Reddit reviews Meditation and the Bible

Read Rabbi Kaplan's other work, "Meditation and Kabbalah"

You might also want to see "Meditation and the Bible" and "Innerspace" for background knowledge.

It is worth noting that traditional kabbalists do not recommend Kabbalistic meditation for those who are not spiritually prepared for it, even though some may at times encourage the theoretical study of it.

The more traditional path is to first be steeped in תורת הנגלה, the revealed Torah, through deep study of chazalic literature with commentaries, Rif, Rambam, Rosh, Tur and commentaries, and Shulchan Aruch. Simultaneously, one would study the process of spiritual growth through a work such as Messilas Yesharim or Chovos HaLevavos and then perhaps the Ramak's Tomar Devorah and Rav Chayim Vital's "Sha'arei Kedushah." Afterwards, there are several theoretical works on Kabbalah you would study before getting to the actual Kabbalistic meditations or כוונות (or even the Ari's works at all). B'hatzlachah in your journey!

> While I certainly agree that there is value in looking at things in a new light to see a new truth, all too often people do not actually read the actual source material and instead read modern interpretations which are fallacious, and misleading.

Sounds like we'd get along. :)

In the Jewish tradition many English speaking practitioners happily accepted Michael Berg's translation of The Zohar as being canonical.

Luckily a scholar with more of an academic eye grounded in Aramaic named Daniel Matt was willing to spend the better part of a decade trying to capture the nuanced almost poetical nature of the texts for an English audience.

This gets to a point that I think Jorge Luis Borges perfectly described in his short story 'An Examination of the Work of Herbert Quain' and 'Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote'.

The first short explores the idea that the same book may tell many stories or that there is only one story iterated infinitely as a sort of synecdoche. The second portrays how translations are in many ways whole new works that never fully capture the original's essence, somewhat similar to Godel's incompleteness theorem.

To illustrate this look at a single simple Hebrew word that has shaped the better part of the last 2000 years of Western civilization: יֵשׁוּעַ. Most westerners think the correct pronunciation of this word is Jesus. Yeshua is far closer to the truth, but even then it doesn't entirely capture the full Hebrew vocalization on the vowels/nikkud.

How did this happen? The name Yeshua (יֵשׁוּעַ) comes from Joshua's Hebrew name, Yehoshua (יְהוֹשֻׁעַ) which sometimes appears in its shortened form, Yeshua (e.g., 1 Chron. 24:11; Neh. 8:17). Yeshua, when transliterated into Greek, comes out as ᾽Ιησοῦς (pronounced YAY-soos), with the final sigma being necessary in the nominative case to designate a proper name. In old English, the "y" sound was rendered as "j," and thus we obtain "Jesus".

Put another way all interpretations and translations are necessarily corruptions.


> As an aside I have not read much re; Kabbalah, do you have a recommendation of a good book?

The tradition spans everything from neoplatonism, gnosticism, hermetica, to pythagorean mysticism. It wouldn't be exaggerating to say Kabbalah is the thread that ties together almost all of western esotericism.

There are a number of popular documentaries that give a general overview without being too inaccurate.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibuSPtXG5dg

Rav. Michael Laitman's protege, Anthony Kosinec, does a nice job as well,

http://www.kabbalah.info/engkab/kabbalah-video-clips/kabbalah-revealed-a-basic-overview

Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan does a stellar job summarizing the traditional Jewish take on Kabbalah in his 1991 book "Inner Space." The book doesn't convey the feeling, however, of what it means to be really "in" the tradition.

The closest thing I think I can share to give a sense of what I'm getting at is this little paper.

Other than that though unless a person has any experience with lucid dreaming or out of body experiences, I am not sure anything I say will make any sense. Kaplan wrote two books, "Jewish Meditation, A Practical Guide" and "Meditation and the Bible", with the hopes that others could have the same sorts of lived experiences. Like anything, though, it requires a little practice. :)