Allgemeines » It is a collection of ideas and Torah material

Pop singer Madonna came this week to Tel Aviv to take part in a congress of Kabbala studies. According to press releases Mel Ott Jersey , she is going to stay in Israel until Sunday night and will have on the last day of her visit, the opportunity to visit the graves of Jewish Tzaddikim (righteous holy people) near Safed, a small town in northern Israel.


Why Safed? What does Kabbala mean? (Literally it means "Receiving" in Hebrew).


I am not so sure the press has given the correct answers to these and other questions related to the background of this visit. Here is my humble contribution.


Safed , one of the four "holy cities" in Israel, together with Jerusalem, Hebron and Tiberias, is actually a small mountain town (27 Madison Bumgarner Jersey ,000 residents). As opposed to other historical cities in Israel, it is not even mentioned in the Bible.


Its golden era was during the Middle Ages, when it functioned as a Crusaders fortress and a Moslem administrative centre. But it was only in the 16th century that Safed was a city of international importance, as well as a Jewish cultural Capital.


What made Safed so special is linked to what Maddona is looking in Israel for.


The Jewish congregation of Safed is the oldest in Israel. It has been there for the last 800 years. But during the Crusaders time it was very small, because the Christian knights did everything they could to massacre Jews (and Moslems).


The turning point was the conquest of the area by the Turkish Sultanate. This Moslem empire gave shelter to the Spanish Jews during their mass expulsion in the end of the 15th century. The Turks, who were great warriors and administrators, did not master commerce Brandon Crawford Jersey , industry and science. They understood the great potential of Spanish Jews who were experts in these fields, and gave them asylum.


Some of those Jews, a few thousands, came to Safed and settled down there. Safed attracted them for two main reasons: The good water sources and the closeness to the grave site of the founder of the Kabbala, the Jewish mysticism, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai.


The water was needed for establishing a wool manufacturing centre which became one of the biggest in the world, and made Safed a flourishing city. The grave of Bar yochai Buster Posey Jersey , and an ancient tradition according to which the Messiah will first come out Safed, attracted some of the greatest Jewish religious scholars of Spain, most of them Kabbalists.


In Safed of the 16th century settled down Rabbi Yosef Karo, of Toledo, the greatest Jewish Law expert of the new era, who wrote the codification book "Shulkhan Arukh", the third most important Jewish book Stephen Vogt Jersey , after the Bible and the Talmud.


Another great Kabbalist was Shlomo Alkabetz, who is known today more for his religious poetry. His most famous liturgical poem is called "Lecha Dodi". It is used in every Synagogue to receive Sabbath. His brother in law was Rabbi Moshe Kordoveiro, a student of Rabbi Karo, who wrote the first book which explains the Kabbala methodically.


The greatest student or Rabbi Kordoveiro was Rabbi Yizhak Luria, who is more known as HaAri Hakadosh. Luria Died when he was only 38 years old. Only two and a half years he spent in Safed. But it was in that short period of time that he created a Kabbalist theoretical movement that has had an immense influence on the life of almost every Jew since then.


What does Kabbala mean? If you have time and patience just go to a site called and start reading. It will take you a few days. Otherwise, here is a somewhat simplified explanation.


According to the Talmud, the world of Torah (the knowledge of Judaism) is based on four layers: Pshat (Literal meaning Joe Panik Jersey , in Hebrew), Remez (Implication), Drash (Interpretation) and Sod (Secrecy). Every one of these layers is a different way of weighing the same words of the Torah. The deepest layer is the Secrecy. The Secrecy doctrine, which includes the Kabbala, is so mysterious, deep, and special Evan Longoria Jersey , that not everyone can understand it. Therefore, it is recommended by Jewish scholars to start studying it only at the age of 40. A younger person does not have the spiritual maturity needed to cope with its depths.


The Secrecy doctrine exists since the 2nd century, but did not appear in any book until the end of the 14th century, when a Spanish Jewish scholar named Rabbi Moshe de Leon rewrote and edited it in a book called "Seffer Hazohar" (The book of Glow, in Hebrew). The contents of the book is attributed to the Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai (mentioned above) who had lived 1300 years before the time of de Leon. Believers claim that Bar Yochai wrote the book, but Kabbala researchers say that the text was written much later, in the middle ages.


"Seffer Hazohar" is not a text book. It is a collection of ideas and Torah material. Only in the end of the 15th century Brandon Belt Jersey , another Spanish Rabbi, Moshe Cordoveiro, who later moved to Safed, wrote structured lessons which enabled a systematic studying of Kabbala.