Title: Kabbalah and the Spiritual Quest: The Kabbalah Centre in America
Abstract:Esoteric mystical traditions are often the well-kept secrets of a small elite, and Kabbalah—the ancient Jewish mystical tradition—is no exception. The transmutation of Jewish mystical teachings to a u...Esoteric mystical traditions are often the well-kept secrets of a small elite, and Kabbalah—the ancient Jewish mystical tradition—is no exception. The transmutation of Jewish mystical teachings to a universal source of wisdom and healing through the auspices of the Kabbalah Centre provides a fascinating episode for scholars of both Judaism and sociology of religion. In Kabbalah and the Spiritual Quest, Jody Myers offers a portrait of the Kabbalah Centre in America: delineating its history and explaining its main teachings, especially its understanding of individual and communal healing. A historian by training, Myers provides a service to sociologists of religion by analyzing the Kabbalah Centre as a New Religious Movement. She carefully traces the influences of New Age spirituality and the contemporary Zeitgeist composed of seekers who are “spiritual but not religious.” Equally important, Myers succinctly presents a history of Jewish Kabbalah—from the first description of God composed of 10 powers in twelfth-century France to the popularization of Kabbalah in eighteenth-century Hasidism, to the rejection of mysticism that accompanied modernization.Read More
Publication Year: 2010
Publication Date: 2010-02-06
Language: en
Type: article
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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