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This is a report on a series of lectures given
by Moshe Idel at the University of Washington
(Seattle) about a year ago. I have divided
report into three posts, one for each lecture.
These are not verbatim transcripts: they are
summaries of the sort that might be made by
anyone from notes made during the lecture. Not
everything is included, and most of what Idel
said is summarized. I have tried to indicate
where I missed things, and what I missed. The
initial material is from the flier that was
passed out to everyone before the lectures.
Moshe Idel is in no way responsible for my
reports of his lectures. I have done my best to
be as accurate as I could. At the same time, I
should hope that I'm not infringing on his
copyright by reporting what he said. --Such are
the mysteries of the copyright law!
THE SAMUEL & ALTHEA STROUM
LECTURESHIP IN
JEWISH STUDIES
Moshe Idel
PARDES:THE QUEST FOR SPIRITUAL
PARADISE IN JUDAISM
April 16
Primordial Wisdom: The Philosophers' Quest
April 18
Primordial Light: The Ecstatics' Quest
April 22
PARDES: Between Sefirot and Demonology
The Core of the "Pardes" Tradition: Tosefta
Hagigah 2:3-4
Four entered the Orchard (Pardes): Ben Azzai,
Ben Zoma, Akher and Rabbi Aqiva. One peeked and
died; one peeked and was smitten; one peeked and
cut down the shoots; one ascended safely and
descended safely.
Ben Azzai peeked and died. Concerning him
Scripture says: "Precious in the eyes of he
Lord is the death of His loyal ones" (Ps. 16.
15).
Ben Zoma peeked and was smitten. Concerning him
Scripture says: "If you have found honey, eat
only your fill lest you become filled with it
and vomit" (Prov. 25:16).
Akher peeked and cut down the shoots.
Concerning him Scripture says: "Do not let your
mouth bring your flesh to sin, and do not say
before the angel that it is an error; why
should God become angry at your voice, and ruin
your handiwork" (Eccl. 5:5).
Rabbi Aqiva ascended safely and descended
safely. Concerning him Scripture says: "Draw
me, let us run after you, the King has brought
me into His chambers" (Song I:4).
Lecture I: Primordial Wisdom: The Philosophers'
Quest
Tuesday 16 April 1991, 8:00 pm.
[This is a precis summary; reporter's comments
are in square brackets; otherwise text should be
taken as an attempt to transcribe the gist of
what the speaker actually said. The result is a
rather dry, compressed text; typographical
devices have been used to break it up and make
it more readable. Some of these may not
transpose well to Net text. I have tried to
regularize the spellings of Hebrew terms, but
I'm afraid I've probably let a number of them
vary all over the map.]
[The first lecture was something of a Society
event; there was quite a collection of The
Better Sort, who actually toughed it out through
much of the first lecture, if only for the sake
of the reception afterward. Idel's lecture (in
thoroughly accented English) made fewer
concessions than one might imagine to a non-
specialist audience. These lectures are usually
edifying cultural events, but Idel used the
opportunity to go over material he was working
up for a book. imposing countenances, who had a
reception for themselves and the speaker
afterward.]
First, some general observations in an attempt to
locate the Pardes legend in its context.
1: Biblical and Rabbinic Judaism were exoteric in
nature: Judaism was seen as being open, to both
the elite and the vulgus [the crowd, common
people, hoi polloi] on the same basis. The idea
was that the knowledge and practice were to be
spread, and could be spread, to all levels of the
Jewish nation, and that study of the Torah was
open to all. Religious life was not regarded as
dangerous.
2. This might seem like belaboring the obvious,
but it was not obvious if seen in the context of
contemporary cults and religions, in either the
world of early Judaism (with the nature religions
of neighboring nations) or in the Hellenistic
world (with its mystery religions). Judaism
insisted on rules binding on all members, and on
public rites, as exemplified by the need for a
quorum to legitimize certain rites. It was
collective, group-oriented, and "nomian," [cf.
"antinomian"] that is, oriented toward practicing
a nomos, i.e., the Torah. The attitude toward the
Commandments was summed up in the saying, "You
shall live by them."
3. Thus, in a sense, that Judaism was relatively
egalitarian [the speaker actually said
"equalitarian"]. The Law was (in principle)
available to and incumbent upon everyone, and the
Law, the nomos, was the standard. Religious
practice was collective, public, non-sectarian,
and not dangerous.
This then is how one can describe the first
phases of Judaism, the Biblical and what might be
called the Classical (i.e. Rabbinic-Midrashic)
phases.
But there were also other types of Judaism,
cultivated in smaller circles, as exemplified by
the Hekhaloth literature. These involved
contemplation of the Divine vehicles, or the
Divine stature, and involved non-Halakhic
techniques for transcending common experiences in
favor of achieving a strong but dangerous result:
the experience or vision of the Merkavah, or of
the Divine body or glory. One finds these efforts
expressed in some very ancient texts, which also
link them with dangers and the paying of a high
price. These efforts lead to awful [or aweful]
encounters with angels; their result is the
experience of a tremendum. It seems to have been
less than delightful, and it was reserved for the
very few.It is presented in terms that constitute
both the statement of an ideal and a warning
against embarking on a quest for it.
One of the key exemplary texts is the account of
the four sages, the four upright persons, who
entered the Pardes, the Orchard or Garden, all but
one of whom were severely damaged by the
experience despite their excellent qualities.
This cannot be taken as a historical document,
despite the fact that these four did live at
approximately the same time. This is not a report
of historical events; it should be taken as a
collection of traditions about the effects of
entering the Pardes. Two results were positive:
one person died, but remained loyal; one (Rabbi
Aqiva) remained safe. Two results were negative:
one person went mad; the other became a heretic.
Instead of reading this as a biographical
account, we should read it as a typological
account, one describing types of experiences and
the types of effects those experiences can have.
From its first appearance, this crucial text was
not historical, but exemplary.
This text is used in different ways in different
settings. In mystical literature, it is used to
point out dangers that can befall the mystic. In
Talmudic-Midrashic sources, it is used to point
out the dangers and achievements that are related
to speculations, rather than to experiences. The
interpretation of the account depends on the
context in which it is used; thus it is a mistake
to try to establish a single "genuine" meaning
common to all versions.
This account is, then, a parable whose
significance is not explicated, as in Kabbalah:
the Pardes is an unexplained parable for an
unrevealed secret. There is a crucial vagueness
here, and one must make the assumption that this
sort of vagueness does not represent a defeat but
an opportunity - to introduce new meanings to an
open text, as in Umberto Eco's account of reading
texts as open texts. [Cf. Umberto Eco, The Open
Work.] The Pardes be comes a generalized metaphor
for the danger zones of religious experience, seen
as something which is good for the few, but
pernicious for others.
The Pardes story, then, has been (re)interpreted
in a variety of directions; here, we are
interested in patterns of interpretation proposed
in the Middle Ages (though the history of the
interpretation of the story could be continued
onward from there).
Today, we talk about Maimonides and the
philosophical tradition.
Next: about the ecstatic tradition.
Last: about (a) the Divine Sefiroth and (b) the
encounter with the demonic.
In all three streams of interpretation, the
vagueness of the basic story contributed to the
richness of the resulting interpretations.
After the Classical (Rabbinic) period, Judaism
underwent two major changes, one of which was its
transformation into an esoteric religion (at least
as understood by some elite masters), a religion
having two levels. An esoteric understanding of
Judaism was a shared feature of various
traditions: the Kabbalah, the classical
philosophical schools (e.g. Maimonides), and the
Hasidi Ashkenaz and other medieval mystical
groups. This move involves [though the speaker
did not overtly label it, the second change] the
atomization of the collective or the group. The
group is important as a mystical tool in some
forms of Kabbalah, but it plays a restricted role.
The core aim of personal redemption, or the
achievement of individual perfection, moved to the
forefront. To understand the underlying secrets,
and to behave in accordance with them: this was
crucial to the Jewish elite in the middle ages.
It was a cult of individual attainment, which
involved the reading of its sources as secret
messages hidden in canonical scriptures, messages
connected to the goal of salvation.
There were two models for salvation in those
scriptures: salvation as attaining the End, or as
returning to the Origin. Thus the effort to
obtain salvation meant either hastening the end
(collectively, this involved messianism), or
reaching back to a lost paradise that had been
existing since the beginning. This is why the
concept of Paradise is important in understanding
the meaning of the Pardes, even though they were
not originally as closely connected is it might
seem.
"Pardes" actually means an orchard. The actual
term for "Paradise," in the sense of the Garden of
Eden, was Gan Eden, which in the Septuagint was
translated by the Greek word for Paradise
[deriving originally from Persian], from which
there was a backward linkage to the Hebrew word
Pardes. The two ideas, originally different, came
to explain or amplify each other. Thus, the
dangers associated with Gan Eden [the angel with
the flaming sword] and Pardes also converged:
both came to represent dangerous ideals, and ideal
dangers.
The Pardes story then came to have as a subtext
the story of Paradise (Gan Eden). It became a
common effort of medieval commentators to explain
the story of Paradise by means of the story of
Pardes. The attempt to escape ritual and return
to Paradise was a threat to Judaism as a religion
[i.e., as a religion based on ritual and the Law];
thus, it could not be proposed openly as a goal.
Any attempt to enter Pardes then was an entry into
a dangerous zone. Classical Judaism was not
escapist: that is, it did not involve an attempt
to transcend history. The transcendental ideal
could stand as an ideal for the few, but it was an
ideal that was dangerous to (or if adopted by) the
many; it thus had to be reserved to the few to
stop escapist religious trends.
Maimonides' interpretation, in summary, took
perfect philosophy as the wisdom of Adam, lost but
retrievable by some (perfect) persons, e.g., R.
Aqiva. To be in Paradise, from this point of
view, was to be a philosopher. Philosophy is
perfection in the present; Paradise is perfection
in the past and in the future. The ideal of
philosophy is to exist in continuous
contemplation. When the Primordial Man fell: he
was [or became] unable to stay in the state of
perfect philosophy.
The Pardes story, however, points out a path of
return, and suggests an analysis of Judaism as a
project of return to perfect philosophy. It
points out both techniques and possible problems.
The first part of Maimonides major Halakhic work
is where he explains the meaning of Pardes - but
of course, since he was a Rabbi, he doesn't
explain it openly. He mentions that it is a
matter of the [four?] key "themes dealt with in
the preceding chapters," leaving the reader to
select which of the many themes are the key
themes. Though all four of the characters in the
story were great men of Israel, not all had the
capacity to grasp the subject clearly. For him,
then, the Pardes is linked to speculation: it is
something to be known, something that must be
grasped clearly, rather than a mystical
experience. Maimonides states that it is not
proper to walk in the Pardes without being filled
with bread and meat, i.e., knowledge of what is
permitted and forbidden, i.e., without having had
a solid Rabbinic education. Why is this? Because
knowledge of these things gives composure to the
mind. Maimonides presents Jewish law as a way of
achieving a certain stability, a mastery of lust
and imagination. The Commandments are a sine qua
non, the basis for the requisite composure.
The Law, then, gives one the possibility of
calming the mind, of mastering imagination and
lust, in order to be able ... to study Aristotle.
By which he meant, to study the Physics and
Metaphysics.
This study has two major dangers. One is the
cognitive or classical or Aristotelian: a
misunderstanding of physics and metaphysics due to
imaginative distortion of reality. One's
understanding [or the clarity of one's
understanding] can be spoiled by one's [non-
rational] inclinations.
There is also the Platonic danger: the
political implications better not understood by
the masses, as in Book l [Book XII] of the
Metaphysics.
Not all of the four Masters, then, were calm
enough, educated enough, to grasp Aristotelian
metaphysics.
There are two ways of understanding Maimonides'
position here: one exoteric, the other esoteric.
The exoteric understanding would take the
historical Adam as the perfect philosopher,
brought down into a fallen state by the last
remnants of desire and fantasy. Thus our current
condition of isolation from philosophic truth
would be the historical result of Adam's fall.
The esoteric reading, however, is that the state
of the Primordial Man is always open to us, always
available at any time - as, too, is the sin of
Adam. In principle, at least. Kafka has an
interpretation of the expulsion from Paradise that
can be taken as a key to the esoteric reading of
Maimonides' position. According to that
interpretation, the Expulsion from Paradise is
final, and life in this world is irrevocable. It
is eternal in nature. [I.e., it is an event "in
eternity," rather than in history.] At the same
time we are continuously in Paradise, whether we
realize it or not. Thus neither the Expulsion nor
the Paradisal state are historical events: they
are structures of experience open to each of us.
This is also, by the way, the Kabbalistic
interpretation developed by Abulafia, who was the
first to treat the Pardes as an ongoing
experience. His interpretation was very similar
to Kafka's. "Anyone who enters Pardes has to
enter in peace and exit in peace."
This spiritualistic reading, that the Pardes is
not a matter of history but is open to anyone,
proposes a spiritualistic typology, a scheme of
typical experiences or states that can be
actualized at any time. History becomes
unimportant. By studying Bible, Talmud, Kabbalah,
philosophy, we become aware of what can happen in
experience.
This reading seems to do justice to certain
passages in Maimonides about people "of the rank
of R. Aqiva." History disappears: The Bible,
Talmud, Aristotle - all speak about inner
experiences related only to the elite because they
are dangerous, but which are to be pointed out to
the masses to orient them, to give them the sense
that Judaism is more than its ritual.
This approach still assumes that there is
danger, but Judaism is here seen as trying to cope
with the problem of the dangerous ideal. The
ideal may be dangerous, but it is to be
cultivated. This formulation becomes a way of
balancing ritualistic approaches against the
explosion of metaphysical speculations that might
endanger the observance of the ritual.
The aim is not merely to propose philosophy but
to use Aristotelian psychology and metaphysics to
point to meditations on secret Judaism, to
introduce a new paradigm for understanding
Judaism. Thus, Maimonides was able to begin a
tradition of interpretation (which lasted from
about the 14th to the 18th centuries) which took
ritual as means of introduction to philosophy.
This interpretation fortifies the place of ritual,
yet puts it in its place, shows that it is not
final. It is needed, but in a way to be
transcended - by the few, for whom a higher ideal
is needed, that of the Pardes.
Next time, we talk not about philosophic
speculation but about ecstatic experience, the
encounter with a terrible Light, the Primordial
Light.
QUESTIONS
Question: The aim is to master the corporeal,
which if not understood will distort one's
grasp of reality? Then for Maimonides there
was a specific absolute reality?
Answer: Yes. He believed a certain metaphysics
was true. His was not a modern,
Heideggerian philosophy. For him, God was
the sum of the intelligibilia, as was the
case for other medieval philosophers. God
was taken as the great intelligence. There
was a negative theology, but there was also
a positive theology.
Question: What about the Pardes story and the
Ari?
Answer: A very complex issue - and another story.
Question: Kafka wrote about Maimonides-
A: Not about Maimonides, but Genesis.
Q: Genesis then. If the expulsion is eternal...
A: We are expelled all the time from Paradise,
but it is here. We are out and in at the
same time. It is a matter of each of us.
That is why the Fall is not final.
Q: The Halakha becomes then a means - is it time-
bound? May there be other means at other
times for Maimonides?
A: Halakha remains necessary all the time. It is
not like a ladder. Desires are always
present. Halakhic discipline is not simply
preliminary: it is needed all the time - it
too is eternal. [Cf. the Great Chain of
Being, or Crowley's understanding of
initiatory hierarchy.]
Q: Why is this in the Mishne Torah, not in the
Guide?
A: To Maimonides, the code of behavior is an
introduction to the Pardes. He starts with
the Pardes, only then to go on to talk about
the Law. The Pardes is integral to the
Mishne Torah.
Q: What then does the RamBam have to say about
the Messiah?
A: There is only one hint - Perfect Philosophy is
Paradise, personal salvation. Each of us
then is his own Messiah, and we don't need
another Messiah - as individuals. As a
collective, it is another story. The
Messiah is needed to embody a certain
political, social, et cetera, state.
Q: And Halakha is a mechanism to reach that
experience?
A: Yes.
Q: What about the discussion of the Castle in the
Guide?
A: In III:51 of the Guide of the Perplexed,
Maimonides mentions Ben Zoma - among rabbis
expert only in Halakha, unable to understand
metaphysics. Thus they are outside the
castle.
Q: Is there any significance in this to the fact
that some of Maimonides' students were not
Jewish, but Muslim?
A: I'm not aware of any advanced students who
were Muslim. There were Muslims who were
followers, who studied the Guide...
Q: But there was a Muslim who studied Aristotle
with Maimonides; we have diaries...
A: I don't know about that.
Q: Esotericism was widespread-
A: But Maimonides was not in Baghdad.
Q: This was in Egypt...
Q: What is the nature of danger in the Kabbalah?
A: Danger is associated with individual
initiative. Danger enters with the desire
for the paranormal, for the transcendent
experience, the desire to go beyond the
communal experience.
Q: What about the use of PARDES as a code [an
acrostic] for the four ways of interpreting
the Torah?
A: It did become that, but only later, long after
Maimonides, with Kabbalists in Spain and
Italy. But there is a huge amount of
material available, and I had to select it
very even inside this narrow topic in order
to be able to give a manageable lecture.
There is material for a year's worth of
lectures for any of these topics.