Are Kabbalistic Meditations all about Ecstasy?

Summary

In order for us to understand this question better, we must first ascertain the different streams within Kabbalah itself. While tradition contends that Kabbalah was first transmitted to Moses on Mount Sinai, Gershom Scholem (1897-1982), the father of the modern academic study of Jewish mysticism, based on historical evidence, describes Kabbalah as a phenomenon that emerges around the twelfth-thirteenth centuries in Europe as it was only until this late period that we see the doctrine of the sefirot take shape and people start referring to themselves as “kabbalists,” i.e. those who have “received” esoteric teachings.

Scholem identified three streams within Kabbalah. The first is the theosophical school sometimes referred to as Kabbalah iyunit or speculative Kabbalah where practitioners emphasise the study of text and theurgical operations. The second current is the meditative group sometimes credited as ecstatic or prophetic Kabbalah. This trend is championed by Abraham Abulafia (1239-ca.1291), the founder of ecstatic Kabbalah, who emphasised the use of shemot or divine names in his intense mind-altering meditations. The third category is the school of kabbalistic magic, also known as Kabbalah ma’asit or practical Kabbalah, where practitioners utilised objects, texts and incantations in order to produce magical effects. While these three classifications are by no means mutually exclusive, they serve as a useful frame of reference for scholars and researchers.

With regard to Jewish meditations, it would be tempting to simply revert to Abulafia – being a representative of the meditative school – and label all such activities as having an ecstatic dimension. After all, Abulafia’s techniques include not only yoga-like praxis such as postures, breath control, and body movements, but also written, pronounced and visualised letter permutation exercises which, if successful, are designed to induce ecstasy. Nevertheless, Abulafia and his followers did not have a monopoly on the practice of meditation. This is quite self-evident since, throughout the ages, meditative operations such as the daily Jewish prayers were practised by Jewish rabbis and kabbalists alike. In addition, Abulafia’s works were banned by the Jewish authority and thus their influence was quite limited.