Kabbalah in General

I live in a small town called Safed in the upper Galilee, the northernmost part of Israel. Around twenty thousand people live in this ancient and historic town. Safed is a quaint and beautiful mountain-town, with winding cobblestone alleys, panoramic views, and a sky that glows with the most incredible hues of blue just after the sun sets.

The Golden Age of Safed was in the 16th Century. A few decades after the Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492. Many famous saints and kabbalists who left Spain and Portugal came to Safed then. One of the reasons why they settled here is because the great 2nd Century kabbalist Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai is buried just across the canyon from Safed in Meron.  According to tradition, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai wrote the Zohar, perhaps the most famous text of the Kabbalah, but any scholars do not agree with this.  All agree that its form is about Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai and his students, their adventures and their mystical teachings, and that it was actually written in Spain in the late 13th Century by Rabbi Moshe De Leon.  Rabbi Isaac Luria, known as the Ari, taught in Safed in the early 1570's . His main disciple Rabbi Chayim Vital wrote down these deep mystical teachings in many volumes - the most famous of which is Etz Chayim (Tree of Life) - and are collectively known as Lurianic Kabbalah.

There is, accordingly, much interest in the Kabbalah here in Safed today. There are many different approaches to the Kabbalah. Some are through Chasidut which is an extension of the Kabbalah that became popular through the teachings of the Baal Shem Tov and his disciples, who lived in the 18th and 19th Centuries. Chasidut is based primarily on the Kabbalah of the Ari - Rabbi Isaac Luria - and the Zohar. There are schools in Safed where Chasidut is learned together with Talmudic studies.

Many orthodox Sefardic Jews whose families came here from North Africa and other Arabic countries have a strong tradition of reading Zohar and revering the Kabbalah. There are Sefardic schools in Safed where the kabbalistic works of Rabbi Chayim Vital and other Sefardic kabbalists are studied.

There is also much interest in the Kabbalah among non-orthodox Jews. Many of these Israelis get interested in Jewish mysticism and meditation after visiting India and Nepal where they encounter Eastern mysticism. Some of these young, searching people come back to Israel and embrace the study of Chasidut and Kabbalah, as well as other spiritual disciplines such as yoga, tai chi and meditation. In many circles there is much fear concerning the Kabbalah. Many believe that it should not be studied by anyone except for married Talmudic scholars who are over forty years old. Some of the fear surrounding Kabbalah is the belief that one who enters into this 'paradise' will go crazy because of the mind-expanding concepts that are presented in the teachings of Jewish mysticism.

The teachings of modern science (relativity, quantum mechanics, big-bang cosmology, chaos theory) are also mind-boggling and potentially mind-blowing. However, this is the nature of today's world view as presented by rational scientists. There are many books that show how the ideas of today's science are very similar to the mystical teachings of the past. I believe that this makes the Kabbalah much more accessible now than ever before because it dovetails with our present world view. Studying both modern science and Kabbalah can help us expand and deepen our notions about the meaning of life and the nature of our universe. They can help us deal with staggering concepts like Infinity, Eternity and God. The great modern mystic Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, who was the first Chief Rabbi of Palestine (at the beginning of the 20th Century) wrote that the revelation of the secret teachings of the Kabbalah in the 'last generation', is absolutely necessary for the continued existence of Judaism. He also wrote that the highest truths, the Divine truths of the Kabbalah are also the most simple truths, and the ones that are most needed by everyone.

The openness and desire to integrate all modes of knowledge holistically that I found in the writings of Rabbi Kook also exist in the works of Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan. Besides being an orthodox rabbi and kabbalist, Aryeh Kaplan was also trained as a physicist, and his kabbalistic writings integrate modern scientific thought in a creative and exciting way. I have been personally deeply affected by both of these open-minded mystical writers. But my primary connection to the mystical teachings of the Kabbalah has been through the writings of the great 18th Century kabbalist Rabbi Moshe Chayim Luzzatto. In the Kabbalah, God is neither Masculine nor Feminine, God Is. What God is is not discussed in the Kabbalah. However, because God relates with the universe, this relationship is revealed to the eyes of seers and prophets in their own likeness.

Luzzatto calls this likeness the 'Likeness of Adam'. Adam is each individual human whether male or female. Adam is also all of humanity collectively. Adam is also the entire process of Creation (the macrocosm) which mirrors the process of a human life (the microcosm). This all-inclusive cosmic Likeness of Adam is called Adam Kadmon, (Primordial Adam). Prophets and kabbalists see visions of God's relationship with Creation as represented by a family of Masculine and Feminine anthropomorphic images called partzufim (Faces or Personifications of God, see my pictures Family Tree of Life, Blessing the Family, and Partners in Creation).

The Masculine and Feminine Faces of God that are seen most clearly and are described in great detail in the Kabbalah are called Kudshah Brich Hu (the Blessed Holy One) and the Shechinah (the Divine Presence). The Shechinah is the Face of God that dwells in us. This represents God's immanence. Kudshah Brich Hu is a Face of God that transcends our world but relates to us according to how we choose to relate to God. Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan explained the idea of immanence and transcendence in the following passage:

Our understanding of God's relationship to the world is ultimately twofold. We conceive of God as being both immanent and transcendental. Some of our great thinkers express this in another way, saying that God both fills and encompasses all creation.

....One of the clearest expressions of this is found in the Kedushah, the prayer we say in imitation of the song of the angels. We first repeat the verse (Isaiah 6:3), "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Hosts, the whole earth is filled with His Glory." Here, we are speaking of the immanence of God, saying that He fills all of creation. The second part of the Kedushah, however, consists of the passage (Ezekiel 3:12), "Blessed is the Lord's Glory from His place." Here, we are speaking of a transcendental God, and even the highest celestial beings cannot comprehend His place.

The fact that we speak of God as both transcendental and immanent, however, does not imply any element of duality in God Himself. We perceive this dichotomy only because of our own imperfect understanding. God Himself is an absolute unity. God's immanence implies that there is no place in all creation that is devoid of His being. We therefore speak of God as being Omnipresent. The Torah thus states (Numbers 14:21), "All the earth is filled with God's Glory." We likewise find (Psalms 148:13), "his Glory is in heaven and earth."

In Judaism, historically, there has been an overemphasis on the Masculine (transcendent) aspect of God. However, thinking of God as only Masculine and transcendent can make us feel distant and alienated from the Divine. That is why I feel that the teachings of Kabbalah are important. They show us how to think about God's relationship with the universe as also being Feminine (immanent). Honoring, nurturing and relating to the Feminine aspect of Creation is of vital importance for both men and women today. Since the Shechinah is the aspect of God that is present in us, it is always accessible and empowering. And this immanent, Feminine aspect of the Divine is our door to enlightenment (see my picture Meditating on the Holy Name).