March/April 2006

Journeys in Spirit

Scientology has long had Tom Cruise as its pitchman; now Kabbalah has Madonna singing its praises—literally. True, when Hollywood stars embrace an ideology, their zealousness can muddy the waters in regard to fact versus fiction. But it can also generate a level of curiosity that didn't previously exist. To be sure, the threads in the red string bracelets worn by Kabbalist celebs will eventually fray; but the ancient philosophy of Kabbalah will surely be none the worse for the wear.

Kabbalah, for all its complexity, at its simplest level means “to receive.” It implies that each of us is capable of receiving directly from God. “At the heart of Kabbalah, there is an attempt to get back to the image and likeness of God,” says Rabbi Rami Shapiro, director of the One River Foundation. “We exist through radical trust and radical grace—you don't have to earn it. As we grow to adulthood, we forget this—we forget who we are. The culture wants us to forget because you can't be manipulated if you know who you are. So, along the way your identity gets stolen. Then you try to be somebody else and discover there's no room for you. But if you try to be your uniqueness, there's plenty of room for you. A quiet regalness takes over when we walk in the image and likeness of God.”

History and symbolism

A profoundly complex Jewish spiritual philosophy, Kabbalah attempts to elucidate the divine structure of the universe. “The Cabalists [sic] teach that everything we do stirs up a corresponding energy in other realms of reality,” says David A. Cooper in God is a Verb (Riverhead Books, 1998). “Actions, words or thoughts set up reverberations in the universe.”

Ironically, there are no fewer than two dozen spellings for this ancient tradition. Scholars prefer the traditional Jewish spelling, Kabbalah, while Qabalah was favored by occultists and Cabala came to be known as the Christian spelling. Confusing perhaps, but these variations are not that unusual because there are often several different systems for translating the Hebrew and Arabic alphabets into Roman letters and finally into English.

Elements of Kabbalah can be traced back to at least the first century A.D., if not well before. It is generally thought that the classic Kabbalah took shape in the 12th and 13th centuries in the south of France and in Spain, with Isaac the Blind considered its founder. He is referred to as the “Father of the Kabbalah” because the oral law was said to have been handed down from Mount Sinai from person to person until it reached Isaac the Blind.

Central to the Jewish tradition is the Torah, the five books of the Hebrew bible written by Moses: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. The tradition also says that there are four levels of meaning in the Torah, from the simple surface message to the deepest, secret level. This secret or embedded level is where Kabbalah comes in.

The central, most important work of Kabbalah is the Zohar (meaning "Book of Splendor") which appeared in Spain around 1300, published by Moses de Leon. This, too, is not one book, but rather a body of literature sometimes attributed to a Jewish scholar at that time, Simeon Ben Yochai, but also said to have been written by various, anonymous authors united under one title. (An earlier text, the Sepher Yetzirah, or Book of Formation, is believed to have been passed down by oral tradition until it was put into writing in the second century.)

In its commentary on the Torah, the Zohar attempts to answer the most difficult, secret or embedded religious questions: “If God is good and the world is God’s creation, why is there evil in the world? If God is limitless and infinite, where is the connection with a world that is limited and finite? How could matter manifest from pure spirit? How can we conceive of and know God if what we call God is unknowable?”

“True perfection includes imperfection,” says Shapiro, an award-winning poet and essayist, whose liturgical writings are used in prayer services throughout North America. “Our entire culture is built on shame, so religion ends up being about conformity, whereas God is about diversity and uniqueness. Think about it like this: If I am I, then you are you; but if I am I because you are you, then I am not me and you are not you. When you end shame, you can be who you really are and then you will be in the kingdom of heaven.”

The tree of life

The Kabbalah text proposed a diagram of the divine, which is known as the tree of life—a symbolic representation of the Kabbalah. It is a system of 10 sephirah, or manifestations of God, from where all knowledge derives. The fourth sefirot, for example, is Chesed, or mercy, and is seen as the first of God’s creative powers signifying ultimate loving kindness poured into the creation of the universe. The 10 sephirah are connected by 22 paths on the tree of life, which represent the reciprocity of divine spirit connecting with human beings in the material world and human beings connecting with divine spirit.

Whatever its origins, the tree of life is a useful meditative device. The 16th-century Cabbalist Johann Reuchlin described the tree as setting out the “10 steps by which we ascend to the knowledge of things.” It’s also a helpful way to focus your mind. “In meditation, everything depends on thought,” says Daniel Matt, author of Essential Kabbalah (HarperSanFranciso, 1996). “If your thought becomes attached to any created thing—even something unseen or spiritual, higher than any earthly creature, it is as if you were bowing down to an idol on your hands and knees.”

Still, as is the case with most ancient schools of wisdom, only so much can be charted; thus, Kabbalah is chiefly an oral tradition. As a result, there are those who believe the tree of life may not have originated with Judaism at all, for its pattern is found in a very similar form in certain Assyrian and Egyptian reliefs.

Modern Kabbalah

Kabbalah is a way of knowledge, and its practitioners are certainly encouraged to meditate and seek thorough understanding and training. A traditional, Jewish Kabbalist maintains that it’s impossible to study Kabbalah without knowing Hebrew, since thousands of important Kabbalistic texts have not been translated from their original Hebrew or Aramaic. Also, there is a tradition that Kabbalah should not be studied by anyone under the age of 40, and certainly not by women. Even today, it’s not always easy for a woman to find a Rabbi prepared to act as her teacher, but for at least the last 100 years, women have largely ignored the taboo to refrain from studying Kabbalah.

Take Madonna, for example. She has almost single handedly made famous the Kabbalah Centre in Los Angeles. The Centre claims to be the largest educational organization on the wisdom of Kabbalah, with 50 branches worldwide. It takes credit for selling millions of books, in 10 different languages, around the world.

Established in 1922 under the leadership of Rabbi Ashlag, then Rav Brandwein and today Rav Berg, the Centre has lofty goals: according to the centre's literature, it is “...dedicated to revealing the ancient wisdom of Kabbalah... to helping people to improve their lives personally, professionally, and spiritually... and to ridding the world of chaos, fostering true peace, and bringing about the spiritual transformation of all mankind.”

Not surprisingly, Kabbalah devotees say the various new age teachings offered by the Centre dilute its true meaning. For example, in traditional schools the 72 names of God form the basis for meditation and ascetic practices. At the Centre, participants are told they can be infused with healing power simply by glancing at the letters. Writing for timesonline.com, Yossi Klein Halevi laments, “You can even call the Centre for a free, 10-minute personal consultation with a highly trained 72-names specialist on how to find the name that best suits your needs. And in the Kabbalah CafŽ in the courtyard, a sign reassures patrons that all coffee and tea is made with Kabbalah mountain spring water, blessed by the Centre's leaders. An adjacent gift shop sells scented candles, for relaxation and better sex.” The reputation of the Centre's leaders has also been questioned, especially their use of what sounds like “cultish” language and references.

“Kabbalah is not pop psychology,” says Samuel Avital, a Boulder mime artist and teacher. Avital was raised in Morocco by a family devoted to practicing the tradition. Speaking to Intermountain Jewish News he says, on the contrary, “Kabbalah is an exploration of the unknown filled with beautiful and practical wisdom.”

Zohara Meyerfoff Hieronimus, founder of the A-Z Kabbalah Forum (www.KBLH.org), studied with Avital. “The beautiful part about Kabbalah is that when you begin to study it, it begins to make your spiritual life more integral in your everyday life,” she says. “Like setting a table—what does it mean? It shows you that you’re setting the conditions for the life force to express itself, to sustain us, to nurture us. No [religious] system is as complete, and I’ve read about many of them. Kabbalah gives you a way to integrate the spiritual and the material, rather than sometimes feeling that one lives a material life and has spiritual experiences. So you don’t spend your life in meditative bliss, but take your meditative bliss and make it help you serve others.”

It wasn’t so many years ago that the West’s fascination with all that was from the East, in particular Buddhism, raised alarms. The search for self-awareness is ongoing, and for those who accept the idea that much the of universe is unexplainable, the recent interest in Kabbalistic teachings, even (or especially) some with suspect ties, comes as no surprise.

The enigma

It’s obvious that Kabbalah is both easy to over-simplify and difficult to explain. Its obscurity, secrecy and mystery have therefore attracted an element of the occult through the ages. It has not gone unnoticed that there are links to the ancient divination system of Galgal, as well as to the Tarot. Indeed, many modern occultists believe that the Tarot was meant to be a tool to explain and teach the Kabbalah. That’s no doubt why, as far back as the 13th century, the great Kabbalist and mystic, Abraham Abulafia, warned people against using it for magical purposes. Could he have meant the $26 Red String bracelets worn by Madonna and other celebrities to ward-off envious stares and looks of ill will?

Perhaps. But if a Western version of Buddhism is now mainstream, a cobbled-up Kabbalah couldn't be far behind.

“Every individual should be regarded as potentially good, as each has a ‘holy spark,’” said the late Rabbi David Wolfe-Blank. “Human fulfillment depends on overcoming separations.”

Resources, local and beyond

For more information on the Kabbalah, see the following resources:

• The Essential Kabbalah: The Heart of Jewish Mysticism, by Daniel C. Matt (HarperSanFranciso, 1996)
• God is a Verb: Kabbalah and the Practice of Mystical Judaism, by David A. Cooper (Riverhead Books, 1998)
• Meditation and Kabbalah, by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan (Weiser Books, 1989)
• The Path of Kabbalah, by David Scheinkin (Continuum International Publishing Group, 1986)
• www.digital-brilliance.com/kab/
• www.jewfaq.or/kabbalah.htm
• www.kabbalah.com
• www.safed-kabbalah.com