Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism

Sandalphon: Fiery Wheel, Cosmic Angel

2012-01-09T08:00:00.002-06:00

Sandalphon: like Metatron (see the earlier entry), the name of this numinous servant of God is derived from Greek, rather than Hebrew, but there is no totally satisfactory explanation for the name.

[A sacred circle, appearing at www.sandiknelltamny.com/amulets.htm]

Sandalphon is a flaming princely angel (sar) and an ofan, or wheel-shaped angel that stretches from heaven to earth, a distance of "500 years" (Beit ha-Midrash 1:58-61). He is the wheel with eyes described by Ezekiel (Ezek. 1:15) that helps propel the divine chariot. Some regard his turning to be the source of heavenly thunder.

According to the Talmud, Sandalphon stands behind the Throne of Glory and continuously crowns God with a crown woven (the image is that of Caesar's laurel crown) from the prayers of Israel (Chag. 13a-b).

Some sources claim Sandalphon is the angelic name of Elijah, the prophet who ascended bodily into heaven. In this association he functions as psychopomp - the gatekeeper who conveys souls to their afterlife abode.

Other sources identify him as the angelic ruler of Asiyah, the material world of action (PR 20:4; Mid. Teh. 19:7). He is also sometimes invoked on amulets as a protector against eviel forces.

In all his iterations (a wheel, conveyor of prayers or souls, the connection between heaven and earth, the spirit of the material plane), he personifies the movement and transfer of forces between higher and lower realms. He is the cyclic, dynamic mandala of divine engagement with creation.

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Adiriron: Power-house Angel of the Merkavah

2012-01-06T20:11:00.000-06:00

In my translation of Havdalah de Rabbi Akiva, there appears many divine and angelic names. One that intrigues me is a name I have seen mentioned multiple times that appears in Hechalot literature and

[Wheel of Life Angel by Elizabeth Frank, found at http://www.lanninggallery.com/]

on protective amulets. The name is frequently mentioned, yet I have not had a clear sense of its nature or function. At times, it is used as a divine name [2]. Some argue it is a substitute for the Tetragrammaton. Other times, Adiriron is treated as an angel. So I am trying to get a handle on this elusive entity. While the name is used in amulets and herem [spirit ban] texts, it is most often mentioned in association with some aspect of the merkavah, the divine chariot. Thus it appears in Hekhalot Rabbati 14:

When a person seeks to descend to the Chariot he will call upon Surya, the Prince of the Countenance, and make him swear one hundred and twelve times in the name of Tutrusyiyah [with many titles]...and Adiriron-YHWH, Lord of Israel...[3]

This could be a divine name or an angel, but either way it gives the adept access to highest levels of the celestial order. Perhaps we can split the difference; this indicates Adiriron is more than an angel, for he is a Malakh Adonai, a super-angelic entity with the "name" of God in it [4]. As such he is either akin to, or another name for, Akatriel-Yah [see T.B. Berachot 7a]. Can we get any more clarity?

In Sefer Hekhalot, he is listed as one of three high angels that personify a divine attribute. In the case of Adiriron, that attribute is God's koach, "power." [5] This association of Adiriron with "power" is repeated elsewhere - Michael receives some of his angelic power from Adiriron! He commands every Saraf angel. Later he is described as the rokeiv ("rider") upon the wheels [of the divine chariot], perhaps this means he is a cherub, but by any account Adiriron is a driving force in the divine superstructure. [6]

My best interpretation is that he is a personification of the "dynamos," the attribute of power within the Godhead, and the reason that the name/entity fades from use is that later Kabbalah would refer to this same divine phenomenon as Gevurah.

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[1] Meaning, in quasi-Hebrew, is "Mighty One." The odd -ron ending resembles the morphology of Metatron. Sometimes the name is divided into Adir Yiron.
[2] Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, p. 56, 363.
[3] Margoliot, Malachei-Elyon, p. 2 [translation is the author's]
[4]ha-Kamia ha-Yehudi presents it as a divine name, noting that it has the same gematria value as the 42-letter name (p. 3).
[5] Dan, Unique Cherub Circle, p. 113.
[6] Sefer Temunah 17b-18a.

Uriel: Angel of the Presence, the Light of God

2012-01-02T09:00:00.001-06:00

[The angelic light of Zionism gives new hope to despairing Jewry, bookplate by E. M. Lilien]

Uriel: ( אוּרִיאֵל “God is my Light”). Uriel is one of the four princely angels (Sar ha-Panim) that surround [or form] the Throne of God (Numbers Rabbah 2:10; PdRE 4):

As the Holy One blessed be He created four winds and four banners, so also did He make four angels to surround His Throne — Michael, Gabriel, Uriel and Raphael. Michael is on its right, next to the tribe of Reuben; Uriel on its left, next to the tribe of Dan, which was in the north [1]; Gabriel in front, next to the tribe of Judah, also Moses and Aaron, who were in the east; and Raphael in the rare, next to the tribe of Epharim which was in the west....

He is first mentioned by name in 1st Enoch (chapters 9; 19-20), though he does not appear in a later angelic list in that same book. He is identified as the angel who revealed the secrets of the true, celestial calendar to Enoch, counteracting the impure lunar calendar given to humanity by the fallen angels (I En. 33; 80). In II Edras he brings God’s message of rebuke to Ezra (4:1). He appears regularly in medieval angelic lists (PR 46; Num. R. 2:10; Mid. Konen).

Uriel is regarded by some to the Sar ha-Torah, the Prince of the Torah:

....Why was he named Uriel? Because of the Torah, the Prophets and the Writings by means of which the Holy One, blessed by He, atones for sins and gives light to Israel (Num. Rabbah 2:10).

He is also the patron angel of Jerusalem (4 Ezra 10). He has control over earthquakes and thunder. In the medieval aggadah Gedulat Moshe he is described as being made entirely from hail. He could also take on the form of an eagle. Midrash Aggadah claims he was the avenging force God sent against Moses for failing to circumcise his son Gershom. He announced the birth of Samson.

In the Zohar he is identified with the lion – faced angel in Ezekiel’s chariot. In lion form, Uriel would descend and consume the sacrifices on the altar of the Temple (I: 6b).

Uriel is one of the four guardian angels invoked for protection while sleeping in the bedtime ritual of K’riat Sh’ma al ha-Mitah.

Zal g'mor - learn more by reading the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism:
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[1] In fact, there is no consensus within the tradition as to Uriel's exact position. Other sources claim he is the angel of the south. One text states he stands in front of the Throne of Glory, another text claims he is behind the Throne (Margoliot, Malachei Elyon).

Metatron: Anomalous Angel of the Countenance

2011-12-28T09:52:00.001-06:00

[Rahab of Jericho confronted by the Sar Tzevaot, a figure sometimes identified as Metatron. An illustration by E.M. Lilien]

Metatron is a Sar (Princely Angel) who features prominently in Jewish esoteric literature. The name “Metatron” itself is a puzzle, being a Greek derived word meaning either meta-thronos, “beyond the throne,” metator, “guide,” or meta-tetra, “beyond the four [Angels of the Countenance].”

Reflecting the varied ways in which he appears in Jewish literature, Metatron has many other names and titles. Among the most common are Sar ha-Panim (Prince of the Countenance), Sar ha-Olam (Prince of the World), ha-Naar (the Youth), Marei de-Gadpei, (Master of Wings), and Yahoel. In the Merkavah traditions we learn that Metatron has twelve names, corresponding to the twelve tribes. This may account for the overlapping names and titles in the Metatron traditions (Sanh. 38b; Zohar I:21a).

Metatron’s place in the angelic host is anomalous for several reasons. So exalted is his status that in some sources he is referred to as the “Lesser YHWH” (Yev. 16b; Sanh. 38b). He is also unique in that he alone among the angels sits upon a throne, as does God. Because of this, Elisha ben Abuyah mistook him for a god and concludes there are “two powers in heaven” (Chag. 15a). Equally remarkable about Metatron is that, according to some traditions, he was once human – the antediluvian hero Enoch (Gen. 5; Jubilees 4:23; Sefer Hechalot 12:5). In III Enoch, Metatron describes to Rabbi Ishmael how he was transubstantiated from mortal to angelic form: Under the direction of Michael and Gabriel he grew in size until his body filled the whole universe (signaling a reversal of the “fall” of Adam Kadmon). He sprouted 72 wings (for each of the 72 names of God), grew 365,000 luminous eyes (indicating he had became omniscient, symbolized by acquiring 1000 eyes for each day of the year), and his material body burned away to be replace with a form of pure fire. Finally, he is given a crown resembling the crown worn by God. At times Metatron is described as the High Priest in the heavenly Temple, a role ascribed to Michael in other texts:

When the Holy Blessed One told Israel to set up the Mishkan [the portal sanctuary] He indicated to the ministering angels that they also should make a Mishkan, and when the one below was erected the other was erected on high. The latter was the tabernacle of the Naar (Youth) whose name was Metatron, and there he offers up the souls of the righteous to atone for Israel in the days of their exile. The reason then why it is written et ha-Mishkan, [The direct object marker et is read as "with", implying that there is something else unstated that was built with the desert sanctuary] is because another Mishkan was erected simultaneously with it. In the same way it says, The place, Adonai, which You have made for You to dwell in, the Sanctuary, O Lord, which Your hands have established [the parallelism of "place" and "sanctuary" is interpreted to mean two sanctuaries] (Ex. 25:17). (Num. R. 12:12)

In Sefer Zerubbabel, he is explicitly identified with Michael. He also functions as the heavenly scribe, writing 366 books. He teaches Torah to the righteous dead in the Yeshiva on High (A.V. 3b; Seder Gan Eden).

He is involved in events on earth as well as in heaven. He led Abraham through Canaan, delivered Isaac from his father’s knife, Wrestled with Jacob, led the Israelites in the desert, rallied Joshua before Jericho, and revealed the End of Times to Zerubbabel (Sefer Zerubbabel). Abraham Abulafia identifies him with the yetzer ha-tov, the human altruistic impulse.

In the Zohar, Metatron receives his most complex treatment. I am not completely confident I fully understand De Leon's multivalent and allusive teachings regarding Metatron, but I am clear he teaches Metatron is the first “offspring” of the supernal union of God’s feminine and masculine aspects (I: 143a, 162a-b). As such he is the personification of the lower sefirot, an idea obliquely alluded to in this description of Metatron as the "staff" of Moses [i.e., the instrument he uses to deliver the people]:

Similarly of Moses it is written, "And the staff of God was in his hand" [the staff that delivered the Israelites and smote the Egyptians]. This rod is Metatron, from one side of whom comes life and from the other death." [life and salvation flows from the "right" side of the sefirot, death and severity from the "left" side] (Zohar 1:27a).

The figure of Metatron fades in importance after the Zohar, but continues to appear in less prominent roles in later Kabbalism, sometimes in his older guises but more commonly as the angel of devekut [mystical union] (Sefer ha-Hezyanot I:23; Otzer Chayyim folio 111a).

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Lulav: Water and Rain, Masculine and Feminine

2011-10-11T07:12:00.000-05:00

The waving of the arba minim/four species, also known as the etrog (a citron) and lulav (a bouquet of tree branches - palm, myrtle, and willow) continues to puzzle and baffle Jewish practitioners. Why gather these four? And what do we do with them? The Torah instructs us to collect them, but does not specify anything else. So the Sages instruct us to shake them toward the four compass points, the heavens and the earth.

And why do we do this? All the explanations provided by Jewish tradition are hundreds of years older than the practice itself. It meant something different to our ancestors than it does to us. Very odd. Pagan holdover, say some. Aboriginal say I. The closest tie we have to our tribal past, excepting perhaps the body-modification practice of circumcision.

The most intuitive explanations of the lulav and etrog relate to water - a central theme of the Sukkot holiday. The rainy season in Israel begins around Sukkot. We initiate our annual prayers for rain at this time. There was a ceremony of "water drawing" performed in the Temple on Sukkot in which the altar and its surrounds were splashed with water.

So applying this logic to the lulav, one realizes that dryness and moisture are denoted in each of the objects. The palm core is rather dry. The willow is a water-needy plant, and the willow branch of the lulav notably withers over the course of the week. The myrtle, by contrast, retains its fresh appearance. And the etrog is the ultimate fruity reservoir of moisture. Aside from water, the only notable feature of all four species is that they are all largely inedible. Water is the most meaningful marker associated with each. The Talmud Yerushalami hints at this when it comments "...they come as intercessors for water" (Taanit 1:1). Most striking of all, when the lulav is waved as prescribed, it's rustling makes a noise that sounds like rain, suggesting the waving ceremony was meant as a sympathetic ritual of power, inspiring the urge to rain in all parts of the earth, from the sky to the earth (filling wells, rivers, and lakes) - sort of the way the sound of running water can trigger the need to urinate.

Additionally, the morphology of the lulav, with it's phallic-like branches clutched together with the round (womb-like/breast-like) etrog, points to a obvious fertility theme. The notion that this is a bringing together of male and female is apparent in Kabbalistic interpretations of the ritual,

He planted an etrog among them [the male plants]...the etrog is female (Bahir 172)...The lulav is male...(Bahir 198 - Also see Shaar ha-Kavanot 5; Sefat Emet, comment on Sukkot)

....while directing it across the earth, again, has a strong theurgic logic to it. This too is a continuation our water theme, for, as the Bahir also teaches, The concept of water contains both male and female aspects...(Bahir 86). This notion of masculine (rain) and feminine (ground) waters that combine to fructify the earth occurs throughout traditional Jewish thought.

And just to add to this, there is the holiday within a holiday, Hosanna Rabbah, which comes at the end of Sukkot. It features yet another ritual of obscure origins - hakafot (parading in circles) with willow branches. Often these are used to "whip" something, like the pulpit or readers table of the synagogue. Characterized by the sages as a "minor day of atonement," it might make sense to see it as a last appeal to God to send the rains promised to a faithful nation (Deut. 11). Can you say "rain dance?"

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Barack Obama, Rapture, End of Days, Israel, prophecy, revelation

Yichudim: The Many Meanings of Unity in Judaism, pt. 1

2011-09-30T13:26:00.017-05:00

If you drop in the word yichud or yihud into your search engine, you will get a long list of links. Oddly, though, most of them take you to the issue of yihud in the sense of "seclusion," the norms governing when Jewish men and women can and cannot be together alone. In a related discussion, there is an element of a Jewish wedding called the yichud, during which the couple is allowed time alone and away from the guests. This actually fulfilled a Talmudic criteria for being married, that witnesses see the couple seclude themselves together for the purpose of marriage.

Ironically, what is much harder to find via search engine is the philosophical and mystical use of the term as it applies to God, which in certain circles is a far more critical issue for a Jew to know. It is even soterological - "salvation" depends on it (according to some). If one finds it used in its philosophic context, the site will discuss Maimonides (RaMBaM). This is wholly as it should be, because RaMBaM is really the first Jewish thinker to make understanding and affirming the unity of God a core issue of Jewish belief. That sounds strange, but it's true. Yes, Jews have recited the Deuteronomic declaration, the Sh'ma (Hear O Israel, Adonai is our God Adonai is one/alone/unique)[Deut. 6:4] since earliest times. But the Sages of the Talmud seem to make it's twice daily recitation mandatory because, well, the Scriptures says you should say it twice ("When you lie down and when you rise up"). They never say, for example, that the Sh'ma is "the essence of Judaism" or "the watchword of our faith," as becomes common in later centuries.

It's centrality is implicitly affirmed in an entirely other context, by Rabbi Akiba's decision to recite it at its designated time -- which happened to be the same time his skin was being raked off his back by a Roman executioner. Again, Akiba doesn't say - "Oh, this is the thing that must be affirmed at my death." Rather, he realizes that the time of day to recite the Sh'ma has arrived, and he's gonna do the Jewish thing, come hell or high water. Still, that commitment to say it at the moment of death gave affirming the unity of God a special significance. Akiba adds a coda, about finally understanding what the Sh'ma means in the following paragraph when it demands one must "Love Adonai your God with...all your being." (Elah Ezkara). Impending death both focuses the mind and makes what comes to mind seem very important indeed. Akiba's story certainly enhanced the significance of declaring God's oneness, but not on a philosophical level. Akiba's martyrdom highlights devotion to God, not any idea about God.

For centuries after Akiba, no one claimed that accepting/internalizing/grokking the oneness of the God of Israel was even a mitzvah until the RaMBaM said it was. In his list of commandments, this belief is the second mitzvah listed. In his Mishneh Torah, it is considered the first obligation and the foundation of the Torah.

Now this is a notable claim, given that the Torah lists a very limited number of commandments that demand of us certain thoughts - to love God utterly is one, to not covet other peoples' stuff is another. And the fact is....belief in God, or God's nature is not one of them, at least explicitly. But the RaMBaM turns a declarative sentence, "I am Adonai your God...." into an imperative, "[You must believe] I am Adonai your God..." He makes a great philosophic argument for that, though it remains contrived in light of what the Hebrew Bible actually does and does not say. But Maimonides goes even further, arguing that simply affirming the idea as creed is not enough - one must grasp it and all its implications on a philosophic level of understanding, one that erases all intellectual doubt. If this all sounds rather Christian, I agree, though historically speaking, the RaMBaM is mostly under the influence of Islamic scholastics who, like Christians, really made reasoned thoughts and belief the sina qua non of valid religious experience. So, more than any rabbi before him, RaMBaM is insisting Jews have to hold certain beliefs (at least 13 of them).

http://www.jewishideasdaily.com/content/module/2011/10/5/main-feature/1/who-owns-maimonides/

So, what does this have to do with Jewish mystical beliefs and rituals of power? I'll get to that next entry. Its just a steep learning curve for understanding what's coming. Key themes: For Akiba, the unity of God is linked to love, for Maimonides, its all about intellect.

Torah, Tarot, and Taos: The Alchemy of Symbols

2011-09-04T12:38:00.015-05:00

So I'm in Taos NM for the Labor Day Weekend. On Shabbat I had a striking progression of encounters. I went to services and Torah study to the Northern New Mexico Jewish Center. What a lovely experience. The people have their own minhag. And for parasha ha-shavua, it seems everyone is invited to bring a drash to share. In some cases, these are meticulously researched and written, in others, the davar is printed off the 'net. While some struggled with the names of the gedolim and their time and place, I would describe their intellectual offerings as pure incense to the Blessed Holy One. These folks take Torah seriously and work hard to make yiddishkeit in La Tierra. And how often does a visitor to a shul get a hug? It was a great Shabbat experience.

An interesting thing struck me while we read through the portion, Shoftim. The portion begins by instructing the Israelites to tear the asherot and m'tzavot, sacred trees* and stone pillars associated with pagan (or, more likely, corrupted Israelite) worship. But then Shoftim ends with God instructing the people not to cut down fruit trees during a siege. It made me think of how the idea assigned to the object makes all the difference. After all, trees and rocks remain potent Jewish symbols. Deuteronomy itself refers to God as Tzur, "Rock." and centuries later Proverbs speaks of wisdom** as "a tree of life." The objects don't go away, they just undergo a symbolic transmutation.

Then, as if to reinforce the point, a few hours later I was wandering through a Taos bookstore when I was engaged by a fellow intrigued by my Hebrew language t-shirt. Jesse Rose ("and a stem shall sprout from the stump of Jesse"?) is a local Taos tarot reader. Realizing this, I made a passing reference to some Jewishly derived symbols I knew appeared on the Waite deck, and pretty soon he wanted to do a reading for me in exchange for some discussion of Kabbalah, a kind of quid-pro-revelation deal.

Jesse gave me an insightful, archetype infused reading, and then afterward we discussed some of the images on his deck. Much of it revolved around the Chariot and Wheel of Fortune cards, both of which lean extensively on Ezekiel 1 and 10 for their imagery.

I was particularly struck by the pair of sphinx (sphinxes?) on the Chariot card. Ezekiel and others describe God's merkavah as being drawn by cherubs. We know (now) from archeaology that these celestical creatures were portrayed as sphinx-like by the Israelites. I'm not so sure that was known in Waite's time. He might have been drawing purely on Egyptian/Hermetic iconigraphy, and in doing so serendipitiously arrived as this surprisingly authentic image. Another observation. The two creatures are male and female, which mirrors a Talmudic tradtion in Yoma that the cherubs represented the erotic structure of the cosmos. The ring-and-rod symbol on the Chariot over the the "cherubim"(see above) likewise parallels the kabbalistic notion the the divine order as kav u'maggel (line and circle).***

So this pagan > Biblical > kabbalistic > hermetic mental mini-tour just drives home the fact that fundamental symbols and archetypes never go away, they just undergo a kind of alchemical transmutation in meaning, revealing their hidden power over and over again.

*Totem poles, really. There might have been living trees in a few shrines and high places, but given the fickle fate awaiting flora in the Levant, a aspirational tree makes a more enduring icon.

**Later equated by the Sages with Torah.

*** OK, so in the movie I saw the next day, The Tree of Life, the viewer is beaten over the head with "men are lines/women are curves" imagery. This movie reminds me that a little recurring symbolism goes a long way. Like drugs, symbols can easily be used to excess, losing their therapeutic value in the process.

Combatting the Evil Eye: Bible, Spit, and the "Fig"

2011-08-31T13:53:00.007-05:00

[First Palin, then Obama. Is this the evil eye of Rep. Bachmann? Not so much, I think. She always seems happy when she looks like this. Maybe the "giddy eye"]

Use of Scriptures in Combating the Evil Eye:
Jews have used folk remedies (segulot), rituals (maʿasim),* and amulets (kemiyiot) to defend against the malevolent effects of the ʿayin ha-ra. Biblical divine names, angelic names, and select biblical texts have been prominent tools in waging this fight. The verses are often chosen because of their semantic content (Ex. 15:6; Num. 6:24-27, 21:17; Ps 46:8, 12; 91:5-6), while others have been singled out based on magical criteria unrelated at all to the meaning (Num 21:17-20). One custom requires the use of verses that begin and end with the Hebrew letter nûn, such as Pss. 46:5, 77:5, and 78:2.

The complex reasoning behind the choice of an apotropaic verse can be illustrated by examining yet another popular passage from Jacob’s blessing, Gen. 48:16 (MT): “May the angel who has redeemed me from all harm – bless the lads….And may they be teeming multitudes upon the earth (NJV).” This verse is regarded as potent against the ʿayin ha-ra because of its perceived two-fold power. Exoterically, it calls for angelic protection upon the Children of Israel. But it simultaneously bears an added, esoteric association. The phrase, va-yidgu larov, “….may they be teeming multitudes….”, literally means, “.…may they multiple as fishes….” The Talmud seizes upon this, “Just as fish in the sea are covered by water so that the evil eye does not rule over them, so too the seed of Joseph is not subject the rule of the evil eye.” (b Sotah 36b). This interpretation makes the verse doubly efficacious. This may also be the rationale for selecting verses framed by the letter nûn: nûn is the Aramaic word for “fish.” The power of pun protects with phish. Pseudo-alliteration, not so much.
Amulets produced by Central Asian (Mizrachi) Jews often begin with Ps 16:8. Angels, both those named in the TaNaKH and others appearing in post-biblical traditions, are commonplace. Some verses are employed because they mention a powerful and virtuous biblical figure regarded to have power over the eye, such as Serach bat Asher (Num 26:46). Again, verses relating to Joseph are among the most often used for their presumed apotropaic power. At times charm writers thought it enough to only allude to the patriarch. Some amulets quote b Ber 55b, “I am the seed of Joseph the Righteous, who is not subject to the evil eye.” It is worth noting this is a claim all but impossible to determine by the medieval period; evidently the Evil Eye is not so perceptive in matters of lineage. Others simply read, “Joseph.”

When Words Fail:

Of the many gestures and ritualized behaviors Jews have employed over the centuries to fend off the ʿayin ha-ra, one of the most persistent is the custom of spitting three times. As times have gotten more genteel (or gentile, perhaps both), that has evolved into a series of sharp exhalations, as immortalized in the literary exclamation found in a thousand Jewish stories - phah-phah-phah. Jews expectorating as a means of exorcism is ancient, and might provide some insight on interpreting the Christian Scriptures, specifically Jesus’ use of spit in his performances of spiritual healing (Mark 8; John 9).

* The most famous Talmudic gesture against the evil eye is the "fig." Here's how. Place your hands palm-to-palm, fingers pointing in opposite directions. Now slide your hands vertically so that the thumb of each hand rests in the center of the palm of the other. Now fold both hands around the thumbs. Ta-da, the fig. Add a good shake and the eye is powerless.

Evil Eye IV: Jewish Law and the Paranormal

2011-08-24T07:01:00.006-05:00

[President Obama gives Fox the Evil Eye. Result? The Megyn Kelly show]

By the close of the medieval period, concerns about the evil eye even come to have a minor role in shaping Jewish law. The Babylonian Talmud (Bava Metzia 59b) discourages using what we would describe as supernatural or paranormal phenomena as a rationale for determining the halacha (normative pratice, literally, “the way to go”). Yet in later legal digests, concern over the over the effects of the ʿayin ha-ra become an occasional factor in determining what is permitted and prohibited. This is especially true in the influential law digest Shulchan Aruch of Joseph Caro (16th Century), who was writing during the peak of the Western obsession with witchcraft, spiritual possession, and diabolical attack.

In section Yoreh Deah 249:1, for example, the minimum amount of charitable donations is specified in order avoid creating an evil eye. In another section, Choshen Mishpat 378:5, a Jew is prohibited from admiring a neighbor’s farm crop for the same reason. Other examples of behavior prohibited out of concern for the ʿayn ha-ra appear in sections Orach Chayyim 141:6; 154:3; 305:11, Even ha-Ezer 63:3, and Yoreh Deah 265:5. It is notable that these rules focus entirely on preventing the unintentional generation of this witchcraft. At no point, however, is the phenomenon in any way criminalized. Medieval authorities never propose a legal proceeding related to an evil eye. Neither is any punishment laid out for an identified perpetrator.

Subsequent works of halakhah tend to repeat these rationales, having been enshrined as they were in such an influential work. But anxiety about the Evil Eye declined as modernity took hold in Jewish life.

Next entry: Combatting the Evil Eye.

Evil Eye III: Getting Medieval on Your Tuchis

2011-08-19T15:20:00.005-05:00

Inspired by Talmudic and popular concern with the ʿayin ha-ra, both medieval midrashim and the systematic exegetes identify the presence of the evil eye at work in numerous biblical passages.

["The Evil Eye rules over counting." Former governor Sarah Palin gives one at the Iowa Straw Poll - is this one aimed at Rick Perry?]

Of all the commentators, the French exegete RaSHI gives the most attention to the ʿāyin hārā, but he is largely content to repeat and amplify rabbinic exegesis on the eye in the Abraham and Joseph cycles (Gen 16:5; 42:5), in the Balaam saga (Num 24:2), and in the conflict between David and Saul (I Sam 18:9). Yet occasionally he finds the eye present in previously overlooked narratives of the TaNaKH. The chief example is his comment that the plague that followed David’s census was a manifestation of the eye, for “…the evil eye rules over counting.” (Comment to Ex 30:11, c.f. I Sam 24:1). This idea took deep roots in Jewish consciousness, creating an aversion to counting people that persists into contemporary times.

The theme of counting related to the eye is further explored the Zohar (II:105a), though, all in all, the ʿayin ha-ra it is not a significant topic in the major works of theosophical Kabbalah. References more commonly appear in Hebrew magical literature of the period, such as Sefer haRaziel and Havdalah deRabbi Akiba.

Next Entry: The Evil Eye and Jewish law

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Evil Eye II: The Talmud and Midrash on the Ayin ha-Ra

2011-08-09T23:18:00.004-05:00

By Late Antiquity the belief in a supernatural malevolent gaze had thoroughly permeated Jewish communities. The ʿayin ha-ra as spiritual phenomenon is repeatedly discussed across the tractates of the Talmud, both with and without a biblical context. Some passages assume it is inflicted unintentionally (B.T. Bava Metzia 84b). Others indicate it is deliberate witchcraft. At times, the ʿayin ha-ra is characterized as an independent demonic force, seeking its own victims. Most intriguing, several passages regard it to be a power the righteous can wield to just ends (b Shabbat 33b-34a; Bava Metzia 58a; Bava Batra 75a).

The Rabbis seemingly believe there is no end to its malicious power. One Sage goes so far as to say, “Ninety-nine perish by the evil eye; only one by natural causes” (b Baba Metzia 107b).

Seen as pervasive in their own time, the Sages assumed the ʿayin ha-ra would have a role in the lives of the biblical worthies and their antagonists.
The midrashim introduce the ʿayin ha-ra into many stories in the TaNaKH. The eye is used as a weapon in the rivalry between Sara and Hagar (Gen. Rabbah 53). Fear of attracting its attention inspires Jacob to instruct his children to each enter a city by a different gate (Gen. Rabbah 91.6).

A debate appears in the Talmud (b Sota 36b) over Joshua’s instruction to the Joseph tribes to settle in a forest (Josh 17:15). One Sage theorizes this was done to conceal their prosperity from the eye, but he is refuted by others who, citing Gen. 49:22, insist Joseph and his descendants are immune from its baneful gaze. The prooftext proffered in this pericope is derived from a word-play on Jacob’s dying blessing to his son. It plays a key role in shaping the Jewish ʿayin ha-ra tradition, and so merits detailed attention.

Characteristic of midrashic discourse, this “Josephite immunity” is derived from a philological “occasion,” a linguistic ambiguity in 49:22. First, the word ʿayin means both “spring” and “eye.” The second ambiguity is the question regarding ʿayin-lamed-yud, the word before ʿayin: what part of speech is it? Centuries after the Rabbis the Masorites would vocalize this key word as a preposition, ʿălê: “…Yôsep bēn pōrāt ʿălê ʿāyin,” “Joseph; a fruitful bough upon a spring.” But by reading it vocalized as ʿōlê, the Sages reveal a different message “…Joseph; a fruitful bough [that] transcends [the] eye.” This only slightly more fanciful reading is reiterated frequently in rabbinic sources (b Ber 20a, 55b; Baba Metzia 84a) and over the centuries beyond, earning it a central place in Jewish efforts to neutralize the eye’s power.

Another biblical text singled out as a resource against the ʿayin ha-ra is the “Priestly blessing” (Num 6:24-27) (Numbers Rabbah 12.4; Pesikta Rabbati 5).
Yet even this late in Antiquity, the term “evil eye” does not always carry a supernatural connotation, as evidenced by a passage from Tractate Pirkei Avot, “Rabbi Yehoshua said: An evil eye, the evil inclination, and hatred of others remove a person from the world” (2:16). From the context it is clear that “evil eye” has a strictly psychological connotation here.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

The Evil Eye I: From Israelite Idiom to Jewish Ju-Ju

2011-08-03T16:45:00.005-05:00

The evil eye (Heb. ʿāyin ha-ra; Ara. ʿeinaʾ bishʾ; lit. “eye of evil”) is the reification of envious desire and ill-will. Belief in the evil eye has ancient roots in the Near East and extends across many cultures. It has been the mostly widely accepted notion of witchcraft to be found in Jewish societies across time and geography. The effects of the evil eye include illness, misfortune, and even death. In all cases, believers regard those subjected to its attention to be vulnerable to harmful forces both natural and supernatural.

Biblical

The Evil Eye the Hebrew Bible: Readers both ancient and modern have attempted to locate the evil eye in biblical literature. The construct phrase “eye of evil” appears in the books of Deuteronomy (15:9; 28: 54, 56) and Proverbs (23:6, 28:22). In each case it serves as an idiom for “stingy” or “parsimonious.”

More connotatively, “eyes” and “seeing” serve as a literary motif for feelings of jealousy. Rhetoric of looking appears in passages describing the rivalries between Sara and Hagar (Gen 17:4-5; 21:9) and between Saul and David (I Sam 18:9). In a more overtly magical context, the antagonistic King Balak and his wizard-for-hire Bilaam each in turn “see” and gaze upon the people Israel (Num 22-23). The leitmotif reaches its apotheosis in the sorcerer’s unintentional blessing, “No harm is in sight for Jacob/No woe in view for Israel” (Num 23:21).

None of these examples point to a belief in the witchcraft eye among Israelites. In all cases, the “eye evil” in TaNaKH is a synecdoche for greedy, jealousy, and angry people. The “eye” has no life of its own apart from the human viewer. Whether this absence from biblical literature is attributable to the absence of the belief in Israelite society or to editorial censorship is a matter of continuing - debate.

Next Entry - Ninty-Nine out of a Hundred Die by the Eye

To learn more, consult in The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism. Purchase it at:
http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/ref=pd_rhf_p_1/104-9077615-8031133

A Necessary Evil: The Yetzer ha-Ra

2011-07-30T22:40:00.000-05:00

Last week I explained that in Judaism ha-Satan, the Adversary, was one of the “severe” agents of God. Another such harsh but necessary force in God’s creation is the Yetzer ha-Ra, which is variously translated as the “Evil Impulse,” the “Evil Desire,” the “Selfish Desire” or just “Desire.” It is that aspect of nature, but especially human nature, which drives us to compete, to fight, to possess, but most of all to desire sexual gratification.
[Postcard by Jungenstil artist Moses Ephraim Lilien]

Though it is counter-balanced by the Yetzer ha-Tov, the “altruistic desire,” it is nonetheless the source of much of the grief in human life – lust, violence, selfishness, vengeance, and ambition. One would think that humanity would be truly better off if we could destroy this impulse. I always think in this context of John Lennon’s “Imagine.” It has struck me that Lennon is thinking of something akin to the Yetzer when he wrote that song. Imagine if human being were finally free of all the selfish drives? No thoughts of property, security, self-aggrandizement or the future? Wouldn’t things be perfect, or at least a whole lot better? Is Lennon right? Well, in fact, the Sages of Talmudic times anticipated Lennon by about 1600 years and imagined just such a scenario. This is their mythic account of the “Day the Muse [almost] died”:

And [they]cried with a great voice to the Eternal their God (Neh. 9:4). What did they cry?...Woe, woe, it is he [the Yetzer ha-Ra] who has destroyed the Sanctuary, burnt the Temple, killed the righteous, driven all Israel into exile and is still dancing in our midst… You have surely given him to us that we may receive merit through him. We want neither him nor merit through him. In that moment a tablet fell from the firmament, the word ‘truth’ inscribed upon it [Heaven accedes to the request]….They [the Sages of the Great Assembly] ordered a complete fast of three day….whereupon he [the Yetzer] was surrendered to them. He came forth from the Holy of Holies like a fiery lion…. At that moment the prophet declared, “This is the Yetzer”…the prophet said, “cast him in a lead barrel” (See Zech. 5:8)….He [the Yetzer] said to them, “Realize that if you kill me, the world is finished.” They held him for three days, then they looked in the whole land of Israel and not an egg could be found. So they asked, “What shall we do now?”…So they put out his eyes and let him go; this helped in that men became less inclined to incest (Yoma 69b).

What a remarkable story. It teaches a most profound truth. We see evil in ourselves, it offends us, and we think the right thing to do is to totally purge ourselves of it. Yet we don’t truly understand it, for things we so easily characterize as “evil” actually spring out of the very nexus of holiness. Surreal as it is, this maaseh makes an incredible point – it is the strife of the spirit, the very struggle between our impulses that makes the world work. Without the Yetzer ha-Ra, the world as we know would cease – people [and animals] would no longer be driven to build, to create, to have children. In short, life as we know, including not only evil aspects but most of what we regard as beautiful also, would cease. Without Desire, Life itself would slowly wither away, and that would be a sad thing. So the goal of the spiritual person is not to destroy the selfish-sexual-evil impulse, but rather to sublimate it to God’s purpose. To be truly what God wants us to be, to achieve our fullest human potential, we need to learn to bend both our impulses to godly ends. We should not cease to lust, but should direct that urge toward love. We should turn our impulse toward vengeance into the desire for justice, our ambition for acquiring possessions into the creation of wealth that will “float every boat,” as GOP rhetoricians like to say.

As Genesis Rabbah teaches:

And God saw all that He had made, and found it very good…vehinei tov zeh yetzer hatov, vehinei tov me’od zeh yetzer hara – "good" refers to the Good Inclination but "very good" refers to the Evil Inclination.
Why? Because were it not for the Yetzer ha-Ra no one would build a house, take a wife, give birth, or engage in commerce.

In other words, God is the source of the Yetzer ha-Ra and, despite what we may think, has blessed us though it with a purpose in mind – to fill us with desire; the desire to make the world better than it is.

To learn more, consult Body; Nature; Sex; and Yetzer ha-Ra in The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism. Purchase it at:
http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/ref=pd_rhf_p_1/104-9077615-8031133

Boaz and Yachin: Pillars of Creation, Trees of Eden

2011-07-07T20:46:00.014-05:00

And he [Solomon] erected the pillars for the portico of the sanctuary, and he erected the right-hand pillar and called it ‘Yachin’, and he erected the left-hand pillar and called it ‘Boaz’. Melachim I 7:21

If the Molten Sea is a puzzle, the significance of the two named pillars on the portico of the Temple (Hechal) is the sod ha-sodot, the mystery of mysteries connected to the great structure.

These two bronze pillars, topped with curved capitals and festooned with a decorative motif of rimmonim (pomegranates) and shushan (lily?), are a genuine puzzle. The complex instructions concerning the capitals, in particular, using terms that appear nowhere else in the Hebrew Bible, introduce considerable uncertainty as to the final look of the pillars, as can be seen by doing a quick image search on the Internet.

Moreover, it seems that the pillars served no structural function, making them, as we would say today, "architectural features," purely decorative objects. The obvious conclusion is that these were symbolic in nature. But the exact meaning of the symbolism has eluded most commentators.

Eluded serious Biblical scholars, that is. More grandiose speculations abound. If you want to know about the role of the pillars in revealing the nefarious Masonic plot, or in warning us about 9/11, there are ample explanations, all offered with relentless certainty. But we do not offer those. So let's review.

One solution is that they are a vestigial element from pagan temple design. There is evidence that Canaanite and Phoenician temples had exterior pillars. The lily motif is one seen on other pillars in ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia.

Overlapping this is the idea, a pretty intuitive one, is that they are representation of the divine phallus, symbols of power, vitality, and fertility. Not to be dismissed, but why two? Sheer symmetry?

A slightly better explanation, in my opinion, grows out of the observation of Jon Levenson, who argues the Temple is meant to be a microcosm of the world at its Edenic, pristine phase:

The world which the Temple incarnates in a tangible way is not the world of history but the world of creation...[The Temple and the World, 297].

One can see this idea more explicitly acknowledged in Ezekiel 47, where the messianic temple resembles Eden, complete with four rivers flowing from its precincts. The Temple exemplifies the world at its primordial origin, the ideal cosmos. Therefore, just as the the Yam Mutzak symbolizes the constrained waters, the pillars would be something paired within the paired process of forming the universe (notice in the Gen. 1 account, the world is formed out of paired merisms - light and dark, water above and below, land and sea, etc). That would make them either the [implied] pillars that hold up the heavens, the cherubs who guarded Eden (Gen. 3) or the two trees that sat at the center of the garden, the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of All Things (a merism usually over-literally translated as the "Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil")

Of course the correspondence between the Genesis narrative and the Temple pillars is not absolute. If they symbolizes cherubs, why pillars at all, especially when cherubs decorate the interior of the building? and if they invoke the trees, why not more centrally located in the structure? And Genesis does not explicitly mention pillars as a feature of creation. But keep in mind, the Genesis account of the creation is not the only one found in the Hebrew Bible (Pss. 74, 104, Job 38-40), which offers several similar, but hardly identical descriptions. Ancient myths tend to have multiple, variant iterations. Cosmic pillars pop up in other Biblical passages.

Out of all these imperfect solutions, I favor the 'tree' symbolism. The pomegranate has long been a popular candidate for the 'fruit' Adam and Eve consumed (sorry, no apples in the Levant). I suspect the pillars were meant to evoke the twin pillars of divine knowledge and fertility that sustain the universe.

But what about the names? The traditional commentaries are good, sturdy, explanations:

He named the pillars to create a positive omen. They were at the entrance to the Temple, and he called them by names to create a positive omen. He called one ‘Yachin’, an expression of establishment, that the Temple should be established forever, like the phrase, ‘Like the moon, it should be established forever.’ ‘Boaz’ is an expression of strength, a contraction of ‘Bo Oz [strength within]’, meaning that God should place in it strength and endurance, as it is written, ‘HaShem will give His nation strength.’ 21 RaDaK, Melachim I 7:21

Another suggestion that makes me laugh, because its so utterly Jewish, is that these are the names of big donors to the Temple project. Sounds anachronistic, but there is a parallel tradition in rabbinic literature that there were two bronze doors in the Heikhal called "The doors of Nicanor" in honor of their funder.

I'm sticking with RaDaK for the time being, but I welcome reader solutions, so long as they revolve around Osama bin Ladin, the Illuminati, or President Obama.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Molten Sea, Chaos Tamed

2011-07-02T14:03:00.021-05:00

The Yam Mutzak, the "molten sea," the large water reservoir that stood outside the Temple in Jerusalem (I Kings 7:23), is one of the most poorly understood features of several iconic structures surrounding the Temple. The description of its exact form is subject to scholarly debate, though it is clearly a curved basin resting on twelve oxen, three facing to each cardinal compass point (rather like a bovine Zia symbol, if viewed from above).

It was seemingly inspired by the laver used by the priests ministering in the desert Mishkan to purify their hands and feet (II Chronicles 4:6). I say "seemingly," because the dimensions of the Yam Mutzak were such that, unless there was a mechanism not mentioned in the Biblical accounts, it was too big to be used as a basin for ritual washing. It is reasonable to argue that it was more symbolic than functional - but symbolic of what? The medieval Midrash states it symbolized "the world," but this seems like a somewhat lazy interpretation, and a rather awkward one at that. Kabbalah extracted elaborate meaning from its many features, almost all of them understood to allude to the sefirot. In both cases, the explanations seem like retrojections, the imposition of later ideas and concerns on an earlier phenomenon. What did it mean to the Israelites who built it and maintained it?

The basin has a Ancient Near Eastern parallel, the Apsu pool, a square tank of holy water that was found in the courtyard of Mesopotamian temples. Apsu is the tellurian "sweetwater sea" (the aquifer) that preceded and supports the earth. Mythologically, the Apsu is the home of Enki/Ea and the wellspring of creation. In one version of Mesopotamian mythology, Apsu is personified as the companion of Tiamat, the salt water sea dragon, and is destroyed by Ea. Besides being a purification device, the apsu tank probably conveyed to the entering worshipper that this sanctuary was the residence of divinity. It may be there were rituals specifically associated with the tank.

So perhaps the Sea was meant to symbolize the mythic cosmos in a similar way. So what's the specific Israelite meaning? Let's start with the name. Usually translated as "molten sea" or "cast sea," based on the adjective tzuk, "melted," this translation is reinforced elsewhere in Scriptures when it is referred to as the "bronze sea". Straight forward, but detached from any clear intellectual context. Is it a "sea" to say the world is like the sea? That's a lot of bronze for an odd analogy. Yet the word mutzak could also be derived from the Hebrew noun tzok, meaning "contraint" or "distress." From this we could plausibly call it the "constrained sea," or "bound sea."

This latter translation makes a great deal of sense to me, because one of the great mythic acts of the God of Israel is the taming of chaos, as embodied by water. God sets the boundaries of the water, allowing the land to appear (Gen. 1:9; Ps. 74:13; 104:7-8; Job 38:8-11). The bound waters are emblematic of cosmos triumphing over chaos. Thus the Yam Mutzak visually encapsulates for the Israelite worshipper the drama of divine creation just as he approaches the Temple, the edenic structure with its cherubs, trees, flowers, and the seat of Divine Presence. The Sea, then, was likely part of a mythic narrative told in architecture.

Why the oxen? Bulls, we know, were popular and widely used symbols of divine power. The Israelite northerners thought the bull to be a suitable symbol for the God of Israel despite, or perhaps because of, the whole Golden Calf incident (I Kings 12:28-31). It is a story told, with much contempt, I might add, from a Southern perspective. Yet for the modern reader it's a subtle distinction - are two calves in the sanctuary more abhorrent than twelve oxen just outside? Why are cherubs cool, but bulls out of bounds, as it were? It seems at some point, both groups used cows as a totem for the God of Israel. And at some point, this icon became problematic. And twelve? Twelve tribes of Israel, of course, in which case the oxen symbolize Israel's role in sustaining the cosmos through sacrifices and fidelity to God. Alternately, the twelve oxen could present the twelves houses of the zodiac, the celestial order that surrounds the world.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Wiki-Spirit: Open Source Judaism

2011-06-30T08:01:00.010-05:00

So there's a story coming out of Israel of a computer program that identifies authorial styles in a text with multiple authors:

http://news.yahoo.com/israeli-algorithm-sheds-light-bible-163128454.html

The test case - jumbling Ezekiel and Jeremiah passages and seeing if the program could sort them out - was a rousing success. So now they use the program to distinguish "priestly" from "non-priestly" authors in a single book.

The idea of the Scriptures being a composite work is nothing new, of course. There truly is nothing new under the sun. The Talmudic rabbis theorized that parts of books popularly credited to one author were the work of another. The classic example is the conclusion that the last twelve verses of Deuteronomy were not written by Moses, but by Joshua after the leader's death. The awareness that the Psalms are the work of multiple hands even though they were widely called "the Psalms of David" was also an accepted idea among scholarly Jews before the modern era.

It has also been discussed in Western academia for almost two hundred years, most famously in the form of the "Documentary Hypothesis" of Graf and Wellhausen. Many of the Bible teachers at my seminary, Hebrew Union College, labored for decades to identify glosses and distinct hands in the books of the Bible, working with all the fervor that medieval kabbalists once devoted to detecting the sefirot they believed were being allegorized by different Biblical narratives. Now their work can be done in minutes.

What is new, therefore, is not what we know -- all Jewish texts until just a few centuries ago, including Talmud and crucial Kabbalah texts like Bahir and Zohar were subject to this multi-author process --- but how we think about this fact. Because before the internet age, we didn't have an ideology of "Open Source" writing.

Now we have people advocating a way of working, for some a philosophy, for creating new knowledge through collaborative writing. It's the idea of "hive" knowledge that has driven things like Wikipedia. This alternative to the valorization of the heroic single author is an interesting one, a different way of thinking about information and about arriving at a wise and useful text. And it seems Jews were doing it to shape and grow our spiritual understanding from the very beginning of our quest to know and understand the Blessed Holy One. God's voice finds expression through the creative tension resulting from multiple contributions and POVs.

Call it "Open Source Spirituality" or "Wiki-God," but Jews have been its first and perhaps greatest practitioners, proving once again that that we are the oldest-newest people in the world. Perhaps too, it reinforces, in a small way, our ancient claim that Torah is, and will continue to be the faith of the future.

Mystical Ascent: Heavenly Body, Soul, and Mind

2011-06-11T09:47:00.011-05:00

Judaism has long taught the practice of the mystically projecting oneself into higher realms while still alive.

Moshe Idel identifies three types of ascents described in Jewish texts:somanoda(bodily ascent), psychanodia (soul ascent), and nousanodia (ascent of the intellect).1

Bodily ascent can itself take two diverse forms - the "taking up" of the physical body, as in the case of Elijah, or of the "spiritual body," called the guf ha-dak in Hebrew. On the other hand, the idea of projecting the intellect is a particularly medieval one, based on the Aristotilian notion that the Intellect is an attribute linking the person to the higher spheres.

Both apocalyptic literature and the New Testament (Paul, obliquely describing himself - II Cor. 12:3) make it clear that such ascensions were known of and accepted in Early Judaism. Different versions of these ascents can be found at virtual all periods of Jewish history.

Apocalyptic traditions tend to limit ascents to the mythic past; only Biblical worthies merited such experiences, figures such as Enoch, Abraham, and Moses. There is little or no indication in apocalyptic writings, however, that the experience is accessible to the contemporary reader. By contrast, the Dead Sea Scrolls (Perhaps inspired by the language of Zechariah 3:7) suggest for the first time that mingling with angelic realms is possible for the priestly elite.

Later Hekhalot literature radically “democratizes” (for lack of a better word) the possibility of mystical ascent – any intellectually and spiritually worthy person can now do it, though it is exceedingly dangerous - and offers descriptions of some of the rituals and preparations necessary for such ascents.

The German Pietists preserved and continued these practices. After the 13th Century, this journey was most often characterized as climbing the "rungs" or "degrees" of the sefirot.

Famous post-Biblical practitioners of ascent include Rabbis Akiba and Ishmael, Isaac Luria, the Baal Shem Tov, and Abraham Joshua Heschel of Apt.

As one might discern from above, terminology for the experience of entering divine realms changes over Jewish history, and has been known variously as Nichnas Pardes (Entering Paradise), Yered ha-Merkavah (Descent to Chariot), Yichud (Unificaiton) and Davekut (Cleaving).

Techniques for ascent in Jewish sources include ritual purification, immersion, fasting, study of sacred and mystical texts, sleep deprivation, reciting word mantras (especially divine names), self-isolation, and even self-mortification.

The purposes of heavenly ascension include various forms of unio mystica, sometimes in an ineffable experience, other times by a visionary enthronement before God or angelification, receiving answers to questions, the power over angels, or even gaining inspiration (for composing liturgical songs).

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

[1] Idel, Moshe, Ascensions on High in Judaism. 27-28.

Barack Obama, revelation, end of days, Justin Beiber, Jesus, rapture, anti-christ, Anthony Weiner

Eitz Hayyim: Sefer ha-Bahir on the Tree of Life II

2011-05-20T15:31:00.007-05:00

"The Tree is Really Rooted in the Sky" -Simone Weil

So I understand Terrence Malick has filmed a movie with Brad Pitt in Texas entitled The Tree of Life. Always an interesting filmmaker, I look forward to seeing it. Seems like a good moment to continue my translation of the Jewish mystical sources for that motif:

119 The Tree and the Fountainhead
The words of a man's mouth are deep waters, and the fountain of wisdom is a gushing brook (Proverbs 18:4).

What this Tree that you speak of?
He said to him, [It is the] powers of the Holy Blessed One,
one atop another, so they resemble a tree.1
Just as a tree, by water[ing], yields fruit, so too the Holy Blessed One
multiplies the powers of the Tree by water[ing].
And what is the ‘water’ of the Holy Blessed One?
It is Wisdom, and the souls of the righteous fly forth2
From the fountainhead toward the great channel,
ascend and cleave to the Tree. And by what means do they fly?
By means of Israel, for when they are righteous and good,
the Shekhinah dwells in their midst,3
and through their deeds they dwell in the bosom of the Holy Blessed One.4
He makes them fruitful and multiples them.5

1. It is the powers of the Holy Blessed One. The Sefirot.

2. The souls of the righteous fly forth. In The Tree that is All, the image was of all souls blooming/flying forth from the Tree. Here, the image is reciprocal: wisdom flows “down” the conduit of the Tree, and in response, the souls of the righteous soar “upward” to nest in various branches of the Tree. The sacred communion of Israel serves as the fountainhead, the source of wisdom below to propel the ascent.

3. The Shekhinah dwells in their midst. The Divine Presence. Alluding to Exodus 25:8. Elsewhere she personifies righteousness (75), the quality that allows her to dwell with the people.

4. They dwell in the bosom of the Holy Blessed One. Through moral and ritual perfection, Israel becomes one with the Godhead. A cosmic union is realized at several levels.

5. He makes them fruitful and multiples them. The deeds of the righteous magnify God’s presence, but also multiply righteousness itself, sustaining the tree from below. The language of fruitfulness alludes both to the procreative blessing of primordial humanity (Genesis 1:28) and the cosmic potency of wisdom (Psalms 1:3) that the Tree embodies.

To learn more, read the EJMMM, available at amazon.com. Click here - http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/sr=1-1/qid=1159997117/ref=sr_1_1/002-7116669-7231211?ie=UTF8&s=books

Barack Obama, Rapture, End of Days, Israel, prophecy, revelation

Three Jews and a Norseman: Why Thor is (almost) a MOT

2011-05-06T13:16:00.009-05:00

So my son loves, loves, loves, American comics. And you know I can't escape going to see Thor. Not a Jewish bone in his two-dimensional, four-color, Aryan-buff body, of course. Total pagan. Except....well, he is (in his alter ego) a doctor. But he also has a heck of a lot of Jewish DNA in his birth. After all, he was the love-child of three Jews - Stan Lee (the imagineer), his brother Larry Lieber (the maggid, or story-teller) and the mighty Jack Kirby (the pen-and-ink demiurge who brought him visually to life). Think of them as a Kind of Komic Kabbalah: Stan as Keter, Larry as Hokhmah, and Jack as Binah. All that Thor was and is emanates from them.

And speaking of KKK, there's another reason for Jews to go see this seeming goyisha fest: Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists hate it. As the poster above reveals, some lily-white schmucks (did I say that?) object to having a black dude guarding the gates to Asgard. They want A BOYCOTT! Owww it just makes the Jewish contrarian nudginess-sense tingle with the desire to see an integrated Norse pleroma over and over again. Of course, sense has nothing to do with any of this; the whole thought that a nice African guy somehow ruins their purity fest collapses in mind-boggling illogic when one knows the god-man Thor was immaculately conceived by three Members Of the Tribe.

Barack Obama, Rapture, End of Days, Israel, prophecy, revelation

Sefer ha-Bahir: The Tree that is All

2011-05-04T08:53:00.011-05:00

So, I'm just finishing up teaching my Kabbalah course at the University of North Texas. Great group of students, a lovely experience. My only gripe, having taught this from 2006? Teaching Sefer ha-Bahir. I'm frustrated by my translation options. Kaplan's complete translation of Margolioth is good, but his commentary is ahistorical, retrojecting later, post-Zoharic assumptions on the texts, and is basically a sefirotic version of Clue "I think its Yesod, using Malchut, in the Keter." Not terribly useful to the general learner.

I use Joseph Dan's selections found in the fine anthology Early Kabbalah (Thanks to the good Brothers at Paulist Press!). Good explanations, but he focused on a very limited number of the two-hundred portions, and he didn't even address many of what I consider te most interesting passages.

So that has meant this year I started writing my own translations and commentary for the students. Its been interesting and fun. I'm going to throw a few up here on the blog now that my focus on the class is winding down. I thought I'd start with a recurrent topic we discussed in class, the Eitz Hayyim, the Tree of life. So here's the first of two Bahir passages, with brief commentary below:

She is a Tree of Life for those who embrace her, and whoever holds on to her is happy (Proverbs 3:18)

I the Lord make all; I alone stretch out the sky, the earth spreads out from Me (Isaiah 44:24).
[Read the last word as] Who is with me?1
I [alone] am the one that planted this tree for all the world to delight in it.2
And through it I spread all. I called its name All, for everything depends on it,
everything goes forth from it, everything requires it, looks to it, waits for it,3
And from there the souls blossom in joy.4
I was alone when I made it.
No angel excels above it who can say “I preceded you!”5
I was also alone when I spread out my earth in which I planted and rooted this tree.4
I rejoiced in unity and I rejoiced in them,
Who was with me that I revealed to him this mystery?6

1. Who is with me? In Hebrew a minor emendation, mi eeti rather than meiti.

2. This tree. The Tree of Life, which is also the Sefirot.

3. I called its name All. The Tree is the totality of all there is. The cosmic Tree of Life is not only a biblical motif (Genesis 2,3, Proverbs 3) but a cross-cultural one.

4. Souls blossom in joy. All consciousness is connected to it. The Human soul is the fruit of the Tree. Elsewhere (section 180) this generative power is specifically located with the sefirah Yesod. There is also wordplay at work, porekh can mean "blossom" or "fly." So there is simultaneously an arboreal and avian vector to the idea of the soul. In the next passage (112), we will see the avian element fore-fronted.

5. No angel excels above it. The Tree pre-exists all spiritual as well as physical reality.

6. My earth in which I planted…this tree. Elsewhere (96) “earth” is revealed to be a code word for the Throne of Glory, the substrate of reality. These two pre-existent entities form the matrix of the universe. Without doubt there is also a syzergy here, a sense of the Tree and the Earth as a masculine/feminine pairing that yields universal fertility and generativity.

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The Secrets: Not Your Run-of-the-Mill Kabbalistic, Lesbian Yeshiva Coming-of-Age Movie

2011-04-25T14:33:00.008-05:00

So, while in Israel with my congregation this past December, I had many phenomenal experiences. But one that took a little time to rattle around in my head was our Shabbat evening in Jerusalem. As we made our way through the Jewish Quarter after Kabbalat Shabbat at the Western Wall, we were overtaken by a a group of two-score Dati (Orthodox) school girls. And these teens were singing. Beautifully. Sounds like no big deal to the uninitiated, but sadly, the first thing I thought to do when I realized who the singers were was to look around at the mass of Dati men flowing around them and gauge their reaction. There were, without question, sneers and hostile looks, but mostly there was indifference; men chatted with men, seemingly unaffected. What a sea change. Twenty years I ago when I lived and moved among the Dati, I never heard women seminarians sing, under any circumstances. A revolution had started between then and now. It was, in retrospect a hopeful highlight of my trip.

So I was excited to discover a great 2006 Israeli film, Sodot, or in English, The Secrets, that captures the struggle for women's spiritual equality in Orthodoxy. Set in a woman's yeshiva, it's the story of two girls: a brilliant but emotionally closed down daughter of a rabbi, and a disaffected wild-child sent to Safed the way we send troubled children to military school. As you can tell, forbidden (sort of) love blossoms between the two, but that really isn't the most compelling element of the story. As the film truthfully reveals, these kinds of relationships, self-discovery for some, transitional for others, are pretty commonplace in such same-sex institutions for the young. This is not a film about Lesbianism (not that there's anything wrong with that).

For me the real meat of the story is the involvement of the two girls in helping a terminal woman, recently released from prison, seeking absolution for her past transgressions. Too out-of-the-box for the Orthodox community to embrace her, she finds solace in these girls guiding her through a series of rituals of teshuvah and kabbalistically flavored tikkunim ("soul repairs"). I can't vouch for the pure authenticity of these scenes, but what I loved was the reverence shown to the process. It was genuinely moving. Unlike many Hollywood portrayals of the Ultra-Orthodox world, the script and director showed not only a serious respect for the culture of Dati Judaism, but were able to capture much of its beauty on film. The director had a discerning eye for the spiritual power of Dati life, even as he offers a strong (but not brow-beating) feminist critique. I'm sure many Orthodox viewers would find plenty to object to, from the naked women shown in a mikvah to the repeated, uncensored speaking of Elohim and Adonai, but as someone who bridges the religious ans secular world, I found this movie both compelling and, at times, inspiring.

Sheol, Gehinnom, Gehenna: Hell in Judaism

2011-04-14T10:28:00.006-05:00

Many times on this site I have mentioned that Judaism does not teach a doctrine of eternal damnation. Now I've noticed more Christian ministers are very publicly having these same Judaic thoughts - Bishop Drew Pearson a few years back, Paster Rob Bell this year, for example. Welcome to Torah, guys!

Since I have inquiries about this, let's look at the sources. First, in most of the Hebrew Bible there is only sheol ("the grave"), the destination of all souls, regardless of their moral state.

[Bookplate by Ephraim Lilien]

It is not until the later books fo the Hebrew canon that we start to hear the idea that there are different destinations in the afterlife. Now if you search non-canonical Jewish sources (apocalyptic literature, for example), the theme of the wicked being fated to eternal suffering in fire and ice appears repeatedly. Indeed, it is from this thread of Jewish thinking from around 100BCE - 100CE that Christianity, and later Isl

am, derive their doctrines of eternal damnation. But Judaism ultimately rejects this idea as incongruent with a God who both just (infinite punishment for a finite life of sin?) and compassionate. There is also an element of God being conscious of sharing responsiblity for our moral shortcoming. God designed us with this potential to sin built in, so how can the Creator totally fault the creation for acting within specs? (see RaSHI's commentary on Hagigah 15b,* for example, or the famous parable on Cain and Able in Genesis Rabbah 22:9). So what you find in rabbinic texts is the notion of Gehinnom (Gehenna in Yiddish/English), a kind of purgatory in which the soul is purified before it returns to God. What is Gehinnom? R. Joshua b. Levi stated: Gehinnom has seven names, and they are: Nether-world (or 'Sheol'), Destruction, Pit (or, 'pit of destruction'), Tumultuous Pit, Miry Clay, Shadow of Death and the Underworld. 'Nether-world', since it is written in Scripture: Out of the belly of the nether-world cried I, and Thou heardest my voice (Jonah 2.3); 'Destruction', for it is written in Scripture: Shall Thy Mercy be declared in the grave? Or thy faithfulness in destruction (Psa 88.12); 'Pit', for it is written in Scripture: For Thou wilt not abandon thy soul to the nether-world; neither wilt Thou suffer Thy godly one to see the pit (Psa 16.10); 'Tumultuous Pit' and 'Miry Clay', for it is written in Scripture: He brought me up also out of the tumultuous pit, out of the miry clay (Psa 40.3); 'Shadow of Death', for it is written in Scripture: Such as sat in darkness and in the shadow of death (Psa 107.10); and the [name of] 'Nether-world' is a tradition. But are there no more [names]? (to Gehinnom) Is there not in fact that of Gehinnom? — [This means,] a valley that is as deep as the valley of Hinnom and into which all go down for gratuitous acts. Is there not also the name of Hearth, since it is written in Scripture: For a hearth is ordered of old? (Isa 30.33) — That [means] that whosoever is enticed by his evil inclination will fall therein (Erbin 19b) Is there a duration to the punishment? Beit Shammai taught: There are three groups – one is destined for eternal life, another consigned to eternal ignominy and eternal abhorrence (these are the thoroughly wicked) while those whose deeds are balanced will go down to Gehinnom, but when they scream they will ascend fro there and are healed…but Beit Hillel taught: [God is] rich in kindness’ (Ex. 34:6) [He is] inclined toward mercy (Tosefta Sanhedrin 13:3) This argument is reiterated elsewhere in the Talmud over the most wicked people the Rabbis could imagine – the generation that drove God to undo creation: The generation of the Flood have no share in the World-to-Come (M. Sanh. 10:3) 'The judgment on the generation of the Flood was for twelve months, on Job for twelve months, on the Egyptians for twelve months, on Gog and Magog in the Hereafter for twelve months, and on the wicked in Gehinnom for twelve months. (M. Eduyot 2:10; Gen. Rabbah 28:8) In the end, Hillel’s opinion prevails (as it always does). The punishing afterlife is temporal; there is no eternal punishment: Rabbi Akiba said:…The duration of the punishment of the wicked in Gehinnom is twelve months. (Shabbat 33b) If there are any unredeemable souls, their fate is annihilation and non-being, not eternal torment: After 12 months, their body is consumed and their soul is burned and the wind scatters them under the soles of the feet of the righteous (Rosh Hashanah 17a) In addition, the tradition tells us that souls in Gehenna also get Shabbat and holidays off (thanks to the reader who reminded me of that)

A Medieval dissent (but its still not forever):

The wicked stay in Gehinnom till the resurrection, and then the Messiah, passing through it redeems them. (Emek Hammelech, f. 138, 4)

How to avoid Gehenna:

He who has Torah, good deeds, humility, and fear of heaven will be spared from punishment [in Gehinnom] (Pesikta Rabbati 50:1)

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

* It's a little obscure, so here's the gist. Hagigah describes God grieving over the execution of a criminal - "My [God's] arm is too heavy for me (Hagigah 15b)" [why is God so distressed?]...for I have created this one who died on account of sin (RaSHI).

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Tsorekha Gevoha: Jewish Theurgy in Kabbalah

2011-04-12T09:44:00.004-05:00

In my earlier post of the desires of God, I indicated that Jewish mysticism assumes God 'needs' humanity. This goes beyond the theological question of the passiblity of God (whether God is affected at all by human action). The Kabbalists believe God is, in a very real sense, 'dependant' upon us. This overlaps with another aspect of Jewish thought (one that extends well beyond the mystical), the taamei mitzvot, the 'reasons for the commandments.'

[For healing, apply mitzvot here - repeat as necessary. Illustration from Illan Gadol]

The TaNaKH is fickle about explaining the purpose of commandments. Sometimes an explanation of an individual command is offered (why for example, taking bribes is forbidden), sometimes the reason approaches the self-evident (why we shouldn't murder), but often, no explanation for a particular commandment is forthcoming at all (much of the sacrificial system, for example, is mandated without any clear rationale).

The Rabbis attempt to explain the rationale for many of the mitzvot, but again, there is not a lot of effort to offer a systemic theory of the mitzvot, except perhaps this: "Israel is beloved by God, for He surrounded them with mitzvot: tefillin upon their heads and arms, tzitzit upon their garments…This can be compared to a king of flesh and blood who said to his wife: 'Adorn yourself with all your jewelry [I gave you] so that you will be desirable to me” So too the Holy Blessed One says to Israel, “Distinguish yourself with mitzvot so you will be desirable to me.” (Sifrei Deut. 36) In other words, the Rabbis include the mitzvot in their erotic theology: In love God gives us the commandments as ornaments of His love. When Israel wears (performs) them, it enhances God's desire for us.

The rationalists, who generally assume God's impassiblity (God is not subject to human influence) regard the commandments to be entirely for our benefit - they mold us into virtuous people, maintain our social and unique identity, etc. Maimonides is the apotheosis of this approach. Moreover, RaMBaM believes that the rationale for every commandment is discernable. If we can't come up with a logical moral, social, or intellectual purpose for a particular commandment, we simply haven't applied enough brain power to the question. This is the attitude toward the commandments that gives birth to the 'hygiene' theory of kashrut - we separate meat from milk to make better distribution of available proteins, or we don't eat pork, shellfish, etc, because we intuit that these food contain harmful substances.

The early mystics found such rationalizations troubling, because once you figure out how to address the 'rationale" (i.e., cook your pork thoroughly and render it safe), the commandment loses its force. And they were all about keeping the fabric of the commandments a whole cloth. So they made an entirely different argument. No only is God subject to human influence, there is a tserokha gevoha - 'a need on high.' The mitzvot don't just help us, they help God. This is baldly stated in the 13th Century mystical treatise Sha'arei Orah, Gates of Light, when Joseph Gilkatilla, the author, asks rhetorically, "Doesn't one see that the lower worlds have power to build or destroy the worlds above?"[1]

This is grabbing the other end of the stick from the radically transcendent and immutable God of much rationalist philosophy. But, rational or not, what this does, religiously, is make the commandments really compelling. It is the cosmic equivalent of Jewish mother's guilt: "So, if you don't do what I ask, it's not like the world's going to come to an end....except it will!" "Go ahead, don't worry about Me, I'm only your Creator!" Thus in Sefer Bahir we read: We learned: There is a single pillar extending from heaven to earth, and its name is Righteous (Tzadik). [This pillar] is named after the righteous. When there are righteous people in the world, then it becomes strong, and when there are not, it becomes weak. It supports the entire world, as it is written, "And Righteousness is the foundation of the world." If it becomes weak, then the world cannot endure. Therefore, even if there is only one righteous person in the world, it is he who supports the world. It is therefore written, "And a righteous one is the foundation of the world." [102] This logic of sustaining and healing God through righteous deeds creates great incentive for zealous, precise, even exuberant observance. On the other hand, it somewhat stifles innovation (change may diminish the potency of the ritual act) and create a certain degree of religious OCD.

1. Gates of Light, Avi Weinstein, trans. (Harper-Collins, 1994), p. 62.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Adam Kadmon II: The Human Cosmos, Conduit of Light

2011-04-08T04:29:00.003-05:00

We learned in my earlier post that the Rabbis believed Adam Kadmon embodied and exemplified the creation. The medieval Bible commentator Abraham ibn Ezra wrote, One who knows the secret of the human soul and the structure of the human body is able to understand something of the upper worlds, for the human body is the image of a microcosm. (Commentary on Exodus 25:40). [Illustration from the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism]. While he plays a mythic role in rabbinic thought, Adam Kadmon occupies an even more important place in Jewish mystical cosmology. This ‘heavenly man’ of antiquity becomes a prominent aspect of many subsequent Kabbalistic systems. In some, Adam Kadmon is a macroanthropos that signifies the totality of the Sefirot. In classic Kabbalah, the ten sefirot are often shown superimposed on the figure of the Adam Kadmon to represent his mediating role between God and creation – he is simultaneously the embodiment of divine attributes as well as the place of the universe (Zohar II:48a, 70b). In Lurianic Kabbalah, he is the first force that fills primordial space after the supernal light of God is withdrawn. Chayyim Vital elaborates on this theme, seeing Adam Kadmon as a kind of “world soul” and finds repetitions of him at each stage of the chain of creation (Etz Chayyim). He also teaches that various facets of the all subsequent human souls are derived from different “limbs” of Adam Kadmon and that the traits and qualities in a given soul reflect the location from which they were derived (Sefer ha-Hezyonot). Most mystics who include the Adam Kadmon in their system see the Jewish project as bringing a restoration of humanity to the state of Adam Kadmon. Mythically, the concept of Adam Kadmon has served Jewish mystics in their efforts to exalt and emphasize the divine aspect of humanity. Conversely, the concept has also elevated the status of the human body. Seizing upon a verse from Job, "In my flesh, I see God," the Kabbalists see the human body as a potentially supernal vessel, the ultimate theater in which the drama of divine redemption unfolds. Rather then retreat from the body and its appetites and its functions, as some religious traditions do, Jewish mysticism encourages us to cultivate an embodied spirituality. To learn more, read the EJMMM, available at amazon.com. Click here - http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/sr=1-1/qid=1159997117/ref=sr_1_1/002-7116669-7231211?ie=UTF8&s=books

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Adam Kadmon I: Spiritual Man, Primordial Being

2011-03-26T11:54:00.003-05:00

[illustration: The Creation of Man by E.M. Lilien]

A reader asked if the Jewish concept of Adam Kadmon that I mentioned in my earlier posting was the inspiration for the Christian concept of the “Mystical Body of Christ.” It’s an excellent question. In fact, we see what appears to be a statement by Paul (I Corinthians 15:45-50) about the Christ that has strong echoes of the Adam Kadmon tradition:

So, too, it is written, "The first man, Adam, became a living being," the last Adam a life-giving spirit. But the spiritual was not first; rather the natural and then the spiritual.
The first man was from the earth, earthly; the second man, from heaven. As was the earthly one, so also are the earthly, and as is the heavenly one, so also are the heavenly.
Just as we have borne the image of the earthly one, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly one.

What is most striking to me is Paul’s insistence on the “order” of being. Paul pointedly states the “spiritual Adam” was not first. I take that to mean that Paul is making sure his readers understand that what he is teaching is markedly different from what they might assume. And that indicates to me that Paul is both aware of and modifying for his own theologic purpose an already well-known doctrine of a “spiritual Adam” that people believed preceded the earthly Adam. Since Jesus came millenia after human creation, Paul finds it necessary for the spiritual Adam be the culmination of humanity, rather then its origin. So in response to the question, all in all, I would think that this idea of being incorporated into the "body of Christ" is likely a specifically Christian re-retooling of the Jewish esoteric doctrine.

The concept that there is a primordial man that encompasses all humanity (indeed, the entire universe) probably has its first basis neither in Judaism or Christianity, but in the Platonic theory of “forms,” the belief that there exists an ideal form of all the varied forms that manifest themselves in the material world. Thus, while there may be many types of chairs (swivel, French provincial, Stichley, folding, La-Z-boy), they all share an essential “chairness,” a quality that Platonic thought would say emanates from the ideal form of “chair.” Likewise, despite the obvious enormous variety of humans (Male, female, caucasian, negroid, dwarf, giant, etc.), there must be an essential, transcendant model of humanness that encompasses all these possibilities.

Esoteric Judaism developed this in the most elaborate and imaginative way:

The [human] body is composed in two worlds: the Lower World and the Supernal World (Zohar 2:23b)

and discovers it to be present in the two Biblical narratives of the creation of humanity (Gen. 1 vs. 2:6 >). Thus the Adam Kadmon (“Primordial Human”) - Also called Adam Elyon or Adam Ila’ah - the supernal, first creation of God that is made in the divine image is specifically described in Gen 1:26-27 (and not to be conflated with the humans created in 2:6-24). It is he that is the true “image of God,” a majestic vessel of divine glory, the ideal human (Deut. 4:32; PdRK 4:4, 12:1, Lev. R. 20:2). All earthly humans (Gen. 2-3) are in his image (B.B.58a). When he was created, in fact, he was so awesome the angels mistook him for God and began to worship him

Said Rabbi Hiyya: "When the Holy One created man to dwell upon the earth, he formed him after the likeness of Adam Kadmon, the heavenly man. When the angels gazed upon him [Adam Kadmon], they exclaimed: 'You have made him almost equal to God and crowned him with glory and honor.' After the transgression and fall of Adam, it is said the Holy One was grieved at heart because it gave occasion for repeating what they had said at his creation, 'What is man that You should be mindful of him, or the son of man that You should visit him.'" (Ps vii. 5.)

According to the Midrash, Adam Kadmon is androgynous, incorporating all the aspects of both genders (Gen. 1:27 can actually be translated thus, though it usually isn't). Inspired by the description of man extending from one end of heaven to the other (Deut. 4:32), he is also a macrocosm, extending from one end of the universe to the other and containing all creation:

The rabbis taught: The creation of the world was like the creation of humanity, for everything that God created in the world, God created in the human being. The heavens are the head of humankind, the sun and the moon are the human eyes, the stars are the hair on the human head (Otzar haMidrashim, Olam Katan 406).

For more on the rabbinic understanding of Adam Kadmon, see Gen. R. 8:1; Lev. R. 14:1, Chag. 12b, 14b.

To learn more, read the EJMMM, available at amazon.com. Click here - http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/sr=1-1/qid=1159997117/ref=sr_1_1/002-7116669-7231211?ie=UTF8&s=books

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The Adjustment Bureau: More Jewish Angels?

2011-03-07T14:30:00.010-06:00

[Couldn't find an angel in a trilby, so I found a trilby with an angel on it]

(This article has a spoiler alert - don't read if you want to be surprised)

Just returned from seeing the movie The Adjustment Bureau. Well done. Damon and Blunt have good chemistry. It has Jon Stewart. Moreover, the plot - that there are unseen agents, slightly sinister, slightly less than omnipotent, not-quite omniscient enforcers of a higher order called "the plan," an order that controls many events, but hardly all, and mingles constantly with chance - is not so far removed from Jewish notions of the angelic. In fact this is a great movie with a religious theme that doesn't beat you over the head with religion, just the way I like it. More Stranger than Fiction than Left Behind, one can watch it for the pure entertainment value, of which there is a lot, but there is also a message for those willing to receive it.

Even better, the "adjustment" dudes (I'd call them angels) are more Jewish - even the WASPy ones - then most hollywood angels, and its not just because they wear fedoras like stylish Haredim. So what makes these entities MOTs? In most movies, the angels are either Christian or anti-Christian. They are unbendingly moralistic, completely humorless, relentless destroyers, fallen or not, good or evil. Many hollywood angels, even the ones in divine service, are effectively demonic (take Christopher Walker in Prophecy). In Jewish sources, especially in the Hechalot texts, but in other Jewish sources as well, angels are fearsome, stern, but not in constant battle with demonic realms. In fact, devils hardly factor into many legends. The Hechalot texts, especially, are all but bereft of the demonic. God reigns, angels are divine agents, and the only spiritual force who can thwart in angel (as in this movie) is a human being.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Brit Milah: Fast Track to Eden

2011-03-01T17:42:00.001-06:00

In one of his more memorable shticks, the Jewish comedian Buddy Hackett would declare, "I know I'm going to heaven because a piece of my dick already went ahead of me."

Crudely put, for sure, but it's a sentiment remarkably in tune with one Jewish mystical tradition regarding the significance of brit milah, ritual circumcision. The meaning of this most arcane of Jewish aboriginal customs has largely eluded many modern Jews. Most people are reduced to saying either:

1) We do to maintain the traditions of our people, or...
2) God told us to do it, so we do it, or...
3) I want all the men in my family to match.

In the Torah itself, it is evident that the practice was thought to bring a measure of physical and spiritual protection (Ex. 4). In a piquant legend along these lines, when the fish who swallowed Jonah is about to be eaten by Leviathan, Jonah flashes the great sea monster and Leviathan flees from the sign of the covenant (I'd be startled too). The fish then releases Jonah in gratitude (PdRE 10).

But the medieval mystics of the Rhineland found another rationale - that circumcision ensures same-day service entry into Eden in the World to Come. How can they claim such a thing?

They demonstrate this is via a remarkably clever display of close reading of the Bible. For they take the wording of Deut. 30:12, "Who among us will ascend into heaven?", ignore the context (it's a rhetorical declaration that one need not enter heaven to know God's will), and instead examine the Hebrew to discover an occult message. Lo and behold, they find one. They note that the first letter of each word in the phrase,

מי יעלה לנו השמימה

spells MILaH, (circumcision). So, "Who among us will ascend into heaven?" The verse, it is claimed, provides its own answer - those who have been circumcised (Eleazar of Worms, commentary on Deut. 30:12)!

Not that those without the seal of the covenant (gentiles and women, for example) won't eventually get to Eden. Brit Milah, however, ensures one takes the short cut [pun intended]. Thus for the trimmed there will be no temporary stop in Gehenna, the Jewish purgatory (Gen. R. 21:9; Er. 19a).

Incidentally, the same interpretation also discovers the four-letter name of God,

מי יעלה לנו השמימה

in the last letters of each word of the same phrase. This in turn provides an explanation (beyond the shape of the letter) for why later Kabbalists associate the Hebrew letter Yod (the first letter of the Divine name) with the phallus.

Zal g'mor - to own the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism, go to: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Mystical Jewish Prayer: The Angelic Astrologic Esotericism of Shabbat Morning

2011-02-24T21:19:00.004-06:00

[Jewish mosaic with zodiac and angels]

The Reform movement to which I belong got its start out of a desire among Western Jews to reform the siddur (Jewish prayer book). Our efforts to streamline Jewish worship led to many a piyyut [1] getting the boot. One prayer recited on Shabbat mornings that was eliminated was El Adon, a praise of God’s celestial power that came from the circle of Jewish ecstatics known as the Merkavah mystics [Bar Ilan, Sitrei Tefillah v' Hekhalot, 1987, pp. 115-120]. Well, it's back. The new Reform siddur, Mishkan Tefillah, has returned El Adon to its place on Shabbat mornings (p. 314), though slightly edited. This provides us an occasion to examine its esoteric theology. Like Shir ha-Kavod, which I discuss in another entry, this is an alphabetic acrostic poem. This prayer, however, focuses not on the theology of the Glory (though it does mention it), but on the angelic hosts and their equivalences to the celestial bodies. The association of angels with stars and planets was common in late antiquity. It is, for example, a major feature of the Hebrew magical text known as Sefer ha-Razim. This idea provides a monotheistic rationale for the otherwise pagan astrological belief that the stars influence the mortal realms – the stars and constellations, these writers are saying, are actually angels and messengers of divine will. The Merkavah adepts were obsessed with angels, their titles, and their powers. Texts associated with them (often dubbed Hekhalot texts) focus on how the angels praise God and how the initiate can both imitate and manipulate God's angelic agents. It is also interesting that there are carefully crafted numerological [gematria] features to this prayer. Verses have 10, 8, or 12 words. The first two stiches of five words, making a verse of ten equals the number of utterances that God made to form creation (Avot 5.1). The nine lines in the middle consist of 8 words, adding up to 72, a number signifying the most powerful of God’s names. The final two stiches are six words each, the complete verse of 12 represents the total houses of the zodiac, summarizing the 'celestial' theme of the poem. God, Master of all creation

Blessed and praised is He by all that breaths

His greatness and goodness fill the universe

knowledge and wisdom surround him (Prov. 3:19)

He is exalted above the holy beasts [2],

And adorned in glory above the chariot [3]

Merit and Justice stand before His throne

Love and Mercy are before His glory (Ps. 89:15) [4] Goodly are the luminaries which our God created,

made with Knowledge, Wisdom and Insight

He gave them power and energy

To have dominion over the world

Full of splendor they radiate brightness;

beautiful is their brilliance throughout the world

They rejoice in their rising and exult in their setting (Ps. 19:6)

performing with reverence the will of their Creator (Ps. 103:21)[5]

Glory and honor do they give to His name,

And joyous song to his majestic fame

He called forth the sun, and it shone;

He saw fit to regulate the form of the moon

All the hosts of heaven give him praise (Ps. 148:2-3);

Splendor and Greatness, the Seraphim and Ofanim and Holy Beasts [6].

[1] Liturgical poems, many of them post-Biblical, post-Talmudic compositions. The Reform movement gave Biblical and Talmudic works priority in their editing of the liturgy. [2] Hayyot are beasts that attend upon God’s throne. Mentioned in Ezekiel chapter 1, they may or may not be synonymous with cherubs. [3] The Merkavah is God’s chariot-throne, also mentioned in Ez. 1. Standing [or sitting] in the divine presence before the throne was the major visionary goal of the Merkavah mystics. [4] The reified figures of these abstract values (wisdom, insight, merit, justice, love, and mercy) are sometimes described as arrayed around the throne, and some writers have treated them as if they are angelic beings. [5] It is not uncommon to find an element of animism/spiritism in Jewish religious thought. The Psalms speak of mountains, rivers, and other geographic features as sentient beings. Here the sun and the moon are conscious of their roles and as consciously offering praise to their creator. Personification is, of course, a common literary technique, but I think this goes beyond rhetoric. A more philosophically oriented reading would call such language poetic panentheism. [6] The last line of praises and angels is awkward, linguistically speaking. That’s because the key words - Shevach notnim...kol tz'va marom... were selected so each word starts with the initial of one of the five planets visible to the ancients: SHabbatai, Nogah, Kokhav, TZedek, and Mo’odam were the Hebrew names for Saturn, Venus, Mercury, Jupiter and Mars. The string of angelic titles at the end adds three non-astrological angelic entities to the mix. Lists of angels, seemingly thrown into a line for no clear purpose, is actually a mark of authorship by the merkavah mystics. Zal G'mor: To learn more, consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism - http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Leviathan I: The Cosmic Sea Dragon of the Bible

2011-02-23T08:56:00.001-06:00

Among the scattered numinous creatures mentioned in the Hebrew Scriptures (Angels, lilot, satyrs), few have captured the imagination more than the great monster, Leviathan (Leviyatan). In Job, God reminds the long-suffering, angry Job of his humble place in the cosmos with an extended meditation on the mighty creature, itself a subordinate creation of God:

Can you draw out Leviathan by a fishhook? Can you press down his tongue by a rope? Can you put a ring through his nose, or pierce his jaw with a barb?....His strong scales are his pride, shut up as with a tight seal. One is so near to another that no air can come between them. They are joined one to another; they clasp each other and cannot be separated. His sneezes flash forth light, and his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning. Out of his mouth go burning torches; sparks of fire leap forth. Out of his nostrils smoke goes forth as from a boiling pot and burning rushes.His breath kindles coals, and a flame goes forth from his mouth. In his neck lodges strength, and dismay leaps before him. The folds of his flesh are joined together, firm on him and immovable.His heart is as hard as a stone, even as hard as a lower millstone. When he raises himself up, the mighty fear; because of the crashing they are bewildered. The sword that reaches him cannot avail, nor the spear, the dart or the javelin. He regards iron as straw, bronze as rotten wood. The arrow cannot make him flee; slingstones are turned into stubble for him. Clubs are regarded as stubble; he laughs at the rattling of the javelin. His underparts are like sharp potsherds; he spreads out like a threshing sledge on the mire. He makes the depths boil like a pot; he makes the sea like a jar of ointment. Behind him he makes a wake to shine; one would think the deep to be gray-haired. Nothing on earth is like him, one made without fear. He looks on everything that is high; he is king over all the sons of pride. ( Job 40: 25-26; 41:15-32).

One actually gets a pretty clear imagine of Leviathan: some kind of fire-breathing, sea going creature, part dragon (Out of his mouth go burning torches; sparks of fire leap forth. Out of his nostrils smoke goes forth as from a boiling pot and burning rushes. His breath kindles coals, and a flame goes forth from his mouth) and part halibut (he spreads out like a threshing sledge on the mire). Most importantly, he seems truly majestic (His sneezes flash forth light, and his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning...He makes the depths boil like a pot).

Why would God make such a creature? In fact, the Hebrew Leviathan (or Rahav - there seems to be two names for this creature) may be a semi-tamed version of the terrible chaos monster mentioned in surrounding pagan mythologies - Lotan, Prince Sea, or Tiamat. This dragon personifies chaos, disorder, and entropy. In most accounts, the gods must slay this primordial monster in order for cosmos, orderly existence, to become possible.

The Bible reworks this myth in monotheistic terms. God contains chaos within this creature, subduing it. Chaos is not destroyed, but delimited. When God stops His part in the creative process, He declares the universe to be tov meod, "very good" - but not perfect. The world, according to this Biblical myth, is orderly on many levels, but residual bits of chaos linger, most visibly in the realm of the moral. As Jon Levenson notes in his book on Biblical myth, Creation and the Persistence of Evil, God's mishpat, literally "justice" but with the connotation of "divine plan," is not yet fully realized. We, God's junior partners, His co-creators, have our part to do in establishing mishpat at the societal level. If we fully embrace this partnership, then God responds reciprocally (as the Zohar puts it, "A quickening below triggers a quickening above") and in time the cumulative result is that God will finally wipe away this last remnant of chaos in creation,

In that day the Lord will punish, With His great, cruel, mighty sword Leviathan the Elusive Serpent-- Leviathan the Twisting Serpent; He will slay the Dragon of the sea.' (Isaiah 27:1)

and existence will be perfected. Rabbinic literature tells us a great deal more about Leviathan, but that will have to wait for a coming post, Leviathan II.

To learn more, consult Abyss, Chaos, Dragon, Leviathan, and Water in the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism.

Look up the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism available at Amazon. http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/sr=1-1/qid=1159997117/ref=sr_1_1/002-7116669-7231211?ie=UTF8&s=books

[Illustration: Border design by E.M. Lilien in Die Bucher der Bibel ]

Barack Obama, Rapture, End of Days, Israel, prophecy, revelation

Trial by Ordeal: Divine Tests in Jewish Tradition

2011-02-15T08:56:00.005-06:00

Anybody who has sat through a particularly contentious synagogue board meeting knows that Jews still practice the ancient custom of trial by ordeal. But this is about the only example still surviving. The Rabbis prefer judicial methods that involve evidence, witness testimony, and the examination of the word of law over the examination of divine responses in determining who and what is right (Baba Metziah 59b).

Yet before the Talmudic period, trial by ordeal popped up, both in the sacred past, but also in at least one legal ritual. An ordeal is a ritualized test that one or both litigants must undergo to be vindicated. We are most familiar with the concept through "ordeal by combat": let the two litigants hack it out, and the gods (or God) will ensure the righteous party will win. Yeah, I bet that concept was just as suspect to the participants as it is to you and me. Napoleon got it right when he said, "God sides with the big battalions." I also know you are thinking about David and Goliath. Indeed, David may have framed that fight as a test of truth and right, but Goliath and I would agree it was really a championship bout for a symbolic victory, just as such contests were in Homer. I wonder how many people assumed these one-on-one contests established the right or wrong of the fight (maybe the winners did).

No, ordeals in the Bible involve inviting God to reveal the truth of the matter through a non-violent test. Examples include determining who should have leadership, such as the face off of Moses vs. Korah (Num. 16), or the dueling staves between Aaronites vs. the other tribes (Num. 17:16-26). Ordeal is also used to select who was worthy to fight for God in a milchamah mitzvah - a divinely ordained war (Judges 7).

Still, none of these are actually formal judicial proceedings. These were one-time crisis tests. The only example of a true legal ordeal appears, not surprisingly, in the book of Numbers, where most of the ordeal stories are recorded. In Numbers 5 we read about the Sotah. In this trial, a wife suspected of infidelity (it may be she had to be pregnant, the text is unclear), she is required to drink a potion made up of earth from the Temple grounds combined with a written curse - possibly written in the earth itself - that has been dissolved in living water. If she is guilty, she (or the fetus) will die and so, as it were, "return to dust." If innocent, the power of the potion would make her pregnant, or, alternatively, the resulting child from the existing pregnancy will "be like Abraham" (Mishna Sotah 2:2; Sotah 17a). This link to Abraham may be because of his righteousness, because God made him endure ten 'tests,' and/or because he once trod on the Temple grounds, infusing the earth with his holiness.

The ordeal of the Sotah was abolished from Jewish judicial practice very early in the Talmudic period, but became the model for magical potions and formulae in Jewish and Christian magic, which often require the adept to write a divine name or incantation on an edible object or dissolves the words in water and drink them.

The Angelus Interpres in Jewish Tradition

2011-02-08T08:48:00.005-06:00

The term Angelus Interpres ("The interpreting angel") is not Hebrew, but the
concept certainly is. An angelus interpres is an entity who helps a prophet or other mortal experiencing a revelation to make sense of it. Seems that divine messages often come in garments that conceal their full import - surreal visual images, obscure oracles, or the like, and some explanation is necessary, rather like how when Americans sit through a Moliere play, they need a pamphlet to explain why it's funny.

[Zechariah confronts an angel, painting by James Tissot]

Probably through the influence of priestly spirituality (Isaiah, Ezekiel, and Zechariah were all priests), these angels become a prominent aspect of later prophecy (for a fully discussion of the affinity of Priests for angels, read Rachel Elior's The Three Temples). For example, Ezekiel (40:3-44:4, where an angel guides him through the messianic Temple), Daniel (7:16; 8:16-19; 9:22; 10:14), and Zechariah (chapters 1-6) - these books all feature angels who assist these respective prophets in understanding the visions bestowed upon them. Zechariah is my favorite, primarily because the explanations are at times as opaque as the visions themselves (check out Ch. 4).

We also see these angels in non-Biblical sources, especially apocalyptic writings (many of them also priestly compositions), such as the Book of Enoch. Scholars have offered various theories as to why the angel becomes important, most arguing that as the Biblical period draws to a close, there is a greater sense of God's exalted transcendence, that it is felt an intermediary entity must interface between a perfect God and imperfect humanity. This is the same attitude that made other kinds of divine intermediaries, like the logos, the memra, Wisdom, or Jesus, necessary in the minds of some Greco-Roman believers.

In Judaism, there emerges a kind of "parenthetical" concept of prophecy - that while prophecy brackets the time before and after our time (the Biblical period and the Messianic Age), we live in a period of history when prophecy no longer functions. Here's a diagram:

biblical age prophecy (........now........)messianic age prophecy

Still, lesser forms of revelation continue to be available to us.

Post Biblically, there are any number of entities who can interpret the world for humans - sarei chalom (dream angels), maggidim (spirit guides), ibburim (the spirits of the righteous dead), and bat kols (echoes from heaven). But by far the most common and well known is Elijah, the angel of the convenant. Elijah appears frequently in rabbinic tradition, either to tell what is happening in the celestial spheres, to help someone make sense of an experience, or even to comment on controversies of Jewish law, as in this passage:

[in arguing over the rights of a concubine….] R. Abiathar said [so-and-so], and R. Jonathan said [so-and-so] R. Abiathar soon afterwards came across Elijah and said to him: 'What is the Holy One, blessed be He, doing?' and he answered, 'He is discussing the question of the concubine in Gibea.' 'What does He say?' said Elijah: '[He says], My son Abiathar says So-and-so, and my son Jonathan says So-and-so,' Said R. Abiathar: 'Can there possibly be uncertainty in the mind of the Heavenly One?' He replied: Both [answers] are the word of the living God (Gitten 6a)

Occasionally Elijah can be more decisive than is the case here, but I share this particular passage because it emphasizes that in our age, God opts, more often then not, to defer to human decision-making. The Torah is in our midst, and so too the responsibility to make sense of it and make it work. We are empowered to the point where we are no longer depend on miracles, angels, or heavenly voices to make up our minds. More than that, if we take the process seriously, if all our arguments are made in a spirit of truth, love, and righteousness, argued truly for the sake of heaven, then whatever we may conclude can be considered "the word of the living God."

To learn more, read entries Angels, Bat Kol, Elijah, Ibbur, Maggid, in The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism.

Angel Adjurations:Drawing Down Divine Power

2011-01-30T13:05:00.000-06:00

In an earlier entry, where I outlined the practice of summoning angels to earth, I subtitled it, "It's almost like Magic." And indeed, depending on how you define "magic" (a notoriously difficult phenomenon to summarize), what I described had a magical flavor to it. Of course if you consult any rabbi or good Jewish source material, you will learn that Torah/Judaism/Tradition forbids a Jew to practice magic. And it is so. Yet one religion's magic is another's fele ("wonder"). And there are practices happening within, or at the boundaries of, Judaism that also make us wonder.

Now what I described last time really isn't "magical" in the narrower sense of the word. Its actually more "shamanistic" - fasting, self-isolation, repetitive chanting, purification, stress positions - rituals meant to trigger visions, spirit encounter, or what anthropologists call "shamanic flight." Both James Davila and Gershon Winkler have noted that there is an archly shamanic quality to the Hekhalot writings, and I agree.

The challenge of drawing a line between ecstatic religion and "magic" in this kind of literature, however, is particularly acute. For we discover that there are other Hebrew documents, very much akin works like Hechalot Rabbati, which seem to take us toward...well, I'm not sure what. Take for example, this text - Charba de Moshe, The Sword of Moses.

This early medieval text was translated by Moses Gaster at the turn of the last century. Part of Chapter One reads like this (I've updated a little of Gaster's wording, but I've left his censoring of the divine/angelic names as he wanted it):

...And when you conjure him he will attach himself to you, and cause the other five Chiefs and their Chariots, and the lords that stand under them, to attach themselves to you just as they were ordered to attach themselves to Moses, son of Amram, and to attach to him all the lords that stand under them; and they will not tarry in their obeisance, and will not withhold from giving authority to the man who utters the conjuration over this "Sword," its mysteries and hidden powers, its glory and might, and they will not refuse to do it, as it is the command of God X [ABDUHU] saying: "You shall not refuse to obey a mortal who conjures you, nor should you be different to him from what you were to Moses, son of Amram, when you were commanded to do so, for he is conjuring you with My Ineffable names, and you render honour to My name and not to him. If you should refuse I will burn you, for you have not honoured Me."
Each of these angels had communicated to him (Moses) a propitious thing for the proper time. These things (words) are all words of the living God and King of the Universe, and they said to him: --
"If you wish to use this 'Sword' and to transmit it to the following generations, (then know) that the man who decides to use it must first free himself three days previously from accidental pollution and from everything unclean, eat and drink once every evening, and must eat the bread from a pure man or wash his hands first in salt (?), and drink only water; and no one is to know that he intends using this 'Sword,' as therein are the mysteries of the Universe, and they are practised only in secret, and are not communicated but to the chaste and pure. On the first day when you retire from (the world) bathe once and no more, and pray three times daily, and after each prayer recite the following Blessing: -- "Blessed art thou [QUSIM], O Lord our God, King of the Universe, who opens the gates of the East and separates the windows of the firmament of the Orient, and gives light to the whole world and its inhabitants, with the multitude of His mercies, with His mysteries and secrets, and teaches Your people Israel Your secrets and mysteries, and has revealed unto them the "Sword" used by the world; and You say unto them: "If anyone is desirous of using this 'Sword,' by which every wish is fulfilled and every secret revealed, and every miracle, marvel, and prodigy are performed, then speak to Me in the following manner, read before Me this and that, and conjure in such and such a wise, and I will instantly be prevailed upon and be well disposed towards you, and I will give you authority over this Sword, by which to fulfill all that you desire...

You can see here a number of elements that have appeared in Midrash and Hechalot texts - Moses having power over angels (the Midrash finds Biblical proof for this in Ps. 68:18, which is understood to refer to Moses, "You ascended on high, having taken captives"), preparatory rituals of purification, and an adjuration of summoning. But there are some subtle and intriguing differences. First is the explicit claim that Moses' authority over the angels is usable by all Israel. Then we have two more "magical" aspects: he must purify with salt or some substance other than water (that's one step beyond Rabbinic ideas of purification) and that authority over angels can be used to "fulfill all that you desire" (that's a lot of authority, and it seems to offer the adept the power to do things that extend beyond the purely "religious")!

Yet, for all that, this is still not grossly magical, at least as magic was conceived in the ancient/medieval world. There is no real materia magica ("Fillet of a fenny snake, In the cauldron boil and bake; Eye of newt and toe of frog, Wool of bat and tongue of dog, adder's fork and blind-worm's sting, Lizard's leg and owlet's wing, For a charm of powerful trouble..."), success still depends on prior authority being given by God, and on being a "pure and chaste" child of Israel. In fact, in a later chapter the Sword of Moses pointedly remarks that:

...in truth, this is the ["Sword of Moses"] with which he [Moses] accomplished his miracles and mighty deeds, and destroyed all kind of witchcraft; it had been revealed to Moses in the bush, when the great and glorious Name was delivered to him. Take care of it and it will take care of thee.

In other words, this may look a lot like magic or witchcraft, but it is in fact the opposite, it is the very mechanism by which Moses performed the feats and wonders ascribed to him in the Torah - this is really a prophetic power (and therefore the prophets were magicians of a sort) and used for good and not for evil, so there! This disclaimer becomes a feature of other Hebrew works of ritual power - a reassurance that the reader may think it looks like magic, trust me, it's Torah.

To learn more, look up the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism available at Amazon. http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/sr=1-1/qid=1159997117/ref=sr_1_1/002-7116669-7231211?ie=UTF8&s=books
[Illustration: "The Sabbath" by E.M. Lilien, appearing in Die Bucher der Bibel]

It is a Tree of Life: Tu B'Shevat

2011-01-19T09:11:00.004-06:00

The minor holiday of Tu B'Shevat (the 15th of Shavat) is not mentioned in the Bible. It is first brought up in the Talmud, as the "New Year of trees." This refers to tithes collected from fruit bearing trees. Tu B'Shevat is to tithing what Dec. 31st is to our fiscal year - the time to close out the books.

That sounds bluntly administrative, but there's more. In terms of the natural order, in Israel this date roughly marks the winding down of the harshest pounding winter rains (the name for the month, Shevat, means "club"). The rains are a pain, but they are also vital to the vitality of the coming growing season (Israel depends almost entirely on rainfall) so this signals the first hints of renewed life. And trees are emblematic of this hope.

Tu B'Shevat also has a metaphysical importance because of the rain and the trees. Trees, in particular, are one of the most potent symbols of and for Judaism. Rooted in the ground and reaching for the heavens, it is a symbol of Torah, the human being, and the Sefirot (the divine order).

In various traditions, we learn that trees are sentient and offer praise to God continuously (Gen., Rabbah 13:2; Perek Shirah). The cosmic trees in the center of Eden, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil (all things, which stands for the universal order we we know, the unredeemed world) and the Tree of Life (understood by Judaism to be the Torah and the source of immortality and the ideal divine order God wants us to restore to creation) are not the only trees of power. All trees in Eden have the power to heal and give off a scent that comforts a soothes the soul - symbolic of the centrality of trees to human well-being even to this day. At the conclusion of most services, quoting the Proverbs, we praise the Torah for it tree-like capacity to nurture, sustain, and protect us ("...It is a Tree of Life for all who cling to it...").

Not surprisingly, then, we find that the mystics of Safed developed a mystical seder in honor of the holiday. This lovely service, involving wine and the eating of various fruits, urges us at a time of torpor and dreariness toward re-sensitizing us to the essential rhythms of the earth and the pulse of divine stirrings.

Summoning Angels: It's almost Magic

2011-01-01T08:12:00.000-06:00

As we have seen, Moses is the archetypal adept who, through the combined power of his righteousness and knowledge, ascends to heaven. In Apocalyptic literature, this ascent is a phenomenon that a number of Biblical worthies experienced: Enoch, Abraham, Isaac, Baruch, and others. In rabbinic literature, this same sort of experience was available to the great Sages: Joshua ben Levi (whom we quoted in a prior entry) and Akiba ben Joseph are classic examples.

The Bible also gives us accounts of earthly encounters with angelic beings. Aside from the more familiar stories (Abraham, Jacob, and Joshua), there is the extraordinary experiences of the prophet Zechariah ben Berekhiah, who describes extended conversations he had with an angelic medium who interprets his visions (Zech. 1-8). The much neglected book of Zechariah contains perhaps the most angel-rich material in the TaNaKH.

In the Talmud, Ishmael ben Elisha ha-Kohen gives us a most vivid and startling account of his encounter with the numinous entity Akatriel-YAH while in the Temple (Ber. 7a).

Another type of Jewish literature, however, does not limit the possibility of angelic encounter to Jewish religious geniuses of other times and places. Much of the Hechalot ("Palaces") literature provides us with the how-to of summoning angels to our plane of existence. So what is entailed in bringing an angel to you? Here's an example taken from the text Hekhalot Rabbati:

"The one who binds himself by the Sar ha-Torah ("the Prince [Angel] of the Torah") should wash his clothes and his garments, and make a strict immersion. He should enter and sit for twelve days in a room or attic. He should not go out or come in. He should not eat or drink except in the evening. When he eats his bread, it should be bread from [his] clean hands. He should drink water, but not taste any kind of vegetable. He should fix this Midrash of the Sar ha-Torah in prayer three times a day, after the prayer [the Amidah prayers] that he should pray from its beginning to its end. And after that he should sit and repeat it repetitively all twelve days, days of his fasting, from morning to night, and he should not be silent. He should stand on his feet and adjure the servants by their king, and he should call twelve times to each prince. And that he should adjure them by the seal, each one of them (Translation from Lesses, Ritual Practices to Gain Power, p. 193-195).

This is a tantalizing glimpse of a practice, but, as you can see it is far from complete. Certain key bits of data, such as how makes the requisite angelic seal, are left unspecified. This text implies that such techniques may be employed by any worthy adept, but does not fully explain them. Presumably, when an occult master is teaching this text, he will orally fill in the details for his disciple. Thus the written works are a fingerpost pointing the experience while keeping it just out of reach for the average reader - a true esoteric text.

Now, we modern readers can recover many of these elements in more detail by consulting and comparing other works in the Hechalot corpus: adjuration spells, the exact number of ritual immersions, postures one must maintain, suitable locations for drawing down the angel, etc., but I can't give you an exact and complete formula, from beginning to end, for adjuring the Sar ha-Torah. So, the modern adept must approach it with a spirit of experimentation by studying the various texts and weaving together a ritual from disparate sources. Of course, being a "worthy" adept is the key for all of this to work. Adjuring a numinous servant of God is a fraught affair, and one must possess the merit necessary to stand before such a pure and potent entity. So you've been warned: be careful out there.

To learn more, look up the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism available at Amazon. http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/sr=1-1/qid=1159997117/ref=sr_1_1/002-7116669-7231211?ie=UTF8&s=books

Correction: Last week in my entry on zombies I credited George Romero with establishing the "zombie rule" that the undead fall only to headshots. In fact, while reviewing the Chthulu mythos with my teenage son, I have learned it was H.P. Lovecraft who revealed this technique to the world in his charming and idyllic short story, "Screams of the Dead."

(Illustration: Joseph encounters an angel, a detail from the medieval "Golden Haggadah," folio 5. A complete online display of the Golden Haggadah appears at - www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/ttp/hagadah/accessible/introduction.html )

Jewish Zombies: The Walking (and Talking) Dead

2010-12-15T09:14:00.007-06:00

[Max Brooks - the world's leading zombie expert is a Jew. What - he couldn't get into medical school?]

So some occult themes seem manifestly not-Jewish. One that immediately comes to mind, given I'm watching the new show on AMC, the Walking Dead, is the zombie. The term "zombie" comes from West Africa. Of course the idea of the undead is not limited to there and the Caribbean. From vampires to Frankenstein, western culture has envisioned various ways the dead could return.

Jews too. A fair case could be made us being early contributors to zombie culture. After all, Judaism introduced the Western world to the concept of resurrection, the bodily restoration of the dead to life and consciousness. That belief transferred to the Roman empire with the whole Jesus back-from-the-dead scenerio. Now Resurrection assumes the complete, even perfected, return of the deceased, which is a far cry from our conception of ambulatory corpses without a neshamah (soul), but these ideas sit on a spectrum, nonetheless.

In our own time George Romero has defined the "zombie rules" we have all internalized: Zomies are human-created, slow moving, simple-minded flesh-eating ghouls who must be physiologically decapitated ("Head shot! Head shot!"). None of this applies to the Jewish phenomenon.

There are relatively few Jewish stories of animated corpses - probably because such stories offend Jewish notions of kavod ha-met (respecting a corpse). Jews don't display corpses, lavish them with make-up, or attempt to preserve them. Every part of a body deserves proper burial, which is why you see those guys in yellow reflective jackets at the aftermath of every terrorist bombing in Israel. That's ZAKA, and those guys are trying to ensure all human flesh is gathered and treated with respect. So making a zombie for the ephemeral needs of the living is unseemly. Still, there are some stories in Jewish traition that overlap the concepts of resurrection with the golem tradition (making an artificial human).

According to these stories, the zombie is created by an adept (a baal shem), usually by using divine names (Maaseh Buch 50b). Most often the name is written on a parchment and inserted under the tongue or under the skin of the deceased, or inscribed on an amulet worn by the body (Sefer Yuhasin, Shivhei ha-ARI).

The most common motivation for performing this radical deed of power was so the corpse could talk: revealing who murdered them, telling of goings-on in the celestial spheres, or to convey vital information and warnings to the living (Maaseh Nissim, Jahrbucher). In this the tradition parallels stories of the hiner bet or hiner plet (Yid. "catatonic"), a condition where a person falls into a death-like coma for days or even weeks, but alien spirits speak through the body, revealing the secret sins of people in the community and calling for the witnesses to repent. In one case, in Sefer Yuhasin, the sage revived a travelling companion out of shame that he had allowed the youth to die, despite a promise made to the parents.

None of these undead creatures are fully-realized people. A give-away is that the animated corpse cannot pray properly. In almost all these stories, the wise come to recognize the unnatural state of affairs and return the corpse to clay by removing the name of power. In the story of the son restored to life, the father poignantly ends his son's pseudo-existence with a kiss, allowing him to extract the name from under the boy's tongue.

Moses: Torah Warrior, Master of Angels

2010-12-10T07:09:00.003-06:00

In my last entry, I wrote that there are many versions of the story that Moses had to ascend into heaven to receive the Torah and that the angels resisted giving it to him.

[E.M. Lilien illustration of angel gripping the Torah (is Moses tugging on the other end?) from Die Bucher der Bibel]

Today I thought I’d show you some examples from the Midrash:

At that time [when Moses ascended to Heaven to receive the Torah] the ministering angels sought to strike Moses. The Blessed Holy One caused his face to resemble Abraham's. Then the Blessed Holy One said to them, "Aren't you ashamed before him? Is he not the one to whom you descended and in whose home you ate?" (Genesis 18:1 8). The Blessed Holy One then said to Moses, "The Torah is given to you only in the merit of Abraham." (Shemot Rabbah 28:1)

And then there is this version found in the Talmud as told by Joshua ben Levi, a Talmudic expert on angels and himself an occasional visitor to the celestial realms:

Rabbi Joshua b. Levi said, "When Moses ascended on high, the ministering angels spoke before the Blessed Holy One, 'Sovereign of the Universe! What business has one born of woman among us? ''He has come to receive the Torah,' answered God to them. They said to Him, 'That secret treasure, which You have concealed for nine hundred and seventy-four generations before the world was created. You desire to give it to flesh and blood! What is man, that You art mindful of him, and the son of man, that You visit him? O' Lord our God, How excellent is Your Name in all the earth! Who has set Your glory [the Torah] upon the Heavens!' (Ps. 8:1-2).
The Holy One said to Moses, 'Return them an answer.''Sovereign of the Universe' replied Moses, 'I fear, lest they consume me with the [fiery] breath of their mouths.'' Hold on to the Throne of Glory,' said God to Moses, 'and return them an answer. '

Moses [then] spoke before God, 'Sovereign of the Universe! The Torah which You give me, what is written in it -- I am the Lord Your God, who brought you out of the Land of Egypt. ' Said Moses to the angels, 'Did you go down to Egypt? Were you enslaved to Pharaoh? Why then should the Torah be yours?''
Again, what is written in it? You shall have none other god. Do you dwell among peoples that engage in idol worship?''
Again, what is written in it? Remember the Sabbath day -- to keep it holy. Do you then perform work, that you need to rest?''
Again, what is written in it? You shall not take [tissa] [the name ... in vain]. Is there any business [massa] dealings among you?''
Again, what is written in it? Honor your father and your mother. Have you fathers and mothers?''
Again, what is written in it? You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. Is there jealousy between you; is the Adversary [working] between you?'

Immediately the angels conceded to the Holy One, for it is said, [Ps. 8:10, after it meditates on the significance if humanity] 'O' Eternal, our Eternal [God], How excellent is Your Name throughout the land, [but] 'Who has set Your glory upon the heavens is not repeated.' Immediately each angel saw Moses as beloved..." (Talmud, Shabbat 88b).

I am amused by the first in that it shows God pulling pranks on His angelic retinue – God loves a good laugh, though always with a point. But I particularly love that in the second version the angels quote Psalm 8 (“…You have made him [humanity] little lower than angels”) to make their argument against humanity. Angels have a sense of irony. And always, I love the genius of rabbinic close reading and imagineering; that it finds Ps. 8 to be a narrative of how the Torah passed from heaven to earth.

There are many things we can take away from this mythic story, but perhaps my favorite is this – The Torah is meant for humanity, not for angels. If God wanted the Torah to be observed perfectly, She would have kept it for the angels. God gives it to us knowing we will be imperfect in our practice of it (I guess that’s why we “practice Judaism”; we just keep doing it until we get it right). Here, as in many other places, we are reminded that Judaism teaches that God looks for our devout service not our perfect service.

Let me also add that, given this legend, the old King James translation of Psalm 8, “…little lower than the angels” actually misses the sense of the Hebrew. A more accurate translation is the NJPS “…little less than divine.” Literally, we are low only in comparison to God while implying we are (potentially) closer to God then the angels themselves.

To learn more, look up the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism available at Amazon. http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/sr=1-1/qid=1159997117/ref=sr_1_1/002-7116669-7231211?ie=UTF8&s=books

JMMM Ranked 16th Best Jewish Blog on the Net

2010-12-08T09:26:00.003-06:00

I was delighted to learn that the Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism Blog has been honored as one of the 50 best Jewish blogs for 2010 by Guide To Online Schools. In fact, the site ranks us as number 16! They write:

"We scoured the web to find the best blogs pertaining to Judaism and came up with this list of 50. These blogs were selected because they demonstrate expertise and passion, and frequently updated, and provide a wealth of information and other resources."

A great way to close out the secular year. Hag Urim Sameah, all!

Moses: The Jewish Prometheus

2010-11-30T15:27:00.001-06:00

According to a number of Midrashim, Moses did not simply receive the Torah at the top of Mount Sinai. In fact, he had to ascend to heaven itself. There he was confronted with a hostile host of angels, angry at the idea that the supernal Torah would be given over to a mere mortal. In some versions, God must intervene on Moses’ behalf, but in others Moses confronts the angels directly. In one version, he actually has to slay a guardian angel named Kamuel in order to obtain the precious revelation. In another source identified by David Halperin in his book, Faces of the Chariot, Moses actually describes himself as fighting his way into heaven. So what gives? Isn’t God is control of Her own celestial household? Why are the angels angry? Is Moses supposed to have the Torah, or did he take it by force?

I am struck by the idea that these accounts of Moses in heaven are reminiscent of the Greek myth of Prometheus. Prometheus, if you will recall, was one of the Titans who, out of sympathy for humanity, steals fire from the gods and brings it down to earth. There are striking parallels between these two legends, but also instructive differences.

In the Moses legend, Torah occupies the same place as fire does in the Greek story: it is a divine power, a potential blessing to humanity, which passes from heaven to earth. The outraged angels stand in the same role as the Olympian gods. Yet here the similarities end and the contrasting fates of Prometheus and Moses serve to highlight what it means to be human in Jewish tradition. In the Greek story, this act of misappropriating divine power is punished with Prometheus suffering eternal imprisonment and torment. He is made a living example of the doom that awaits all those who challenge the existing order. It teaches that while daring is to be admired, humanity is meant to be humbled and miserable; hubris is always punished by the gods. Moses, by contrast, is meant to have the Torah and he is honored by both God and man for taking it. According to Ben Ish Chai, God sets up the confrontation with the angels both to test Moses (reminding us that nothing in life worth having comes without struggle) and to reveal the superiority of people over angels (we, not they, are God’s real partners in creation). In fact, this legend parallels a number of other tales in Jewish tradition where God actually rejoices when humans show chutzpah (gall) in the face of His obvious power and authority (Gen. 18, Baba Metzia 59b).

In this myth, Moses is us; he stands for all humanity, and his storming into heaven is meant to highlight the unique dignity and importance of humanity in God’s eyes. God, this myth assures us, looks for us to empower ourselves and to fulfill our godly potential, even in the face of overwhelming power.

(Illustration: A cosmic Moses extends from earth to heaven in this E.M. Lilien drawing)

To learn more, look up the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism available at Amazon. http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/sr=1-1/qid=1159997117/ref=sr_1_1/002-7116669-7231211?ie=UTF8&s=books

Obama Psalm: Curses in Politics

2010-10-28T08:48:00.020-05:00

So I saw a bumper sticker the other day that read, "Pray for Obama" - a nice gesture - and is followed by the citation, "Ps. 109:8."

May his days be few; may another take over his position.

Pretty funny. But then one reads the context of the verse....

Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.
Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg:
let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.
Let the extortioner catch all that he has;
and let the strangers spoil his labor.
Let there be none to extend mercy unto him:
neither let there be any to favor his fatherless children.
Let his posterity be cut off;
and in the generation following let their name be blotted out.
Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the LORD;
and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out.
Let them be before the LORD continually,
that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth.

And things get considerably darker. And after a moment's reflection, another thought arises -- it that a curse? Yes it is. Turns out the Psalms, like the rest of the Bible, defies our stereotypes. The Psalms have all sorts of peculiarities. For example, Ps. 45 is neither a prayer nor a paean to God. It's a rather obsequious ode to a king. And the Psalms are sometimes just as surprising for what they don't contain. For example - the themes of brit (covenant) and mitzvah (commandment), so central to the Torah and post-biblical Judaism, are essentially non-entities in the Psalms. Virtually no psalm references these concepts as a framework for the writer's faith. Ps. 119 stands out as the exception. So does what does this imply for the centrality of Torah to ancient Israel?

And curses. There are actually several Psalms that are, or contain, extended curses. Ps. 35, 58, 137, all invoke hair-raising afflictions upon the writer's enemy, and 109 is the ultimate execration text.

This shocks our modern sensibilities...its seems so unreligious. But as I tell my students in my Bible as Literature course at UNT, this idea that religion only engages in the uplifting is a relatively modern rethinking of what constitutes "religion." For virtually every religion until very recently, God is expected to protect his own and punish their enemies. Truly, the idea that what God wants is the repentance of the sinner, not his destruction, is a theme already found in the Bible. But as for God's followers, well...they want satisfaction.

Of course some would argue that these aren't "curses" in the magical sense, but "prayers" venting anger. Perhaps. But, as I have discussed before in this blog, the distinction between an incantation and a prayer is very fine distinction indeed. Thus we read:

Moses is not mentioned in the parashah [Tetzaveh]....The reason for this is that Moses said to God: 'Wipe me out from Your book [Ex. 32:32]" and the curse by a righteous person is fulfilled, even if it is made conditionally. (Ba'al ha-Turim)

Many modern scholars of ancient religions would eschew the distinction entirely, lumping glamors and petitionery prayers together under the category of "rituals of power," speech-acts that will lead to constructive (or in this case, destructive) results. People want their pleas to be answered and the things they ask for, come to pass.

All this needs to be placed in historical context. Biblical Israel. The Psalms were written in a period of human history when most people lived either in a tribal environment, or one step away from it in farming villages or a fortified urban environment. Brutality from within and without the society was commonplace, armed conflict would visit people at least once in their lifetime, and at some point most tribes/nations fought using what amounted to atrocities directed against their rivals. The hope that one could escape persecution, plunder, or worse via the intervention of one's god was an understandable hope, and the idea that the deity would visit upon them what they planned to mete out to you was pretty appealing.

So much for history. We live in a different age, with different expectations for and from our enemies. In our time, law prevails by and large, and even the worst leaders are subject to election, re-election, and term limits. The time for asking for God's wrath to fall upon our political enemies and their families seems, well, a kind of curse of its own visited on our modern body politic. As Nahal Kedumim teaches, "...even if a person has good intentions, he should not allow a curse to escape his lips."

Angel of Death I: Malach ha-Mavet, Severe Agent of God

2010-10-06T07:23:00.001-05:00

Angel of Death: (Malakh ha-Mavet, Mar Mavet, Malach Ahzari). God’s agent of death in the world and the most dreaded of all numinous beings.

["The end of man is to die" - Microscript illustration found at www.isidore-of-seville.com/]

First mentioned in Biblical literature simply as Mavet (personified Death), ha-Mashchit (the Destroyer), Malach-Adonai (Angel of the Lord),

And the Angel of the Lord went out and attacked the Assyrian camp; One hundred eighty-five thousand.And when they arose in the morning, they were all dead bodies. (Isaiah 37:36)

in later literature the title “Angel of Death” becomes conventional. God created the Angel on the first day, along with light.

The notion of an angel bringing death probably arose out of the widespread belief in the Bible that those who look upon God would die. In Judges 13:22-23, this logic was also applied to seeing the Malach Adonai.

The various legends about the Angel are so diverse it is hard to reconcile them all. Some traditions fuse the Angel with God's other severe agents, ha-Satan and the Yetzer ha-Ra (See earlier entries A Necessary Evil: The Yetzer ha-Ra and Did Satan Fall?: The Devil is in the Details ). Others identify the Angel with Samael [“The Gall of God”](See Samael: Demon Prince, Consort of Lilith) (LOTJ III:475), Suriel (LOTJ VI:162), or Leviathan (LOTJ V:26) (See Leviathan II: Demon of the Sea, Messianic Meal). Another strand of tradition teaches that the same angel that brings a soul into the world is also the one who will bring it back. There are also traditions concerning Domah, the angel of the grave, who pronounces the initial judgment against the soul while it still clings to the body. In some texts, he functions exactly as the Angel of Death does. Perhaps in an attempt to pull all the strands together, according to a late tradition there are actually six angels of death: Gabriel over kings; Kazfiel over youths; Mashbir over wild animals; Mashchit (the angel responsible for the tenth plague) over children; Af and Chemah over man and [domestic] beast (Beit ha-Midrash, 2:98). Plant life, evidently, does not require such direct supervision.

According to the Talmud, death is the slowest of all the angels, except in times of epidemic, when he is the fastest. The Malach ha-Mavet is monstrous in appearance: full of eyes that see all creatures (Ber. 4b), and can appear with seven dragon heads (Testament of Abraham). He is robed in a mantle that allows him to change appearance. Death can command hosts of demons (Gen. R. 26). Some traditions hold the Angel was created on the first day, along with darkness, while others say he arose after the first sin (PdRE 13; A.Z. 22b; Zohar I: 35b).

I will follow with accounts of the Angel's interactions with humanity.

Zal G'mor: To learn more, consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050
[1] God is utterly committed to following

Ushpizin at Sukkot: Time to Gather the Spirits

2010-09-22T23:39:00.001-05:00

"Humans are not proud of their ancestors, and rarely invite them round to dinner." - Douglas Adams

One of the recurrent experiences I have found in delving into Jewish lore is how often the most startling esoteric practices are hiding in plain sight. Take for example the Ushpizin (Aramaic, “Guests”). Granted, until the release of the 2005 award-winning comedy of the same name, many Jews had never even heard the word. But those of us who observe the festival of Sukkot every fall certainly have. We’ve just failed to think through the true nature of this ‘quaint’ tradition.

Sukkot, of course, is the Biblical festival that follows almost immediately after Yom Kippur. Christians who know it at all know it by the charmingly archaic "Feast of Tabernacles." It celebrates the fall harvest (and is sometimes called the "Festival of Ingathering"), heralds the rainy season, and commemorates the generation our ancestors spent wandering and living in the wilderness before we were allowed to enter the Land of Israel. The centerpiece of the holiday is constructing and living in sukkot, “huts,” for seven (or eight) days. A beautiful theo-psycho-drama, during Sukkot we relive the experience of our ancestors while we reconnect with the earth and its life-giving power. The Gerer Rebbe compares the Sukkah to a chuppah, that through our desert experiences, we became "wed" to God.

Any wedding requires guests, and ushpizin are guests we invite to join us in our sukkah. It is considered a great tikkun, a great act of healing and rectification to have living souls share our hospitality in our temporary shelters. But ushpizin do not have to be alive. In fact, Jewish mystical tradition actually encourages us to summon the spirits of our ancestral dead to visit us also. Most modern commentators, when describing this ritual, stick the word “symbolically,” "metaphorically" or "poetically" in front of the word “invite.” But if you read the traditional explanations of this ritual, there is no sense that this is merely a symbolic act. Rather, the tradition is “dead” serious that spirits gather with us at this time of year: "When a person sits in his Sukkah the Shekhinah spreads its wings over it from above and then Avraham together with the other five Tzadikim and King David dwell together with him” (Zohar, Emor).

How is this possible? Mystics believe it is because the Sukkah serves as a kind of liminal zone between the physical and spiritual realms. The sukkah occupies material and supernal space simultaneously. As one contemporary Chasidic master put it, Di suke iz iber undzere kep vi di Shkhine shvebt iber undz, vi a mame iber di kinderlekh...“The sukkah is over our heads as the Shekhinah hovers over us like a mother over her dear children...”[1]. Even more striking, according to Isaac Luria the sukkah is a potential ‘frame’ for the Shekhinah, the feminine dimension of God. When we properly perform the commandments within its space, we unite the feminine Shekhinah with the masculine divine principle of Tiferet. In doing so we transform the sukkah into a spiritual womb which draws together Jewish souls, both living and dead (Sefer Sha’ar ha-Kavanot, drash 5).

In order to draw in these spirits, we recite this prayer of summoning:

"May it be Your will, Lord my God and God of my fathers, to send Your presence to dwell in our midst and to spread over us the sukkah of Your peace, to encircle us with the majesty of Your pure and holy radiance. Give sufficient bread and water to all who are hungry and thirsty. Give us many days to grow old upon the earth, the holy earth, that we may serve You and revere You. Blessed by the Lord forever - amen, amen. I invite to my meal the exalted guests — Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Aaron and David."[2]

As you can see, there are seven spirits, one for each day of the Biblical observance. You may also notice that they are all men. This is the norm in many traditional Jewish communities, but some mystics have not neglected to draw upon the spiritual power of our matriarchs also. 16th Century Italian mystic Menahem Azariah of Fano also associated the seven “lower” sefirot with the seven prophetesses the Talmud enumerates: Sarah, Miriam, Devorah, Hannah, Abigail, Huldah and Esther. So in some traditions, these spirits are also called forth to bless their descendants on Sukkot.

So on Sukkot we gather souls as well as produce. Fact is, Judaism as always been comfortable with the idea that there is some interaction possible between living Jews and their righteous ancestors. They visit us in our dreams, they are present with us at critical moments. In time, as the Bible puts it, we will all be “gathered to our kin” (Deut. 32:50-51). But at Sukkot, at least, they can gather to us.

To learn more, see the entries Ancestors, Ghosts, Sukkot, Prophecy, Usphizin in the EJMMM.

Footnotes:

Illustration: The Ushpizin prayer plaque is displayed at www.jhom.com/calendar/tishrei/

[1] R’ Shlomo Halberstam, the Bobover Rebbe, 1999, cited at http://telshemesh.org/fire/the_jewish_goddesses_justin_lewis.html

[2] Translation taken from Jewish Heritage Online Magazine

Lilith - semen demon or feminist icon?

2010-09-18T21:17:00.000-05:00

Exactly who or what is Lilith? Now regarded by Jewish esoteric tradition to be one of the four queens of demons, the nature of Lilith has undergone many reinterpretations throughout Jewish history.

[Illustration: etching of Lilith on a metal amulet]

The origins of Lilith are probably found in the Mesopotamian lilu, or “aerial spirit.” Some features of Lilith in later Jewish tradition also resemble those of Lamashtu, a Babylonian demoness who causes infant death. There is one mention of lilot (plural) in the Bible (Isa. 34:14), but references to lilith demons only become common in post-Biblical Jewish sources.

Furthermore, the characterization of Lilith as a named demonic personality really only begins late in antiquity. Amulets and magical texts well into the Middle Ages continue to speak of lilot as a class of demonic beings. Even the gender of the creature is not fixed. Several incantation bowls, for example, explicitly protect against “…lilot [plural], whether male or female…”

Jewish tradition gradually fixes on lilith as a female demon. In Talmud she is described as a demon with a woman’s face, long hair and wings (Nid. 24b; Er. 100b). In amulet incantations she is addressed as a demon that preys on women in childbirth and as a killer of children (Ber. 8a; Zohar I: 148a-b; II:267b).

Other sources describe her as a kind of succubus, seducing men in their sleep and then collecting their nocturnal emissions in order to breed demonic offspring (Shab. 151b) (See earlier entry, "Spawns of Satan").

The use of “Lilith” as the proper name of a specific demonic personality first appears in the Midrash. The most famous legend of Lilith is the one first appearing in the Medieval satirical text Aleph-bet ben Sira. In that document, Lilith is identified as the first woman God created along with Adam. The case for their having been two women in the Garden of Eden is based on the differing accounts of the creation of woman (Gen. 1:27 vs. Gen. 2:19-23). According to AbbS, Lilith immediately quarreled with Adam over sexual positions during intercourse. When Lilith did not get satisfaction, she invoked the power of the Tetragrammaton and flew away. God sent three angels, Sanoi, Sansanoi, and Samnaglof, to bring her back. When she refused, she transformed herself into a demon that weakens children with disease (perhaps diphtheria, whooping cough, or SIDS – probably all three) to take her vengeance on God and humanity. But, the story concludes, if the names of her three pursuing angels are used together on an amulet, she is powerless to harm the person bearing it (see Sefer Raziel for the continuation of this tradition). This account, incidentally, is a Jewish variation of a story about a demon curbed by three pursuers that also appears in Greek, Coptic, Arabic, Armenian, and Slavonic legends.

Lilith appears in a very different incarnation in the Treatise of the Left Emanation, the Zohar, and other later mystic texts, where she is one of the four queens, or the four mothers, of demons. She is the most prominent of the four, being queen of the forces of Sitra Achra, the impure side of divine emanations that shape our world. In the Treatise, she and Samael are the evil doppelgangers of Adam and Eve, coming in existence as a spiritual byproduct of the primordial couple’s sin.

In answer to your question concerning Lilith, I shall explain to you the essence of the matter. Concerning this point there is a received tradition from the ancient Sages who made use of the Secret Knowledge of the Lesser Palaces, which is the manipulation of demons and a ladder by which one ascends to the prophetic levels. In this tradition it is made clear that Samael and Lilith were born as one, similar to the form of Adam and Eve who were also born as one, reflecting what is above. This is the account of Lilith which was received by the Sages in the Secret Knowledge of the Palaces. The Matron Lilith is the mate of Samael. Both of them were born at the same hour in the image of Adam and Eve, intertwined in each other. Asmodeus the great king of the demons has as a mate the Lesser (younger) Lilith, daughter of the king whose name is Qafsefoni. The name of his mate is Mehetabel daughter of Matred, and their daughter is Lilith (Trans. from Early Kabbalah, Joseph Dan ed.).

Intriguingly, the Treatise of the Left Emanation starts to come full circle, once again referring to multiple Liliths, as did the ancients. This tradition of there being two (or more) Liliths also appears in Pardes Rimmonim.

In the Zohar, she is the evil antipode of the Shekhinah (II: 118a-b; III: 97a). There is also a tradition in the Zohar that Lilith was the Queen of Sheba who came to test Solomon. Most startling of all is a Zoharic statement that while Israel is in exile, Lilith has replaced the Shekhinah as the "consort" of the Blessed Holy One (See my earlier entry, "The Sacred Feminine II" ). This seems to be a mythic way of expressing how, because of their condition as a despised, persecuted minority, medieval Jews perceived theirs to be a world given over to the control of the dark side.

Defenses against Lilith include providing amulets to women in childbirth and to newborns inscribed with the angelic names Sanoi, Sansanoi, and Samnaglof (or Sandalfon), not sleeping alone in a house, and tapping an infant on the nose if he appears to be responding to something the parent cannot see. Psalms, particularly Ps. 91, Ps. 121, and 126, are effective in driving off Lilith (Shimmush Tehillim). There is also a ritual that can be performed during and after intercourse to drive her away (Zohar III:19).

In modern times, inspired by the singular Ben Sira portrayal of her as a woman who stands up to male domination, Lilith has become something of an emblem among feminists in critiquing the overwhelmingly male-oriented perspective of traditional Judaism and she has been adopted as a symbol of feminist resistance to male spiritual hegemony. It should be pointed out, however, that modern claims by Raphael Patai, Robert Graves, and others that Lilith was an early Hebrew goddess later censored out of the tradition by editors of the Scriptures has no foundation whatsoever in any literature we have from before the 10th Century CE. This claim appears to depend entirely on appealing to the Ben Sira narrative, but this story is sui generis, and there is no precedent for any tradition of Lilith as either as “Wife of Adam” or “Wife of YHWH” prior to the Middle Ages.

Zal g'mor - to own the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism, go to: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

The Passion of Israel's God

2010-08-27T15:31:00.008-05:00

The very nice folks at Parabola Magazine, a quarterly journal devoted to the thematic

[God seeks Man - the Dura Europos Synagogue]

exploration of the world's spiritual and mythic traditions, have just published an article by me in their Fall issue.

Entitled A Song of Desire: the Yearnings of Israel's God, it begins like this:

What is desire (Heb. Ta’eiv; Ta’avah; Teiavon), and what is its role in the cosmos? Desire is the craving to fill an absence, and once possessed, to cling to that which fulfills. Western thought sees desire as driving the world. It is, the Greeks taught, the appetitive nature of the soul that compels motion. And since at least Plato, desire has also been considered a problem to be managed. Aristotle regarded it to be the irrational part of the soul, an impulse to be curbed by the control of reason.[i]

But what if the world is not merely filled with desire? What if the world is desire? In some Eastern thought, desire tethered to ignorance is the world, and as such it is the flywheel that perpetuates suffering.[ii] Jews, too hold that the universe is made up of longing, but in the Hebrew imagination, desire is lyric, not dirge. It is the music of creation, and longing the resonant instrument that reveals the meaning of the cosmos. This secret truth is concealed in the very first word of the Hebrew Bible, BeRESHIT, the word for “creation” itself. The secret is uncovered by re-arranging its six Hebrew letters. Doing this discloses that creation is a SHIR Ta’EiV, a “song of desire” (Zohar Hadash 5b-6a). Creation is one great ballad of longing, and God is the One who sings this lyric in endless variations.....

To read the rest of the article, you can purchase the Fall 2010 "Desire" issue of Parabola at your local Barnes and Noble, or by going directly to http://www.parabola.org/.

[i] W.L. Reese, Dictionary of Philosophy & Religion (Sussex: Humanities Press, 1980), 22.

[ii] Robert E. Van Voorst, ed., Anthology of Asian Scriptures (Belmont: Wadsworth), 88-90.

Consider Yourself Warned: Sneezing in Jewish Folklore

2010-08-14T12:20:00.013-05:00

[Kyle Gets It]

It is remarkable how Jewish tradition, in its careful reading of the Bible, discovers stories hidden beneath stories. Even more extraordinary is the wit to see a story lurking in a lack of story. Take illness. The first person who is described as ill is our ancestor Jacob (Gen. 48:1). This led some perspicuous Jewish reader to ask the question, "Why is this first mention of an ill person so late in the story of humanity? Could it be that Jacob is the first person to experience illness?" And that's exactly what happened. Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer was the first to fully develop this thought:

From the day the heavens and earth were created, no man was ever ill... Rather, in any place he happened to be, whether on the way or in the market, when he sneezed his soul left through his nostrils. [So it was] until our ancestor Jacob came and prayed for mercy concerning this, saying, Blessed Holy One, do not take my soul from me until I have blessed my sons and my household; so He accepted him, as it was said, "And it came to pass after these things that one came to Joseph and said, "Look, your father is ill."..... (PdRE 52).

Thus a sneeze, once the very act of expiration itself, comes to be understood to be an act of divine compassion, an omen that death is approaching.

This is an idea very much in keeping with the idea, rooted in the Bible (Gen. 1:26), that the spirit enters and leaves through the nose, and that all humans are pneumatically permeable, that various spirits (of wisdom [Exo. 28:3, 31:3], prophecy [Num. 11:17, 29], and woe [I Sam. 16:23]) pass easily in and out of the body, and that our very souls even leave us on a temporary basis while we sleep (the Elohai Neshamah morning prayer).

Of course, an omen can be averted with the proper ritual or words of power. And so it is that Jews came to believe it was obligatory to respond to a sneeze with a word or phrase to counteract it:

....Therefore a man is duty bound to say to his fellow who sneezes, Chayyim! [Life!] changing death in the world into light [fulfilling the promise of Scripture] as is written, "His sneezes flash forth light" (Job. 41:10)....

Other phrases evolved to keep the soul within the body, such as l'chayyim tovim [Hebrew], marpe, assuta [Aramaic], zu gesund, and gesundheit [Yiddish].

The fact that this was more than just a wish, but actually a counter spell, is made clear in arguments in the Tosefta, where some Sages worry that the blessing response may in fact be a "Way of the Amorites" [the Talmudic idiom for witchcraft] (T. Shabbat 7:5).

Over time this concern subsided and, as the medieval Pirkei de Rabbi Eliezer highlights, a blessing in response to a sneeze came to be considered mandatory.

Zal g’mor: To learn more, read the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism:http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Witchblade: Making Comic Book Jewstory

2010-07-24T09:31:00.006-05:00

So now I have achieved a new level of celebrity, at least as far as my 14-year-old son is concerned. I have appeared in a comic book (sorta). Turns out Ron Marz, the writer for a series entitled Witchblade (Top Cow Comics) used my book for background research. In this series, a very attractively drawn woman detective is unwillingly attached to a mysterious cosmic artifact, a bracelet/gauntlet that morphs into weapons/armor (which in most situations shields only the parts of her body that would normally be covered by bikini swimwear). It's sort of Elric of Melniboné meets X-Files meets Baywatch. Anyway, one storyline included a Jewish subplot. So I get this e-mail asking me to write the introduction to the most recent compilation (Witchblade TPB volume 7 - See cover above). It gave me a chance to write 400 words on the connections I see between superheroes, Jewish mythology, and the (mostly Jewish) creators of the comic book genre.

So I'll be completely up front. I'm trying to sound cynical about it all, but you know what....it's soooo cool. I feel like Michael Chabon Jr.

The payoff for me has been getting Avi the entire series signed by the author, which is plenty. And now I should do my part for Top Cow. So if you are inclined that way, drop by your local comic book shop (here's my plug for our favorite, Titan Comics on Northwest Hwy/Rt. 12, Dallas) and check it out.

The Soul is the Lamp of the Lord: Candle Divination

2010-07-16T21:44:00.007-05:00

We Jews love our candles. Candles accompany us from birth to death...and beyond. The linking of light to life cycle is probably inspired by the passage, "The lamp of Adonai searches the spirit of a man; it searches out his inmost being" (Proverbs 20:27). According to the Talmud, a light shines above the head of a soul while it awaits birth in the womb and the illumination allows the soul to see from one end of the universe to the other (B.T. Niddah 30b)[1]

David Sperber in his book The Jewish Life Cycle, traces one fascinating aspect of the Jewish love affair with candles - the mantic use of candles to determine when a soul will be extinguished. In the Talmud there is a tradition associated with Rosh ha-Shanah, the Jewish New Year. According to Tractate Horayot 12a, a person may divine whether he or she will live out the year to come by kindling a lamp in a draft-free location. If the lamp or candle burns until its fuel is utterly consumed, the person would live. If, for whatever reason, it gutted before the fuel was used up, that was a sign that death would come that year. Apparently, this belief became so widespread that separate custom of lighting a candle for Yom Kippur (the Yom Tov lights) became conflated with this idea. In order to keep panic from sweeping a household, it was decided in Eastern Europe that the synagogue sexton would tend all the candles together at the shul. That way, individuals would not know if any candles that extinguished prematurely among the multitude was their candle!

For a Jew who had the misfortune to see their candle go out, it was said that if they made special supplications for the remainder of Yom Kippur and rekindled the light after the holiday, and it subsequently completed burned up, it was a sign that their repentance had redeemed them and the evil decree was repealed.

Jews in Morocco had a variant belief. Two candles would be lit, one for each of a newlywed couple, and the first candle that went out would be a augury that that partner would die first.

Zal g’mor: To learn more, read the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism:http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

[1] This is a variation on the tradition that Adam Kadmon, the primordial human, shined with a supernal body and that he had the power to see the entire cosmos.

Brit Milah: Water or Earth?

2010-06-23T21:32:00.009-05:00

Another custom little seen anymore outside of the most traditional circles is that of having a cup or bowl of dirt or sand at a Brit Milah (circumcision) ceremony. The practice was that immediately after the Milah is performed, the foreskin is placed in the earth and covered over. This now-neglected custom is yet another example of the aborginal dimension of Judaism that (pardon the pun) lies just below the surface.

In fact, the earliest forms of this ritual disposal of the foreskin varied from community to community. Apparently in the early middle ages, Jews in Babylon performed the circ over a bowl of water, sometimes mingled with myrtle and spices (Otzer ha-Geonim, vol 2), then the foreskin was deposited there, while the Jews in the Land of Israel placed it in earth.

Why water? The symbolism, even the source of the custom, is not so clear to me. Perhaps it refers to the water used to ritually bathe the child prior to the circumcision, as required by some authorities. The child is circumcised "over" this cleansing water, after which the removed tissue is placed in the pan. If any readers have insight into this from sources in the Mesorah, I would love to hear it.

The rationale for the dirt is esoteric, yet easier to account for. It assumes that the foreskin signifies the future virility of the male child. By placing it in dirt, the community symbolically reminds God of the promise He made regarding the fertility of the Jewish people, Your descendants will be as the dust of the earth (Gen. 28:14; as explained in PdRE 29).

Many discussions of the practice refer to using sand, rather than earth. This not only comports well with another text, Gen. 32:13, Your descendants shall be as the sand of the sea, but the sand also represented a compromise between the water custom and the earth custom, as sand is the liminal material between the two realms.

Zal g’mor: To learn more, read the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism:http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

The Barren Shall Rejoice: Battling Infertility With Jewish Rituals

2010-06-20T18:48:00.008-05:00

["Genesis" by the sculptor Jacob Epstein]

Its been a while since I've added an entry. And recently it occurred to me that I have only addressed issues of infertility tangentially, through the themes of Sukkot, or the fabulous stories of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs. So here is something more on point:

Fertility and infertility is a major issue in any traditional culture, and Jewish culture is no different. In fact, infertility is a central theme in the book of Genesis, starting with the divine command to be "fruitful and multiple," right through the growing pathos arising from the contrast between God's promise to make Abraham a great nation and the constant struggles with infertility he and his family endured (Gen. 30:1).

Over the centuries, Jews, and especially Jewish women, developed a whole arsenal of folk cures, rituals, and devices to combat prolonged bouts of infertility (this is aside from wedding rituals encouraging fertility, aphrodisiacs and treatments for male impotence, things I explored in an earlier entry). These include -

Mandrakes, which have a biblical warrant (Gen. 30:14-16). This root is incorporated into varied cures across the centuries.

Consuming rubies was another popular treatment in medieval medical texts.1

Visiting the grave of Rachel outside Bethlehem, to ask for the Matriarch's intervention. The burial places of other deceased worthies, such as Hasidic masters, are also sought out.

Mizrachi (Asian) Jews would place a cup of water under the chair set out for Elijah at a circumcision ceremony (Brit Milah). Following the ceremony, barren women would drink this water in hope of aiding in pregnancy. A related practice would be to drink from a kiddush cup that had just been used at a Brit Milah. In Europe, women would meditate upon the knife used to perform a circumcision. All this was inspired by the hope that the fertility embodied in the newborn boy that permeated the ritual would prove contagious. 2

The exact reverse of this association, and one probably adopted from surrounding gentile cultures, involved having a woman stand in close proximity to a corpse, or sprinkle themselves with the water used to purify a corpse (European gentile women would stand under a gallows or even a hanging criminal).

Incantations and kamiyot (amulets) were common and widely circulated. Most amulets included verses from Scripture that promise to counter barrenness (Isaiah 30:19, for example, or Exodus 23:26).3

Most startling is a practice forbidden by the rabbis, but nevertheless reported in several communities - infertile women consuming the foreskin tissue from a circumcision (perhaps not so weird if we think of the occasional modern practice of women eating the afterbirth, but still shocking). Not surprisingly, keeping the foreskin as a talisman was more common. 4

Zal g’mor: To learn more, read the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism:http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

1. Klein, A Time to Be Born, 41.

2. Sperber, The Jewish Life Cycle, 16, 452.

3. Naveh and Shaked, magic Spells and Formulae, 160-161.

4. Patai, "Folk Customs and Charms Related to Childbirth" (Heb.), Talpiot 6.

South Park and Mohammad: Blasphemy and Violence

2010-04-23T07:55:00.003-05:00

I just read that the cartoonists at Southpark, Matt Stone and Trey Parker, are receiving death-threats because

[The prophet as holy warrior that appears in the Islamic text Jami'al-Tawarikh, dated 1314-5. Is this image blasphemy? ]

they created a storyline in which Muhammed, though never seen, is purported to be inside a cartoon bear suit. Ever since a series of Danish political cartoons portraying and satirizing the Prophet Muhammad appeared, there have been worldwide protests and threats by Muslims. At issue, it seems, is that contemporary Islam regards any perceived insult to the Prophet, even the implication of him being invisible, yet present within an illustration, to be tantamount to blasphemy.

If only Internet death threats were to sum of it. Embassies and businesses have been burned, bounties have been offered against the artists and journalists connected to the cartoons, and dozens have died. Such events leave us puzzled by Muslim notions of what is “holy,” which in turn invites us to think about holiness as a concept.

The 20th Century German philosopher Rudolph Otto defined what is “holy” as the “numinous” -- that which fills us with fear and mystery. It is a good definition. As Isaiah’s angels testify (Ch. 6), the God of Israel is awesome and inscrutable –and therefore holy beyond measure.

Yet God also assigns a measure of holiness to things “outside” Himself. God declares the Sabbath to be holy (Gen. 2.3). God also sanctifies locations of revelation (Ex. 3.5). From such lessons Judaism embraces the concept of holy space and, especially, of holy time.

To these Christianity and Islam eventually added what historian Karen Armstrong dubbed the “cult of the holy human being.” But Armstrong also writes, “any symbol of the sacred, be it a building, a city, a literary text, a law code, or a man, is bound to be inadequate.” That inadequacy becomes evident when, for example, a religion criminalizes misuse or criticism of things regarded as holy – “blasphemy.” Judaism prohibits the abuse of God’s name (Lev. 24). The regnant Church went further when it determined that demeaning the person of Christ was a criminal offense. And, as we have come to learn of late, Islam made it a death penalty crime to denigrate any “holy prophets,” especially Muhammad.

Because of this, as the recent violence reveals, the holy can be a double-edged sword. It has the power to inspire, but also to inflame, humanity. Otto was correct - holiness invokes both mystery and terror.

But the idea of holiness is still a profound and useful insight, despite its inadequacies. Take Lev. 19, for example. The entire People Israel is collectively commanded, “You shall be holy, for the Lord your God is holy.” It seems on the surface an invitation to claim special privilege for the Jewish people above all others. But the wording of this passage crucial to understanding this particular idea of the holy. The Hebrew verb to “be holy” appears here in the imperfect form; it is not describing what humans are already, but prescribing what we must strive to be. From this nuance Judaism has learned to elevate self-criticism almost to the standing of a sacrament, a phenomenon familiar to everyone in the days approaching Yom Kippur.

Just important, holiness in the Bible is inextricably linked to the ethical. The same passage in Leviticus continues by saying that pursuing holiness requires of people that they “not deal basely…not take vengeance, or bear a grudge…. love your fellow as yourself…” Killing or jailing those who slight the honor of prophets and places does not protect nor advance holiness. Rather, such actions ultimately undermine the very meaning of holiness. All the Abrahamic faiths need to emphasize that just as The Holy One is Mysterium Tremendum, an awesome mystery beyond our control, so too holiness is a condition beyond human regulation. God’s holiness does not require defending -- it needs emulating.

The Mystery of Samson

2010-04-13T14:43:00.002-05:00

I still love the fact that three years after its publication, readers of the EJMMM still send me new sources for traditions not included in my book. This is the marvel of Jewish tradition. It is as big as the sea itself. You could swim in it all your life and still not discover all its secrets.

So this concerns Samson, the biblical judge and strongman. In the EJMMM I wrote that:

As a redeemer of Israel, his birth was heralded to his mother and father by an angel (Jud. 13). He was dedicated to God from birth, and lived his entire life as a nazirite. God blessed him with extraordinary physical strength, which he demonstrated in a series of amazing feats.
Nevertheless he was easily distracted from his dedication to God’s purpose. This made him vulnerable to the schemes of his enemies, the Philistines. Eventually he was shorn of his long hair, which the Philistines believed was the source of his power, after which he was blinded and enslaved. Both his faith in God and his hair grew during his servitude, and he eventually was able to ambush the Philistines while in their temple, bringing the building down upon everyone inside, including himself (Judges 13-17).

Given the already fantastic nature of the Biblical account, there is surprisingly little additional rabbinic material about him and his adventures.

So that last sentence isn't wrong, but it's incomplete. This is what Brem, a reader in NY, shared with me. He found a book, published by Bezalel Naor entitled Kabbalah and the Holocaust (Spring Valley: Orot Inc., 2001). This book cites a number of Kabbalistic traditions regarding Samson. For one, the Hasidic Master Zadok ha-Kohen of Lublin put forward the argument that Samson's multiple marriages to non-Jewish women were part of a messianic scheme to uplift the k'lipot, the "fallen sparks" among the gentiles in order to prepare the way for the Messiah (Yisrael Kedoshim). This is further developed in an obscure Kabbalistic treatise by a Rabbi Isaac Messer, U'mi-Midbar Matanah. In it, R. Messer draws together several esoteric sources. Samson's very name, shimshon, "sun," who mates with d'lilah, "night," signifies his spiritual mission, which as to reconcile cosmic opposites, in this case Jews and non-Jews. Samson was meant for this mission because, in fact, he was the reincarnation of Jeptha, the son of Noah, and ancestor of many gentile nations.[1] Thus, Samson's great strength was a personification of the power of the nations, derived from his (partly) non-Jewish soul. Yet this mission in anecient times failed. But Samson will be be reincarnated one more time, as Serayah, the Danite, the messiah's general at the end of times.[2]

Todah rabbah to Brem for adding further to my library of Jewish lore. If I am ever blessed to published a 2nd edition of the EJMMM, this will be included.

Zal g’mor: To learn more, read the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism:http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

1. Galya Raza 42c

2. Zohar III: 194b

Esther: The Myth Behind the Legend

2010-02-24T10:21:00.007-06:00

[Esther in the herem of the king, by E.M. Lillien]

Shortly Jews everywhere will be celebrating the farcical, ferocious festival of Purim.

Built entirely around that acute and absurdist meditation on antisemitism, the Book of Esther, we Jews have serious fun, ridiculing authority, laughing at a sacred text, hiding our identity behind costumes and masks, even as we reveal another side of ourselves through our riotous behavior and the very personas we choose to disguise ourselves.

Scholars have long been aware that the author of Esther did some pointed borrowing from mythology in telling his story. Esther and Mordecai, the "Persian" names of the Jewish heroine and hero, are seemingly derived from the Ancient Near Eastern deities, Ishtar and Marduk (alternatively, in the case of Mordecai, the Sages think it may be derived from mor dror, "dripping myrrh" [Megillah 10b], see below for how that factors in).

But there is more. Esther's Hebrew name is Hadassah, "myrtle," a tree used medicinally in the ancient world for its contraceptive effect, offering a possible parallel to Mordecai's name, which the Rabbis connected to myrrh, another popular contraceptive substance.

In fact, the Book of Esther reminds the mytholically minded of the myth of Myrrha, the woman miserably married off in an incestuous-rape relationship to her father the king, where she suffers drunken sexual assaults until the gods take pity on her, transubstantiating her into the myrrh tree. The tree's oil, which drips from the branches like tears, was also a prime contraceptive substance (Notice the six-month treatment of the virgins with myrrh prior to their night with the king in Esther 2:12).

Joseph Prouser points out parallels between the myth and the book of Esther:

1) Incest - What was Esther and Mordecai's relationship? The Rabbis suspected it was more than "Uncle" and "ward" (B.T. Megillah 13a-13b)

2) Transgressive marriage - in Esther, both she and the king are forbidden to each other by both Jewish law and Persian royal taboos.

3) A drunkard king (Esther 1:10)

4) Rape (Esther 7:8)

5) Death and salvation through a tree (Esther 7:9-10)[translated as "stake," or "gallow," in Hebrew execution device is consistently called an eitz, "tree," in the four places it is mentioned].[1]

All of which suggests that the story of Esther may have as much basis in myth, the deliberate Judaic reworking of pagan mythology, as it does in any historical event.

Zal g’mor: To learn more, read the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism:http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

1. Prouser, Joseph, "As the Practice of Women," Conservative Judaism, Winter 2001.

Blood Sacrifices, Jesus, and Jews

2010-02-16T11:06:00.012-06:00

Got into another conversation about Jewish perspectives on Christian theological claims about Israelite religion. We quickly found ourselves on the "blood" theme, a beloved one in Christian discourse.

Now Jews take blood seriously - we even speak of circumcision, Brit Milah, as a "covenant of blood." But some forms of Christianity will insist God only forgives human sin only if we participate in a “blood sacrifice.” This sounds strange to Jews, yet Christians like to point to this verse to back up this claim.

It is the blood, as life, that effects expiation (Lev. 17:11, JPS)

Let’s start with the context of this verse (verses 10-14) which is that Israelites should not eat blood when they eat animal flesh. Spilling the blood and not eating the blood of the animal you consume is an expiation for killing a living thing for food or sacrifice (bird, deer, lamb, cow) that God has created. This practice is akin to the scene in the movie Avatar where the Nabi hunter addresses the prey she's just killed and acknowledges a life has been taken and offers a ritual confession as expiation. Read it yourself:

10 And whatsoever man there be of the house of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among them, that eats any blood, I will set My face against that person that eats blood, and will cut him off from among his people.

11 For the life of the meat is in the blood; and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your lives; for it is the blood is in the living thing makes atonement.

12 Therefore I said unto the children of Israel: No person of you shall eat blood, neither shall any stranger that sojourns among you eat blood.

13 And whatsoever man there be of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among them, that hunts down any beast or fowl that may be eaten, he shall pour out the blood its, and cover it with dust.

14 For as to the life of all meat, its blood is its life; therefore I said unto the children of Israel: You shall not eat the blood of any meat; for the life of all meat is its blood; whosoever eats it shall be cut off.

But setting that context aside, Christian polemics go on to argue that the death of Jesus was the perfect "blood sacrifice" that God made on our behalf. Here’s what Jews bring to this discussion:

In the Hebrew Bible, God condemns human sacrifice (Lev. 18:21; 20:2-5).
Even in the Book of Leviticus itself, blood is not necessary for the forgiveness of sins, despite what Christians may tell Jews. Even while the sacrificial system existed, a contrite poor person need only bring an offering of flour (Lev. 5:11). This teaches us that it was not the blood that was critical, it was the contrite spirit shown when someone would acknowledge his or her sin in public through any sort of sacrifice.

Throughout the Torah and the rest of the Hebrew Bible it is clear that blood is not necessary for God’s forgiveness of sins (Numbers 14:20; Lev. 5:11-13; Ezek. 18:21-28; Amos 5:21-22; Hosea 6:6, 14:2; Ps. 51:18-21; Jer. 7:22; Isa 1:11-18; Micah 6:6-8). If fact, it becomes quite clear from these verses that no sacrifices of any sort are required for God to forgive us, save the sacrifice of our own pride by admitting we’ve done wrong. Therefore…

Since the end of the sacrificial system, people’s prayers and sincere repentance are sufficient to be forgiven (see citations above).

Judaism teaches that God is demanding, but does not demand you drench your every sin in blood and death. Jewish theology assumes that God is aware He designed us to be morally vulnerable, so He knows we will make mistakes. Judaism teaches that God accommodates that reality by demanding that we repent when we do wrong. There is no blanket condemnation that requires blood and death to account for sin. When we do, God forgives us. Judaism teaches God wants better living from us, not death (SEE Ezekiel 18:23-28).

Armilius: The Jewish Lord Voldemort

2010-02-05T12:07:00.000-06:00

[Emblem of the The Holy Roman Empire: a double-crowned two-headed eagle]

Since everybody is talking Harry Potter, I too will ride the wave. In that vein, Judaism has its own tradition of a “Dark Lord,” Armilius or Armilus ben Belial. He is the eschatological nemesis of the Messiah(s). The name itself may be derived from Romulus, the mythic founder of Rome (which, as in the Christian tradition, embodies ungodly forces – with a Jewish twist, as you will see below), while Belial is a demonic figure who enjoys greatest prominence in the traditions of the Dead Sea Scroll sect.

The tradition of Armilus is early medieval in origin, first surfacing textually during the 7-8th Century (Sefer Zerubbabel, Targum Pseudo-Jonathan to Isa. 11:4). While there are several variations, the core myth is that Armilius is a king who will attack Jerusalem in the wars of the last days (see Zechariah 9-14 for the essential elements of this apocalyptic version of the End of Days), killing the Messiah, son of Joseph. In turn the Messiah, son of David will counterattack and slay Armilus, either with the breath of his mouth (an allusion to Isa. 9) or by fire raining from heaven (Sefer Zerubbabel; BhM 1:56; 2:51; 3:141; 4:124-26).

Sefer Zerubbabel reports he will be the offspring of sexual congress between ha-Satan and a beautiful Roman statue (a riff on the Virgin Mary?). Thus Armilus is a semi-human monstrosity with green skin, gold hair, and two heads (Dan. 11:27) who thinks himself God (Dan. 11:36).

Amilus narratives can be read as a counter-narrative (or parody) of Christian eschatological beliefs. This conflation of Imperial Rome with Christendom may seem confusing to the casual reader, but in the Jewish mythic imagination, Pagan and Christian Rome are a continuous phenomenon, their imperial oppressions being virtually indistinguishable (from a Jewish perspective).

Zal g’mor: To learn more, read the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism:
http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Nefilim, Refaim, Anakim: Biblical Giants

2010-01-10T11:23:00.001-06:00

[Goliath (and David, prematurely crowned) from Kaufmann Ms. of the Mishneh Torah, at www.hum.huji.ac.il/cja/IJA2.htm ]

Many cultures have traditions of a primordial race of giants. The Greeks have the Titans, the Irish the Fomor. Jews too. Among the monstrous beings mentioned in the Bible, few get more attention then giants. Goliath the Gittite, of course, is the banner example, but it turns out he is only the most prominent of many.

The basis for the tradition of a race of giants is Gen. 6:4, the same locus classicus for the tradition of fallen angels. The angels, as you may remember, came down and took wives among mortals. The giants were either around at the time of those events, or the offspring of those unions (the phrasing of the Hebrew in Gen. 6 is ambiguous): "The nefilim [possibly meaning 'fallen ones,' it's debatable] were on the earth in those days...," and may or may not be the basis of the stories about mythological heroes "....these were the gibborim [heroes, superheroes, demigods?] of old, the men of renown." However under-defined the language of Genesis, the earliest translation of the Bible, the Septuagint, assumes Genesis is talking about gargantuanism, translating both nefilim and gibborim as "giants."

Variously known as the Nefilim [often spelled "Nephilim"] (Num. 13:32-33), Refaim (II Sam. 21:16-22), Emim (Deut. 2:1o-11, 21), Refadim (Ibid. - though this may be a simple scribal misspelling of "Refaim") or the "Children of Anak" (Deut. 9:2), the giants were prevalent enough that the spies saw them throughout their scouting of Canaan, "...we saw men of giant stature...we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers... (Num. 13:32) and Moses repeatedly alludes to them in Deuteronomy, most notably in reference to the massive King Og of Bashan, who approached 15 feet in height (Deut. 3: 11): "Only King Og of Bashan was left remaining of the Refaim." Apparently this was not a wholly accurate report. Hundreds of years later, David's soldiers had to kill a number of them (II Samuel 21; I Chron. 20:4-8). Perhaps the different names signified different clans within the ethnos of giants.

Numerous as they are vague, these passages would be the basis for a very elaborate complex of legends about giants in post-Biblical Jewish literature.

To learn more, read the entries Giants; Goliath; Og, in the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism.

The EJMMM is available at amazon.com. Click on http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/sr=1-1/qid=1159997117/ref=sr_1_1/002-7116669-7231211?ie=UTF8&s=books

Af and Chemah: Dark Angels of Destruction

2010-01-05T13:30:00.009-06:00

Af and Chemah (or Hemah) are Hebrew for "Wrath" and "Anger." The angelic names are derived from Ps. 37:8 and Deut. 9:19, where these two words are understood to be proper nouns, the personifications of God's fury.

Af and Chemah are two of the six angels of death, the others being Gabriel over kings; Kapziel over youths; Mashbir over animals; Mashchit over children. Af and Chemah are the destructive angels over men and beasts (Beit ha-Midrash, 2:98). Unlike the others, however, these are often paired together, apparently because they are chained to each other with bonds of black and red fire on the seventh level of heaven (Gedulat Moshe).

They have been unleashed on earth several times, most notably to destroy Jerusalem for its sins (T.B. Shabbat 55a) and to punish Moses for failing to circumcise his son Gershon (Exo. 4; T.B. Ned. 32a):

R. Judah b. Bizna lectured: When Moses was lax in the performance of circumcision, Af and Hemah came and swallowed him up, leaving nought but his legs. Thereupon immediately Zipporah 'took a sharp stone and cut off the foreskin of her son'; straightway he [they?] let him alone. In that moment Moses desired to slay them, as it is written, "Cease from Af and forsake Hemah" (Deut. 9:19) (Nedarim 32a) [1]

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

1. Trans. from the Soncino Talmud.

Song of Songs: The Secret Meaning is the Plain Meaning

2009-12-13T20:04:00.019-06:00

[Illustration from Die Bucher der Bibel, by Ephraim Moses Lilien]

Today we assume the proper way to read Scripture is for it's plain (and/or historical) meaning. This way of reading started to appear in the Middle Ages and accelerated with the Reformation. While rarely acknowledged, however, the plain sense of Scripture often presents problems. Take Shir ha-Shirim/Song of Songs (or Song of Solomon, or Canticles), for example. The plain meaning is - - there is nothing 'religious' at all about this book. It's a collection of ancient love poems, maybe even wedding poems. But it never mentions God, it teaches no ethics, it contains no metaphysics beyond the romantic assertion that "love is stronger than death." In short, we all know, its only rock 'n roll....

Modern fundamentalist churches, I've noticed, try to teach it, but even if they are "six-day creation," "sun stood still," "walk-on-water" literalists, they immediately abandon the obvious meaning when it comes to the SofS. Within a breath or two, all these hot-guy-pursues-lusting-maiden lyrics become a symbolic representation of Christ and the church.

In doing so, they revert to the now much poo-pooed but indispensable medieval strategy of "allegorical" reading. I don't fault the preachers for surrendering their fundamentalism in the face of this work. In order to make religion out of this stuff, one has to get allegorical. In fact, the book was probably included in the canon in the first place only because the Rabbis were persuaded that reading it allegorically as the love between Israel and God is the only real meaning.

For most of its interpretive history, in fact, the Bible has been treated as a cryptic text. The Jewish assumption has been that it operates on (at least) two levels, the niglah and nistar (The revealed and concealed). And Song of Songs was held to be the most esoteric of all the canon, because it has no niglah, only nistar. Thus the medieval Jewish commentator ibn Kaspi wrote:

Solomon, a"h, composed three books which we possess, corresponding to three types of discourse....entirely open and literal....entirely hidden, with nothing revealed...

the third has both hidden and revealed....Song of Songs is the second type...

(Commentary to Song of Songs)1

But once you claim to hold the key to unlock the secret treasure (i.e., "Its about God and Israel" or "God and the soul") then you have explain the parabolic meaning of all the figures, symbols, or imagery - what do the "garden," "nut," or "breasts" refer to? In Judaism, this has led to a vast array of interpretive strategies and conclusions. Here are just a cross-section:

A Love-Dialogue Between God and the Community Israel

This usually assumes that the images are all related in some way to events of the Exodus (Midrash Song of Songs) or to the entire arc of Jewish history, from Abraham to the Messiah (Targum Song of Songs)

A Dialgoue Between God and the Soul

This Neo-Platonic perspective is the primary focus of Issak ibn Sahula's 13th Century commentary.

A Dialogue Between the Torah and its Disciples

This reading is, to my knowledge, only to be found in the writings of Solomon Alkabetz (16th Century)

A Dialogue Between the Material and the Intellect

This scholastic-philosophic interpretation is exemplified in the commentary of Gersonides (14th Cent.)

An Dialogue Between the Feminine and Masculine Aspects of Divinity

This Kabbalistic reading begins (as far as I know) with Ezra of Gerona (13th Century). The Zohar includes this interpretation in Zohar Hadash.

In a following entry I will further explore SoS by providing a couple of sample readings to illustrate some of these interpretive strategies.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

1. Berlin, Biblical Poetry Through Medieval Jewish Eyes, p. 105.

JMMM Ranked 14th Best Jewish Blog on the Internet

2009-12-09T09:21:00.000-06:00

I was delighted to receive the news that the OnlineSchools network has honored the Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism Blog as one of the 50 top Jewish blogs in 2010. In fact, the JMMM came in 16th! A great way to finish the secular year. Hag Urim Sameach everyone.

Olam ha-Ba: The World to Come in Judaism

2009-11-18T08:58:00.011-06:00

The World-to-Come (Olam ha-Ba; Alma de-Atei) is a general term for those spiritual realms in which humanity will one day be a part (Isa. 64:3 is occasionally cited as a reference to the World-to-Come). Sometimes it refers to a perfected reality that is temporally in the future, i.e., the messianic Kingdom of God, which will follow the advent of the Messiah, a period of interregnum between the advent of the Messiah and the end of the world (Pes. 68a; Ber. 34b; Sanh. 91b). Its duration is indeterminate, with periods as short as 40 and as long as 1000 years being proposed (Sanh. 99a). In this renewed creation, ten things will change: The supernal light of first creation will return, living waters that heal will flow forth form Jerusalem, fruit bearing trees with healing powers will sprout from those waters, all the ruined cities will be rebuilt, Jerusalem will be completely rebuilt out of precious materials, harmony will reign in the animal kingdom, and between animals and humans, suffering will be swept from the world, death will be swallowed up, and all human beings will know wholeness and contentment (Ex. R. 15:2).

At other times the World-to-Come refers to a temporally current spiritual world that surrounds the material world and is the place of the afterlife (Shab. 152a; Tanhuma, Vayikra 8; MT, Bahir 106 (160); Hilkhot Teshuvah 8:8). In this interpretation, it is mysterious and beyond our ken (Ber. 17a; Ex. R. 52:3). In Zohar it emanates from the sefirah of Binah (3:290b). It is a place of unending bliss, though the Sages find themselves in some dialectic tension over this. For some regard the World-to-Come as less interesting and rewarding than this world, since there will be little to do there and no commandments to fulfill (Ber. 17a). Whatever it’s true configuration, the righteous of every nation have a portion in the World-to-Come (P Yev. 15:2; Ber. 17a; Uk. 3:13; B.B. 75a; Shab 152b; Sanh. 90a; Tos. Sanh. 13:12).

For a more personal reflection on Olam ha-Ba, go to my earlier entry: Texas, Hell, and Governor Perry

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Ancestral Spirits in Israel and Judaism

2009-11-12T13:44:00.000-06:00

[The shrine over the Cave of Machpelah, where the Patriarchs and Matriarchs were buried]

The belief in the continuing presence of the dead and their and influence on the living has been, in different forms, a feature of Jewish belief from earliest times. This has led to venerating the ancestral dead, and even cults dedicated to them. The Bible itself refers to such practices as ensuring the dead are gathered together with the clan on ancestral land (Gen. 50:24-25), caring for the dead spirits (Deut. 26:14; Isa. 57:6), and consulting them for occult knowledge (Deut. 18:11; Isa. 8:19-22; 19:3; I Sam. 28:3-25).

It is clear that ancient Israel venerated its dead (Deut. 10:15). Many scholars also believe that the Children of Israel inherited a cult of the ancestral dead, possibly even deified dead, from their Semitic milieu and that it remained a popular belief among Israelites despite the opposition of the Prophets.The burial places of Judges and Rachel may have served as shrine/oracles (Judges 8:30-32, 10:1-15; 12:7-15; Sam. 10:2; Jer. 31:15).

References in the Bible to the ob, (A familiar spirit, possibly derived from the same Hebrew root as "father") has been considered part of that covert tradition. Other scholars argue that a cult of the beneficent dead was introduced by influence of the Assyrians, who were obsessed with necromancy, in the 8th-7th Centuries BCE (Isa. 29:4). From this perspective, all seemingly earlier references found in the Bible are actually anachronisms introduced by later editors.1 The
only clear example of a Biblical figure who, contrary to the proscription of the Torah, consulted the ancestral dead for guidance is that of Saul summoning the dead spirit of the Prophet Samuel (I Samuel 28:4-25). The account clearly illustrates that the author of Samuel believed necromancy was real, though the end results for Samuel were personally disappointing.

With the prophetic verse Jer. 31:15-16 serving as locus classicus, "A cry is heard in Ramah, wailing, bitter weeping, Rachel weeps for her children, she refuses to be comforted...," the Sages of Talmudic times believed that their ancestors were aware of what transpired on earth and would plead before God on behalf of their descendants (Ta’anit 16a; Men. 53b). Midrash Lamentations Rabbah includes a description of Biblical figures like Abraham, Moses, and Rachel interceding before the Divine Throne when God's judgment is being pronounced against Israel (Lam. R. 24). In time this idea of the positive influence of the beneficent dead expanded into the doctrine of zechut avot (the merit of the ancestors), which became canonized in the daily liturgy with the Avot prayer ("You remember the faithfulness of our ancestors and therefore bring redemption to their children's children..."). Sefer Chasidim describes how the dead pray for the living (452). As late as the Zohar, we find the theme of being reunified with one’s relatives is still a prominent expectation of the afterlife (Va-yehi, 218b). In later Kabbalah there is a shift from veneration of biological ancestors to “soul” ancestors (see Reincarnation).

Under the influence of Christian and Muslim saint veneration, the doctrine of zechut avot eventually evolved into a more direct veneration of the meritorious dead, with practices such as praying to them for their intercession in personal matters. The purported graves of many luminaries - Biblical (Rachel's tomb in Bethlehem), Rabbinic (Simon bar Yochai in Meron), Medieval (Meir Baal Nes in Tiberia), and modern (Nachman of Bratzlav) - have become the focus of pilgrimages and prayers for divine intervention among the Ultra-Orthodox. Even the tombs of Jews who would have scoffed at such behavior, like Maimonides, have become destinations for Jewish pilgrims and supplicants.

The custom of graveside veneration endures and thrives to this day in some sects of Judaism, and is extended even to such 20th Century figures as the Moroccan faith healer Baba Sali and the seventh CHaBaD rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson.

1. Schmidt, Israel’s Beneficent Dead, pp. 132-263.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Bible Course at the University of North Texas in 2010

2009-11-11T16:42:00.002-06:00

Since I have a blog, I might as well use it for promotional purposes. This Spring 2010 at UNT, I am slotted to teach an undergraduate class on the Hebrew Scriptures. Here it is:

THE HEBREW BIBLE AS LITERATURE
Eng. 4800 - 002 CRE 3.0
Tu-Th, 3:30-4:50

The Hebrew Bible or Hebrew Scriptures (known to Christians as the Old Testament) is one of the foundational books of both western literature and world culture, and serves as the basis for Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In this course we will survey the biblical literature, acquaint students with literary and critical methods for the study of the Bible, situate the Bible within the writings and culture of the ancient Near East (ANE), and discuss the artistic and religious heritage of ancient Israel. We will deal with questions of translation, prose and poetry, rhetoric, artistry, structure and meaning – what the biblical text meant to its ancient readers, and what meanings it has today - but also with some historical, sociological, and archaeological issues useful to the reader’s fuller understanding. All texts will be read in English translation. Geoffrey Dennis, instuctor.

I hope to get an interesting crowd, so if there is a local blog reader, I encourage you to sign up.

Fire, Water, and Oil: Lost Jewish Rituals

2009-10-06T14:29:00.012-05:00

Over the course of 3500 years, certain rituals and holidays have come and gone, though in the spirit of the ever-dying,

[Igulim v'yashar - water in forms circular and linear]

ever-resurrected people, few holidays go away forever. Here are a couple I think of in light of Sukkot:

The Festival of Wood offering: A holiday mentioned in the Temple Scroll of the Dead Sea Scrolls, evidently inspired by the mundane task of gathering firewood for the altar sacrifices in the Temple, turning it into a sacred occasion. Observed on a solar calendar and evidently performed several times a year it is a holiday unattested to in surviving Jewish tradition and may have been simply part of an idealized, rather than actual, calendar featured in that secterian text. There is some Biblical basis for it once having existed, though (Neh, 10:34-40). The largely defunct annual Rabbinic observance of Tu B'av may be a cognate or competing version of the Qumran custom.

Simchat Beit Hashoeva, or Water Libation or Water Drawing Ceremony: When the Temple stood, one of the rituals of the holiday of Sukkot would be the Water Libation ritual. This theurgic ceremony entailed gathering a jug of water from the Pool of Siloam (an underground spring) and taking it up to the Temple, where it would be poured over the altar in a mimetic act of rainfall. As the drawn water was poured out, this incantation was recited: “Let your waters flow, I hear the voice of two friends [the drawn water calling to its source], as it is said, ‘Abyss calls to abyss in the roar of the channels’” (Tan. 25b). The purpose of the ritual was to draw the underground waters of the abyss toward the surface of the earth, to trigger the fructifying mingling of tellurian (subterranean/circular/feminine) and heavenly (rain/linear/masculine) waters that would allow growth in the coming season (T. Ta'anit 1:4; Ta’anit 10b; PdRE 23).

While the ritual in its ancient form is no longer viable without an altar, today some communities hang onto the party aspect of the ritual and it is an occasion for a concert, dancing, or a community program.

Festival of the First Oil: Another holiday unknown to the normative Jewish calendar but mentioned in the Temple Scroll. It may have its basis in the Biblical list of priestly privileges, however (Num. 18:12-13; Neh, 10:34-40). It is not known whether the holiday was actually ever observed outside the circle of the Dead Sea Scrolls community.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Hymns to the Divine Warrior, the Hebrew God of Battle

2009-09-11T12:02:00.035-05:00

[The Egyptian army drowning, from 1740 illustrated book, found at the British Museum website]

It's interesting to consider how much social context shapes religious rhetoric and the language we use to describe the divine. Take Christianity. In the West it is the religion most associated with pacifism. Indeed, there is considerable rhetoric of forgiveness, turning the other cheek, universal government, and universal love in the Gospels. But few people realize how this rhetoric of universality is grounded in the Gospel writers' lifestyle under the Pax Romana. The hegemony of Rome from the Atlantic to the Euphrates created an unparalleled sense of security and shared identity for the people of the ancient world, a sense of participating in a universal order few people of earlier or later times would know. In a world where war was generally confined to the borderlands of empire, it was much easier to think and talk about life lived without the necessity of violence and war.

By comparison the Hebrew Bible was composed in more unstable times. Israel was a small ethnic group surrounded by aggressive tribal and imperial neighbors. War was a constant anxiety and violence a frequent reality. By necessity, the Israelites were themselves a capable warrior culture, with many tales of great war chieftains (Abraham, Joshua, Ehud, Gideon, Samson, Saul, David, etc.). Yet for the very same reasons, Israelite writings are permeated with dreams of enduring peace, a peace which in their experience would require a massive reordering of the way things were, a divine transcending of the reality they knew.

It should come as no surprise, then, that the God of Israel is sometimes envisioned as a champion who will fight on Israel's behalf, delivering His people from the hands of oppressor nations.

And so it is that we find a literary genre, the poetic hymn to the "Divine Warrior," which appears in different forms in different periods of Israel's history. Derived from Canaanite and Mesopotamian mythic stories of gods like Baal and Marduk, the Divine Warrior poem stereotypically consists of a series of conventional elements:

1) The threat (cosmic, national, or personal)

2) The battle

3) God victorious

4) The divine procession (to Jerusalem, across the desert)

5) Salvation (in this world, not usually in the Christian sense) for the followers

6) The advent of universal peace.[1]

There are many variations on these six conventions. Like any other restrictive form of poetry - iambic pentameter, or hyku - the artistry lies in the twist the writer can put on the conventions: reordering them, inverting them, compressing or expanding a theme against the other. sometimes a writer will not include one or two of these elements as part of his message.

Bible readers are most familiar with this type of hymn in the "Song of the Sea" (Exodus 15), Moses' victory song after crossing the Sea of Reeds and seeing the overwhelming of the pursuing Egyptians:

Then Moses and the Israelites sang this song to the LORD : "I will sing to the LORD, for he is highly exalted. The horse and its rider he has hurled into the sea.
2 The LORD is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise him, my father's God, and I will exalt him.
3 The LORD is a warrior; the LORD is his name.
4 Pharaoh's chariots and his army he has hurled into the sea. The best of Pharaoh's officers are drowned in the Red Sea….
9 "The enemy boasted, 'I will pursue, I will overtake them. I will divide the spoils; I will gorge myself on them. I will draw my sword and my hand will destroy them.'
10 But you blew with your breath, and the sea covered them. They sank like lead in the mighty waters.
11 "Who among the gods is like you, O LORD ? Who is like you— majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonders?....
13 "In your unfailing love you will lead the people you have redeemed. In your strength you will guide them to your holy dwelling….
17 You will bring them in and plant them on the mountain of your inheritance— the place, O LORD, you made for your dwelling, the sanctuary, O Lord, your hands established.
18 The LORD will reign for ever and ever."

Other examples of the hymn form appear in Josh. 10-11; Ps. 48, 74; Isa. 51: 9-11, 59:15-20, 63-64; Zech. 9.

This is a remarkably flexible and enduring poetic genre. It is used in the Hebrew Scriptures early and late in the Biblical period to address all kinds of conflict: cosmic or national, military or religious, external or internal, struggles literal and metaphoric.

1. See Cross, Frank, "The Divine Warrior in Israel's Early Cult," in Biblical Motifs and Hanson, Paul, The Dawn of Apocalyptic.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

The Girdles of Job: Power Cords

2009-08-28T23:30:00.016-05:00

[A modern belt of power]

I recently came across one legend that did not make it into the EJMMM, the legend of the "girdles of Job," three belts or cords of divine craftsmanship.

Mentioned in the Greek language Testament of Job, these girdles were given to Job by God (Job 38:3), curing him of all his ailments and granting him knowledge of future events (why Job needed three is not explained). At his death, Job gave the sashs to his three daughters by Dinah [1], his second wife: Yemima, Ketziah and Keren-Happuch. The belts are described as "three-stringed girdles about the appearance of which no man can speak; For they were not earthly work, but celestial sparks of light flashed through them like the rays of the sun" [2]

Job assured them the garments would act as amulets, protecting them from external dangers and transforming their hearts. When the daughters secured the golden girdles across their chests (over their hearts?), the women knew the language of angels and sang praises in celestial tongues. So girded, they were also relieved of all worldly fears (Testament of Job, Chapters 46-53).

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

1. According to the Sages, Job's first wife, Uzit, died and he married Jacob's daughter, herself a bit of a schlemazel
2. The Testament of Job, M. R. James, trans., Cambridge University Press, 1897.

Jewish Alchemy: Transformation and Kabbalah

2009-08-28T09:38:00.010-05:00

[Alchemists using a bain Marie, the oven invented by Jewish alchemist Maria Hebraea]

The Hermetic tradition, one part theosophy, one part astrology, and one part experimental science, was first expounded in writings attributed to the Egyptian Hermes Trimagistium. Emerging in late antiquity, alchemy was a profoundly spiritual pursuit, a quest to uncover the potential for transformation of the natural order through the study of transformation in certain iconic natural substances – metals. Some alchemists even envisioned their ritualistic chemistry as a kind of sacrificial rite.[1]

Alchemy has been associated with Jews since antiquity. Moses is credited with being the teacher of Hermes himself, but this may also represent a conflation of Moses with the figure of Moses of Alexandra, an Egyptian-Jewish alchemist of antiquity. Some traditions credit the Patriarchs with transmitting alchemical knowledge (along with the philosopher’s stone) that was learned from Adam. Bezalel, the builder of the Mishkan, is said to have been an alchemist (Exodus 31:1-5). Late traditions associate David and Solomon with the Hermetic arts, based on the Biblical account of how David gave Solomon stones, assumed by later readers to be philosopher’s stones (I Chron. 22:14). One ancient alchemist even interpreted the sacrifices made in Solomon’s Temple as kind of nascent alchemical rituals.

By far the most important and influential historical Jewish alchemist of ancient times is Maria Hebraea (Miriam the Jewess). She introduced the Bain Marie, a water-bath oven method still used in chemistry to this day. Medieval alchemists, both Jewish and gentile, frequently claimed occult knowledge of Kabbalah. The Zohar of Moses Shem Tov de Leon and the writings of Abraham Abulafia show a familiarity with alchemy. Directions for the making of gold appear in several Kabbalistic works and Jewish scholars debated whether such transformations were actually possible.

Because Kabbalah was so widely applied by Christian alchemists to their work, by the dawn of the modern era alchemy and Jews were uniquely linked, though this appears to be more perception than reality. So ingrained was this perception that, in order to give their ideas more gravitas, a number of treatises on alchemy were evidently published by non-Jews using Jewish pseudonyms.

Actual Jewish practitioners include Jacob Aranicus (French, 13th Cent), Isaac and John Isaac Hollander (Dutch, 15th Cent.), Modecai Modena (Italian, 16th Cent.) and Samuel de Falk (English, 18th Cent.). Even Baruch Spinoza expressed an interest in it. Oddly, however, only a few Hebrew language alchemical texts have survived to the present.

[This entry excerpted from The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism. To learn more, the EJMMM is available at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050 ]

1. Janowitz, Icons of Power, pp. 109-122; also see Patai, The Jewish Alchemists.

Taharah IV: Clothed in Righteousness

2009-08-16T15:10:00.006-05:00

["Behold the couch of Solomon. Sixty mighty men surround it, of the mighty men of Israel" A taharah table]

This is the fourth entry in our study of the liturgy for the ritual of body purification:

Having undergone ablution [1] the body is ready to be dressed (ha-l'bashah) in burial shrouds. The tradition as it currently stands is to use tachrichim, a white three-piece bio-degradable outfit of pants, blouse, and head covering [2] followed with a winding sheet (sovev). The Tachrichim are meant to resemble the garments of the priesthood. In fact, some of the items are known by the same terms as the priest's outfit - mitznefet (miter), michnasayim (breeches), and kittel (robe). This continues the motif of earlier liturgy that death is in essence an elevation to a higher status, that the deceased is being readied to enter the mikdash ha-maalah, the "Temple on High." Again, mimicking the dream-vision of Zechariah 3, the Chevra Kadisha serves as the angelic entourage attending to the newly elevated "priest."

As the corpse is being so dressed, the following liturgy is recited:

I will greatly rejoice, my soul shall be joyful in my God, for
God has clothed me with the garments of salvation; God
has covered me with the robe of righteousness as a
bridegroom puts on priestly glory and as the bride adorns
herself with jewels (Isaiah 61:10).
And I said, “Let them set a pure headdress upon his head,”
and they set the pure headdress upon his head, and they
clothed him with garments, and the angel of Adonai stood by
(Zechariah 3:5).
For as the earth brings forth her growth, and as the garden
causes the things that are sown in it to spring forth, so
Adonai will cause righteousness and praise to spring forth
before all the nations
(Isaiah 61:11).
And Adonai will guide you continually and satisfy your soul
in time of drought, and make strong your bones, and you shall be
like a watered garden and like a spring of water whose waters
never fail (Isaiah 58:11).

The uplifting, upbeat images catalogued here are quite striking, even discordant - the deceased is compared to a bride/groom on the wedding day (with the implication of God being the complimentary partner); to the High Priest undergoing coronation; to a seed [about to be 'sown' in the earth!] that will spring forth in new life; and to a garden with a perpetual spring, which, what ever the fate of the individual growths, collectively will never wither or dry up. The Chevra Kadisha simultaneously defies and embraces, and verbally redefines death with tropes of joy, empowerment, fertility, purity, and eternal life.

It is an exquisite act of dialectic interplay between reality and hope. Through speaking this liturgy before the speechless corpse and the valley of the shadow of death is inverted into a high place of hope. Performing magic with words, the Jews of the holy fellowship construct hope from the stuff of tragedy, sending both the death and the living on to renewed life.

[1] Many douse the body in water while it is on the taharah table, others actually use a mikveh, submerging the body in a built-in ritual pool. There is controversy over which is preferable - having handled a few bodies, I find bringing the water to the dead somewhat more dignified.

[2] For those families who insist on the western custom of burying their loved one in fine street clothing, a kittel sometimes will be put over the suit/dress.

Taharah III: The Hope of Israel

2009-07-29T10:10:00.008-05:00

[Jugs dedicated to a Chevra Kadisha. Note the image of men carrying a burial litter. Found at www.shtetlinks.jewishgen.org/nikolsburg/w16.jpg]

The term "taharah" is used to refer to the entire ritual of preparing a corpse for burial, but it more specifically refers to the one stage of the ritual in which the body undergoes ablution. Having already physically cleansed the body, we now symbolically cleanse the spirit. This is achieved by either the body's total immersion in a body of "living water" (a moving natural body of water or a man-made ritual pool), or by continuously dousing the body in a minimum of 24 quarts of water (usually by means of buckets). This is the center-piece of the preparation, the culminating moment.

This is so because "living water," water that has flowed down from heaven, is, in effect, a heavenly substance. Jews regard bodies of water to be a kind of celestial embassy on earth, a nexus point between us and Eden. By immersing, we in effect place ourselves at the very doorstep of the World-to-Come, we are prepared to encounter divine things. Since the dead can do nothing from themselves, we perform this liminal ritual on their behalf.

While the ablution is performed, we read a lectionary of verses affirming that God is the mikveh (the purifying waters) that cleanses the spirits of all flesh in the end:

Said Rabbi Akiva, “You are fortunate, Israel. Before Whom do you purify yourselves, and Who purifies you? Your Father in heaven, as it is said: ‘And I will pour pure water upon you, and you shall be purified’ (Ezekiel 36:25), and it says: ‘The mikveh [ritual bath, also a word play on 'hope'] of Israel is God’ (Jeremiah 17:13). Just as a mikveh purifies the defiled, so does the Holy Blessed One purify Israel” (Mishnah Yoma 8:9). A fountain for gardens, a well of living waters, flowing from Lebanon (Song of Songs 4:15) . And I will pour pure water upon you, and you shall be purified from all of your impurities; and from all of your abominations I shall purify you (Ezekiel 36:25).

This ablution, once again, is a mimetic performance. We are acting out physically what we believe to be happening spiritually. It is God, not the Chevra Kadisha, that purifies soul, but we purify the body as a ritualized assertion of faith that God will receive this deceased Jew.

Most of the verses selected are straight-forward prooftexts of this belief. The somewhat oblique verse from Song of Songs, "A fountain of gardens...," refers to the female lover of the poem, who is a understood to be a literary figure for the people Israel. The reference to her as "living waters" affirms that life is still present in death, that just as water moves from one state to another, there will be an enduring aspect of the person who has died. The deceased is now ready to enter and participate in the garden of eternity.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Taharah II: In My Flesh I See God

2009-07-26T07:00:00.002-05:00

[Illustration by David the Artist, found on Flickr]

Continuing our discussion of the rich symbolic blending of liturgy and action that is the ceremony of taharah, of preparing a body for burial, we come now to the ritual washing. The body undergoes two cycles of cleansing. First, the body is gently washed, starting at the head and working down the limbs. Only then is the actual taharah, a whole body ablution, performed.

Like the removal of clothing, the washing is done while passages of Scripture are recited. In the case of the cleansing, it is Song of Songs 5:11-16, widely known as the Rosho ketem paz from the opening words:

His head is like the most pure gold [ketem paz].

His hair is curly – black like a raven.
His eyes are like doves by streams of water,
washed in milk, mounted like jewels.
His cheeks are like garden beds full of balsam trees yielding perfume.
His lips are like lilies dripping with drops of myrrh.
His arms are like rods of gold set with chrysolite.
His abdomen is like polished ivory inlaid with sapphires.
His legs are like pillars of marble set on bases of pure gold.
His appearance is like Lebanon, choice as its cedars.
His mouth is very sweet;
he is totally desirable.
This is my beloved!
This is my companion, O maidens of Jerusalem!

The juxtaposition of text and context could hardly be greater. It is little short of mind boggling; reciting the lively, lusty, hyperbolic description of the male lover in Song of Songs while one washes the limp, grey, lifeless limbs of the corpse. It seems yet another example of exquisite, some might say tasteless, Jewish irony.

Yet this paean to beauty thrown in the face of obvious physical desolation is precisely the point. The human, made in the divine image, is to be celebrated. Even if these limbs no longer course with life, what a miracle that they once did. The liturgy forces us to look past the dead flesh to meditate on the sublime nature of the human body. It also suggests that the most splendid aspect of this person endures in a way that may not be obvious, even with the close examination of his corpse.

But there is more. Any Jew conversant with the siddur knows that this passage from Song of Songs has long been treated as an allegorical description of God, the lover of Israel. In the Shabbat service there is Shir ha-Kavod, the Song of Glory, which uses the imagery of ketem paz to praise the God of Israel. The Midrash and Kabbalah frequently cite these words when describing God's attributes.

So reciting these words over the body implies we are looking at, and caring for, something divine. In the divine image, for sure, but something more; God is present in the flesh, even in the decaying flesh, of every person. As the body is readied for burial, the implication is this: God is present in this moment, which is obvious in its tragedy, but may also be hiding something of surpassing beautiful just below the skin.

Addendum: In many traditional chevra kadisha, ketem paz will be recited over both men and women. In more contemporary circles, the woman's washing will be performed to the description of the female lover, Song of Songs chapter 4.

Zal g'mor - to learn more, consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Taharah I: Memesis of Angels, Transformation of the Dead

2009-07-22T14:13:00.020-05:00

One of the one of the most widely practiced yet least familiar ritual customs is that of taharah (or tahorah): Purification of a corpse. In theory, every Jewish body buried undergoes this ritual (with variations), though in fact most newly deceased Jews outside the State of Israel probably don't.

A form of body preparation, taharah is performed by a chevra kadisha, a "sacred fellowship" of community volunteers who take on this task. In past centuries, these groups were a cross between the Optimists Club and the Masonic Lodge. Membership was considered a kind of elite privilege, it functioned partly as a social club, and often had more than a air of secrecy about it (anonymity was considered a virtuous aspect of participation).

At its core is a ritual of transition not unlike what is done in most cultures; it is a mechanism to show respect for the deceased by preparing the body for its final resting place (When I worked as a registered nurse, we had our prescribed 'ritual' for washing and preparing a body for transfer to the hospital morgue). Taharah has been, over time, elevated to the status of a sacrament in some circles - there are sources which claim a dead Jew cannot take his or her place in Eden if the body has not undergone taharah. The steps in body preparation became more and more elaborate, and each ritual gesture was given more complex and metaphysical interpretations.

There are endless geographic and communal variations of how this ritual is performed, but I want to comment on examples of the liturgy performed during taharah, because I think the resulting "speech-act" of reading and doing is revealing and interesting.

In this entry I will focus on one of the early steps of the ritual, the removing of any clothing worn at the time of death. Every aspect of what is done, even something as mundane as stripping the body prior to its washing and purification, is considered integral to the ultimate meaning of the ritual, which is to help the dead make the transition from one state of being (existence in this world) to another state of being in the World-to-Come. This is captured in the very fact that there is a liturgy for the pragmatic act of removing the clothing. Moreover, the choice of reading, taken from the prophets, is both startling and beautiful. As the clothes are cut away (the body is at all times partly covered to protect its modesty), one of the participants recites Zechariah 3:4-5:

And He raised his voice and spoke to those who were standing before him, saying, "Remove the soiled garments from him" And he said to him, "Behold, I have removed your iniquity from you, and I will cloth you in fine garments."

Even without comment or prior knowledge, this is a great quote for the occasion, but consider the original context. In Zechariah, the prophet is having a dream-vision where he sees Joshua, the High Priest of his time, being tried in an angelic court. Joshua is clothed in filthy clothing, symbolic of the spiritual corruption that threatens the disintegration of the sacred community of Israel. In the midst of the trial, God graciously intervenes and declares Joshua fit, having endured the ordeal of exile, and ready to take on new, priestly duties. The angels strip him of his outer garments in a gesture signifying his spiritual purification. What has happened is that his soul has been cleansed, even as his material covering is cleansed - also indicating that sin, like the garments, are incidental, not integral to who he is.

By reciting these verses while stripping the body (perhaps in death the body itself is the covering that is removed, revealing the soul beneath), the Chevra Kadisha is acting out a memesis of Zechariah's vision. We become the angels preparing the dead for his/her elevation to a new and holy state. The deceased is Joshua, sullied and stained by transgression in life, undergoing the ordeal of death, but now he/she is readied by us to take a new form, a new role, to become a being akin to the priesthood. An unstated subtext is that life itself is an exile analogous to the exile Joshua endured, and merely having endured it has prepared the spirit for future glorification and return to God, Who is the homeland (ha-Makom, "the place," as the Sages refer to Her) of the soul.

It is a brilliant use of text in a ritual setting to affirm the values of Judaism and the enduring value of the individual. It marks death not as an end, but almost as an overcoming of life and a transfer of the essential part of each person into a higher, purer, order of being. The Chevra Kadisha is, in that moment, an angelic assembly privileged to be the facilitator of that transformation.

Zal g'mor - to learn more, consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Ruach P'sak'nit: Who Speaks for Israel?

2009-07-20T21:05:00.019-05:00

It is apparent that the people Israel could sure use some help. Spiritually, there have been numerous intercessors on our behalf. Among humans, we can immediately think of Moses,

[Hopeful Angel, by Paul Klee]

whose actions on our behalf are recorded in Torah.

The Sages also call attention to numerous times where the prophets following Moses speak in defense of Israel. Some argue that no prophet is worthy of the name unless he is willing at some point to step in between God and Jewish people. As it turns out, keeping us out of trouble in more than a full time job. Abraham, Rachel, and other virtuous ancestors, we are told, are still occupied with this advocacy long after they've died (LOTJ 4:304-10).

Among angels we are told, in various sources, that Michael (Exodus Rabbah 18:5), Gabriel (Sanh. 44b), and even an eponymously named angel, Israel (Mid. Teh. 8:6; PdRE 37), is our people's guardian spirit and advocate. Least known, however, is the Ruach P'sak'nit.

The Ruach P'sak'nit ("Intervening/Intercessory Spirit") Is a celestial defender of Israel. Perhaps based on the recording angel who pleads on behalf of suffering Israel in the Book of Enoch (1 En. 89.76), he goes by three names - Piskon, Itamon, and Sigaron (B.T. Sanh. 44b). He is given permission to dispute with God over matters pertaining to the Jewish people (Tanhuma, V'zot ha-Brachah). I was not aware of him when I wrote the EJMMM and would welcome anyone who knows of additional sources or traditions about any angel of these names or titles.

Zal g'mor - consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Herev: Mythic Jewish Swords

2009-07-17T16:26:00.010-05:00

[The sword and olive branch symbol of the Israeli Defense Force]

I just finished watching the 1980 John Boorman film Excalibur with my sons. They enjoyed it, but, OK, three decades later, it's showing its age. The acting is a little lackluster, the editing abrupt, and the soundtrack hit-and-miss (Orloff still shines), but when that sword pierces the surface of the lake for the first time, water streaming off it, gripped by the alabaster, fish-scale sheathed hand of the Lady of the Lake, well, the archetypal substrata of my brain grabs hold of the parasympathetic nervous system, yanks hard, and my hair still stands on end.

There's just something about swords. Maybe it's Freudian, but it's definitely something. A sword, it seems, is more than just a sharpened crow bar, it's got mythic power like no other weapon. I mean, look at ZaHaL, the IDF. Nobody, and I mean nobody in the IDF wears a sword, even for ceremonial purposes. Yet no rifle, tank, or plane [weapons they actually wield] is used as the IDF's central symbol - they chose a sword.

So what roles do swords occupy in Jewish myth? A symbol of power, force, and punishment, God has a sword of judgment which is given to the angels; it makes its first appearance in the hands of the Cherubim that guard the way back to Eden (Gen. 3). this may be the same sword that is wielded by the Angel of Death. Right now it “sleeps,” but woe to the world should God ever awaken it (Mid. Teh 80:3). God will use a "mighty and hard" sword, presumably this same one, to slay Leviathan at the end of time (Isa. 27:1). This “sword” is sometimes a figure of speech, referring to Divine speech (Deut. 32:41; 3rd Enoch 32).

Magical swords in the hands of humans are much rarer. It is actually the staff of Moses that serves as the Excalibur of Jewish folklore (SEE: The Rod of Aaron, Staff of Moses: Jewish Wondrous ... ). Nevertheless, swords inscribed with divine names wielded by humans in supernatural combat are mentioned in the Dead Sea Scrolls (The Children of Light will have such swords during the final apocalyptic battle against the Children of Darkness) and in Midrash Abkir, where Methuselah subdues demon changelings that torment primordial humanity with a divinely empowered vorpal blade (my eldest is also reading Alice through the Looking Glass).

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Serafim: Fiery Angels of Presence

2009-07-10T23:03:00.017-05:00

Seraphim, Serafim: (“Fiery Ones”). A class of angels first described in the apocalypse experienced by Isaiah in the Temple (Isa. 6). There are four seraphim, corresponding to the four winds. The appearance of the Seraf is truly awesome. It has six wings, sixteen faces, and is the height of all seven heavens combined. Serafim are born anew each day, rising from the river of light that flows from under the Throne of Glory (Sefer Hechalot). According to Enoch I, they are serpent-like. The Talmud counts Michael among the Serafim:

R. Eleazar b. Abina said furthermore: Greater is [the power] ascribed to Michael than that ascribed to Gabriel. For of Michael it is written: Then flew unto me one of the Seraphim, whereas of Gabriel it is written: The man Gabriel whom I had seen in the vision at the beginning, being caused to fly in a flight.... [one "flap" vs. two "flaps"]. How do you know that this [word] 'one' means Michael? — R. Johanan says: By a word association; [the words] 'one', 'one'. Here it is written: Then flew unto me one of the Seraphim; and in another place it is written: But, behold, Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me (B.T. Ber. 4b)

The Zohar contains a section on angels, probably a Hekhalot text inserted into the teachings on creation, which briefly discusses Serafim.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Hillula: Partying with the Righteous Dead

2009-06-27T06:32:00.010-05:00

All Jews consider visiting the graves of deceased relatives a meritorious act. But outside of Hasidic circles, American Jews have no experience with the custom of making a pilgrimage to visit the tombs of Jewish saints and folkheros. Among the Jews of North Africa and Asia, however, the veneration of the righteous dead is widespread and widely observed.

Called variously a ziyara (Arabic: "visitation"), aliyah ha-regel (Hebrew: "pilgrimage") or hillula (Aramaic: "party" or even euphemistically "wedding"), thousands will make a journey, sometimes alone, but more often in organized caravans, to the gravesides of venerated scholars, rabbis, and faith healers.

Largely (but not entirely) unknown in Biblical and Talmudic times, the custom arose in the Middle Ages, coinciding with the rise of saint veneration in Christian and Muslim societies.

There are appointed "holidays" (a yom hillula) for some figures, often the yahrzeit, the most famous in Israel being the Lag b'Omer (33rd Day of the Omer Count) hilula to the Safed grave of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, the Talmudic Sage, mystic, and purported author of the mystical tract, Sefer Zohar. Others include Choni ha-M'aggel, the Talmudic rainmaker buried in Hatzor, the medieval healer Meir Baal ha-Nes in Tiberius, and Baba Sali (a modern folk hero) in Neivot. [See this Youtube clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWqWIFEox0c]

These events are lively social gatherings, freely mixing religious, commerical, and party atmospherics, with food, drinking, bonfires, marketing, worship, dancing, and Bar mitzvah celebrations. They also are the focal points for a widespread belief in miracles. Like Lourdes, these sites will attract pious petitioners seeking spiritual intervention for health, fertility, marital problems, and the like. Offerings are made - sacred books, bottles of olive oil and liquor, candles (often tossed, or hurled en mass, into a huge brazier) - in hopes of soliciting a divine response.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Marot ha-Tzovot: Reflections of Male and Female, Lens of Prophecy

2009-06-09T10:46:00.024-05:00

[Woman gazes at mirror art by Israeli artist Daniel Rozin, found at http://nymag.com/images/2/daily/entertainment/07/09/06_artcandy_lg.jpg]

Mirrors have occupied an interesting place in human thought. More than just a means of seeing the self, they are often an archetype for a portal between mortal and immortal realms, or ironically, a means to see "beyond" the self ("Mirror, mirror on the wall, whose the fairest of them all?" is followed by the power to see unseen and distant things).

Given that the Tabernacle and Temple were the places of divine vision and encounter, places to "see the face of the Eternal (Deut. 16:16; Ps. 11)," it is surprising that more early interpreters of the Torah didn't make symbolic hay out of Exodus 38:8, an explicit reference to mirrors associated with the sanctuary of God:

He made the laver of copper and its stands of copper, from the mirrors of the women who worked at the opening of the Tent of Meeting.

The laver of copper/bronze used in the Mishkan came from these mirrors, making them "integral" to the cosmic scheme embodied in the Sanctuary and its objects. But in what way?

In a small number of Rabbinic interpretations, these mirrors were not symbols of divine vision, but emblems of female sexuality and the Sages explored its appropriateness both in the sanctuary as the locus of God's holiness and in the larger divine plan. In Numbers Rabbah, Moses selects them specifically because the Israelite women did not use them for "immorality" (i.e., used them to make themselves look more sexually appealing) (IX:14). RaSHI playfully tweeks this rather puritan Midrash by making Moses' prudishness a foil for a more positive view of sexuality:

From the mirrors [marot] – The Israelite women had in their possession mirrors that they would look in when they put on their jewelry. Even these mirrors they did not withhold from the donations to the Tabernacle, and Moses was disgusted with them because the mirrors were made for the evil inclination. God said to [Moses], "Accept the mirrors, for they are more precious to Me than anything else, since with the mirrors the women brought many hosts of children into being." When their husbands were oppressed with slave labor, the women would go and bring them food and drinks, and feed them. They would bring the mirrors with them and each one of the women would look at herself in the mirror with her husband and entice him with worlds, saying "I am more beautiful than you." From this they would make their husbands desirous and have sex, and the women became pregnant there (in the fields), as it says: "Under the apple tree I roused you" (Song of Songs 8:5). And this is why [it calls them] "marot tzovot" which can be read as "mirrors of multitudes." (Tanhuma Pikudei 9 has a similar account)

Kabbalah, by contrast, focuses on the word-play of the word marah between "mirror" and "vision." Thus Marot ha-Tzovot can be read as "visions/mirrors of the Hosts [of heaven]," reminiscent of another esoteric teaching, the "nine shining speculum," or levels of prophetic vision (Num. 11:6-8; T.B. Yebamot 49b). Thus these "mirrors" associated with the place of Divine Presence (the lowest of the sefirot which is the "speculum that does not shine") are apertures for gazing upon degrees of divine light, as Joseph Gikatilla (13th Cent) wrote:

Know that Moses our teacher was greater than all the other prophets, and Moses never used the phrase "YHVH TZVAOT" for his level cleaved to YHVH [alone] and he did not have to look into "mirrors of TZoVOT" (the hosts or legions of women). Thus it is written that Moses our teacher, PBUH, looked into the luminous mirror (Num. 12:8). The other prophets see through an opaque, unfinished mirror "...I make myself know to him in a vision [Marea] (Hosea 12:11)" [which] is the essence of Marot Tzovot...this is also the essence of the mirrors of Tzovot that were arrayed around the doorway of the Tent of Meeting. [1]

In later sources, the tenth sephirah, Malchut/Shekhinah, is even dubbed the Marot ha-Tzovot. By the late 13th Century there is a book devoted entirely to the Kabbalistic symbolism of these "mirrors" [2] Which is not to say that the sexual association of the marot made by the Rabbis is lost - Kabbalah takes as a premise that God's creation is shot through and sustained at all levels by erotic energy. Elsewhere Gikatilla links the mirrors of Exodus 38:8 to the lower sefirot of Hod (female) and Netzach (male), which are most closely tied to prophecy.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

1. Weinstein, Avi, trans., Gates of Light, Harper Collins, 1994, p. 119

2. Matt, Dan, "David ben Yehudah HeHasid and His Book of Mirrors," HUCA Annual, 1980.

Kiss of Disclosure, Kiss of Death

2009-06-05T21:18:00.006-05:00

The kiss as a spiritual act has a long history in Judaism. It is closely linked with the handling and learning of Torah. Jews often kiss a Torah scroll when it is brought into the congregation. People will kiss a chumash or siddur that has been dropped.

Students would kiss the hand of their master after a learning session, symbolically acknowledging the hand that “fed” them spiritual sustenance (PdRE 2; Zohar III:147a). Masters would kiss disciples on the head as a kind of initiation ritual (T. Chag. 2:2). In the Zohar, in particular, masters would kiss students, often on the eyes, when they had demonstrated an insight or high attainment of wisdom.[1]

In the highest heaven, the angels who serve before the Throne of Glory kiss God during the afternoon worship (Hechalot Rabbati). A special category of kiss is the “kiss of God” (Meitah be-nesikah in Hebrew or mise binishike in Yiddish). This refers to death directly at the hands of God (or the Shekhinah):

930 kinds of death were created in the world...The most difficult is plague, the easiest of all is a kiss. Plague is like burr being pulled through a wool fleece or like stalks in your throat. A kiss is as gentle as drawing a hair out of milk (T. B. Ber. 8a)

The concept arises from the death of Moses, where it is said he died al pi Adonai, "at God's command", but literally "by God's mouth" (Deut. 34). This easiest of all deaths circumvents the dreaded Angel of Death. According to the Sages, only six people have died this way: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Miriam, Aaron, and Moses (B.B. 17a; S of S R. 1:2; Tanh., Va-Etchanan). In later Jewish mystical writings, a number of kabbalistic masters die in ecstasy via the “kiss” (Zohar III: 144b; Sha’ar ha-Gilgulim 39). Jewish mysticism also equated the “kiss” with devekut, mystical fusion with God (Zohar II: 53a).

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

1. Arthur Green, “Introducing The Pritzker Edition Zohar,” at 2004 Conference of the
Central Conference of American Rabbis, Toronto.

Divine Tears: The Zohar on Weeping

2009-05-28T11:57:00.010-05:00

[Found at http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Pbqs7mCGdtM/STVvR_qBVTI/]

I made an earlier entry on weeping as a spiritual practice in Jewish tradition. I also alluded to the idea that God weeps. In the Zohar, the distinction between divine and mortal tears blurs in fascinating and beautiful ways. Here we have a passage which suggests that heartfelt tears are actually a manifestation of the Divine Presence (Shekhinah):

The great Rabbi Hiyya went to the masters of Mishna to learn from them.
He went to R. Shimon ben Yohai and he saw a curtain was blocking the entrance to the house. R. Hiyya was astonished and said: I will hear something from his mouth from here. He heard R. Shimon saying, “Hurry my beloved, swift as a gazelle or a young stag, to the hill of spices…”
(SoS 8:14)
R, Hiyya heard this and said: Exalted ones are engaged in the house and I am sitting outside! He wept.
R. Shimon heard this and said: the Shekhinah is surely outside! [The Midrash repeatedly describes the Shekhinah as weeping out of love for exiled Israel. Here Hiyya's tears at being "exiled" from the scholars is taken by Rabbi Shimon to be a sign the Divine Presence is nearby] Who will go out? [See Isa. 6.1-10 - there are several moments that echo the summons of Isaiah] His son R. Elazar said: If I am burned, I shall not really be burned, for the Shekhinah is outside of us. Let the Shekhinah come inside and there will be a complete flame. [Bring the Shekhinah "in", uniting it with the Word, i.e., fulfilling the verse under discussion, a mimetic act of ending the estrangement of Israel from its God]
He then heard a voice that said: The pillars have not yet been supported, and the gated have not been completed. R. Elazar did not go out.
R. Hiyya sat down. He wept and groaned. He opened and said: “Set out my beloved swift as a gazelle or a young stag, to the hill of spices…” (SoS 2:17) [He offers a complimentary verse to Rabbi Shimon's, echoing his longing to unite the separated lovers - God and Israel - and signifying that he is spiritually fit to enter into the company of the enlightened circle of mystics]
The gates of the curtain opened but R. Hiyya did not go inside. R. Shimon lifted his eyes
and said: Learn from this that permission has been given to the one who is outside while we are inside. R. Shimon arose and fire went from his place to the place of R. Hiyya [The fire of Torah uniting with the water (tears) of Divine Presence, reconciling the duality ]….Once he entered inside he lowered his eyes and did not left up his head. R. Shimon said to R. Elazar his son: Arise and pass your hand over his mouth [Look again at Isa. 6.1-6]…R. Hiyya then opened his mouth and said: My eye has seen what I have not seen before, something I’ve never contemplated has been shown to me. It is good to die in the good glowing fire of gold! [to experience unio mystica, or as the Hasids put it, bittul ha-nefesh] (Zohar 2:14a)

Notice that Shimon never repudiates his earlier claim that it was the Shekhinah outside weeping - Rabbi Hiyya's tears transfigured him into something divine! In fact, elsewhere in Zohar, enlightened individuals are also called "Shekhinah."

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Kosher Fodem: Sacred Threads between the Living and Dead

2009-05-08T07:00:00.000-05:00

[Candles stacked upon the ohel (gravesite) of a Hasidic master]

People are aware of the use of strings and threads as amulets in Jewish popular culture. Heck, the Kabbalah Centre has made it into an industry. There are a number of sources and explanations for this custom, but today I'll consider just one.

Kosher fodem ("fit string") is an outgrowth of the Ashkenazi pious custom known variously as Kneytlekh Legn ("laying wicks") or Korim Mesn ("measuring graves"). In Poland and other Eastern European communities, pious women would go, en mass, to graveyards and lay thread around the graves of people known for their piety in life. This seemingly morbid practice was actually a spirited and popular women's outing [1]. The string so prepared were thought to "absorb" a measure of the dead soul's merit. Most often, the strings would be cut into wicks, made into candles, and then donated to a synagogue or house of study.

This was a charitable effort to support these sacred institutions, but it was also done, pardon the pun, out of 'enlightened' self-interest. Often the donation would be made to coincide with High Holidays or an illness or trouble in the family, in hopes of receiving divine intercession. The candles could also be reserved for rituals of divination or as a means to protect the household against malevolent forces [2].

No doubt, some of this string was simply attached to places of vulnerablity one wanted to protect - a baby crib or birthing bed, for example. And some just got tied around the wrist.

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

1. Wex, Born to Kvetch, p. 178.
2. Weissler, "Measuring graves, Laying Wicks," pp. 61-80.

Abbahu: Magic Herbalist, Fiery Preacher

2009-05-04T11:54:00.005-05:00

Along with my earlier entries on Jewish shamans of the Talmudic era,

Choni the Circle Drawer: Rainmaker and Rip Van Win...
Chanina Ben Dosa: Jewish Shaman
Akiba: Mystic and Miracle-Worker
Lamed Vavniks: The thirty-six righteous who sustai...
Rav Aha ben Jacob: Dragon Slayer, The Jewish Beowu...
Joshua ben Levi: Esoteric Master, Cosmic Jester

I must add Rabbi Abbahu. This Talmudic Sage (ca. 3rd-4th century) was a man of exceptional physical perfection, rivaling that of Jacob and Adam (B.M. 84a). When he sat and interpreted Torah, supernal fire would flash around him (S of S R. 1:10). He experienced clairvoyant dreams (T.Y., Taanit 1:4, 64b). He once escorted Elijah to Eden, where he gathered healing leaves, wrapping them in his cloak. Afterward he discovered his cloak had such a heavenly scent that he could sell it for a great price (B.M. 114a-b). An avid collector of lore both legal and legendary, he preserved stories of how angels intervened in the lives of biblical figures (PdRE 16, 43). He was given a glimpse of his reward in the Olam ha-Ba (the World to Come) before he died, which appeared to him as thirteen rivers of soothing balm (T.Y., A.Z. 3:1). When he did die, the building pillars in his home town, Caesarea, voiced their mourning (Mo'ed Katan 25b; T.Y. A.Z. 3:1, 42c).

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Cry Out To The Lord: The Spiritual Power of Weeping in Judaism

2009-05-01T10:13:00.008-05:00

Weeping, biologists now tell us, is a useful mechanism for keeping our body in balance (The Mystery of Tears, William Frey). Jewish tradition has always weeping a great tool for maintaining spiritual equalibrium. As the Yiddish proverb goes, "Tears are to the soul what soap is to the body." There are branches of Jewish thought that take the idea of tears cleansing the soul quite seriously (Talmud A.V. 17a). In the Zohar we are told,

“If a person grieves and sheds tears for the death of Aaron’s two sons, God declares, ‘Your sin has left and your iniquity has been atoned for’ [Isaiah 6:7]”

and

"...all those that are pained from those righteous who have died, or who sheds tears for them, God proclaims over him, 'Your sins are remove, your iniquities atoned for.'" (Zohar 3:57b).

The significance of weeping is in Zohar is complex and wide-ranging, often being the necessary precursor to revealing a divine secret, a marker that the revealor is spiritual cognisant of the awesome nature of what he is about to do (Fishbane, Eitan. “Tears of Disclosure: The Role of Weeping in Zoharic Narrative,” The Journal of Jewish
Thought and Philosophy, Volume 11, No. 1) and appears in many phases of Jewish mystical tradition.

Thus, weeping can induce visions (II Enoch; Zohar 1:4a, 3:166b; Sefer ha-Hezyonot). It has the power to draw the Shekhinah to one who cries in worship (Reshit Chochmah). Hasidic figures like the Kotzker Rebbe and the Seer of Lublin encouraged weeping as a spiritual discipline (Idel, M., Kabbalah New Perspectives). The tears of the righteous have the power of Torah; in some cases, they even turn into words of Torah when they fall ("Sealing the Book with Tears," Nechemia Polen).

Zal g'mor - To learn more consult the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050