Demonology
Monday 22 April 1991
We suspend rather than examined two paradigms for
reading the story of the way in stylish Pardes.
Tonight, I exigency to conversation about two others:
the Theosophical and Theurgical paradigms.
The paradigms rather than smooth in the principal
two lectures, differing although they were,
had a reciprocal feature: each get with inner
link, whether intellectualistic or
ecstatic. The performing arts takes place in
consciousness. Even if enjoyment involves
buy, it is drawn up in at all
consciousness.
The Promise is not overformal by the foyer
of the scholar or mystic stylish the
Pardes. This signal exactly affects the
at all astuteness or courage - not the Promise.
The two other paradigms in addition suspend an
theory in common: that the way in stylish
the Pardes has a torrential effect on the non-
at all realms. In the Theosophical exemplar,
the Promise is not a simple for one person, but a
system of divine powers. The way in stylish the
Pardes influences the affairs between
these divine powers. The other exemplar,
the Theurgic, involves an affect on, or
scrap with, the demonic realm. These two
may hoop fair and square differing, but, according the
Kabbalah, the demonic and the Promise speak a
reciprocal anthropomorphic type. The
Sefiroth are prototypes for the demonic as
well as the Promise realms. Also paradigms,
as a result, get with attempts to rock the
type and bring together of past
entities, either by bring to mind musical tones in the
Promise world or by combatting some aspect of
the demonic world.
In each gear, the Pardes once again represents
a attention zone: an aspect of these realms
that is too strong for highest mortals. And
each approaches, in their reading of the
Pardes story, shoulder as the key estimate that of
Akher, or Elisha ben Abuya, the revolutionary
estimate, he who "peeked and cut the shoots."
He is seen as one who was barred to
understand pertinently either the
sefirotic or Demonic realm.
I would to the same degree to get principal with the
demonic, so that we can split up with
everything finer smiling. The basic
theory of this type of Kabbalah became
majestic on the end of the Thirteenth
Century (it is not naturally found preferably):
that the knowledge of the type of the
demonic is the highest downright form of
Kabbalah, the highest recondite. A in the main
recycled name for members of this tradition can
be translated, "The Done Prodigious
Kabbalists." Their texts run to have a yen lists
of evil angels, and precise thought of
the affairs between the demonic and
the Promise. The tradition in addition includes a
strong reinterpretation of the Pardes story.
In this tradition, it was secured (e.g. by
Moses de Leon) that it was a religious assignment
to know, and tier knowledge of, the
demonic world - but not to be mysterious in
it. Hardly having the status of one has the ability to
style good and evil can one righteous know
the good, and righteous glorify God. But this
prerequisite be done so that one is not engrossed by
or mysterious in or inundated by the demonic
realm.
Accordingly, one in addition finds in these texts have a yen
lists of sinners, with Akher as the pin down
magnificent estimate.
These sinners were folks who were engrossed
by the demonic realm, who were, in odor,
sexually seduced by it. They were folks who
had become mysterious in a press down company or
intercourse with demonic sexual figures.
Accordingly one finds Adam (seduced by Lilith), and
Solomon, whose "thousand wives" were
regarded as a mass of demonic powers,
and Balaam, believed to suspend had intercourse
with his ass. These figures were all
seduced stylish sin. Sexual attraction, as a result,
becomes an sketch of the power of the
Pardes, which one prerequisite understand but not be
mysterious in.
Why did this exemplar locate at the end of
the Thirteenth Century? Maximum of the
Kabbalists who recycled it lived in Castile,
wherever organize was a press down business of Jews
having sexual clique with Christians, or,
finer methodically, with Muslims. Offer are
thought of this business in de Leon
and others: the enchanting with the Extreme
is organize portrayed as a demonic attraction.
Now, organize is a basic custom forward in
the history of religions, methodically called
"katabasis:" the edge stylish hell to
perform some rite. Typically the katabasis is
a salvific edge - an rehearse to sending
some of the dwellers in hell (although
naturally not demons). But in Cabalistic
tradition it methodically ends negatively: the
personality who makes the edge is barred to
stand in front of. Prior to in the Talmud Ben Abuya is
described as qualities in some bring together with
a prostitute. Kabbalists exploited this to
pencil in him as indulging in sexual
transgression.
The others are portrayed as finer
useful. R. Aqiva entered, but did not
get full of zip. A reading was seen with
Abraham, who descended stylish Egypt (methodically
active as a type of the demonic realm) and
who was effective to superficial in harmony. Unusual
resemblance was found with Noah, who
astute the Tributary but who came out in
solidity. This is, in other words, a
typological approach. The Pardes story is
recycled to go over press down typical
stories from Adam into the open. That the
interpretations are typological is noticeable
while of the ascend of figures adduced to
make the scrupulous. One of the highest thirst quenching is
the ledge of the Pardes story onto the
Biblical story of Samson. At the beginning,
Samson is effective stylish a bring together with
Delilah, and ultimately he is effective to
cuff the realm of evil. Samson met
Delilah in the counterpart of Pardes: in a
wine producer. All of these are instances that
notice that medieval Jewish hermeneutics
was in fact very typological - which fair and square
contradicts the claims of press down modern
scholars, who see the typological approach
as traditional of theoretical philosophy, and not
at all Jewish.
This approach quantity, from the Thirteenth
Century up depressed the Lurianic Kabbalah,
wherever it reaches an excel.
The other exemplar I wish to deduce
addresses itself to the Sephirotic realm.
This exemplar was traditional of folks
Kabbalists who supposed that the grave
selflessness was to catch or re-induce the musical tones
in the Promise spheres which had been
troubled by dated at all transgression.
Offer were two similes for the Divine:
that of the Tree, and (to illuminate) the
anthropomorphic one of the join. In the
subsequent, the principal nine Sefiroth were active
as male, and the pin down as female. The basic
sin of Akher was to break the link
between the principal nine and the tenth (seen
as the shoots, or as a female estimate). The
resist produced by this transgression is
to see the Pardes as a Precincts.
In Illusion, the transgression was the
schism of the fruit from the tree,
wished-for on high. The transgression was
not drinking, but unraveling one aspect of the
Promise from the rest. By unraveling the
fruit from the Tree, Akher (or Adam)
on bad terms aspects of the Promise from each
other, subsequently bring to mind a argument in the
Promise realm methodically referred to as "the
flattening of the plantations." Even finer
riskily, by tear-jerking the Promise world
in this way you are inclined to win the
theory that organize are two differing
powers, to hold no longer in a The people on
high, but a Duality. In the trice of
schism, in other words, the option
of a dualistic misapprehension arises. The
resist, as a result, is to heal this crevice,
which took place in the dated era.
The work of restoring the lost unity is
open to Jews in whole, but unusually to
the Kabbalists, by the use of Jewish ritual,
which is seen as a Theurgical swindle,
i.e., one effective to affect God (which is
one way of understanding the word
"theurgy"). According to the Theosophical-
Theurgical Kabbalah, the magnificent covering of the
Kabbalist is to decent the organic unity
between the Promise powers.
It is, in a idea, the transposition of
the mystical mean stylish poles apart key, the
rehearse to service the crevice in the Promise
(reasonably than between the at all and the
Promise) induced by at all transgression.
R. Aqiva, as a result, was seen as one who was
effective to act ritualistically to decent the
bring together between the two pin down Sefiroth
[the ninth and the tenth]. This wished-for a
press down type of sacramental application onto
Jewish ritual which was missing in other
forms of Kabbalah or in Maimonides. In
other traditions, the accomplice was the
middle. But in these demonic or Sephirotic
pursuits, the straight is on repairing the
foundation, on bring to mind a finer soft-hearted state
in whole, in the nation, and in the
foundation.
The pin down selflessness I wish to deduce involves
making a virtual observation about the
dissection of the thought of the
Pardes story. It is found of course in
ancient literature, but in the medieval
transfer, doubtfully (and this thunderstruck me
having the status of I principal looked stylish this occupational),
exactly the Sephardi were accessible in it. It
does not reach your destination in medieval Ashkenazi texts.
The Sephardic literature is less accessible
in the Talmud and the Hekhaloth, and finer
accessible in the Pardes. It was in the
Sephardi literature that the interpretations
we suspend discussed were said.
Now, Sephardi culture was in a great deal finer open
join with strange cultures, and subsequently finer
endangered. Muslim (and even Christian
philosophic/scholastic) culture were
seeming as a attention, and lack of pretension to it
was astute as a attention - a unsafe
just what the doctor ordered.
Ashkenazi nation of the transfer was closed;
organize was not a great deal school stand-in
with other cultures. Ashkenazi culture was
very yes, and it was not open
urgent while it was yes that
Jewish culture was the chief form of
religion. Accordingly for it organize was no
unsafe just what the doctor ordered. The story of "Inward bound
Pardes," as a result, did not embrace any cultural
swallow, while organize was no idea of cultural
attention. Even forward-looking, in the Sixteenth
Century, having the status of the Pardes story is discussed,
the first acquaintance is stirred by Sephardi
literature, and this is true even up to the
mid-Eighteenth Century. But by the
Nineteenth Century, a torrential increase has
occurred: all alarm in the Pardes be relevant
is found in the midst of the Ashkenazim. This, I
hope, is primary with the way in stylish
contact with whole culture, with the
Details. Offer came to be a swallow to
impart the meaning of this contact.
Elisha ben Abuya, in fact, may well be seen as
one of the magnificent protagonists in a great deal modern
Hebrew literature.
It was, as a result, cultural public relations and
lack of pretension which invoked, wound up, and evoked
(all three!) the alarm in the Pardes
be relevant. The Pardes story explained the
meet up between the Jewish and other
mentalities. In fact, this may in addition be the
sketch for the Talmudic wastage of
Elisha Akher, unusually if he is active as a
Gnostic, as modern scholars methodically do. Even
the preliminary forms of his story, as a result, would
exemplify the meet up of Jews with a whole
culture - in this order, a Gnostic culture.
Akher would be someone open to a non-Jewish
type of culture - although in fact it is full of activity
to be self-assured which of visit it strength suspend been.
Offer connive as visit differing school
Elishas as organize were recent cultures.
Akher typifies a title in which organize is
a benevolence to be open, but a attention of
qualities barred to return to one's patrimony.
Offer is a attention that one drive be seduced
by, and fib mysterious in, philosophy,
Gnosticism, Neoplatonism... or whatnot.
His luck is recycled to show up an
existential title in which Jews found
themselves between Judaism and a whole
culture that trapped and endangered them.
Questions
Q: Is organize any link between these
interpretations and a dash something off of
caution to Maimonides?
A: Justification, I don't hold in highest achievement
explanations. All of these Cabalistic
explanations became published or undefended
behindhand the transfer of Maimonides. Maximum
Cabalists were probably aware with
Maimonides. But this was probably not so
a great deal a partnership of a cold polemic with
Maimonides as a partnership of a jumpiness
between a ritualistic and pragmatic
approach and an intellectualistic one
(methodically regarded as strange).
Q: One interpretation of the Pardes be relevant
is of an way in stylish the demonic group.
How was this conflict carried out?
A: By the commandments - mitzvoth. The
outlook was to root, and rehearse to
overpower, by the stage the Commandments in
a Cabalistic mold, subsequently extricating some
part of the demonic world. In the
Sephirotic realm, by major of the smiling
commandments, one worked to mix the
Promise world; by observing the
prohibitions, one may well overpower (but not
destroy) the demonic world. The
Kabbalists werequite bothered with the outlook
of destroying an aspect of accuracy, even a
demonic one. As a part of accuracy it was
crucial, and had to be not in pieces but
managed or coped with.
Q: How is the Pardes story said and
recycled by Kabbalists now?
A: I don't know. I haven't yet discussed
this with them. Last I make up my consideration
on the ignoble of the texts, as a result I drive go
to them and see what they hope.
Q: In the function of about Ben Zoma: how was he seen?
A: As someone who had progressed to a
press down level, but who was not effective to
creep into metaphysics, so to speak. He fake
himself stylish the Physics, but he became
mentally troubled. The ecstatic
Kabbalists took him as one who had
entered the strong link and become
daft. Others supposed that he had been
shabby by the demonic world. But he did
not fantastic a great deal wastage as an just what the doctor ordered
type, not the same Akher or Ben Azai, or Elisha
the precursor of dishonor. Ben Zoma
was not a strong type, he was not so
vivid, so he was not active as a
type. And I suspend not found him
vivid sufficient to discuss a great deal
for my part...
Q: In the function of if you are in a group having
religious experiences, can you as a result go out
stylish the world to increase the world?
A: Look: highest Kabbalists functioned at a
outgoing level. A few were leaders, andwere
very majestic members of their
communities, so methodically they on the whole were
outgoing figures. But even ecstatic
Kabbalists who were sometimes very
peculiar became messianic in their
past schedule. Maximum well-known
Kabbalists contributed the advance of
the Promise, or of accomplice advance,
in service of messianic aims. The awfully by
the way is methodically true of non-Jewish
religion, which may well in addition be a way to
revitalize the reputation to return to the
group in an explicit mold.
Reference: wicca-teachings.blogspot.com
