Jewish Mysticism E-Book

Joshua Abelson

• Herausgeber: FV Éditions
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

General and special studies on Christian mysticism are numerous enough; but it is somewhat remarkable that, in their introductory pages, authors, who have much to say of Plotinus and Neoplatonism, have nothing or very little on the still more cognate subject of Jewish mysticism. This is not, however, so very surprising, for, truth to tell, there is a singular dearth of anything like an adequate introduction to the study of Jewish mysticism itself. The impression left with the general reader is that there is little of a mystical nature in the legitimate tradition of Jewish religion, and that the Kabbalah is simply a morbid and late growth, fed entirely by elements foreign to the genius of Israel. How ill-founded is the former view, and how extreme the latter, may be seen in the following pages. In an able summary, that may well serve as an introduction to the general study of Jewish mysticism, Dr. Abelson makes accessible to the general reader, in simple terms, the results of his careful inquiry, based on the researches of the best Jewish scholars, and reinforced by his own wide acquaintance with Talmudic and Rabbinical literature.Contents :IntroductionChapter I. Some Early Elements: EssenismChapter II. The Merkabah (Chariot) MysticismChapter III. Philo: Metatron: WisdomChapter IV. Kingdom of Heaven: Fellowship: ShechinahChapter V. The Book 'Yetsirah'Chapter VI. Some General Features of the 'Zohar' MysticismChapter VII. The Ten SefirotChapter VIII. The SoulConcluding Note

Leseprobe

Table of contents

Copyright

Jewish Mysticism

PREFACE

INTRODUCTION

I

II

III

IV

V

VI

VII

VIII

CONCLUDING NOTE

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Notes de bas de page

Copyright

Copyright © 2017 - FV Éditions

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ISBN 979-10-299-0469-1

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Jewish Mysticism

by

Joshua Abelson

PREFACE

THE following pages are designed to give the reader a bird's-eye view of the salient features in Jewish mysticism rather than a solid presentation of the subject as a whole. The reason for this will be apparent when one thinks of the many centuries of variegated thought that have had to be packed within the small number of pages allotted to the book. It is this very fact, too, that will possibly give the present treatment of the subject a fragmentary and tentative appearance. Thus Chapter V. follows immediately upon the contents of Chapter IV., without the least attempt to show any of the numerous intervening stages of development. Similarly, Chapter VI., dealing with the Zohar, should have been preceded by an exposition of the evolution of Jewish theological thought in the many centuries which divide that chapter from the matter contained in the previous chapter. But lack of space made these omissions inevitable. Should the reader be stimulated to a deeper study of the subject, he will be easily led to the missing parts by the aid of the bibliography at the end of the book.

I should add that the translated extracts from the Zohar are only in some cases made by me from the original Hebrew-Aramaic. I owe many of them to the French and German translations to be found in the works of the scholars from whom I have drawn much of my material.

J. ABELSON.

ARIA COLLEGE, PORTSMOUTH.

INTRODUCTION

IT might strike the average reader as exceedingly odd that any attempt should be made at writing a book on Jewish mysticism. The prevailing opinion--among theologians as well as in the mind of the ordinary man--seems to be that Judaism and mysticism stand at the opposite poles of thought, and that, therefore, such a phrase as Jewish mysticism is a glaring and indefensible contradiction in terms. It is to be hoped that the contents of this little book will show the utter falsity of this view.

What is this view, in the main, based upon? It is based upon the gratuitous assumption that the Old Testament, and all the theological and religious literature produced by Jews in subsequent ages, as well as the general synagogue ritual, the public and private religious worship of the Jew--that all these are grounded on the unquestioning assumption of an exclusively transcendent God. The Jews, it is said, never got any higher than the notion of the old Jehovah whose abode was in the highest of the seven heavens and whose existence, although very very real to the Jew, was yet of a kind so immeasurably far away from the scenes of earth that it could not possibly have that significance for the Jew which the God of Christianity has for the Christian. The Jew, it is said, could not possibly have that inward experience of God which was made possible to the Christian by the life of Jesus and the teaching of Paul.