OK. Let’s get her out of the way. You know who I mean. The celebrity who is to kabbalah what the Beatles were to Eastern religions: simplifier, popularizer, provocateur. Would the world know about kabbalah if it weren’t for her music videos, her tattoos, the denunciations of her by all serious kabbalists?Kabbalah is an ancient tradition, its lineage varying according to who is telling the story. Scholars say kabbalah emerged in distinctive form, embodying much older traditions, in 11th century Europe. I am on the trail of that first kabbalist, Isaac the Blind. Believers, the ultra-Orthodox Jews who gather each year in the tens of thousands around bonfires outside the Israeli town of Meron in midsummer, say the secrets were revealed to the Biblical Abraham, Isaac, Ezekiel. These Orthodox believers will tell you the ancient secrets were revealed in detail and at great length to Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai in a second century Galilean cave, were finally written down by him in the multi-volume text known as the Zohar.
The Zohar brings the story to Spain, and is why I’m here. The Zohar is the canonical text of kabbalah; it exists together with Torah and Talmud as the core of rabbinic Judaism, and represents the full flowering of medieval kabbalah. The Zohar appeared in Spain in the 13th century, and most modern scholars believe it is the work of Moses de Leon.
What is much less well known is that De Leon wrote most of the immense ms. in the small Spanish town of Avila, close to Madrid. Christians know Avila as the home of the great mystic Theresa of Avila, although few know that she was from a family of Conversos, those Spanish Jews who became Christians in the time of the Inquisition. The contemporary visitor to Avila will find several churches and monasteries dedicated to Theresa. Only by getting off the tourist route was I able to find the small commemorative garden in honor of Moses de Leon. Some even say that a small house inside the medieval city walls is the place where the Zohar was written.
The physical traces are few, and inconclusive. One of the primary teachings of kabbalah is that what the eye sees is not necessarily the key to ultimate truth, or meaning.
Faced with this kind of lineage, open to this kind of tradition, do we even need to think about Madonna?
Thank you, Kitty, for leaving the beaten tourist tracks…But what did the memorial plaque say?
Can we conclude that there must be something in the water in Avila?
Bravo!
Looking forward to reading about your adventures.
Hey Kitty. Sounds like a mythic journey… Brave of you to leap in. and what an evocative landscape. I can’t remember if we had spoken about Ruth E. Gruber’s _Virtually Jewish_ book — though she does write mostly about central Europe: relevant nonetheless on Euro tourism’s reinvention of Jews via official channels… bons voyages.
Ilana
Very important book, and I’ve quoted her at times. Virtual Jews are everywhere, alas.
dear kitty, had to look on a map to put you in geographical context. i’ve been as close as the sierra national park to your west. quite a surprise in southern spain. , and as these things happen i was looking at small synopsis of the norwegian jewish community experience last night.
sent this line to my brother in an emai:
[Jews allowed in Norway 1851; first synagogue after 40 years 1890s] 2100 jews in norway just prior to the war/ all but 758 flea to or through Sweden. we now know 4. [who were murdered] in 1946 there were 559 Jewish people in Norway, i assume returning from sweden / and were there a few survivors [of the camps}? 1500 jews in norway now… we met several of them [in Wroclaw, May 2010, at the rededication of Zum Weissen Storch [synogogue.]]
i hope at some point you will provide the polish detail for the migration through shoa. i was specifically looking at the two members of my family who made it to norway only to be deported to their death with the 756 other jewish people from norway who did not escape into sweden. but this may be for another place and time.
for now i wish you continued immersion in a wonderful company of artists and may the threads of isaac the blind form a metaphorical tallit, your prayer shawl, on this journey.
shalom, don
metaphorical tallit for you journey.. beautiful.
love this madonna entry and yr last line!
love seeing and knowing where you are.
miss you. happy for you and what you’re getting to do there.
today was the 4th shabbat auf ruf today in the last 2 months maybe. seems to be in the water there.
oh, and at least 3 bar mitvahs honorings. and in addition to the prayer circle in the back of the schurch today comprised of four devotees under 2 feet tall, there was the newest member of romemu… matisyahu…one month old. so adorable, full head of dark hair.
and did you know… adina became a member!
i assisted at a two day NVC training for 25 middle and high school teachers in lawrence school district in long island. went very well. altho the education system is historically a tough place for this to take hold.
i’m almost 1/2 way into my NVC foundations course.. all women interestingly, one from romemu (yay). enjoying the sparks of creativity and aliveness i can feel while there.
started rehabilitative water exercises for my better, but still painful feet.
definitely ‘better’ in ways i can see in my face, eyes and thoughts. still elusive, but closer to some hope about some happiness, whatever that means.
city diner booth last night after services with jayne & howard, slender married couple who always sit up front. adina was stuck at work and didn’t make it.
good to connect with you here. thank you for blogging. love seeing the pictures. looks beautiful.
am avoiding two priority tasks on my list. wanting to nap. going to bedford, ny tmow for my niece’s sweet 16 (cory’s daughter). will be good to be with family.
xoox, shana