The concept of absorption in the beginnings of Kabbalah

Authors

  • Jordi Gendra Molina Wilson College, Chambersburg

Keywords:

Kabbalah, Sefer Yetzirah, Sefer ha-Bahir, Isaac the Blind, knowledge of God

Abstract

In his commentary on the Sefer Yetzirah, R. Isaac the Blind distinguishes between three forms of knowledge, namely sensory knowledge, mediated through the bodily senses; intellectual knowledge, mediated through analogy; and direct knowledge, which, in contrast to the other two, allows for knowledge of divinity which, while partial, does not require bodily senses or reasoning. Isaac the Blind refers to that third form of knowledge as “absorption”, and he expresses it by means of the metaphor of a child nursing at its mother’s breast, an innovative image of the divine at that time. This article examines the aforementioned metaphor’s roots in classical rabbinic literature, as well Isaac the Blind’s use of it in his
commentary.

Keyboards: Kabbalah, Sefer Yetzirah, Sefer ha-Bahir, Isaac the Blind, knowledge of God

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Author Biography

Jordi Gendra Molina, Wilson College, Chambersburg

Professor adjunt,

Departament de religio,

Wilson College

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Published

2013-06-26

Issue

Vol. 9 (2013)

Section

Articles

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