Title: Jewish Mysticism as a Universal Teaching: Allen Ginsberg’s Relation to Kabbalah
Abstract: This essay comes to explore the relation of Allen Ginsberg, an iconic leader of the Beat Generation, towards Kabbalah, which he and other members of the American Counterculture encountered through Gershom Scholem's writings. Through an examination of what Kabbalah meant for Ginsberg and the manner in which he utilized it in his poetry, the article traces the image and role of Kabbalah among the intellectual and spiritual pursuits of countercultural Americans. Ginsberg kept away from mainstream Jewish groups or ideas, but took interest in the mystical, Kabbalistic, and Hasidic elements of that tradition, which he viewed as transcending parochial affiliation. Mysticism was a niche of Judaism, which the ecumenical and integrationist Ginsberg could relate to without a sense of conceding to restricting ethnic loyalties. Kabbalah fascinated western thinkers and a number of American religious seekers and intellectuals incorporated Kabbalah into their teachings. For Ginsberg and others, interest in Kabbalah meshed with other spiritual and intellectual pursuits, and worked to create a diverse and multi-faceted inner world and cultural environment.
Publication Year: 2020
Publication Date: 2020-04-27
Language: en
Type: book-chapter
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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