There is an interesting response to Scholem and Tishby at
http://www.chabad.org/kabbalah/article_cdo/aid/380410/jewish/The-Zohars-Mysterious-Origins.htm
This has a few parts, and you link to them at the bottom of the page.
For a 2 line biography of R' Moshe Miller,
http://www.judaism.com/bio.asp?author=Moshe%20Miller
Monday, October 11, 2010
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
The True Tension Between the Rabbis and Scholars
When it comes to the study of the Zohar and Kabbalah, there is a tremendous tension between the rabbis and scholars. The the earliest Jewish scholars of the "scientific/historical school" or as some have called it "historical Judaism", such as Leopold Zunz, Abraham Gottlober, and of course, Heinrich Graetz (the former Talmid of Samson Rafael Hirsch), held that the Zohar was an intrusion onto true Judaism which according to them was inherently rational and philosophical. So that for example, in Graetz "History of the Jews", Moses Miamonides and Moses Mendelssohn are seen as the true luminaries of Judaism, whereas the Zohar is "obscurantism" and Hasidism "the daughter of darkness." Still today the consensus among scholars is that the Zohar appeared in the 12th century to counteract the heavy-set rationalism that inundated Judaism through the works of Ibn Pehaya, Ibn Ezra, and of course Rambam.
The next generation of scholars from the "historical school" became more accepting of Kabbalah as a legitimate form of Judaism. Solomon Schechter and Shimon Dubnow, for example, were the first to write somewhat positive portrayals of Hasidic teachings in 1889. Of course, the two generations of Jewish scholars were influenced by two different social forces. In Germany in the middle of the 19th century, to really boil it down, rationalism was predominant, especially since many of the above mentioned scholars of the first generation sought to inegrate with the German society, or in Galicia (then under the Austro-Hungarian empire). Then, however, Romanticism set in, and the next generation of scholars mainly represented in Russia and the US (thus I chose Dubnow and Schechter as my prime examples) did not wish to integrate as much as before and began to focus on elements in Jewish history that showed a more folklore-like connection between Jews in the past. Schechter was fighting assimilation in America and Dubnow was fighting for Jewish cultural autonomy in Tsarist Russia.
In the 20th century, of course, the Romantic element predominated amongst scholars of the "historical school" and they would rarely, therefore, call it "scientific," or at least not with the same need to emphasize rationalism in Jewish history. When I say "rationalism" I mean the ability by any thinking person to understand the particular "terms" in Judaism through his or her own reason [this individualization is perhaps a biggest boon to traditional Judaism, but perhaps on this a little later]. I should also say that "scientific" means not that there is a "scientific" procedure to understand the past, but rather that when we do look at the past we only recognize people, ideas, or events as legitimate only that had somehow benefited science, usually in natural sciences, and helped humanity to progress into the more enlightened future. The "scientific" part is not the doctrine of the historical school nowadays, especially among Jews. Yet, still today, history is used by Jews to mostly dictate, propose, or defend, a particular version of Judaism. There has been a certain reversion to the first generation of Jewish scholars in thinking about the nature of Judaism as opposed to the nature of the Jewish people [much of this has to do with the growing disenchentment with Zionism and Israel since the Yom Kippur War]. I believe largely in response to this, there has been an explosion in the past thirty years of Orthodox Jewish historiography, to counteract the secular Jewish version of history and other forms of Judaism. As a rabbi phrased it to me recently when I told him a little about my research, "what's the Nafka Mina Lemasa!?"
Therefore, when we speak about controversy of the "Mesorah" and "History", and it certainly exists, I am much less hopeful, even skeptical that the two could be so easily reconciled as to say that "even if the Zohar is from 12th cenury" the rabbis have endorsed it through the ages and that since it had left a definite mark the question of "authenticity" is all the more unimportant. However, to say this is to perhaps miss the mark. The controversy over the Zohar's "authenticity" is not necesserily its age, but its provenance. In fact the age issue is not really all that important. The question now is to what extent was the Zohar and Kabbalah, by extension, influenced by Gnosticism or Neo-Platonism. All scholars agree, nowadays, that the Kabbalah comes from either one or the other or both and that the origins of Kabbalah, therefore, may not be purely monothiestic but polythiestic. So the reason, in my opinion, why the issue of age is so central for Orthodox Jewry is not to search for "authenticity" of the Zohar but the simple, even utilitarian means to protect one's own turf, as perhaps Noel illustrated with Reb Moshe Feinstein: If the rabbis or Orthodox Jews begin to accept that the Zohar comes from the 13th century, as the scholars claim, they would then be very close to accepting that the Zohar is actually a product of polythiestic ideas, also a scholarly contention. The issue of age is only a cover for the issue of provenance just like the issue of evolution is a cover for the issue of the age of the universe (I like the irony between the two examples).
In other words, the very teaching that has been held to be fully and organically Jewish Hashkafa, is no different from, say, the Hovot Halevavot and More Nevuchim in their self-professed and unabashed inclusion of non-Jewish worldview. But this does not stop there. At least, the Rambam took rationalist ideas, that could be easily, and perhaps rationally applied in a monotheistic worldview by any thinking person. In other words, it does not really matter that, say, the finest mussardiker sefer, Cheshbon Hanefesh, endorsed by the Heiliker Reb Israel Salanter was directly plagiarized from a section of Benjamin Franklin's autobiography (Happy Fourth of July!) because it deals with fully fathomable ideas, particularly in the way in which one may act like a mensch, perhaps may be disagreeable by some, but fully understood by all. But in Kabbalah, when the very name for such teaching and its very nature bespeaks submission, total submission, and almost the total suspension of reason when confronted by the "terms" of Kabbalah, the idea that Kabbalistic concepts could have been passed down in an altered form and context from originally polythiestic teachings is very hard for Orthodox Jews to grasp. Let's remember that there is no machlokes in Kabbalah but rather different schools - Rashbi, Abulafia, Cordavero, Arizal, Reb Zalman of Lyady. The only machlokes is over the extent of revelation! This issue of provenance, therefore, I think is the core of the issue and the faith of the Orthodox Jews is tested out most effectively particularly in this issue from among all other issues (and there are many many issues).
The next generation of scholars from the "historical school" became more accepting of Kabbalah as a legitimate form of Judaism. Solomon Schechter and Shimon Dubnow, for example, were the first to write somewhat positive portrayals of Hasidic teachings in 1889. Of course, the two generations of Jewish scholars were influenced by two different social forces. In Germany in the middle of the 19th century, to really boil it down, rationalism was predominant, especially since many of the above mentioned scholars of the first generation sought to inegrate with the German society, or in Galicia (then under the Austro-Hungarian empire). Then, however, Romanticism set in, and the next generation of scholars mainly represented in Russia and the US (thus I chose Dubnow and Schechter as my prime examples) did not wish to integrate as much as before and began to focus on elements in Jewish history that showed a more folklore-like connection between Jews in the past. Schechter was fighting assimilation in America and Dubnow was fighting for Jewish cultural autonomy in Tsarist Russia.
In the 20th century, of course, the Romantic element predominated amongst scholars of the "historical school" and they would rarely, therefore, call it "scientific," or at least not with the same need to emphasize rationalism in Jewish history. When I say "rationalism" I mean the ability by any thinking person to understand the particular "terms" in Judaism through his or her own reason [this individualization is perhaps a biggest boon to traditional Judaism, but perhaps on this a little later]. I should also say that "scientific" means not that there is a "scientific" procedure to understand the past, but rather that when we do look at the past we only recognize people, ideas, or events as legitimate only that had somehow benefited science, usually in natural sciences, and helped humanity to progress into the more enlightened future. The "scientific" part is not the doctrine of the historical school nowadays, especially among Jews. Yet, still today, history is used by Jews to mostly dictate, propose, or defend, a particular version of Judaism. There has been a certain reversion to the first generation of Jewish scholars in thinking about the nature of Judaism as opposed to the nature of the Jewish people [much of this has to do with the growing disenchentment with Zionism and Israel since the Yom Kippur War]. I believe largely in response to this, there has been an explosion in the past thirty years of Orthodox Jewish historiography, to counteract the secular Jewish version of history and other forms of Judaism. As a rabbi phrased it to me recently when I told him a little about my research, "what's the Nafka Mina Lemasa!?"
Therefore, when we speak about controversy of the "Mesorah" and "History", and it certainly exists, I am much less hopeful, even skeptical that the two could be so easily reconciled as to say that "even if the Zohar is from 12th cenury" the rabbis have endorsed it through the ages and that since it had left a definite mark the question of "authenticity" is all the more unimportant. However, to say this is to perhaps miss the mark. The controversy over the Zohar's "authenticity" is not necesserily its age, but its provenance. In fact the age issue is not really all that important. The question now is to what extent was the Zohar and Kabbalah, by extension, influenced by Gnosticism or Neo-Platonism. All scholars agree, nowadays, that the Kabbalah comes from either one or the other or both and that the origins of Kabbalah, therefore, may not be purely monothiestic but polythiestic. So the reason, in my opinion, why the issue of age is so central for Orthodox Jewry is not to search for "authenticity" of the Zohar but the simple, even utilitarian means to protect one's own turf, as perhaps Noel illustrated with Reb Moshe Feinstein: If the rabbis or Orthodox Jews begin to accept that the Zohar comes from the 13th century, as the scholars claim, they would then be very close to accepting that the Zohar is actually a product of polythiestic ideas, also a scholarly contention. The issue of age is only a cover for the issue of provenance just like the issue of evolution is a cover for the issue of the age of the universe (I like the irony between the two examples).
In other words, the very teaching that has been held to be fully and organically Jewish Hashkafa, is no different from, say, the Hovot Halevavot and More Nevuchim in their self-professed and unabashed inclusion of non-Jewish worldview. But this does not stop there. At least, the Rambam took rationalist ideas, that could be easily, and perhaps rationally applied in a monotheistic worldview by any thinking person. In other words, it does not really matter that, say, the finest mussardiker sefer, Cheshbon Hanefesh, endorsed by the Heiliker Reb Israel Salanter was directly plagiarized from a section of Benjamin Franklin's autobiography (Happy Fourth of July!) because it deals with fully fathomable ideas, particularly in the way in which one may act like a mensch, perhaps may be disagreeable by some, but fully understood by all. But in Kabbalah, when the very name for such teaching and its very nature bespeaks submission, total submission, and almost the total suspension of reason when confronted by the "terms" of Kabbalah, the idea that Kabbalistic concepts could have been passed down in an altered form and context from originally polythiestic teachings is very hard for Orthodox Jews to grasp. Let's remember that there is no machlokes in Kabbalah but rather different schools - Rashbi, Abulafia, Cordavero, Arizal, Reb Zalman of Lyady. The only machlokes is over the extent of revelation! This issue of provenance, therefore, I think is the core of the issue and the faith of the Orthodox Jews is tested out most effectively particularly in this issue from among all other issues (and there are many many issues).
Monday, July 5, 2010
Re: Authenticity of the Zohar
As Shimshon and Nachum have pointed out, there is quite a lot of scholarly debate about this issue, and in the past, there was some rabbinic debate about it too. But these days the prevailing Jewish view is that the Zohar is the work of R Shimon bar Yochai.
The question that Nachum seems to be posing -- if I understand "Comments?" to mean "When do you think the Zohar was written?" -- is interesting in itself and merits some attention. Given that there is such a strong agreement within current religious thinking about the origins of the Zohar, does it really matter if one could verify or disprove the Zohar through independent means?
Whether or not it was written by R' Shimon bar Yochai, the Zohar has become an integral part of our tradition (at least the tradition of the past thousand years). This was not just because the Zohar claims to be written by Rashbi. Rather, it's because what it teaches us is deep and true and mostly fits with the rest of our tradition. Any set of proofs one way or the other regarding the Zohar cannot change the fact that it was object of study of great rabbis from the Ramchal to the Vilna Gaon to R' Nachman. That fact alone is enough for us to pay attention to what it says.
I think there is a temptation here to see this as a conflict between mesorah and scientific/historical study. "Scholars might think one thing, but we have a mesorah that tells us something else." This is my speculation, but I don't think there really is a mesorah one way or another. Certainly there is no room for any Kuzari-proof-type mesorah regarding the Zohar. The rabbinic controversy over the Zohar suggests that there is no clear mesorah.
In this case, when the question is whether to consider the Zohar as a religious text, the primary question is not a question of origins, where you might see research and mesorah pitted against each other, but rather a question of what the text actually teaches. The content of the Zohar is what really determines its authenticity, and in this case the Zohar passes with flying colors.
An interesting modern example where there is a clash between the mesorah regarding a text and its content is the case of the Perush al ha-Torah of R' Yehuda heHasid. For a great summary and historical background by Dr. Shnayer Z. Leiman, see here. The case involved a manuscript of a commentary on the Torah by R' Yehuda heHasid which contained several passages (3 or 4) deemed heretical. The question came to R' Moshe Feinstein as to whether to print the manuscript. The manuscript was verified to be authentic by a reputable scholar and talmid chacham. Moreover, several rishonim quote the problematic passages, attribute them to R' Yehuda heHasid, and do not consider them to be heretical.
The manuscript would appear to be perfectly authentic: scholars can vouch for its origins, there is a mesorah that it is the work of R' Yehuda heHasid, even its problematic passages, and other rishonim did not have a problem with passages we find problematic. R' Moshe Feinstein however forbade publishing any part of the manuscript, declaring it to be a forgery (IM YD 3:114-115). Addressing one rishon, the Tziuni (a mekubal by the way), who quotes the manuscript, R' Moshe declares that that entire sefer should also not sold:
ולא ידוע לנו בברור מי הוא ר' מנחם ציוני וכנראה שהעתיק מה שנמצא באיזה ספר על שם ריה"ח בלא עיון, ואני הייתי אומר שאסור למכור ולקנות גם ספר ציוני מאחר שנמצא דבר כפירה זו וטוב לכתוב זה לגדולי א"י
For R' Moshe, faced with the issue of content, the question of origins is irrelevant: heresy is heresy no matter where it comes from. Historical proofs should play no role in validating a sefer. Obviously there is much I find troubling in this approach: the disregard for careful historical research, the wanton accusations of forgery or scribal error, all for the sake of ideological purity... Nevertheless, the important point that I find very valuable, especially for a blog concerned with Jewish ideas, is that we should evaluate ideas based on their content, not based on their lineage.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Authenticity of Zohar
Wikipedia: "The Zohar first appeared in Spain in the 13th century, and was published by a Jewish writer named Moses de Leon. De Leon ascribed the work to Shimon bar Yochai, a rabbi of the second century CE"
Orthodox Jews generally accept that this was indeed the work of R' Shimon bar Yochai, but it seems to be a subject of controversy.
(Shimshon, I think you mentioned this in one derech hashem class.)
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Welcome to the Haskafa / Kabbalah blog. Feel free to start new posts with any ideas or issues you've been wondering about.
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