An innovative handbook to the world of the Jewish mystics that opens up a window onto a higher reality. "When we embark upon the path of the mystic ... this earthly plane is no longer the focus of our lives. Rather, it is the invisible realm of the soul that draws us toward it. We become aware that there are worlds upon worlds beyond the material existence in which we live.... This understanding [illuminates] our ascent into the Timeless Expanses of Infinity." ―from “The Divine Structure of Reality” This unique guide to the world of the Jewish mystics will refashion the way you understand life, God and religion. Renowned teacher and spiritual mentor Rabbi Yoel Glick uses the secret traditions of Judaism and other faiths to show you how to deepen your self-knowledge and live life with greater meaning and awareness. Through the exploration of the body's energy centers (the sefirot and chakras), the many dimensions of the soul, the divine structure of reality and the unfolding relationship between the lower and the higher realms, you will discover how to harness the power of the Infinite inside you and infuse that power into your life and world.

An innovative handbook to the world of the Jewish mystics that opens up a window onto a higher reality. ''When we embark upon the path of the mystic ... this earthly plane is no longer the focus of our lives. Rather, it is the invisible realm of the soul that draws us toward it. We become aware that there are worlds upon worlds beyond the material existence in which we live.... This understanding [illuminates] our ascent into the Timeless Expanses of Infinity.'' - from ''The Divine Structure of Reality'' This unique guide to the world of the Jewish mystics will refashion the way you understand life, God and religion. Renowned teacher and spiritual mentor Rabbi Yoel Glick uses the secret traditions of Judaism and other faiths to show you how to deepen your self - knowledge and live life with greater meaning and awareness. Through the exploration of the body's energy centers (the sefirot and chakras), the many dimensions of the soul, the divine structure of reality and the unfolding relationship between the lower and the higher realms, you will discover how to harness the power of the Infinite inside you and infuse that power into your life and world.

Deepen your understanding, harness the power of the Infinite inside you, and connect to your own soul. This unique guide to the nature of both physical and spiritual reality explores the body’s energy centers, the many dimensions of the soul, the Divine nature, and the unfolding relationship between the lower and the higher realms.

As the greatest book of Jewish mysticism, the Zohar is a revered and much-studied work. Yet, surprisingly, scholarship on the Zohar has yet to pay attention to its most unique literary device—the presentation of its insights while its teachers walk on the road. In these pages, rabbi and scholar David Greenstein offers the first examination of the "walking on the road" motif. Greenstein's original approach hones in on how this motif expresses the struggles with spatiality and the everyday presented in the Zohar. He argues that the walking theme is not a metaphor for realms to be collapsed into or transcended by the holy, as conventional interpretations would have it. Rather, it conveys us into those quotidian spaces that are obdurately present alongside the realm of the sacred. By embracing the reality of mundane existence, and recognizing the prosaic dimensions of the worldly path, the Zohar is an especially exceptional mystical treatise. In this volume, Greenstein makes visible a singular, though previously unstudied, achievement of the Zohar.

Unraveling the web of ancient traditions hidden in such texts as the Sefer Yetzirah and the Zohar, this book traces history and offers an accessible introduction to understanding Kabbalah and its practices. Jewish mysticism has flourished—sometimes brilliantly, sometimes darkly—over five thousand years. This pioneering, popular text on Jewish mysticism was the first written for a general audience, and in it, Perle Besserman offers a lively and accessible introduction to the methods, schools, and practitioners of this intriguing world. She traces the history of Kabbalah through the lives of its illustrious scholars and saints and unravels the web of ancient traditions hidden in such texts as Sefer Yetzirah and the Zohar. Running through these pages are the words of the outstanding Kabbalists and mystics—including Simeon bar Yohai, Isaac Luria, Abraham Abulafia, and the Baal Shem Tov—giving instructions on practices ranging from contemplation of the Bible’s secret teachings to ritual, ecstatic prayer, and intensive meditation.

An accessible introduction to the concepts of Jewish mysticism and how they relate to our lives. Allows us to experience mysticism's inexpressible reverence before the mystery of creation and celebrate the quest to transform ordinary reality into holiness.

An innovative yet practical guide to greater mindfulness that brings spirituality into our everyday lives—for any lifestyle. “Judaism offers a rich tradition for the spiritual seeker: its spirituality infuses daily activities with holiness and purpose. While relating the spiritual journey to a typical day in your life, we will walk with you through brief sections that discuss Jewish thought and tradition. These are followed by sections that include methods, activities, devotions, and blessings to enrich your spiritual practice. Every page offers the reader another step, another area of focus, another perspective to bring the sacred into everyday life.” —from the Introduction In every moment of each day, we have the opportunity to bring the sacred into our everyday lives. We can perform acts of mindfulness and thanksgiving that can transform our lives and help us repair the world. Stepping Stones to Jewish Spiritual Livingprovides spiritual activities, meditations, prayers, and simple rituals to accommodate any lifestyle and daily routine, giving us a chance to embrace God’s creation throughout the day. Coauthored by a rabbi and a psychotherapist, it bridges the gap between faith and healing, tradition and innovation, acceptance of the past and transformation for the future. Chapters are arranged according to the cycle of each day—from sunrise to midnight—and feature creative new rituals, inspiring passages from traditional Jewish texts, prayers, poems, blessings, acts of kavanah (spiritual intention), and more: SunriseRenewing our bodies with meditation and mindful breathing. Morning Contributing to tikkun olam (repairing the world) by ethically pursuing our livelihoods and recognizing our social responsibility. Afternoon Giving thanks with blessings at meal times, and extending hospitality to family, friends, and community. Evening Combining study and prayer with relaxation and leisure. Night Confronting pain, loss, and death with rituals for healing and renewal for the future. Includes special sections dealing with the sacred aspects of relationships, love and sexuality, mourning and loss, Kabbalah, and more. By transforming our days, Stepping Stones shows us how we can transform our lives to practice mindfulness all day, every day—and transform the ordinary into the extraordinary.

In Three Mystics Walk into a Tavern, Jalal ad-Din Rumi, Moses de León, and Meister Eckhart—three of the greatest mystics of all time—meet in Venice for an imaginary night-long conversation that will inspire everyday individuals of the twenty-first century to find their own spirituality and realize that everyone can be a mystic. Although the mystics came from different backgrounds and religious traditions (Islam, Judaism, and Christianity), their spiritual paths led them to similar understandings of a union with the Divine. The three mystics have a timeless and timely message for people who walk the earth eight centuries after they did, no matter an individual’s religious background or even if they have none. It is a message of connecting with the “divine spark” deep within us and within the universe.

“Despite the obvious contradictions, complexity, and apparent randomness that assault any human being day after day, everything is somehow nevertheless connected, orchestrated. The universe is filled with meaning.... In Jewish mysticism, the river is a metaphor for the Holy Oneness that unifies all creation. Just imagine it: a sacred stream, luminous and ubiquitous, a river of light.” —from the Preface to the Anniversary Edition This is an invitation to wade into a deeper spiritual consciousness. Taking us step-by-step, Kushner helps us to allow “the river of light”—the deepest currents of consciousness—to rise to the surface and animate our lives.

A comprehensive treatment of visionary experience in some of the main texts of Jewish mysticism, this book reveals the overwhelmingly visual nature of religious experience in Jewish spirituality from antiquity through the late Middle Ages. Using phenomenological and critical historical tools, Wolfson examines Jewish mystical texts from late antiquity, pre-kabbalistic sources from the tenth to the twelfth centuries, and twelfth- and thirteenth-century kabbalistic literature. His work demonstrates that the sense of sight assumes an epistemic priority in these writings, reflecting and building upon those scriptural passages that affirm the visual nature of revelatory experience. Moreover, the author reveals an androcentric eroticism in the scopic mentality of Jewish mystics, which placed the externalized and representable form, the phallus, at the center of the visual encounter. In the visionary experience, as Wolfson describes it, imagination serves a primary function, transmuting sensory data and rational concepts into symbols of those things beyond sense and reason. In this view, the experience of a vision is inseparable from the process of interpretation. Fundamentally challenging the conventional distinction between experience and exegesis, revelation and interpretation, Wolfson argues that for the mystics themselves, the study of texts occasioned a visual experience of the divine located in the imagination of the mystical interpreter. Thus he shows how Jewish mystics preserved the invisible transcendence of God without doing away with the visual dimension of belief.