Ascensions on High in Jewish Mysticism: Pillars, Lines, Ladders (review)

Abstract

Ascensions on High in Jewish Mysticism: Pillars, Lines, Ladders, by Moshe Idel. Budapest and New York: Central European University Press, 2005. 249 pp. $41.95. The ascent from lower to higher realms is central theme in literary sources associated with Jewish mysticism. The most significant contribution of this book, written by of leading scholars of Jewish mysticism, is its engagement with research agendas of Ioan P. Culianu and Mircea Eliade in their studies of ascensions to higher realms in various religions. The author enriches his analysis of images and imaginings about ascent of body, mind, or soul on pillars, lines, and ladders, which appear in Jewish sources, by giving critical consideration to premises, methods, and results of Culianu's and Eliade's research, and, where possible, applying their categories to analysis of ascent in Jewish mysticism. The choice of ascension on high itself is reflection of Culianu's research interests and is offered by author as memorial to Culianu (p. ix). The result is an interesting exploration of contributions that Culianu's and Eliade's work can make to understanding varieties of Jewish mysticism. The exploration of ascent unfolds in an introduction, five chapters, and concluding remarks. The introduction surveys eight approaches to study of and introduces two additional approaches which form methodological basis for studies in book. The first is a general, loose approach called methodological eclecticism, which resorts to different methodologies when dealing with various aspects of religion (p. 9). The second is perspectivism, which involves the possibility of interrogating certain religious literature from perspective of acquaintance with another religious literature. . . . It is . . . an attempt to better understand logic of systems by comparing substantially different ones and learning about from other (p. 11). The introduction concludes with an exposition and critique of an aspect of Gershom Scholem's analysis of Kabbalah, in which author argues that Scholem's historical analysis of Kabbalah rests on theological understanding of Kabbalah as symbolic system. In contrast to this approach, author asserts that he will try to emphasize . . . some other, and more experiential, aspects of this mystical lore (p. 19). Chapter One presents typological analysis of ecstatic ascents undergone while alive. Here Idel presents central thesis of his analysis of ascensions on high, namely that one of major developments in post-biblical Judaism is continuous growth of apotheotic vector in general economy of Judaism, theophanic in its first manifestation, through emergence and flowering of some forms of Jewish mysticism (p. 25). This reviewer is not convinced of this thesis, although Idel's analysis of pillar does conform to suggested pattern. Chapters Two through Four present an extended analysis of pillar in Jewish sources from Rabbinic texts to Hasidic texts. In these chapters, Idel adopts perspectivist approach, comparing representations of pillars in Jewish sources with analyses of pillars in works of Romanian scholars, particularly Eliade and Culianu. The thrust of Idel's analysis is to extend Eliade's and Culianu's distinctions and classifications concerning ascensions to representations of pillars as means of ascent in Jewish sources which were ignored or overlooked by Eliade and Culianu. Chapter Two provides background for analyzing pillar as means of ascent from world to another by considering representations of pillar itself in post-biblical Jewish mystical literature. Idel discerns an architectural-static (axis mundi) and ritualistic-dynamic (the righteous as pillar) (p. 79) conception of pillar in rabbinic literature and shows how these conceptions are harmonized in kabbalistic sources. …