A tension exists within Kabbalistic/Hasidic thought between two outlooks on God, man and the world that are so different that it is hard to imagine that they co-exist within a single system of religious thought and practice. On the one hand we find in the Kabbalah, and especially amongst the Hasidim, what can only be […]
Read MoreWhile the Lurianic Kabbalah is highly complex and recondite in its symbolism and ideas, its understanding of the meaning of life is neither hidden nor obscure: It involves the endeavor to realize objective values in the face of the obstacles, suffering, and tragedies of this world. This view if life-meaning follows from what I have […]
Read MoreThe following essay utilizes the kabbalistic idea of the sefirot to provide a theory of personhood analyze the question of whether it is possible to create a digital person. __________ The word “golem,” which in Hebrew has the connotation of “raw material,” is used in the Bible (Psalms 139: 15,16) to refer to the imperfect […]
Read MoreAbstract: Creative negation, wisdom, understanding, love, power, beauty, endurance, splendor, foundation, sovereignty – the ten dimensions of the Kabbalists’ universe form a guide not only to the godhead’s inner nature but to the psychological development of the human personality. The forty-nine days between Passover and Shavuot are known in Jewish tradition as the sefirat ha-Omer, […]
Read More“Concerning everything that cannot be grasped its question is its answer” –Shimon Labis, Ketem Paz 1 (Provides a philosophical foundation for the Kabbalist’s idea that values (i.e. the sefirot) are the foundation of existence.) The riddle of existence is approached through an analysis of the meaning and existential significance of the question, “Why is there something rather […]
Read MoreHegel, who was extremely disdainful of Judaism in his early theological writings, presents a mature philosophy, which can be understood as an attempt to rationally explicate the basic metaphors of the Lurianic Kabbalah. However, the extent of the impact of the Kabbalah on Hegel is difficult to determine. Hegel discusses the Kabbalah briefly in his Lectures on […]
Read MoreGnosticism refers to a group of second century self-defined Christian sects that were regarded as heretical by the early church. Scholars have differed regarding the identity and defining characteristics of Gnosticism. Some point, for example, to its dualism of good and evil, others to its theories regarding the aeons, and the demiurge, etc. However, a […]
Read MoreThe influence of Greek philosophical thought, particularly that of Plato and Neoplatonism, upon the development in the Kabbalah has long been recognized. A number of Kabbalists took note of a close relationship between the Kabbalah and Platonic philosophy, and some went so far as to suggest that the Kabbalah itself was a source for Platonic […]
Read MoreIn their notion of Ein-Sof the Kabbalists developed a concept of an infinite Godhead which in many ways parallels ancient Indian ideas. Both the Kabbalist’s Ein-Sof and the Indian Brahman refer to an underlying reality that is the substance and energy of all life and mind. Like Ein-Sof, the principle called Brahman (or in its creative mode: Atman), is in effect, beyond any God who […]
Read More(For More on Derrida, Postmodernism and the Kabbalah see: Jacques Derrida and the Lurianic Kabbalah and my book Kabbalah and Postmodernism: A Dialogue.) (Kabbalah and Postmodernism: A Dialogue (Studies in Judaism): Drob, Sandford L.: 9781433103049: Amazon.com: Books) In one of his last meetings with Jacques Derrida, Emmanauel Levinas is said to have asked Derrida to […]
Read MoreIn one of his last meetings with Jacques Derrida, the French-Jewish philosopher, Emmanuel Levinas 1906-1995), is said to have asked Derrida to confess that he was in fact a modern day representative of the Lurianic Kabbalah. I learned of this from the death-of-God theologian, Thomas J.J. Altizer, who related that he had heard it from […]
Read MoreMordecai Menahem Kaplan (1881-1983) was the founder of the Reconstructionist movement in American Judaism. He had been my grandfather’s teacher at the Jewish Theological Seminary and later went on to become his colleague in the Rabbinical Assembly, in fact succeeding Max Drob as President of that body in 1928. I had the good fortune to […]
Read MoreDavid Birnbaum’s God and Evil (Ktav, 1989) is a bold and highly original synthesis which attempts to provide an overarching metaphysical solution to the vexing problem of radical evil in a world created and sustained by an all powerful, all knowing, benevolent God. Birnbaum’s treatment of the highly intimidating and emotionally wrenching problem of a Jewish […]
Read MoreSanford L. Drob Fielding Graduate University, C.G. Jung Institute, New York, USA Sanford L. Drob (2023) Are you praying to a videogame God? Some theological and philosophical implications of the simulation hypotheseis. International Journal of Philosophy and Theology, 84:1, 77-91, DOI: 10.1080/21692327.2023.2182822 ABSTRACT The hypothesis that we may be living in a digital simulation is […]
Read MoreThe idea that we may be living in a computer simulation provides insight into the Kabbalist’s understanding of Ein-sof and their idea that the world is grounded in ethics and value. The Mirror Cosmos: Simulation and Idealism An interesting implication of the idea that we may be living in a simulation is that it results […]
Read MoreRecently, at a lecture in Brooklyn, I was asked to clarify my views on Kabbalah, dogmatism and the problem of evil. I am happy to do so here in some detail as my views on these topics are fundamental to my thinking about God, atheism, and intellectual freedom. I have considered the problem of evil from a Lurianic perspective […]
Read MoreKabbalist’s have long utilized the image of a tree to depict the growth and development as well as the organic unity of the ten Sefirot that are said to be the archetypal elements of creation and thus the basic value structure of the world. The following “Tree of Life” (Etz Chayyim) is based upon the Kabbalah of Rabbi Isaac Luria […]
Read MoreThe Sefirot as “Circles” In his systematic work on the Lurianic Kabbalah, Sefer Etz Chayyim. Chayyim Vital describes how previous Kabbalists have been divided on the question of the precise organization, at the time of their emanation, of the Sefirot, the ten value-archetypes through which God creates and structures the world. Some Kabbalists, Vital informs us, held that the Sefirot were […]
Read MoreGershom Scholem, whose own interpretation of the Kabbalah was itself influenced by the philosophy of German idealism, once remarked that Moses Cordovero’s doctrine of the behinnot exemplifies the application of dialectical thinking within a Kabbalistic framework. The behinnot doctrine, in brief, states that each of the sefirot, the ten archetypes through which God emanates and structures the world, […]
Read MoreThis article was originally published in The Journal of Humanistic Psychology, Volume 43, No. 4, Fall 2003 © 2003 Sage Publications. Download PDF here Abstract: The author proposes a dialectical/realist solution to the problem of multiple paradigms in psychology. Specifically, he argues that theoretical models in psychology are akin to various two-dimensional maps of the three-dimensional, spherical earth. In cartography […]
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