Open Secret: Postmessianic Messianism and the Mystical Revision of Menaḥem Mendel Schneerson

In the first instance, the dispersion of Moses in every generation (itpashṭuta de-moshe be-khol dara we-dara) signifies the capability of every Jew to expand his or her consciousness (da‘at) to the point of being assimilated within the divine and to draw down the infinite light into the world.42 However, the righteous sages, the “eyes of the congre

the talmudic dictum that one must get so inebriated on Purim that it is no longer possible to discern the difference between “cursed is Haman” and “blessed is Mordecai.”49 Just as the consumption of wine on the physical plane brings about the nullification of the senses (biṭṭul ha-ḥushim), so, in the spiritual plane, the disclosure of secrets can l

The only truth that may be observed is truth garbed in the appearance of truth.

Beyond the panentheistic and acosmic insights associated with the two levels of contemplation is the apophatic awareness of the divine enigma, the transcendence that is designated as the conjunction of the intention of the heart (devequt di-reu‘ta de-libba), a knowing that consists of the unknowing by which the Jewish soul attains the state of bein

my hermeneutic belief that by digging into the soil of a specific cultural matrix one may uncover roots that lead to others.

Material space can contain the immaterial beyond spatial delimitation, a possibility actualized in the Temple, which is imagined archetypically as the place above place.

The sixth Rebbe deduced from this principle that Israel ben Eliezer (1698–1760), the Ba‘al Shem Ṭov, “master of a good name,” generally abbreviated as the Beshṭ, should be considered the “Moses of Ḥasidism” and Shneur Zalman of Liadi, the “Moses of Ḥabad.”

To apprehend reality, one must strip it of its materiality, a reversal of the process of creation of something from nothing

Truth did not come into the world naked, but it came in types and images. The world will not receive truth in any other way. – GOSPEL OF PHILIP