What is the Essence of Kabbalah?
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Posted by Mark Zimmerman May 28, 2007 |
VIDEO: What is the Essence of Kabbalah? (04:31)
If you look in the comments section of most of the videos discussed in this blog (all of them are found on this page), you'll notice comments either praising or denouncing Kabbalah as a meditative practice, as a religion, as magic or something that's only for crazy people...
This video aims to, in as quick a summary as possible, state outright what Kabbalah is not. As stated in the video, "Kabbalah is not and has nothing to do with:
religion,
magick,
mysticism,
witchcraft,
divination,
cults,
healings,
meditation,
self-help,
philosophy,
theory,
parapsychology,
ESP,
telepathy,
clairvoyance,
new age,
psychokinesis,
superstition,
dream interpretation,
phrenology,
tarot cards,
mantra’s,
yoga,
red strings,
holy water,
blessings,
Judaism,
Islam,
Christianity,
Buddhism,
Hinduism,
Sufism, or anyism,
past life regressions,
holistic medicine,
numerology,
faith healing,
aromatherapy,
secret societies,
reiki,
hypnosis,
channeling,
transmutation,
phrenology,
astrology,
astral travel or projection,
lucid dreaming,
spiritualism,
communicating with the dead,
out of body experiences,
magnetism,
voodoo,
freemasonry,
theosophy,
reflexology,
UFOs,
creationism,
fanaticism,
or any other belief…"
Although at some point within this dictionary of what-Kabbalah-is-not-isms someone might be ready to point their finger with a "But I heard that!..", if one approaches the definition that is introduced straight afterwards, as if they had never experienced anything called "Kabbalah" before, then one can save a lot of confusion and time:
This wisdom is no more and no less than a sequence of roots, which hang down by way of cause and effect, in fixed, determined rules, weaving into a single, exalted goal described as “the revelation of His Godliness to His creatures in this world.” (Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag, in his article "The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah")
The rest of the video explains and attempts to simplify this definition of Kabbalah.
"Godliness" is explained as being "the laws of nature"; laws that humans haven't yet succeeded to reveal through any of our religious or scientific methods to date.
After going through what Kabbalah is not, it is most correct to define "what Kabbalah is" as a science. This is because it concerns the research of the cause-and-effect chain of nature, of how our world and everything was created, and through this research aims to reveal the complete picture of nature and its laws to the researcher.
If a word like "religion," "mysticism" or "meditation" is still floating around your mind near the word "Kabbalah" (or any of the above-mentioned words), then you should watch the video.