, meanwhile, note 59 above. See also Abrams, “The Literary Emergence,” p. 69.

102. Sefer ha-’Emunah ve-ha-Bitahon, chap. 23, in Kitvei ha-Ramban, ed. C. D. Chavel (Mossad ha-Rav Kook, Jerusalem, 1963), 2:435.

103. Meshiv Devarim Nekhohim, ed. Y. A. Vajda (Israeli Academy, Jerusalem, 1968), pp. 140-141.

104. See note 62 above.

105. Commentary on the Pentateuch, ed. C. D. Chavel (Jerusalem, 1959), 1:4; Halbertal, People of the Book, pp. 37-38.

106. Ibid.

107. Introduction to Commentary on the Pentateuch, 1:7. For the importance of this passage for the overall view of Kabbalah in Nahmanides’ thought see Idel, “We Have No Kabbalistic Tradition,” pp. 59-60.

108. Lo’itbonenu.

109. Commentary on the Pentateuch, 1:4. For more on this issue see below, chap. 13, par. I.

110. Ibid., 1:9.

111. Ibid., 1:14.

112. Compare Wolfson, “By Way of Truth.”

113. Exodus 14:19-21. On this view of the alphabets and that found in an anonymous commentary on the liturgy from the school related to Abraham Abulafia, I hope to elaborate elsewhere.

114. Deuteronomy 34:10.

115. Preserved in Ms. Schocken Kabbalah 14, fol. 120b; see also Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 151-152. This book differs from that referred to above in chap. 2.

116. See ’Avot, ed. Taylor, p. 43, and our discussion above.

117. See Moshe Idel, “To the History of the Interdiction to Study Kabbalah before the Age of Forty,” AJSR 5 (1980), pp. 4-5 (Hebrew). See also R. Yehudah he-Hasid, Sefer Gematria’ot, p. 54.

118. See Moreh ha-Moreh (Pressburg, 1837), p. 6. For more on the background of this view see Idel, ibid., pp. 2-6.

119. According to the translation in Scholem, Major Trends, p. 139, Hebrew original p. 382, note 75. Compare also Idel, Messianic Mystics, pp. 299-300. See also another important text stemming from Abulafia’s school, Haqdamah, in Ms. Paris, BN 851, fol. 29ab, printed in the appendix to Abrams, “The Shekhinah Prays Before God,” where he adduced also a great variety of medieval sources dealing, inter alia, with secrets and understanding. On understanding and the divine name see also below, the quote from R. Todros ha-Levi Abulafia’s book.

120. Scholem, ibid.

121. For more on this issue see Idel, “Defining Kabbalah,” p. 111.

122. See also ’Otzar ha-Kavod, fol. 19d.

123. This form of exclamation is characteristic of the Zoharic style. I assume that the whole passage, starting with “Happy,” points to an awareness not only of the Zohar as a book but also of its ambiance. Indeed, this Kabbalist and his son were acquaintances of R Moses de Leon. See especially Liebes, Studies in the Zohar, pp. 135-138.

124. Tzenu’im. On this term see Idel, “Defining Kabbalah,” p. 115, note 14.

125. Sefer ’Otzar ha-Kavod, fol. 13d, also quoted by R Meir ibn Gabbai, Sefer ’Avodat ha-Qodesh, fol. 16d. See, however, R Todros’s assault on Kabbalists who discuss divine names, below, appendix 2, note 20.

126. See the important passage of R Hayyim Vital, ’Etz Hayyim, gate Mohin de-Qatnut, chap. 3. The nexus between Binah and occult knowledge is still evident in the middle of the eighteenth century, when the Besht is described as someone who was graced by God with a bounty of Binah, binah yeterah, and he can understand things belonging to the upper world. Epistle of the Ascent of the Soul, printed in Joshua Mondshein, Shivhei ha-Baal Shem Tov (Jerusalem, 1982), p. 234. This term is found already in talmudic sources; see, e.g., BT, Sotah, fol. 35b. See also the importance of the hit-bonenut, a term that became current for contemplation, sometimes regarding textual issues, in later Hasidism, as for example R. Dov Baer of Lubavitch’s Quntres ha-Hitbonenut. See also R Hayyim of Volozhin, Nefesh ha-Hayyim, pp. 52-53. It should be mentioned that Binah was also understood by the Besht as pointing to the understanding of the meaning of words of prayer or a text that is studied, in a rather interesting manner. He is reported by R Jacob Joseph of Polonnoye to have said that a person who prays or studies without understanding the meaning of the words corresponds to the sefirah of Malkhut, while he who understands (mevin) the meaning, and intends it, links this sefirah to Binah. See Ben Porat Yosef fol. 127b.

127. Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation, p. 245.

128. And PRSh, as pointed out by Fishbane, ibid.

129. For the relations between the two phenomena in later Jewish literature see Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 234-249, and idem, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 101-109; Elliot R. Wolfson, “Circumcision, Visionary Experience and Textual Interpretation: From Midrashic Trope to Mystical Symbol,” History of Religions 27 (1987) pp. 189-215; idem, “The Hermeneutics of Visionary Experience: Revelation and Interpretation in the Zohar,” Religion 18 (1988), pp. 311-345.

130. For attempts to separate between what could be called mystical literature and mystical experience—too radical a distinction, in my opinion—see, e.g., the views of Hal-perin, The Merkabah in Rabbinic Literature, passim; Schaefer, Hekhalot-Studien, pp. 294-295, and Joseph Dan, The Revelation of the Secret of the World, pp. 11-13.

131. I do not know the meaning of this verb. See, however, Moshe Z. Segal, Sefer Ben Sira’ ha-Shalem (Mossad Bialik, Jerusalem, 1972), p. 53.

132. Ben Sira’ 39:4, according to the reconstructed text of Segal, Sefer Ben Sira’ ha-Shalem, p. 152, on the basis of a Syrian translation: Nistarot mashal idrosh, uvehidot mashal itratash. Compare Proverbs 1:6, and see also Kugel, in Kugel and Greer, Early Biblical Interpretation, pp. 62-63.

133. The term ’imqei in Ben Sira’ is reconstructed by Segal, Sefer Ben Sira’ ha-Shalem, p. 152, on the basis of Syrian. On ’omeq in contexts of secrets see above, notes 24, 47, 84, and Idel, “Defining Kabbalah,” p. 102 and note 51, as well as below, in the context of the Hasidei Ashkenaz texts, where the notion of the depths of the Torah will be mentioned. In this context, the importance of the ten “depths” of the universe in Sefer Yetzirah should also be mentioned. See also Liebes, “The Messiah of the Zohar,’ ’ p. 211, and Daniel Abrams, “The Book of Illumination of R Jacob bem Jacob HaKo-hen” (Ph.D. diss., New York University, New York, 1993), p. 34 (Hebrew), where more Kabbalistic sources dealing with the depths of the Torah are adduced. The concept of depths of the sefirot and the depths of nothingness are important aspects of Kabbalistic theology, but those topics should be discussed separately.

134. Segal, Sefer Ben Sira’ ha-Shalem, p. 16; See also Liebes, Het shel ’Elisha’, p. 154.

135. ’Anavim. See also verse 16.

136. Segal, Ben Sira’ ha-Shalem, p. 16.

137. Ibid., pp. 17-18.

138. This is reminiscent of the idea found in the Greek Bible as to those who will inherit heaven.

139. Segal, Ben Sira’ ha-Shalem, pp. 17-18.

140. See his “Interpretive Authority in Studying Community at Qumran,” JJS 44 (1993), pp. 58-59, 62.

141. Mishnah, Hagigah, fol. 13a; Liebes, Heto shel ’Elisha’, pp. 106-107, 131–141, 148.

142. Hagigah, fol. 13a.

143. Ibid.

144. Halperin, Faces of the Chariot, pp. 26-27.

145. See also the parallel pointed out by Halperin, ibid., p. 26, note 17, where the notion of the age is indicated in a talmudic text in connection with the study of the Merkavah topics.

146. Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism, p. 38, has merged these criteria in a way that presupposes one view that informed both Origen and the mishnaic material.

147. The World of the Sages, p. 522.

148. ’Avodah Zarah, chap. 2, Mishnah 8: razei torah. See also the parallel in Midrash Rabba on Song of Songs 1:2: sitrei torah.

149. BT, Hagigah, fols. 13a-14a. A different view of this legend is found in Liebes, Heto shel ’Elisha’.

150. In my monograph on the Four Sages Entered the Orchard, in preparation.

151. Sod. Unlike many other studies which translate this word as “mystery,” I prefer to translate it as “secret,” for reasons I shall elaborate elsewhere. See, meanwhile, the different view of Alexander Altmann, “Maimonides’s Attitude toward Jewish Mysticism,” in Alfred Jospe, ed., Studies in Jewish Thought (Detroit, 1981), pp. 200-219, esp. pp. 201-202. According to other manuscripts, the version here is sar, namely “prince.” On the prince of the Torah see also above, chap. 4, par. I.

152. Yidreshuhu.

153. Schaefer, Synopse, pp. 132-133, par. 297; Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 36-37, note 39. See also above, chap. 6, par. III.

154. See Gershom Scholem, ed., “Two Treatises of Moshe de Leon,” in Qovetz ’al Yad 8 (18) (1976), p. 332 (Hebrew): “And by means of this secret is the Torah expounded.” For another medieval use of the verb darash in the context of dealing with secrets see the text related to R. Eleazar of Worms mentioned above, note 24, and Abrams’s discussion referred to there. On the history of derash in Jewish hermeneutics see David Weiss Halivni, Peshat and Derash (Oxford University Press, New York, 1991); Fishbane, The Garments of Torah, pp. 113-120; and Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 88-91.

155. See Sara O. Heller Wilensky “The Dialectical Influence of Maimonides on Isaac ibn Latif and Early Spanish Kabbalah,” in M. Idel, W Z. Harvey, and E. Schweid, eds., Shlomo Pines Jubilee Volume (Jerusalem, 1988), 1:294 (Hebrew).

156. See Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 53-54, and the pertinent footnotes.

157. See note 2 above.

158. Cf. Palestinian Talmud, Rosh ha-Shanah, I:2.

159. See Scholem, Major Trends, pp. 41, 46, 84; Dan, The Esoteric Theology, pp. 18-20; Roberto Bonfil, “Tra Due Mondi: Prospettive di ricerca sulla storia culturale degli ebrei nell’Italia meridionale nell’Alto Medioevo,” Italia Judaica 1 (1983), p. 149, note 54; Abrams, “The Literary Emergence,” p. 68. The controversy between Israel Wein-stock and Gershom Scholem concerning Weinstock’s assumption that the secrets of Abu Aharon are still extant in a certain manuscript in the British Library is irrelevant to the very possibility, which seems to be accepted by all scholars, including those mentioned above, that Abu Aharon apparently brought some secrets from Baghdad, whether they are still extant or not. It would be pointless to say that the possible Mesopotamian extraction of some of the topics related to Jewish ancient esoterics does not invalidate the possibility of other influences—Greek, Egyptian, Iranian, etc.

160. See Tishby The Wisdom of the Zohar, 3:1077, and below, chap. 10.

CHAPTER 8: SEMANTICS, CONSTELLATION, AND INTERPRETATION

1. On hypertextuality see, e.g., the studies collected in The Future of the Book and in Hyper/Text/Theory, ed. George P. Landow (John Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 1994).

2. Heinemann, Darkhei ha-’Aggadah; Fishbane, The Exegetical Imagination; Fraenkel, The Ways of’Aggadah and Midrash; Stern, Midrash and Theory, pp. 1-14; idem, Parables in Midrash: Narrative and Exegesis in Rabbinic Literature (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1991); Goldin, Studies in Midrash; Bruns, Hermeneutics Ancient and Modern, pp. 104-123; Weiss-Ha-Livni, Midrash; idem, “Aspects of Classical Jewish Hermeneutics,” in Hendrik M. Vroom and Jerald D. Gort, eds. Holy Scriptures in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam: Hermeneutics, Value and Society (Rodopi, Amsterdam, Atlanta, 1997), pp. 77-97; Boyarin, Intertextuality; I. L. Seeligmann, Studies in Biblical Literature, ed. A. Hurvitz, S. Japhet, and E. Tov (Magnes Press, Jerusalem, 1996), pp. 429-474 (Hebrew); Jacob Neusner, Midrash in Context: Exegesis in Formative Judaism (Fortress Press, Philadelphia, 1983); Gary Porton, “Defining Midrash,” in The Study of Ancient Judaism, ed. Jacob Neusner (New York, 1981), 1:55-92; Geza Vermes, “Bible and Midrash: Early Old Testament Exegesis,” in Post-Biblical Jewish Studies (Brill, Leiden, 1975), pp. 59-91; Handelman, The Slayers of Moses, pp. 27-82; Herbert W. Baser, “Josephus as Exegete,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 107, no. 1 (1987), pp. 21-30; Kugel, in Kugel and Reer, Early Biblical Interpretation, pp. 9-106. See also below, notes 8, 39. For a comprehensive bibliography on Midrash, see Midrash and Literature, pp. 369-395.

3. See Weiss-Ha-Livni, Midrash, p. 16.

4. See M. S. Cohen, The Shi’ur Qomah: Liturgy and Theurgy in Pre-Kabbalistic Jewish Mysticism (Lanham, New York, 1983), p. 93, where a phrase from the famous verse Psalms 147:5 is interpreted as pointing by its numerical equivalence to the size of the divine body.

5. See Stern, Midrash and Theory, pp. 73-93. According to Heinemann, Darkhei ha-’Agga-dah, it is the neglect of the logos that induced the linguovert attitude toward the text, which he designated by the term creative philology, a view that is consonant with the general approach of Handelman, The Slayers of Moses.

6. For more on this issue see below, chap. 9, par. III.

7. Le degré zero, pp. 45-47.

8. Compare Joseph Heinemann, “The Nature of the Aggadah,” in Midrash and Literature, p. 53; Rawidowicz, “On Interpretation,” p. 91; Mordechai Rotenberg, Re-biographing and Deviance (Praeger, New York, 1987).

9. On these practices see above, chaps. 5 and 6.

10. “Poterion enheiri kyrion: Philo and the Rabbis on the Powers of God and the Mixture in the Cup,” Scripta Classica Israelica 16 (1997), pp. 91-101; see also Belkin, Midrash Tadsche’, pp. 12-14. On the possible Greek source for the theology of two measures see Winston, Logos, pp. 18-20. On the possibility that the theology of the two attributes had been combined with the concept of ten sefirot as contributing to the emergence of Kabbalah see Buber, The Origin and Meaning of Hasidism, pp. 176-177.

11. Israel Knohl, The Sanctuary of Silence: The Priestly Torah and the Holiness School (Fortress Press, Minneapolis, 1994), pp. 124-148, 168-172, 227.

12. See above, chap. 3, par. III, and below, app. 5, par. II.

13. Isaiah 26:21. See below, note 24.

14. Pesiqta’ de-R. Kahana’, ed. Jacob Mandelbaum (Jewish Theological Seminary, New York, 1962), 2:364; PT, Ta’anit, fol. 65b. See also the important discussion of A. Marmorstein, The Old Rabbinic Doctrine of God (Oxford University Press, London, 1927), 1:44 and note 14.

15. Leviticus Rabba’, 19:4. See also Midrash Tanhuma’ Huqat, chap. 6; Ecclesiastes Rabba’, ad locum.

16. See BT, Berakhot, fol. 7a.

17. See Roland Barthes, “From Work to Text,” in Textual Strategies, p. 78. It was Prof. Geoffrey Hartman, who drew my attention to the affinity between midrashic herme-neutics and the “disastered” view of Barthes. Somewhat along this line is the interesting study by Stern, Midrash and Theory, on earlier Jewish literature and Handelman’s exposition of modern Jewish philosophers in Fragments of Redemptions, esp. p. 292. On hermeneutics and stars see Hartman, The Fate of Reading, pp. 114-123.

18. Printed in Epstein, Mi-Qadmoniyyot ha-Yehudim, p. 144. See also Raphael Patai, The Hebrew Goddess (New York, 1978), p. 82, who noted the affinity between Philo and Midrash Tadsche’; also pp. 76, 119-120, on Philo, Kabbalah, and divine attributes. For more on the possible affinities between this midrash and Philo see Belkin, Midrash Tadsche, esp. pp. 10-14.

19. Be-yihud gamur.

20. Cf. Exodus 36:13. The Tabernacle became a recurrent symbol in theosophical Kabbalah for the sefirotic realm, which should be unified.

21. This is a shorter form of the Tetragrammaton.

22. Genesis 19:24.

23. The Hebrew text was first printed by Gershom Scholem, Reshit ha-Kabbalah (Schocken, Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, 1948), p. 79 (Hebrew); see also idem, Origins of the Kabbalah, p. 217; Isadore Twersky Rabad of Posquieres: A Twelfth-Century Talmudist (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1962), p. 291, note 20.

24. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 128-129. The expression “the Tetragrammaton passed” has to do with Isaiah 26:21, where the Tetragrammaton occurs in an apocalyptic verse in which God is described as punishing, thus an operation that is not related to the attribute of mercy.

25. See Abrams, R. Asher ben David, pp. 61, 72.

26. See, e.g., R. Meir ibn Gabbai’s discussions in his Sefer ’Avodat ha-Qodesh, fols. 88c, 97c, 98a, 104c.

27. See Dan, Esoteric Theology, p. 122.

28. 2 Samuel 2:6.

29. Sodei Razaya, ed. Israel Kamelhar (Bielgoria, 1936) p. 58. See also below, chap. 9, note 18.

30. See Mekhilta’ de-Rabbi Ishma ’el, ed. and trans. J. Z. Lauterbach, in Max Kadushin, A Conceptual Approach to the Mekilta (Jewish Theological Seminary, New York, 1969), part 2, p. 113; see also Yalqut Shim’oni, on Numbers 10:31, par. 730. On the Mekhilta’ see Boyarin, Intertextuality, pp. 39-56, and the bibliography adduced on p. 130, note 3, and Hirshman, A Rivalry of Genius, pp. 55-66. For the background of the Exodus verse that is interpreted here see G. H. Skipwith, “The Lord of Heaven,” JQR 19, o.s. (1902), p. 693.

31. Exodus 1:14.

32. Interestingly, the noun “sapphire” was also understood as hinting at slavery; in PT, Sukkah, IV:3, it is related to Ezekiel 1:26, “stone of sapphire,” concluding that the Babylonian diaspora is harder than the Egyptian—stone in comparison to brick.

33. See Kadushin, A Conceptual Approach to the Mekilta, part 1, p. 186.

34. Printed by Abraham Epstein in Ha-’Eshkol 6 (1909), p. 207.

35. See Kadushin, A Conceptual Approach to the Mekilta, part 1, pp. 186-187.

36. Isaiah 63:10.

37. Mekhilta’ de-Rabbi Ishma ’el, Masekhet de-Shirta’, IV, ed. M. Friedmann (Vienna, 1870), fol. 37b.

38. See Midrash Tanhuma’, pericope Ha’azinu, 4, where a series of contradictory descriptions of God is adduced in relation to our verse.

39. See James L. Kugel, “Two Introduction to Midrash,” in Midrash and Literature, pp. 91-100, for the concept of verse-centeredness, and Michael Fishbane, “Inner Biblical Exegesis: Types and Strategies of Interpretation in Ancient Israel,” in ibid., pp. 19-37, and his Biblical Interpretation for the reinterpretation of some older traditions by the biblical authors themselves.

40. BT, Menahot, fol. 29b; Scholem, The Messianic Idea, pp. 282-283.

41. Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 87-91, 110-111.

42. See Joseph Dan, “Midrash and the Dawn of Kabbalah,” in Midrash and Literature, pp. 127-139.

43. See Wolfson, “By Way of Truth.”

44. Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 217-218. See also, more recently, Magid, “From Theosophy to Midrash.”

45. Or, as Charles Mopsik defined the Zohar, it is a midrash on Midrash; see Le Zohar (Verdier, Lagrasse, 1996), 4:16-23.

46. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 156-199, 222-234; Mopsik, Les grands texts; Lorberbaum, Imago Dei.

47. Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 230-232.

48. See Wolfson, “Letter Symbolism,” pp. 195-236; idem, “Anthropomorphic Imagery and Letter Symbolism in the Zohar,” in The Age of the Zohar, pp. 147-181 (Hebrew).

49. Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 70-74; see also above, chap. 3.

50. See Ithamar Gruenwald, “From Talmudic to Zoharic Homiletics,” in Joseph Dan, ed., The Age of the Zohar (Jerusalem, 1989), p. 259 (Hebrew). Cf. also Stern, Midrash and Theory, pp. 31-32. See also above, Introduction, par. III, and below, chap. 10, par. II.

51. See Buber, The Origin and Meaning of Hasidism, pp. 117-119, 124, 133-137, 252-253.

52. See above, chap. 1, par. I, chap. 3, par. I, and also below, chap. 11, par. I. In this context the exegetical aspects of another ancient Jewish author drastically marginalized by the rabbinic tradition should be mentioned. See Baser, “Josephus as Exegete,” esp. pp. 25-26, where esoteric topics are mentioned.

53. See Goodenough, By Light, Light, and An Introduction to Philo Judaeus (Yale University Press, New Haven, 1940); Winston, Logos; idem, Philo of Alexandria.

54. Bruns, Hermeneutics Ancient and Modern, pp. 83-103.

55. See, e.g., the critical review of Morton Smith, “Goodenough’s Jewish Symbols in Retrospect,” Journal of Biblical Literature 86 (1967), pp. 53-68, and Arnaldo Momi-gliano, Essays on Ancient and Modern Judaism, ed. Silvia Berti and trans. M. Masella-Gayley (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1994), pp. 48-57.

56. See R. J. Zwi Werblowsky, “Philo and the Zohar: A Note on the Method of the Scienzia Nuova in Jewish Studies,” JJS 10 (1959), pp. 25-44, 113–135; Scholem, On the Kabbalah, p. 34, note 2. See the rejoinder of Joshua Finkel, “The Alexandrian Tradition and the Midrash ha-Ne’elam,” in The Leo Jung Jubilee Volume, ed. M. M. Kasher, N. Lamm, and L. Rosenfeld (New York, 5722/1962), pp. 77-103, and Shmuel Belkin, “Philo’s Symbolic Midrash in Comparison to the Rabbinic Midrash,” Wolfson Jubilee Volume (Jerusalem, 1965), 1:25-32 (Hebrew). In this context the affinities between Philonic and Kabbalis-tic ideas that Yizhak F. Baer suggested should also be mentioned. See, e.g., Baer, Studies, 1:111-114, and Scholem’s skeptical reaction, On the Kabbalah, p. 34, note 1. See now Liebes, Ars Poetica, passim.

57. See, e.g., On the Kabbalah, pp. 32, 40, 45-46, 53, note 1.

58. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 131-132.

59. See Idel, “Be-’Or ha-Hayyim,” p. 208.

60. On this topic see e.g., McGinn, The Presence of God, 1:35-41; Pinhas Carny, “Philo Alexandrinus’ Theory of Allegory” (Ph.D. diss., Tel Aviv University, 1978) (Hebrew); David M. Hay, “Philo’s View of Himself as an Exegete: Inspired, but Not Authoritative,” The Studia Philonica Annual, Studies in Hellenistic Judaism 3 (1991), pp. 40-52; de Lubac, Histoire et esprit, pp. 150-166; Fraenkel, The Ways of the ’Aggadah and Midrash, pp. 473-475; Handelman, The Slayers of Moses, pp. 93-96, 100-104.

61. De Cherubim, par. 27-28; Winston, Philo of Alexandria, p. 89; Wolfson, Philo, 1:236-237; Belkin, Midrash Tadsche, pp. 10-14; Stroumsa, Savoir et salut, pp. 34-35. For the reverberation of the symbolic attitude toward the Bible after Philo see Francis T. Fallon, “The Law in Philo and Ptolemy: A Note on the Letter of Flora,” Vigiliae Christianae 30 (1976), pp. 45-51.

62. According to Goodenough, By Light, Light, p. 25, Philo refers here to the Divine names Kyrios and Theos.

63. Questions et Solutiones in Exodus, II:66, quoted in Goodenough, By Light, Light, pp. 25-26. See also Philo, De Cherubin, pars. 27-28, quoted above; Quis Rerum Divinarum Heres Sit, par. 166; cf. Winston, Philo of Alexandria, p. 89; Baer, Studies, 1:405-408; Belkin, Midrash Tadsche, pp. 10-14; Stroumsa, Savoir et salut, pp. 34-35; Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 131-132; and Elliot R. Wolfson, “Woman—the Feminine as Other in Theosophic Kabbalah: Some Philosophical Observations on the Divine Androgyne,” in L. J. Silberstein and R. L. Cohn, The Other in Jewish Thought and History (New York University Press, New York, 1994), pp. 173-175.

64. On the concept of the two powers in Philo’s thought see Wolfson, Philo, 1:217-226; N. A. Dahl and A. F. Segal, “Philo and the Rabbis on the Names of God,” Journal of the Studies of Judaism 9 (1978), pp. 1-28; Winston, Logos, pp. 21-22, 69-70, note 59.

65. De Cherubim, pars. 27, 42. See Bruns, Hermeneutics Ancient and Modern, p. 101.

66. For more on these issues see below, chap. 11.

67. See below, chap. 11.

68. De Specialibus Legibus, 3:178; cf. Winston, Philo of Alexandria, p. 79.

69. De Migratione, par. 89; Winston, Philo of Alexandria, p. 81.

70. See De Lubac, Histoire et esprit, p. 289.

71. Ibid., p. 288. For more on Origen’s hermeneutics see Irvine, The Making of Textual Culture, pp. 252-257.

72. Colossians 1:15-17, 19. See S. J. Grasowski, “God ‘Contains’ the Universe: A Study in Patristic Theology,” Revue de l’Université de Ottawa 26 (1950), pp. 90-113, 165-187. See also below, the discussion of the passage from Midrash Tadsche 3.

73. The Refutations of All Heresies, VIII:6, pp. 318-319. I was unable to find any substantial discussion of Monoimos in the most important studies on Gnosticism, a fact that demonstrates that his views do not correspond to any of the main texts that constitute the Gnostic literature. On the tittle of iota in Monoimos and in Kabbalah see Carl G. Jung, Mysterium Conjunctionis (Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 1980), p. 44, note 26. In any case, it seems that the “inverted interpretation” of the biblical texts, representative of many of the Gnostic texts, is not corroborated by any of the passages attributed to Monoimos, which seem to be more representative of Jewish traditions. See below, notes 74-76.

74. The phrase “tittle of iota” seems to reflect the Jewish expression “tittle of yod”; see BT, Menahot, fol. 34a. The rabbinic authority who uses this phrase, Rav, adduces the following statement in another discussion in connection with R ’Aqivah: “A man will come after several generations whose name is R ’Aqivah ben Joseph, who is destined to comment upon each and every tittle [of the letters], heaps of halakhot.” Cf. BT, Menahot, fol. 29b. For a later interpretation of the “heaps” as pointing to the infinity of the Torah see R Moses ha-Darshan, Bereshit Rabbati, p. 20.

75. On the many faces of God see the rabbinic parable adduced above, chap. 3, par. III, from Yalqut Shim’oni.

76. The description of supernal beings, such as angels, as possessing innumerable eyes is known in Jewish sources; see BT, ’Avodah Zarah, fol. 2b.

77. Refutation of All Heresies, VIII:7, Anti-Nicene Christian Library (Edinburgh, 1968), 6:320. On this passage see Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, 5:63, note 1. For two ontologi-cal decads related to biblical material see also the important discussions found in the Pseudo-Clementine Recognitions of Clemet, III, chap. 61, etc. I hope to elaborate elsewhere on the importance of this source for understanding the history of Kabbalah.

78. See Bruns, Inventions, pp. 37-38; see also the discussion by de Lubac, Exégèse medieval, 4:82-83.

79. The Tripartite Tractate, in James M. Robinson, ed., The Nag Hammadi Library (Harper & Row, San Francisco, 1981), p. 66. See also Irenaeus, Against Heresies, IV, 1, 1, in Ante-Nicene Fathers (Grand Rapids, Mich., 1977), 1:463.

80. Cf. the LXX translation of YHWH tzeva’ot as “the Lord of the powers.”

81. Apocalypse of Adam, trans. G. Macrae, in James H. Charlesworth, ed., The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (New York, 1983), 1:712.

82. Cf. Marc Philonenko, “Essenisme et Gnose chez le Pseudo-Philon,” in Le origine dello Gnosticismo (Brill, Leiden, 1967), pp. 409-410.

83. See, e.g., George MacRae, “The Jewish Background of the Gnostic Sophia Myth,” Novum Testamentum 12 (1970), pp. 86-101.

84. Such a view is found in Philo and occurs, though rarely, in rabbinic sources. See Yehoshua Amir, “The Decalogue According to the Teachings of Philo of Alexandria,” in Ben-Zion Segal, ed., The Ten Commandments (Magnes Press, Jerusalem, 1985), pp. 95-126, esp. pp. 99-100 (Hebrew); Ephraim E. Urbach, “The Place of the Ten Commandments in Ritual and Prayer,” in ibid., p. 135, idem, The Sages, pp. 360-365; Geza Vermes, “The Decalogue and the Minim,” in In Memoriam Paul Kahle (Berlin, 1968), pp. 232-240; Wolfson, Philo, 2:201; for more general discussions on the Decalogue in Jewish culture see Greenberg, Studies, pp. 279-311; Heschel, Ancient Theology of Juda-ism, 2:75-79; Wolfson, Through a Speculum That Shines, pp. 354-355; Fishbane, The Exegetical Imagination, pp. 9-10. See also below, the discussion of the passage from the Zohar, and Ha-Shelah, I, fol. 172b, and the early-fourteenth-century Sefer Yesod ’Olam, by R Abraham of Esquira, Ms. Moscow-Gunsburg 609, fol. 9a.

85. For other emanative theories in ancient Judaism see Shlomo Pines, “Points of Similarity between the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Sefirot in the Sefer Yezira and a Text of the Pseudo-Clementine Homilies,” Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, Proceedings 7, no. 3 (1989), pp. 68-69, 104-106; idem, “God, the Divine Glory” and a Philonic text preserved in Armenian, translated in Ralph Marcus, Philo: Supplement I, Questions on Genesis, Loeb Series (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1953), p. 266, analyzed in Idel, “Be-’Or ha-Hayyim,” p. 208, and the material adduced in idem, Messianic Mystics, p. 340, note 42.

86. See Idel, “The Concept of Torah,” pp. 45-46; Moses Gaster, The Tittled Bible (London, 1929), pp. 15, 30-31.

87. See R J. Zwi Werblowsky, “Some Psychological Aspects of Kabbalah,” Harvest 3 (1956), pp. 77-96; cf. the opinion of F. C. Burkitt, Church and Gnosis (Cambridge, 1932), pp. 41-42, and E. R. Dodds, Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety (New York, 1970), pp. 18-20, who regard the Gnostic mythologies as a hypostatization of the Gnostics’ inner experiences.

88. Dialogue with Trypho, chap. 61, p. 170. See also Greer, in Kugeland Greer, Early Biblical Interpretation, pp. 146-147. The metaphor of the kindling of one candle or fire from another for the process of emanation is found also in Jewish rabbinic sources; see Tishby The Wisdom of the Zohar, 1:303, note 21.

89. See especially chaps. 126 and 128.

90. See Pines, “God, the Divine Glory,” pp. 5-7.

91. Kasher, Torah Shelemah, Va-’Era’, 9:43. For later reverberations see Idel, “Sefirot above Sefirot,” passim, and Wolfson, Through a Speculum That Shines, p. 139, note 53.

92. Dibbur, although the meaning is “word.”

93. Midrash Tadsche’, p. 144. See the proposal of Belkin, Midrash Tadsche’, pp. 18-19, who sees in Philo’s thought the source of the midrash. I believe that my suggestion is more pertinent. See also R. Moses ha-Darshan, Bereshit Rabbati, p. 55. On the ten commandments pronounced in one word see Baruch J. Schwartz, “ ‘I Am the Lord’ and ‘You Shall Have No Other Gods’ Were Heard from the Mouth of the Almighty: On the Evolution of an Interpretation,” in Sara Japhet, ed., The Bible in the Light of Its Interpreters: Sarah Kamin Memorial Volume (Magnes Press, Jerusalem, 1994), pp. 172-173 (Hebrew).

94. Midrash Tadsche’, p. 145; see Hananel Mack, “Midrash Ba-Midbbar Rabba’ and the Beginning of the Kabbalah in Provence,” in Myth in Judaism, ed. Havivah Pedayah (Be’er Sheva’, 1996), pp. 82-88 (Hebrew). Compare also the interesting version of a statement found in Tractate ’Avot but preserved in Hebrew only in an Isma’ili writing: “By means of ten ma’amarot the world was created, and by the Decalogue it stands.” Cf. Paul Kraus, “Hebräische und syrische Zitate in ismäilitischen Schriften,” Der Islam 19 (1930), p. 260; Salomon Pines, “Shi’ite Terms and Conceptions in Juda Halevi’s Kuzari,” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 2 (1980), pp. 243-244.

95. See, e.g., the introduction of C. Albeck to Bereshit Rabbati, pp. 18, 64, and Martha Himmelfarb, “R. Moses the Preacher and the Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs,” AJSR 9 (1984), pp. 55-78. See also below, note 97.

96. See Commentary on ’Avot, printed in R Simhah, Mahzor Vitri, ed. Shim’on ha-Levi Hurvitz (Jerusalem, 1963), p. 536.

97. See R Moses ha-Darshan, Bereshit Rabbati, p. 8, and note 16, and above, note 84.

98. Zohar, II, fol. 90b. See also Holdrege, Veda and Torah, pp. 200, 317-318, 323. On the view that the ten commandments comprise all the others see above, note 84, and in Spain the ethical treatise of R. Abraham bar Hiyya, The Meditation of the Sad Soul, pp. 131-132. See also Wolfson, Along the Path, pp. 74-75.

99. See Idel, “Sefirot above Sefirot,” pp. 256-257. For ’amarin in a context that points to ma’amarot see Zohar, II, fol. 34b. See also above, chap. 4, par. VI.

100. Cf. R Abraham bar Hiyya, The Meditation of the Sad Soul, pp. 131-140, where the expansion of revelation as articulated in writing is conceived of as representing greater involvement with materiality. See especially the view found in ibid., p. 131, that the nine commandments (all but the first commandment of the Decalogue) “are emanated from God.” This is quite a Neoplatonic view, which presupposes a hierarchy within the different parts of the biblical text, a view that has been debated by many medieval thinkers.

101. The people of Israel.

102. This is a short mid-thirteenth-century ethico-mystical treatise attributed to various authors, one of them the twelfth-century R. Tam. The attributions, however, are spurious, and the identity of the author remains unknown.

103. See Sefat’Emmet, 1:156. On combination of letters see also above, chap. 6, note 168, and below, chap. 12. The hierarchy that organizes the biblical material, starting with the divine name, then ten other names standing for the ten sefirot, and ultimately comprising the entire biblical text, is the core of R. Joseph Gikatilla’s Sha’arei ’Orah, as we shall see in chapter 12, par. III. The Rabbi of Gur combines, however, Gikatilla’s triangular attitude toward the text with the theory of letter combinations, which are two different models, as we shall see in chapter 12. Cf. also R Abraham of Turisk, Magen ’Avraham, IV, fol. 77cd. For another triangular theory, similar to the one quoted above, see another Hasidic master, R Samuel Aharon ha-Kohen of Ostrog, Sefer ve-Tziwah ha-Kohen (Jerusalem, n.d.), p. 57.

104. See Sha’arei Tzedeq, pp. 23-24.

105. Cf. R Qalonimus Qalman Epstein, Ma’or va-Shemesh, 1:84.

106. Theologia aporrhetos.

107. Contra Celsum, I, 24. For a short discussion of this passage see John Dillon, “The Magical Power of the Names in Origen and Later Platonism,” in Origeniana Tertia, ed. R. Hanson and H. Crousel (Rome, 1985), pp. 207-208. See also the interesting study by Naomi Janowitz, “Theories of the Divine Names in Origen and Pseudo-Dionysius,” History of Religions 30 [1991], pp. 360-365. For another interesting tradition preserved by Irenaeus concerning the pronunciation of the divine names by Jews see Yehuda Liebes, “The Angels of the Shofar and Yeshua Sar ha-Panim,” in Early Jewish Mysticism, p. 194, note 86 (Hebrew).

108. Dillon, “The Magical Power of the Names in Origen and Later Platonism,” p. 208.

109. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 123-127.

110. See John G. Gager, Moses in Greco-Roman Paganism (Abington Press, Nashville, 1972), pp. 142-143, 150, 152.

111. See BT, Qiddushin, fol. 71a. For the importance of the traditions related to divine names for the emergence of Kabbalah see Idel, “Defining Kabbalah.”

112. Cf. Gikatilla’s introduction to his Sha’arei ’Orah.

113. See Sefer Yetzirah, I:1.

114. On ten unerasable divine names see PT, Megilah, fol. 12b; Soferim 4:1; Mopsik, Le Sicle, pp. 278-289.

115. For more on the concept of code and symbolism see below, chap. 10, par. III.

116. See Vajda, Le Commentaire, pp. 47–49.

117. See the anonymous Kabbalistic text printed and analyzed by M. Idel, “Kavvana and Colors: A Forgotten Kabbalistic Responsum,” in M. Idel, D. Diamant, and S. Rosenberg, Tribute to Sara: Studies in Jewish Philosophy and Kabbala (Magnes Press, Jerusalem, 1994), pp. 1–14 (Hebrew).

CHAPTER 9: RADICAL FORMS OF JEWISH HERMENEUTICS

1. See the studies mentioned below in notes 8, 11, 25.

2. It is only in the last two decades that the commentaries of R. Yehudah ben Shmuel he-Hasid and R. Eleazar of Worms have been printed. R. Abraham Abulafia’s commentary on the Pentateuch, entitled Sefer ha-Maftehot, is extant only in manuscripts. The somewhat later commentaries, however, written in the same vein, those of R. Efrayyim ben Shimshon and of R. Jacob ben Asher, have been in print for centuries.

3. See John D. Caputo, Radical Hermeneutics: Repetition, Deconstruction, and the Hermeneutic Project (Indiana University Press, Bloomington, 1987). On “radical interpretation” see Bruns, Hermeneutics Ancient and Modern, pp. 83–103.

4. See Eco, The Search, p. 27. See also below, chap. 12.

5. See H. G. Enelow, The Mishnah of Rabbi Eliezer or the Midrash of Thirty-Two Hermeneutic Rules (Bloch, New York, 1933); Saul Lieberman, Hellenism in Jewish Palestine (Jewish Theological Seminary, New York, 1962), pp. 47–82; Lieberman, “A Mesopotamian Background”; Handelman, The Slayers of Moses, pp. 51–66, 225–227. See especially Stephen Lieberman’s study, where additional pertinent bibliography is adduced. It should be mentioned, as Lieberman has pointed out, ibid., pp. 221–222, that systematic descriptions of exegetical rules are found neither in the Mesopotamian sources he investigated nor in early rabbinic discussions.

6. See the recent collection of articles on this figure edited by Isadore Twersky and J. M. Harris, Rabbi Abraham ibn Ezra: Studies in the Writings of a Twelfth-Century Jewish Polymath (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1993).

7. See Dan, “The Ashkenazi Hasidic”; idem, On Sanctity, pp. 87–107; Marcus, “Exegesis for the Few”; idem, “Judah the Pietist and Eleazar of Worms: From Charismatic to Conventional Leadership,” in Jewish Mystical Leaders, pp. 97–126; Wolfson, “The Mystical Significance”; Daniel Abrams, “The Literary Emergence of Esotericism in German Pietism,” Shofar 12 (1994), pp. 68–70.

8. For the pertinent bibliography on the Pardes exegesis see below, app. 1, notes 1–3.

9. Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. 82–124.

10. Scholem, Kabbalah, pp. 337–343; Heinemann, Darkhei ha-’Aggadah, pp. 106–107; Fraenkel, The Ways of the ’Aggadah and Midrash, pp. 132–137; Lieberman, “A Meso-potamian Background,” pp. 167–176; Gruenwald, “Uses and Abuses”; Abrams, “From Germany to Spain.” For the ancient rabbinic resort to gematria see Bacher, Die exegetische Terminologie, 1:127–128, 2:27–28. On the concept of jafr in Muslim sources see Nwyia, Exégèse coranique, pp. 164–168.

11. To be sure, I do not at all mean, by emphasizing the hermeneutical aspect, to minimize the importance of the material adduced by Gruenwald and Abrams as to the nexus between gematria and some mystical experiences. The relationship between interpretation and mystical experience has been dealt with in a number of studies. See, e.g., Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 34–38; idem, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 234–246; Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. 101–109. See also Elliot R. Wolfson, “Circumcision, Visionary Experience and Textual Interpretation: From Midrashic Trope to Mystical Symbol,” History of Religions 27 (1987), pp. 189–215; idem, Through a Speculum, pp. 119–124, 326–377, 383–392.

12. See Martin Samuel Cohen, The Shi’ur Qomah: Liturgy and Theurgy in Pre-Kabbalistic Jewish Mysticism (University Press of America, Lanham, Md., 1983), pp. 104–105.

13. See especially Abrams, “From Germany to Spain.”

14. Remiza’.

15. On derision in this context see also below, the quote from Nahmanides, and note 22. On parodies of gematria-like devices in ancient literature see Lieberman, “A Meso-potamian Background,” p. 218.

16. Perush Roqeah, I, p. 17. For another description of the gematria technique in R. Eleazar that points to an ecstatic effect see Abrams, “From Germany to Spain,” p. 93. A plausible source for R. Eleazar’s “etymology” of gematria is R. Nathan of Rome’s influential Sefer ha-’Arukh, ed. Alexander Kohut, Aruch Completum, vol. 1, p. 309.

17. ’Elohim = 86 = zeh dayyan. The last phrase means “He is [functioning] as a judge.”

18. The plain sense is chair, but in this context it stands for the divine throne. The same gematria occurs in R. Jacob ben Asher, in a famous commentary on the Torah known under the title Ba’al ha-Turim, ed. J. Reinitz (Benei Beraq, 1985), p. 3. See also the same gematria below, note 39. On the relation between a divine mode of action and the divine seat see below, R. Eleazar of Worms’s passage adduced above, chap 8, par. II. The gematria kisse’ = ’elohim is quite widespread in Kabbalah, especially in the early writings of R. Joseph Gikatilla and in Tiqqunei Zohar. See, e.g., Tiqqunei Zohar, Introduction, fol. 4b, and below, note 39.

19. Perush Roqeah, p. 18.

20. See the texts and bibliography adduced by Wolfson, Along the Path, pp. 141–142, note 183; 158–159, note 234.

21. Evidently, ancient Jewish texts know about a throne of judgment, a view reiterated by R. Eleazar several times in his writings. See, e.g., Wolfson, Along the Path, pp. 50–51.

22. On this motif see above, the quote from R. Eleazar of Worms, note 15.

23. Compare again the fear of R. Eleazar that gematria is used by clowns.

24. Gematria’ot.

25. See Ephrayim Kupfer, “The Concluding Portion of Nahmanides’ Torat ha-Shem Temi-mah,” Tarbiz 40 (1970), p. 74 (Hebrew). On Nahmanides and gematria see also Wolf-son, “By Way of Truth,” pp. 130–131, note 76. On ibn Ezra’s even greater reticence to resort to gematria for commenting on the biblical texts see Lieberman, “A Mesopotamian Background,” p. 218, note 300. In a separate study I hope to show that ibn Ezra’s reticence may point to the existence in his lifetime of individuals and techniques reminiscent of the somewhat later Hasidei Ashkenaz. See also below, chap. 13, par. I. For a much later warning against the perils of the gematria, formulated in the aftermath of Sabbateanism, see the passage from R. Jacob Emden printed and discussed by Liebes, Sod ha-’Emunah, p. 201.

26. Or divine attributes, middot.

27. Ha-tzurot ha-tishboriyyot.

28. Ha-misppar.

29. This is a medieval pronunciation of the classical Greek geo. Abulafia’s etymology is found in earlier sources, and it is accepted by modern scholars; see Lieberman, “A Mesopotamian Background,” pp. 173–174, 188.

30. Medidah.

31. Heshbbon. Gematria was designated as heshbbon also in other writings close to Abula-fia. See R. Joseph Gikatilla, Sefer Ginnat ’Egoz (Jerusalem, 1989), pp. 408–410. See also below, note 66.

32. Apparently greater than the measuring thing.

33. Ha-metziy’ut. Compare also the view expressed by Abulafia in another book, written in the same year in Rome, Sefer Hayyei ha-Nefesh, Ms. München 408, fol. 65a, where the divine names are described as malkhei ha-metziy’ut, “kings of reality.” From this point of view the divine names, as the quintessence of Torah, point to an absorptive quality.

34. Namely to the Kabbalists.

35. Sefer Sitrei Torah, Ms. Paris BN 774, fols. 162b–163a. For another, partial translation and additional analysis of this passage see Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 1–2.

36. See Idel, “Abulafia’s Secrets of the Guide,” pp. 300–306.

37. ’Elohiim. Perhaps it is a mistake, in this unique and not very reliable manuscript, and the version was ’elohim.

38. Ha-teva’.

39. Ha-kisse’. See above, note 18, in the quote from R. Eleazar. See also Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. 30–32, 41, 44.

40. Exodus 8:15.

41. ’Etzba’ ’elohim.

42. Teva’.

43. This is a common midrashic view; see, e.g., Genesis Rabba, XIV:1.

44. Get ha-Shemot, Ms. Oxford, Bodleiana 1682, fol. 101b. On this work by Abulafia see Idel, “Abraham Abulafia,” pp. 4–5.

45. For more on the equation of nature and God in Abulafia see Idel, Maimonides et la mystique juive, pp. 110–114.

46. Sefer ha-Hesheq, Ms. New York Jewish Theological Seminary 1801, fol. 8b.

47. See Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 21, 24–25, 28, 30, 136, 138, 156, 158.

48. Sefer Mafteah ha-Hokhmot, Ms. Moscow-Guenzburg 133, fol. 25a. A similar though less radical claim is found in another contemporary Castilian Kabbalist, R. Todros ben Joseph ha-Levi Abulafia, Sefer ’Otzar ha-Kavod (Warsaw, 1879), fol. 6a: “See how the sages . . . commented on each and every word, by [resorting to] the inner and esoteric way.” See also below, chap. 11, beside note 29.

49. See Marcus, “Exegesis for the Few,” pp. 11, 13, 22–23.

50. See also above, note 7.

51. BT, Rosh ha-Shanah, fol. 21b.

52. On this issue I hope to elaborate in a separate study.

53. Marcus, “Exegesis for the Few,” pp. 16–17.

54. See Marcus, Piety and Society, p. 69.

55. For a more elaborate description of these techniques see Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. 95–109.

56. Ibid., p. 99.

57. Ibid., p. 110; also pp. 96–97. On a specific gematria, related to a biblical term, described as a secret see Idel, “Maimonides and Kabbalah,” pp. 62–63. On the esoteric nature of both gematria and temurah that will concern us below, see some explicit statements by Abulafia’s student, R. Joseph Gikatilla, Sefer Ginnat ’Egoz, p. 13.

58. See above, note 5.

59. Lieberman, “A Mesopotamian Background,” p. 217, and the claims regarding the origin of some forms of Jewish hermeneutics, similar to those of Lieberman later on, already in Jeffrey H. Tigay, “An Early Technique of Aggadic Exegesis,” in H. Tadmor and M. Weinfeld, eds., History, Historiography and Interpretation: Studies in Biblical and Cuneiform Literatures (Magnes Press, Jerusalem, 1983), pp. 169–188; and above, chap. 7.

60. Lieberman, “A Mesopotamian Background,” pp. 171–173.

61. Cf. the pioneering studies of Parpola, especially “The Assyrian Tree of Life.” See also P. Kingsley, “Ezekiel by the Grand Canal: Between Jewish and Babylonian Tradition,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 3d ser., vol. 2 (1992), pp. 339–346. On ma’aseh merkavah, a main topic of later Jewish esotericism, as represented by the first chapter of Ezekiel see Moshe Weinfeld, “Divine Intervention in War in Ancient Israel and the Ancient Near East,” in Tadmor and Weinfeld, History, Historiography and Interpretation, pp. 142–143, note 119, and Moshe Greenberg, “Ezekiel’s Vision: Literary and Icono-graphic Aspects,” in ibid., pp. 159–168.

62. See Michael Sokoloff, A Dictionary of Jewish Palestinian Aramaic of the Byzantine Period (Bar Ilan University Press, Ramat Gan, 1990), p. 128; Gruenwald, “Uses and Abuses,” p. 827, note 14. The use of Greek terms to point to an already existing technique is quite plausible. See Lieberman, “A Mesopotamian Background,” p. 219, and notes 302–303.

63. On temurah, o r hillufei ’otiyyot, see Lieberman, “A Mesopotamian Background,” pp. 160–162, 164–166. My assumption is that although the technique of temurah has sometimes been included in the broader view of gematria (cf. ibid., p. 164, note 27), that of tzerufei ’otiyyot should not be identified with gematria. See, e.g., Gikatilla, Sefer Ginnat ’Egoz, p. 410. Cf. Gruenwald, “Uses and Abuses,” pp. 826-829. For a talmudic resort to temurah to explain the intriguing enigma found in Daniel 5:25 see BT, Sanhedrin, fol. 22a, and Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. 53-54 and 175-176, note 119.

64. Tzerufei ’otiyyot. See also below, notes 69 and 76. For more on this topic see below, chap. 12.

65. Of the category named mishqal. On the affinity between the two categories see the Kabbalistic treatise from Abulafia’s school called Sha’arei Tzedeq, p. 37. In general this book was one of the major sources for the exposition of the techniques reproduced by R. Yehudah Albotini in his book Sullam ha-’Aliyah, which will be dealt with later in this chapter.

66. Heshbbonot. See also the discussion by his student, R. Joseph Gikatilla, Ginnat’Egoz, pp. 408-409. See above, note 31, and below, note 78, and Lieberman, “A Mesopotamian Background,” p. 189.

67. Hokhmah mefo’arah. See also below, note 71.

68. Sefer Get ha-Shemot, Ms. Oxford 1862, fol. 90ab. Interestingly, Abulafia does not introduce here the possibility of different vocalizations. Cf. above, chap. 3, par. II, where his former student, R. Joseph Gikatilla, mentions vocalizations in the context of using exactly the same word. See also his Ginnat ’Egoz, pp. 135, 401, 410, on the “science of combination.” In general Abulafia was not so much concerned with permutations related to the vowels as part of an exegetical technique, although permutations of vowels are crucial in his mystical technique.

69. For an interesting discussion of this technique see Heinemann, Darkhei ha-’Aggadah, pp. 105; Nicolas Sed, “Le Sefer ha-Razim et la methode de ‘combination des lettres,’ ” REJ 130 (1971), pp. 295-303; Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 20-24.

70. Philosophie und Kabbala, p. 4; Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, p. 100. See also Abulafia’s Commentary on Genesis, Ms. Moscow-Guenzburg 133, fol. 20ab.

71. Hokhmah mefo’arah. See also above, note 67.

72. In my opinion, here the significance of this term is mental concentration. See Idel, Studies in Ecstatic Kabbalah, pp. 122-123.

73. Sefer Sullam ha-’Aliyah, p. 19; Gruenwald, “Uses and Abuses,” p. 827. On causing the descent of the divine power see above, chap. 5.

74. On this view see Idel, Hasidism: Between Ecstasy and Magic, pp. 155-162; idem, “On Talismatic Language.”

75. See also Gruenwald, “Uses and Abuses,” pp. 826-827. On the basis of Abulafian passages a more complex relationship between the initial introduction of the initiants to head chapters, rashei peraqim, then to gematria, tzerufei ’otiyyot, and mystical experience is in order. As Abulafia mentioned in an important passage, the study of the two techniques precedes the transmission of the divine names, the latter stage being the way to attain a mystical experience. See Sefer Mafteah ha-Shemot, Ms. New York, JTS 1897, fol. 60b. See also below, note 96. The sequence of the different techniques is described in the autobiographical testimony of R. Nathan ben Sa’adyah in his Sha’arei Tzedeq, pp. 22-23. I hope to deal with this issue in a separate study.

76. Tzerufei ha-’otiyyot. See also above, note 64.

77. Bahun u-menusseh bo. This phrase, which occurs elsewhere in Abulafia’s writings in similar contexts, stems from magical terminology. See also Sheva’ Netivot ha-Torah, p. 21.

78. Heshbbon ’otiyyot. See also note 66 above.

79. Hilluqam. On the path of hilluq see Sha’arei Tzedeq, pp. 33-35.

80. Hibburam. On the path of hibbur see Sha’arei Tzedeq, p. 36.

81. Hippukham. On hippukh as close to gilgul see Abulafia, Hayyei ha-’Olam ha-Ba’, pp. 104-105. For more on hippukh see below, app. 2.

82. Gilgulam. On gilgul as combination of letters see also the quote from the early Ashke-nazi Sefer ha-Kavod, preserved in R. Abraham ben Azriel, Sefer ’Arugat ha-Bosem, ed. E. E. Urbach (Mekize Nirdamim, Jerusalem, 1939), 1:175-176; Wolfson, Circle in the Square, p. 169, note 62; see also below, note 90; chap. 12, note 57; and app. 2.

83. Temuratam. See note 63 above.

84. On this book as one of the major sources for Abulafia see Idel, “Maimonides and Kabbalah,” pp. 67-68, and also below, note 111.

85. Sefer Sitrei Torah, Ms. Paris, BN 774, fol. 163a. This book had been translated into Latin by Flavius Mithridates; see Wirszubski, Pico della Mirandola, pp. 61-62.

86. Sheva’ Netivot ha-Torah, pp. 14-15; L’Epître des sept voies, p. 72; Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, p. xvi, and above, chap. 3, note 43. An issue of paramount historical importance, which cannot be dealt with here, is the apparent similarity between this view of Abulafia’s and theories of combination of letters, described as a “superior etymology” in Arabic writings since 1000. See Henri Corbin, Histoire de la philosophie islamique (Paris, Gallimard, 1964), pp. 206-207. For the reverberation of this passage in the writings of a twentieth-century mystic, R David ha-Kohen ha-Nazir, a figure who claimed prophetic experiences, see Dov Schwartz, Religious Zionism between Logic and Messianism (’Am ’Oved, Tel Aviv, 1999), pp. 305-306 (Hebrew).

87. Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. 97-101.

88. ’Omeq; on depth as a hidden dimension of the Torah see also above, chap. 7, note 133. On R Eleazar of Worms and Abulafia on depths see also Idel, The Mystical Experience, p. 17.

89. Gilgulam. See note 82 above.

90. Tzerufam. See also above, note 84. On another, much later nexus between prophecy and combinations of letters see R Joseph Al-Qastiel in the text edited by Gershom Scholem, “For the Knowledge of Kabbalah in the Generation of the Expulsion,” Tarbiz 24 (1954/55), p. 197 (Hebrew). Here, however, there is a synthesis between the combinatory and theosophical brands of Kabbalah.

91. Printed in ’Arzei Levanon, fol. 39b; See also above, chap. 3, note 35; Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, p. 109. For the significance of the mystics referred to as prophets and visionaries see the next section of this chapter.

92. See my introduction to Gikatilla’s Sefer Sha’arei ’Orah, in Gates of Light, p. 6. In this context it is worth mentioning a later development of the weaving theme in Kabbalah: the sixteenth-century concept of malbush, or the divine garment that is identical with both the primordial Torah and the combinations of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet; see Idel, Golem, pp. 148-154, and above, chap. 1, par. VII, and below, chap. 12. See also the Sarugian reverberations in R. Nathan Neta’ Shapira of Cracow, Megalleh ’Amuqot, fol. 80bc.

93. See Baer, Studies, 1:114-118, who attempted to trace the theme of weaving from Plato to Philo to Gikatilla. For the image of weaving in connection with sacred scriptures see Rene Guenon, Le symbolisme de la croix (Vega, Paris, 1983), chap. 14. See also above, chap. 1, note 45.

94. See The Gate of the Vowels, fol. 39b.

95. Pardes Rimmonim, gate 30, Introduction, II, fol. 68c. See also above, chap. 3, note 35. There can be no doubt that Abulafia influenced Cordovero’s reference to the exegeti-cal technique concerning the head, middle, and end of words, designated by Abulafia by the acronym seter. See below, chap. 11, note 62, and more at the end of this chapter. For more on Cordovero’s description of numerical and combinatory techniques see his Shiur Qomah, fols. 63d-64a, 92bc, and Sack, Be-Sha’arei ha-Kabbalah, p. 177. The combination of letters became a crucial issue in the Besht, and even more in R. Ze’ev Wolf of Zhitomir’s ’Or ha-Me’ir. For more on this issue see chap. 12, par. VIII.

96. It should be noted that the logocentric nature of the supernal intellect was attenuated in Abulafia by its identification with linguistic concepts; see, e.g., Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. 22-23, 36, 40-41. Sometimes Abulafia described the Agent Intellect as primordial speech. On the direct nexus between the path of the divine names and mystical experience see above, note 75.

97. On the Nahmanidean source of this assertion and its interpretations in Abulafia see Idel, “Abulafia’s Secrets of the Guide,” pp. 306-311, and below chap. 11, pars. IV-VI, and chap. 12.

98. Sefer Mafteah ha-Hokhmot, Ms. Moscow-Guenzburg 133, fols. 7b-8a. See also a very similar discussion at fol. 12b. See also below, chap. 11, par. V.

99. See below, app. 1. On ontological and textual hierarchies see also above, chap. 8, par. VI.

100. See Idel, Hasidism: Between Ecstasy and Magic, pp. 56-57.

101. On this book see the succinct description by Francois Secret, Les kabbalistes chrétiens de la Renaissance (Dunod, Paris, 1964), pp. 198-199. I hope to elaborate on this interesting exposition of Kabbalistic hermeneutics in a separate study.

102. See esp. gates 19-21, 27, 30, and above, par. V, and R Joseph Ergas, Shomer ’Emunim, pp. 17-19.

103. See Idel, Hasidism: Between Ecstasy and Magic, pp. 56-59, and below, chap. 12, par. VIII.

104. See R Menahem Mendel’s resort to allegory, gematria, and combination of letters in all of his printed Kabbalistic writings, and even more so in some of his manuscript writings. On this issue I shall elaborate elsewhere.

CHAPTER 10: THE SYMBOLIC MODE IN THEOSOPHICAL-THEURGICAL KABBALAH

1. On the nonsymbolic nature of Judaism see A. Y. Heschel, “Symbolism and Jewish Faith,” in F. E. Johnson, ed., Religious Symbolism (New York, 1954), pp. 53–79, esp. pp. 76–77, and Scholem’s reaction in On the Kabbalah, p. 22, note 1.

2. See especially above, Introduction, par. III.

3. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 210–218.

4. Eco, Semiotics, p. 153; idem, The Limits of Interpretation, pp. 14–15; idem, The Aesthetics, pp. 144–159. See also below, Concluding Remarks, par. I. See a somewhat similar approach to early Kabbalistic symbolism formulated by resorting to Eco’s theory of codes—though following also some of the suggestions proposed in my Kabbalah: New Perspectives—in the pertinent observations of Mark B. Sendor, “The Emergency of Provencal Kabbalah: R. Isaak the Blind’s Commentary on Sefer Yezirah” (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1994), volume I, pp. 234–242.

5. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 200–210. See also the important study by Liebes, “Myth vs. Symbol.”

6. See, respectively, Huss, “Symbolism,” and Rojtman, Black Fire on White Fire.

7. Tishby, Paths of Faith and Heresy, p. 13; idem, The Wisdom of the Zohar, 1:284. For the ancient and medieval sources of this approach see Eco, Limits of Interpretation, pp. 9–14.

8. Tishby, Paths of Faith and Heresy, p. 13.

9. Scholem, On the Kabbalah, p. 36; ibid., p. 22: “Symbols, by their very nature, are a means of expressing an experience that is in itself expressionless”; idem, On Jews and Judaism, p. 48; idem, Major Trends, p. 27: “the Kabbalist . . . discovers . . . a reflection of the true transcendence,” or his view that the symbolized realm is “a hidden and inexpressible reality.” See also ibid., p. 28. Cf. Goetschel, Meir ibn Gabbai, pp. 113–122. This view has been accepted by Dan, The Early Kabbalah, pp. 9–13, and again more recently in his collection of articles On Sanctity.

10. “The Name of God,” p. 60. See also ibid., pp. 62, 165, 193; Scholem, On the Kabbalah, p. 36; idem, On Jews and Judaism, p. 48; Tishby, Paths of Faith and Heresy, pp. 11–22; Dan, The Early Kabbalah, p. 13. For more on Scholem’s view of the Kabbalistic symbol see Handelman, Fragments of Redemption, pp. 82–84, 93–114, and Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 200–234; idem, “The Function of Symbols,” and my introduction to Reuchlin’s De Arte Cabalistica in On the Art of the Kabbalah, pp. xv–xvi. It should be noted that both Scholem and Ernst Cassirer put a greater emphasis on the role of the symbolic than on the magical aspect of language, which in itself has been duly recognized elsewhere in their writings. Does their preference for the symbolic mode over the magical one reflect their Hegelian or Frazerian stance?

11. See a similar stand expressed in G. G. Coulton, Medieval Panorama (Meridian Books, New York, 1955), p. 519. Cf. also W. R. Inge, Christian Mysticism (Meridian Books, New York, 1956), pp. 249–332, who emphasizes the symbolic nature of Kabbalah, to a great extent under the impact of Reuchlin’s view mentioned above, note 10. See also H. P. Blavatsky, Isis Unveiled (Rpt., Pasadena, Calif., 1972), p. xxiv.

12. Origins of the Kabbalah, p. 408; when dealing with historical symbolism, Scholem again invokes the historical experiences of the Kabbalists as the source of their symbolic vision of reality. See also his On Jews and Judaism, p. 48.

13. Idel, “On Talismanic Language”; idem, Hasidism: Between Ecstasy and Magic, pp. 83–84.

14. See Elqayam, “Between Referentionalism and Performativism”; Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 176, 204–206. Compare also Walter J. Ong’s claim that words as sounds are hardly considered as symbols; The Presence of the Word (Simon & Schuster, New York, 1970), p. 323.

15. M. Idel, “Some Remarks on Ritual and Mysticism in Geronese Kabbalah,” Jewish Thought and Philosophy 3 (1993), pp. 111–130.

16. Tishby, Paths of Faith and Heresy, p. 20.

17. Ibid., p. 22; Tishby, The Wisdom of the Zohar, 3:1077.

18. Tishby, Paths of Faith and Heresy, pp. 16, 22.

19. On Scholem’s views of Gnosticism see M. Idel, “Subversive Catalysts: Gnosticism and Messianism in Gershom Scholem’s View of Jewish Mysticism,” in David N. Myers and David B. Ruderman, eds., The Jewish Past Revisited: Reflections on Modern Jewish Historians (Yale University Press, New Haven, 1998), pp. 46–56.

20. For the implicit mentioning of the Shoah see Tishby, Paths of Faith and Heresy, p. 22. For the existential background of Alexander Altmann’s earlier studies on Gnosticism and Judaism see Paul Mendes-Flohr’s introduction to Altmann, The Meaning of Jewish Existence: Theological Essays, 1930–1939 (University Press of New England, Hanover, N.H., 1991], pp. xlv–xlvii. On the influence of the Shoah on Scholem’s concept of history and symbol see Idel, “The Function of Symbols.”

21. Scholem, On the Kabbalah, p. 2. See also idem, On Jews and Judaism, p. 48.

22. Ibid. See also another assertion to this effect: “The magnitude of the messianic idea corresponds to the endless powerlessness in Jewish history during all the centuries of exile.” The Messianic Idea in Israel, p. 35; ibid., p. 7, as well as Major Trends, pp. 287–288.

23. Idel, “On the Concept of Zimzum”; idem, “An Anonymous Commentary on Shir ha-Yihud,” in K.-E. Groezinger and Joseph Dan, eds., Mysticism, Magic and Kabbalah in Ashkenazi Judaism (Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, 1995), pp. 151–154.

24. On the Kabbalah, p. 2.

25. See Jonas, “Myth and Mysticism: A Study of Objectification and Interiorization in Religious Thought,” Journal of Religion 49 (1969), pp. 328–329.

26. On the Kabbalah, p. 2.

27. See below, par. III. On a few philosophical terms that became Kabbalistic symbols see Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 218–222.

28. Tishby, Paths of Faith and Heresy, p. 14; compare also his The Wisdom of the Zohar, 1:284. For the essential vision of Kabbalah as impressed by symbolism see Scholem, Major Trends, p. 26. See also Handelman, Fragments of Redemption, p. 109.

29. On the process of arcanization see above, Introduction, chaps. 2, 6, 7, and 9.

30. On philosophical allegoresis see below, chap. 11, note 1.

31. On Aristotelianism see Eco, The Aesthetics, pp. 140-141.

32. D. J. Silver, Maimonidean Criticism and the Maimonidean Controversy (Brill, Leiden, 1965); Joseph Sarachek, Faith and Reason: The Conflict over the Rationalism of Maimonides (New York, 1935); Bernard D. Septimus, Hispano-Jewish Culture in Transition: The Career and Controversies of Ramah (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1982); Charles Touati, Prophetes, Talmudistes, Philosophes (Le Cerf, Paris, 1990), pp. 201-218; idem, “Les deux conflits autour de Maimonide,” Juifs et Judaïsme de Languedoque, ed. M. Vicaire and B. Blumenkranz (Toulouse, 1977), pp. 173-184; Sarah Stroumsa, “Twelfth Century Concepts of Soul and Body: The Maimonidean Controversy in Baghdad,” in Self, Soul and Body in Religious Experience, ed. A. I. Baumgarten, J. Assmann, and G. G. Stroumsa (Brill, Leiden, 1998), pp. 313-334; on R. Jacob ben Sheshet’s Sefer Sha’ar ha-Shamayyim, a polemic against the mental prayer, see Georges Vajda, Recherches sur la philosophie et la Kabbale dans la Pensée Juive du Moyen Age (Mouton, Paris, 1962), pp. 356-371.

33. On this theory of the emergence of the historical Kabbalah in general see Idel, “Maimonides and Kabbalah,” pp. 32-50. See also above, chap. 1, par. I, and chap. 8, par. V. On the dialectical relationship between allegorization and remythologization see the important observations of Rider, “Receiving Orpheus.”

34. See especially the important discussion of Zoharic hermeneutics by Scholem, Major Trends, p. 208, but compare his negation of the possible relevance of the Maimonidean controversy for the beginning of Kabbalah, ibid., p. 24, as well as his “Me-Hoqer li-Mequbbal,” Tarbiz 6 (1935), pp. 91-92 (Hebrew), or “Maimonides dans l’oeuvre des Kabbalistes,” Cahiers Juifs 3 (1935), pp. 104-105. Tishby, Wisdom of the Zohar, 3:1077-1078, did discuss the emergence of Kabbalistic symbolism as a reaction to philosophical allegorizations but assumed, like Heinrich Graetz before him, that there were no pertinent materials that contributed to the articulation of the symbolic alternative.

35. See Scholem, Major Trends, pp. 205-206.

36. On these two kinds of relation see Umberto Eco, A Theory of Semiotics (Indiana University Press, Bloomington, 1979), pp. 183ff, 217-260.

37. See Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. 11-12. See also the discussion above, chap. 2, par. III.

38. See Huss, “Symbolism.” For more on Gikatilla’s book see below, par. VI.

39. For an example of the relations between David the king and Malkhut see Idel, Messianic Mystics, pp. 110-114.

40. On Jerusalem as a symbol in thirteenth-century Kabbalah see Moshe Idel, “Jerusalem in Thirteenth-Century Jewish Thought,” in J. Prawer and H. Ben Shammai, eds., The History of Jerusalem: Crusaders and Ayyubids (1099-1250) (Yad Izhak ben-Zvi Publications, Jerusalem, 1991), pp. 265-276 (Hebrew). On Jerusalem in medieval spirituality see, e.g., Leclercq, The Love of Learning, pp. 54-56.

41. See Idel, Hasidism: Between Ecstasy and Magic, pp. 215-218.

42. Ma’arekhet ha-’Elohut, fols. 104b-105a.

43. See the late sixteenth-century R. Abraham Azulai, Hesed le-’Avraham, fol. 21a.

44. The righteous, who is an everlasting foundation, namely the ninth sefirah.

45. Ms. Moscow-Ginsburg 90, fol. 41b. A short version of this passage appears in Ms. Cambridge, Add. 400.7, fol. 692a. A corresponding discussion, apparently preceding that in Ms. Moscow, appears in another anonymous Commentary on Ten Sefirot extant in Ms. Berlin Or. 122, fol. 91a, in which it is said about the sefirah of Yesod: “And it is called Mount Zion, for the heavenly Jerusalem is as the earthly Jerusalem, and the heavenly Zion corresponds to the earthly Zion; just as (from the border) [mi-gevul; the correct reading is migdal, the fortress] of Jerusalem and the fortress [migdal, instead of the faulty mugdal] guarding the city, so too does the supernal fortress [mugdal!], which is the righteous, guard the tenth [sefirah], i.e., Jerusalem, from the demonic powers.” On this literary genre see below, note 64. For more on geographical symbolism see above, chap. 4, par. VII.

46. The Limits of Interpretation, p. 18.

47. For the importance of the myth of the Edomite kings in the Zoharic theosophy and other Kabbalists of his age see Liebes, Studies in the Zohar, pp. 66, 128. For an approach that strongly pleads for the priority of the religious, or typological interpretations of natural symbols in medieval Christian literature, see Ricoeur, Conflict of Interpretations, pp. 59–61.

48. See Idel, “A la recherche,” pp. 417–420.

49. Paths of Faith and Heresy, p. 22.

50. Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 112–122, 260–264, as well as above, chap. 8, par. V. See also Lorberbaum, Imago Dei.

51. Kitvei ha-Ramban (Mossad ha-Rav Kook, Jerusalem, 1964), 2:496. See also Tishby, The Wisdom of the Zohar, 3:1157–1157; Idel, “Maimonides and Kabbalah,” pp. 42–45.

52. Seder ’Amran Gaon, ed. Fromkin (Jerusalem, 1912), p. 79; Idel, “Maimonides and Kabbalah,” p. 44, note 39.

53. ’Al ’omeq diqduqam. The term “depth” is related in many sources to the inner meaning of the Torah: see chap. 7, note 84.

54. Ms. Roma-Angelica 45.1, fol. 2b; Scholem, Origins of the Kabbalah, p. 38.

55. I hope to corroborate this analysis in a much more detailed discussion elsewhere. Meanwhile see Idel, “Maimonides and Kabbalah,” pp. 42–50, and above, chap. 8, par. V.

56. See Idel, “Maimonides and Kabbalah,” pp. 42–50.

57. See Eliade, “Methodological Remarks,” p. 99; Ricoeur, The Conflict of Interpretations, pp. 58, 63–67; and the material referenced by Idel, Messianic Mystics, p. 426, note 63.

58. Image and Pilgrimage in Christian Culture (New York, 1978), p. 247; V. Turner, The Forest of Symbols (Cornell University Press, Ithaca, N.Y., 1967); for an interesting analysis of Turner’s view of ritual see Mathieu Deflem, “Ritual, Anti-Structure, and Religion: A Discussion of Victor Turner’s Processual Symbolic Analysis,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 30 (1991), pp. 1–25.

59. Mary Douglas, Natural Symbols: Explorations in Cosmology (Pantheon Books, New York, 1982), pp. 11–12; on the efficacy of the ritual see Marcel Mauss, A General Theory of Magic (Norton, New York, 1975), pp. 97–108. A very interesting treatment of the crucial role of the ritual is found also in the more recent approaches of Walter Burkert, Homo Necans: The Anthropology of Ancient Greek Sacrificial Ritual and Myth, trans. P. Bing (University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1983), pp. 29–34; Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures (Basic Books, 1973), esp. pp. 112–118; the foreword by D. F. Pocock to Mauss, A General Theory of Magic, p. 4.

60. See, respectively, Anthropologie structurale (Plon, Paris, 1974), pp. 213–234; Théologie symbolique (Tequi, Paris, 1978), pp. 352–379. See also the important article by Elqa-yam, “Between Referentionalism and Performance,” where he discusses the performative role of the symbol.

61. On the Kabbalah, p. 99.

62. See my discussion in Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 14, 156–157.

63. See Scholem, Major Trends, pp. 205–207; Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 234–248; Wolfson, Through a Speculum That Shines, pp. 383–392. See also above, chaps. 2, 3, and 6, and below, app. 2, as well as par. VI below.

64. See Gershom Scholem, “An Index to the Commentaries on Ten Sefirot,” QS 10 (1932), pp. 498–515 (Hebrew); Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, p. 213. See also note 45 above.

65. See the numerous articles by Wolfgang Kluxen, mentioned in his “Maimonides and Latin Scholasticism,” in Maimonides and Philosophy, ed. Shlomo Pines and Yirmiyahu Yovel (Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht, Boston, Lancaster, 1986), pp. 224–323; Avital Wohlman, Thomas d’Aquin et Maimonide: Un dialogue exemplaire (Le Cerf, Paris, 1988); Jacob Haberman, Maimonides and Aquinas (KTAV, New York, 1979).

66. See Ferdinand Brunner, Platonisme et aristotelisme: La critique d’Ibn Gabirol par Saint Thomas d’Aquin (Louvain, 1965).

67. Scholem, Major Trends, p. 203; Idel, “Jewish Kabbalah and Platonism,” pp. 319–352.

68. On the nexus between Platonism and symbolism see Eco, Limits of Interpretation, pp. 9–11; idem, The Aesthetics, pp. 139–140.

69. Namely the Kabbalists.

70. I.e., the same symbols refer to two or more sefirot, whereas the particular names refer to one sefirah alone.

71. I.e., of the sefirot.

72. Nevokhim bahem me’od. See Ve-Zot Li-Yhudah, p. 18, where Abulafia claims that “if the master of the sefirot thinks that he knows better than me the written or the oral Torah, according to their secrets, it will become clear to him that he errs and induces others in error.” Therefore, according to Abulafia, the contest between the different forms of Kabbalah took place not only on the plane of theology but also on that of hermeneu-tics, that is to say, the main claim, as pointed out in this passage, is related to the esoteric understanding of canonic books. See also below, note 75.

73. Printed as an appendix by Adolph Jellinek in his Philosophie und Kabbalah (Leipzig, 1854), 1:37-38; Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, p. 202; Elliot Wolfson, “The Doctrine of Sefirot in the Prophetic Kabbalah of Abraham Abulafia,” JQS 2, no. 4 (1995), pp. 351-352.

74. See Jellinek, Philosophie und Kabbalah, p. 37. See also below, app. 2.

75. Abulafia sharply criticized some Kabbalists’ view of the ten sefirot as the essence of God; see Idel, “Defining Kabbalah,” pp. 109-110; Wolfson, “The Doctrine of Sefirot,” pp. 342-343.

76. See Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, pp. x-xi, 95-109.

77. See above, note 73.

78. See the lengthy discussion of a follower of ecstatic Kabbalah translated in Scholem, Major Trends, pp. 147-149.

79. See Scholem, Major Trends, p. 205.

80. See above, chap. 3, and below, app. 2.

81. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 210-218; idem, “Kabbalah and Elites in Thirteenth-Century Spain,” Mediterranean Historical Review 9 (1994), pp. 5-19; Moshe Idel, “The Kabbalah’s Window of Opportunities, 1270-1290,” in Me’ah She’arim: Studies in Medieval Jewish Spiritual Life in Memory of Isadore Twersky, ed. E. Fleisher, G. Blid-stein, C. Horowitz, and B. Septimus (Magnes Press, Jerusalem, 2001), pp. 171-208; and app. 1 below.

82. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 217-218.

83. See Daniel H. Matt, “New-Ancient Words: The Aura of Secrecy in the Zohar,” in P. Schaefer and J. Dan, eds., Gershom Scholem’s Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, 50 Years After (J. C. B. Mohr, Tübingen, 1993), pp. 181-207; Liebes’s study referenced above, note 5; for more on Zoharic hermeneutics as part of a general discussion of Kabbalis-tic hermeneutics see also Wolfson, “By Way of Truth”; idem, “Circumcision, Visionary Experience and Textual Interpretation: From Midrashic Trope to Mystical Symbol,” History of Religions (1987), pp. 189-215; idem, “Left Contained in the Right: A Study in Zoharic Hermeneutics,” AJSR 11, no. 1 (1986), pp. 27-52; idem, “The Hermeneutics of Visionary Experience: Revelation and Interpretation in the Zohar,” Religion 18 (1988), pp. 311-345; Ithamar Gruenwald, “From Talmudic to Zoharic Homiletics,” in Joseph Dan, ed., The Age of the Zohar (Jerusalem, 1989), pp. 255-298 (Hebrew), and Daniel C. Matt, “Matnita Dilan: A Technique of Innovation in the Zohar,” in ibid., pp. 123-145 (Hebrew); Benin, “The Mutability”; Giller, The Enlightened; Eliezer Segal, “The Exegetical Craft of the Zohar: Toward an Appreciation,” AJSR 17 (1992), pp. 31-49; and Fishbane, The Exegetical Imagination, pp. 105-122.

84. See Matt, The Book of Mirrors, pp. 13-17; Idel, “Targumo.”

85. See chap. 8, par. V.

86. See Idel, “Sefirot above Sefirot,” pp. 268-277; idem, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 113-118; Elliot Wolfson, “The Theosophy of Shabbetai Donnolo, with Special Empha-sis on the Doctrine of the Sefirot in Sefer Hakhmoni,” Jewish History 6 (1992) = The Frank Talmage Memorial Volume II, pp. 281-316; and Parpola, “The Assyrian Tree of Life.”

87. See note 64 above.

88. For the contribution of this book to medieval Jewish speculations see e.g. David Neumark, Geschichte der Jüdischen Philosophie des Mittelalters (Berlin, 1907-1928), 1:116-117, 131-132, 182-183; Scholem, Origins of the Kabbalah, pp. 33-35; Gruenwald, “Jewish Mysticism’s Transition from Sefer Yesira to the Bahir,” in J. Dan, ed., The Beginnings of Jewish Mysticism in Medieval Europe (Jerusalem, 1987), pp. 15-54 (Hebrew); Liebes, Ars Poetica, passim. See also above, chap. 9, notes 84 and 111.

89. Ta’amei ha-Mitzvot, Ms. Jerusalem 8°3925, fol. 110b; for details regarding this passage see above, chap. 2, par. V.

90. See Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” p. 67.

91. Genesis 2:10.

92. Proverbs 10:25.

93. It also means “because of.”

94. Isaiah 27:5.

95. Sod ha-Keruvim, Ms. Parma, de Rossi 1230, fols. 108b-109b; Ms. Paris BN 823, fol. 54ab.

96. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 191-197; Green, Keter, index, sub “ascent,” esp. p. 149.

97. See Abulafia’s epistle printed by Adolph Jellinek, Auswahl Kabbalistischen Mystik (Leipzig, 1853) 1:16-17.

98. Abulafia’s basic assumption is that there are sefirot in man. See Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 147-149; idem, Hasidism: Between Ecstasy and Magic, pp. 227-238.

99. Namely the attributes of man.

100. Lehitboded. In some texts this verb means mental concentration, though in many others it stands for isolating oneself. See Idel, Studies in Ecstatic Kabbalah, pp. 108-111.

101. The question of awareness of the source of revelation is crucial for Abulafia’s experiential approach to mysticism. See the text from R. Nathan ben Sa’adyah’s Sha’arei Tzedeq translated by Scholem, Major Trends, p. 140.

102. See note 100 above.

103. This is a metaphor for the union between the human and the divine intellect. See Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 180-184.

104. Namely the human intellect.

105. Namely the spiritual entities, the human and the divine intellect, which are united during the experience.

106. I assume that Abulafia alludes to the union between the corporeal and the spiritual, which is dissolved during the mystical experience.

107. The Kabbalist intends the inner, human reality, which is transformed by the mystical experience.

108. Exodus 26:6.

109. For Abulafia the divine name and its signified—God—are sometimes interchangeable.

110. Zechariah 14:9.

111. Ezekiel 37:17.

112. Ms. Sasson 56, fol. 56a.

113. Namely from the names.

114. Sefer Gan Na’ul, Ms. British Library Or. 13136, fol. 3a, printed also in Sefer ha-Peliy’ah (Premiszlany 1883), I, fol. 73a.

115. See Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 24-41.

116. See his Commentary on the Merkavah of Ezeqiel, Ms. New York, JTS 1609, fol. 167b; R. Joseph Gikatilla’s Commentary on Ezekiel’s Chariot, ed. Asi Farber-Ginat (Cherub Press, Los Angeles, 1998), pp. 46-47, 51-52.

117. Deuteronomy 4:4.

118. Sha’ar ha-Niqqud, printed in ’Arzei Levanon, fol. 38a.

119. See Sha’arei ’Orah, pp. 7-8.

120. Zohar, II, fols. 99ab, which was analyzed in detail by several scholars: See Bacher, “L’exégèse biblique,” pp. 36-38; Scholem, On the Kabbalah, pp. 55-56; Talmage, “Apples of Gold,” pp. 316-317; Tishby, The Wisdom of the Zohar, 3:1084-1085; Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 227-229; Wolfson, “Beautiful Maiden,” passim; Matt, Zohar, pp. 121-126; Benin, The Footprints of God, pp. 168-169. See also above, chap. 6, par. VI.

121. See Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, p. xiv.

122. See Talmage, “Apples of God,” p. 316 and note 21.

123. Arcana Caelestia, par. 1872, translated in Internal Sense of the Word (London, 1974), p. 41. See also above, chap. 3, par. II.

124. For more on this issue see below, app. 1.

125. See Zohar, I, fols. 25b-26a. For more on this passage see Moshe Idel, “Metatron: Remarks on Jewish Mythology,” in Havivah Pedaya, ed., Eshel Beer Sheva (Beer Sheva, 1996), 4:29-44 (Hebrew). On this later layer see Giller, The Enlightened.

126. Zohar, I, fol. 26a.

127. Or, more precisely, dies.

128. BT, Pesahim, fol. 94b.

129. 1 Samuel 25:29.

130. Psalms 22:21.

131. Exodus 11:7.

132. First printed in Moshe Idel, “An Unknown Text from Midrash ha-Ne’elam,” in J. Dan, ed., The Age of the Zohar (Jerusalem, 1989), pp. 73-87 (Hebrew).

133. Psalms 48:2.

134. Zohar, III, fol. 5a.

135. Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 128-136. On the erotic and sexual symbolism in the Zohar see also Liebes, Studies in the Zohar, pp. 19-25, 37-43, 63-65, 67-74; idem, “Zohar and Eros,” pp. 67-119. Compare the elaborate exposition of the view of Wolfson, Circle in the Square, pp. 95-110, adumbrated in earlier studies of this scholar, which assumes a tendency to obliterate the difference between the male and female divine powers, as part of the absorption of the female by and within the male. This thesis, which is sometimes helpful in understanding texts of Zoharic Kabbalah and those influenced by it, does not hold, however, for numerous other Zoharic treatments of the nature of the sexual polarity.

136. Leviticus 1:2

137. On “ascending” versus “descending” symbolism, see Erich Kahler, “The Nature of the Symbol,” in Rollo May, ed., Symbolism in Religion and Literature (George Braziller, New York, 1960), pp. 50–75; on a more general exposition of the two forms of sexual symbolism in Kabbalistic literature see Moshe Idel, “Sexual Metaphors and Praxis in the Kabbalah,” in The Jewish Family, ed. D. Kraemer (Oxford University Press, New York, 1989), pp. 179–224.

138. See below, app. 3.

139. See Idel, R. Menahem Recanati, the Kabbalist, pp. 24–32. In this paragraph I draw on discussions in my Kabbalah: New Perspectives, pp. 210–218.

140. On this issue, see Idel, “Targumo,” pp. 72–73.

141. Emile Mâle, The Gothic Image (Harper and Row, New York, 1958), p. 51.

142. Martin Buber, Hasidism (New York, 1948), pp. 69, 141, aptly describes the tendency of “the Kabbalah” to schematize the mystery; however, this evaluation is much more true of Safedian Kabbalah than earlier phases of Kabbalah; by and large, for Buber the Kabbalah is the Lurianic school. On the analogous phenomenon in Western Christian culture compare Johan Huizinga, The Waning of the Middle Ages, trans. F. Hopman (Penguin Books, 1968), pp. 193–205.

143. Quoted in W. P. Lehmann, “The Stony Idiom of the Brain,” in Helmut Rehder, ed., Literary Symbolism: A Symposium (Austin, Texas, 1967), p. 15.

144. This understanding of the emergence of the Zoharic literature as the zenith of a certain process taking place over the two decades (1270–1290) is not, however, identical with the view that this work is the exclusive composition of R. Moses de Leon, as assumed by Scholem or Tishby. I believe that older elements, including theosophical views, symbols, and perhaps also shorter compositions, had merged into this vast Kabbalistic oeuvre, which heavily benefited from the nascent free symbolism. See now the important study by Liebes, Studies in the Zohar, pp. 85–138, and Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, p. 380, note 66.

145. See Fine, Safed Spirituality, pp. 77–80.

146. On the place of symbolism in R. Nahman of Braslav see Joseph Dan, The Hasidic Story: Its History and Development (Keter, Jerusalem, 1975), pp. 132–188 (Hebrew); Yoav Elstein, Ma’aseh Hoshev: Studies in Hasidic Tales (Tel Aviv, 1983) (Hebrew); idem, In the Footsteps of a Lost Princess (Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, 1984) (Hebrew).

CHAPTER 11: ALLEGORIES, DIVINE NAMES, AND EXPERIENCES IN ECSTATIC KABBALAH

1. On Jewish medieval philosophical allegoresis in general and on that of Maimonides in particular see, among many others, Isaak Heinemann, “Die Wissenschaftliche Allegoristik des Jüdischen Mittelalters,” HUCA 23, part 1 (1950–1951), pp. 611–644; Talmage, “Apples of Gold,” pp. 318-321, 338-340; Sara Klein-Braslavy, Maimonides’ Interpretation of the Adam Stories in Genesis (Reuven Mass, Jerusalem, 1986) (Hebrew); Rawidowicz, “On Interpretation,” pp. 97-100; Shalom Rosenberg, “Observations on the Interpretation of the Bible and Aggadah in the Guide of the Perplexed,” in Shlomo Pines, ed., Memorial Volume to Ya’aqov Friedman (Hebrew University, Jerusalem, 1974), pp. 215-222 (Hebrew); Elqayam, “Between Referentionalism and Performativism,” pp. 37-40; Jean Robelin, Maïmonide et la langage religieux (Presses Universitaires de France, Paris, 1991); Arthur Hyman, “Maimonides on Religious Language,” in Joel Kraemer, ed., Perspectives in Maimonides: Philosophical and Historical Studies (Littman Library, Oxford University Press, 1991), pp. 175-191; Marc Saperstein, Decoding the Rabbis (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1980); Fraenkel, The Ways of the’Aggadah and Midrash, pp. 501-531; Halbertal, Concealment and Revelation, passim.

2. For more on this issue see below, app. 1.

3. H. A. Wolfson, “Veracity of Scripture,” in Religious Philosophy (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1961), p. 225.

4. Steven D. Fraade, From Tradition to Commentary (SUNY Press, Albany, 1991).

5. Recently important studies have helped to detect some of the resemblances between Greek and Jewish forms of hermeneutics stemming from common Babylonian sources; see above, chap. 9, as well as chap. 1, par. I, and chap. 3, par. I.

6. The first and secondary literatures on the divine names in Judaism are huge; I shall mention only a few of the pertinent bibliographical references: Abraham Marmor-stein, The Old Rabbinic Doctrine of God (Oxford University Press, London, 1927), pp. 41-107; Samuel S. Cohon, “The Name of God, A Study in Rabbinic Theology,” HUCA 23, part 1 (1950-1951), pp. 579-604; Idel, “Defining Kabbalah”; Dan, On Sanctity, pp. 123-130. For the topics to be discussed below see especially Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 26-30, and Wolfson, “The Mystical Significance,” and the references to be adduced in notes 7-11 below.

7. See Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 14-41.

8. Idel, “On R. Isaac Sagi Nahor,” pp. 31-42; Gruenwald, “The Writing, the Written and the Divine Name.”

9. Gruenwald, “The Writing, the Written and the Divine Name”; Trachtenberg, Jewish Magic and Superstition, pp. 78-103.

10. See Idel, “Abraham Abulafia,” pp. 133-137.

11. On this issue see below, pars. III–IV.

12. Midrash Konen, printed in Y. Eisenstein, ’Otzar ha-Midrashim (New York, 1928), p. 253, ’Arzei Levanon, fol. 2a, quoted above in chap. 1, and the discussion in Idel, “The Concept of Torah,” p. 45.

13. See Dan, The Esoteric Theology, p. 124; Idel, “The Concept of Torah,” p. 54; Wolfson, “The Mystical Significance.”

14. See Idel, “The Concept of Torah,” p. 54, note 102. See also the text quoted in the name of the tenth-century R. Hai Gaon in ’Otzar ha-Ge’onim, Massekhet Nedarim, ed. B. M. Levin (Mossad ha-Rav Kook, Jerusalem, 1942), p. 11.

15. ’Aval. Compare, however, Scholem’s assertion that this tradition of Nahmanides also stems from Sefer Shimmushei Torah: cf. “The Name of God,” pp. 77-78.

16. Nahmanides, “Torat ha-Shem Temimah,” in Kitvei ha-Ramban, ed. C. D. Chavel (Jerusalem, 1961), 2:167-168, Idel, “The Concept of Torah,” p. 53, Holdrege, Veda and Torah, pp. 198-199.

17. Nahmanides, “Torat ha-Shem Temimah,” p. 168.

18. Commentary on the Torah, p. 7; Halbertal, People of the Book, pp. 38-39.

19. Exodus 14:19-21.

20. See Ephrayim Kupfer, “The Concluding Portion of Nahmanides’ Torat ha-Shem Temimah,” Tarbiz 40 (1970), p. 74 (Hebrew), quoted above, chap. 9, par. III. On Nahmanides and gematria see also Wolfson, “By Way of Truth,” pp. 130-131 and note 76.

21. Cf. Iser, The Act of Reading.

22. Kitvei ha-Ramban, ed. Chavel, 1:281.

23. See the interpretation of Ba’alei ha-Tosafot on BT, Hagigah, fol. 11b.

24. Hayyei ha-’Olam ha-Ba’, Ms. Paris BN 777, fol. 108a.

25. Scholem, Origins of the Kabbalah, pp. 387-388. For my understanding of radical interpreters see the beginning of chapter 9.

26. Exegetical techniques were expounded in great detail by the Ashkenazi Hasidim; see Dan, “The Ashkenazi Hasidic,” and Marcus, “Exegesis for the Few.” In Kabbalah they were adopted in Abraham Abulafia’s hermeneutics; see Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 95-119; idem, “Abulafia’s Secrets of the Guide”; and above, chap. 9.

27. See Idel, “Maimonides and Kabbalah,” pp. 73-74.

28. Mafteah ha-Hokhmot, Ms. Moscow-Guenzburg 133, fols. 7b-8a. See also a very similar discussion, ibid., fol. 12b. On the expression “combination of holy names,” which is implied in this quote, see below, chap. 12. For the theory that someone should combine the letters of the entire Torah see the text quoted in the name of the Besht in chap. 12, par. IX, from R. Gedalyah of Lunitz’s Teshu’ot Hen.

29. Mafteah ha-Hokhmot, fol. 25a. For the passage referred to here see above, chap. 9, beside note 48 and below par. IX. On the particularistic approach in hermeneutics versus the universalistic one see Handelman, The Slayers of Moses, pp. 39, 56-57, 65, 225-227.

30. This term, though in another context, occurs in Daniel Matt, “The Old-New Words: The Aura of Secrecy in the Zohar,” in P. Schaefer and J. Dan, eds., Gershom Scholem’s Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, 50 Years After (J. C. B. Mohr, Tübingen, 1993), pp. 200-202.

31. Mafteah ha-Hokhmot, fol. 20ab. See also his Sheva’ Netivot ha-Torah, pp. 3-4, discussed in Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 100-101.

32. See above, chap. 3, par. III, 3.

33. On the interpretations of the forefathers’ names in Abulafia see Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 127-128.

34. Mafteah ha-Hokhmot, fol. 23b; Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, p. 111.

35. Mafteah ha-Hokhmot, fol. 23b; Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, p. 111.

36. Mafteah ha-Hokhmot, fol. 23b.

37. Ibid.

38. Ibid.

39. Mafteah ha-Hokhmot, fols. 23b–24a. The phrase “according to nature” translates the Hebrew lefi mishppat, which means, regularly, “according to the judgment.”

40. The Bible in the Middle Ages, p. 2. See also Handelman, The Slayers of Moses, pp. 110–111. This preoccupation with a definite truth more than with the textual details does not detract from the deep devotion to the study of the text. See especially the interesting remarks on the Christian attitude to the study of the text in André Vauchez, La spiritualité du Moyen Age occidental, VIIIe–XIIIe (Editions du Seuil, Paris, 1975), pp. 180–183; Leclercq, The Love of Learning, pp. 71–88; Stock, The Implications of Literacy, pp. 407–408.

41. This tradition is found in most of the versions at the very end of the book.

42. Sha’arei Tzedeq, p. 29; this passage should also be read in the context of another quote from this book discussed in Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, p. 17. On this passage see Georges Vajda, who has translated it into French in an appendix to his article “Deux chapîtres de l’histoire du conflit entre la Kabbale et la philosophie: la polemique anti-intellectualiste de Joseph b. Shalom Ashkenazi,” AHDLMA 31 (1956), pp. 131–132. On part of this passage and its possible affinity to a view of Dante’s see Eco, The Search, pp. 48–49. The possibility of contact between Abulafia’s views on language and Dante’s is strengthened by the fact that Abulafia’s former teacher, R. Hillel of Verona, spent some years in Forli, a place where Dante was exiled. I hope to return to this issue in a separate study. See also below, chap. 12.

43. See Sefer Hotam ha-Haftarah, translated in Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 18, 52. See also below, chap. 12.

44. Ibid., p. 18.

45. See Idel, “The Concept of the Torah,” pp. 55–56, note 107.

46. Ibid., pp. 55–56.

47. See Sha’arei Tzedeq, p. 17; Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 24–27.

48. Sefer ha-’Edut, Ms. Rome-Angelica 38, fols. 14b–15a; Ms. Munich 285, fol. 39b; see also Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 126–127, 199. The Hebrew original of the passage has been printed in the Hebrew version of this book (Magnes Press, Jerusalem, 1988), pp. 110–111, 154. See also idem, Messianic Mystics, pp. 82–83.

49. See Ms. München 285, fol. 39a.

50. Ibid., fol. 39b.

51. Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 127–128.

52. Written in a plene form by using yod.

53. Written in a defective form without vav.

54. For other similar expressions in Abulafia and his followers see Idel, Studies in Ecstatic Kabbalah, pp. 11–12; idem, “On Symbolic Self-Interpretations,” and the next paragraph.

55. See above, chap. 9.

56. See above, chap. 10, note 32.

57. See Dov Schwartz, “Rationalism and Conservatism: The Speculative Thought of Rashba’s Circle,” Daat 32–33 (1994), pp. 143–180 (Hebrew); Halbertal, People of the Book, p. 174, note 54.

58. Chap. 3, par. II.

59. On this issue see below, app. 2.

60. See ibid.

61. Sefer Gan Na’ul, Ms. Munich 58, fols. 327b–328a.

62. Ms. Roma-Angelica 38, fol. 6a; Ms. Munich 285, fol. 10a; Idel, Hasidism: Between Ecstasy and Magic, p. 155, and above, chap. 9, note 95. See also Holdrege, Veda and Torah, p. 365.

63. For more on this technique see Idel, Messianic Mystics, pp. 298–302. See also R. Mena-hem Mendel of Shklow, Menahem Tzion, p. 22.

64. See ibid.

65. See Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 36–37.

66. On this issue see below, app. 2.

67. On this topic see also Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 96–98, 112, 113, 157–158, note 138.

68. Deuteronomy 12:23.

69. Leviticus 17:11.

70. ’Otzar ’Eden Ganuz, Ms. Oxford, Bodeliana 1580, fols. 163b-164a. For the general context of this quote see Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 75–76.

71. Ibid., fol. 162a.

72. See Sha’arei Tzedeq, p. 24.

73. Sefer ha-’Ot, p. 82. ’Ot: a pun on the two senses of the word, “letter” and “sign.” See also ibid., p. 81: “and the battle within the heart between the blood and the ink is very intense.”

74. Sefer ha-Hesheq, Ms. New York JTS 1801, fol. 8a.

75. Sikhliyyot u-muskkalot.

76. Ha-metzayyer ’inyano.

77. Hitztayyer meihem.

78. He-hakham ha-mamshil.

79. Melitzah ve-divrei hidah.

80. Sefer ha-Tzeruf, Ms. Paris BN 770, fol. 168b. On this book and its various manuscripts see Idel, “Abraham Abulafia,” pp. 69–72; Wirszubski, Pico della Mirandola, pp. 59–60, 63–64, 220–221, 258–260.

81. See Genesis Rabba, 82:7 etc. See Ira Chernus, Mysticism in Rabbinic Judaism (Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, 1982), pp. 19–21. On the mystical interpretations of this dictum see the learned studies of Vajda, Le Commentaire, pp. 339–351; Micheline Chaze, “De l’identification des patriarches au char divin: recherche du sens d’un enseignement rabbinique dans le midrash et dans la Kabbale prezoharique et ses sources,” REJ 149 (1990), pp. 5-75; and Abrams, R. Asher ben David, pp. 196-197; Goldreich, Me’irat ’Einayyim, pp. 381-382, 393, 396.

82. Ecclesiastes 9:8.

83. On Torah as median see below, note 104, and app. 2, note 41.

84. Ms. Firenze-Laurenziana II, 48, fols. 25b-26a. See also above, chap. 5, par. I.

85. See R. Hayyim Vital, ’Etz Hayyim, Sha’ar ha-Kelalim, chap. 1, where the goal of the creation of the world is to create creatures that will know God and become as a Chariot to Him in order to cleave to Him. However, I doubt if Vital refers here to unio mystica; rather, I assume that he implies that the divinity will dwell onto the mystic. See also Idel, Messianic Mystics, pp. 317-319. See also numerous instances where this view is found in R. Hayyim Joseph David Azulai, Penei David, fols. 11d, 92a, idem, Tzavarei Shalal, fol. 217c. As to Hasidism see, e.g., R Aharon ha-Kohen of Apta, Sefer ’Or ha-Ganuz le-Tzaddiqim, col. 8, fol. 2b; col. 9, fol. 1b, fol. 4ab; col. 10, fol. 4b; R Hayyim Haike of Amdur, Sefer Hayyim va-Hesed (Jerusalem, 1953), p. 210. On this passage see Schatz-Uffenheimer, Hasidism As Mysticism, p. 213, who interprets this text as pointing to unio mystica. However, provided that the divine attributes are explicitly involved here, I am inclined to doubt such a radical interpretation. See also ibid., p. 162. See also R. Abraham of Turisk, Magen ’Avraham, I, fol. 19c. Compare the Hasidic view of the Merkavah to the ecstatic description of this issue by R Shem Tov ben Abraham ibn Gaon in his Sefer Baddei ’Aron, analyzed in Idel, Studies in Ecstatic Kabbalah, pp. 119-122. For another Hasidic source that uses the concept of becoming a Merkavah in order to point to mystical union see M. Idel, “Universalization and Integration: Two Concepts of Mystical Union in Jewish Mysticism,” in Idel and McGinn, Mystical Union, p. 47; Naftali Loewenthal, Communicating the Infinite: The Emergence of the Habad School (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1990), pp. 59-60.

86. Hitpatehut hiddush. This awkward phrase is also found in Ms. British Library 757, fol. 41a.

87. Sitrei Torah, Ms. Paris BN 774, fol. 149ab.

88. Apparently “with the soul.” However, these words are also missing in Ms. British Library 757, fol. 43a.

89. Sitrei Torah, Ms. Paris BN 774, fol. 151a.

90. Ibid., fol. 150a.

91. See ibid., fols. 5b-6a. This passage has Muslim mystical sources, and I hope to deal with them in a study which was originally planned to be written with the late Prof. Shlomo Pines. See also Lory, Les Commentaires esoteriques, p. 12.

92. See, e.g., Paul Fenton, ed. and trans., The Treatise of the Pool, Al-Maqala al-Hwadiyya, by Obadyah b. Abraham b. Moses Maimonides (Octagon Press, 1981), idem, ’Obadyah et David Maimonide: Deux traites de mystique juive (Lagrasse, Paris Verdier, 1987); idem, “Some Judaeo-Arabic Fragments by Rabbi Abraham ha-Hasid, the Jewish Sufi,” Journal of Semitic Studies 26 (1981), 47-72; idem, “The Literary Legacy of Maimonides’ Descendants,” in J. P. del Rosal, ed., Sobre la vida y obra de Maimonides, I Congreso internacional (Cordova, 1991), pp. 149-156, idem, “A Mystical Treatise on Perfection, Providence and Prophecy from the Jewish Sufi Circle,” in D. Frank, ed., The Jews in Medieval Islam (Brill, Leiden, 1995), pp. 301-334, and above, chap. 6, note 102, and below, Concluding Remarks, note 7. On mysticism and Maimonides’ study see Ignaz Goldziher, “Ibn Hud, the Mahommedan Mystic, and the Jews of Damascus,” JQR, o.s., 6 (1894), pp. 218-220.

93. See Idel, Studies in Ecstatic Kabbalah, passim; idem, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 132, note 1, pp. 138-139, note 20.

94. See M. Idel, “Enoch Is Metatron,” Immanuel 24/25 (1990), pp. 220-240.

95. See, more recently, Daniel Abrams, “The Boundaries of Divine Ontology: The Inclusion and Exclusion of Metatron in the Godhead,” Harvard Theological Review 87 (1994), pp. 316-321; Moshe Idel, “Metatron: Observations on the Development of Myth in Judaism,” in Haviva Pedaya, ed., Myth in Judaism (Beer Sheva’, 1996), pp. 22-44 (Hebrew).

96. See Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 140-141, 200-201; idem, Messianic Mystics, pp. 73-74. See also above, chap. 4, par. I, where the material related to Metatron as the angel of the Torah in Abulafia has been adduced.

97. Cf. Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, pp. 29-41.

98. See Idel, Studies in Ecstatic Kabbalah, pp. 15-16; idem, Messianic Mystics, pp. 85-86.

99. Exodus 23:21.

100. See R. Abraham ibn Ezra, Long Version on Exodus 23:20-21.

101. Deuteronomy 30:19. See also the resort to this verse below, chap. 12, note 47.

102. Ms. Firenze-Laurentiana II, 48, fol. 32a. See a parallel stand in another text of Abulafia’s, as translated in Idel, Language, Torah and Hermeneutics, p. 39.

103. On mystical potentials of this concept in medieval philosophy see Idel, Messianic Mystics, p. 349, notes 26, 27. For the mystical overtones of this concept in Islamic mysticism see the various studies of Corbin, especially Alone with the Alone, pp. 10-11, 17-18, 80; idem, Cyclical Time and Ismaili Gnosis (Kegan Paul International, London, 1983), p. 76.

104. Ha-’emtza’it. See below, app. 2, note 41.

105. See Sitrei Torah, Ms. Paris BN 774, fol. 155b, translated in Idel, Language, Torah, and Hermeneutics, p. 38. Compare also R Dov Baer of Mezeritch, ’Or Torah, pp. 58-59, and R. Menahem Mendel of Shklow, Menahem Tzion, p. 18, in a text that is reminiscent of Abraham Abulafia’s thought. See also ibid., p. 21.

106. On knesset yisra’el as a metaphor for the supernal intellect, as well as for the human spiritual power, see also Idel, The Mystical Experience, pp. 211-212, note 36.

107. See above, Introduction, note 49, where the various discussions in this book are mentioned, and especially chap. 4, par. III.

108. Nissim Yosha, Myth and Metaphor: Abraham Cohen Herrera’s Philosophical Interpretation of Lurianic Kabbalah (Ben-Zvi Institute, Magnes Press, Jerusalem, 1994) (Hebrew).

109. See also Idel, “Abulafia’s Secrets of the Guide,” and above, Introduction. On ibn Gab-bai’s critique of allegory see Goetschel, Meir ibn Gabbai, pp. 108-112.

110. See below, chap. 12, par. XI.