Kabbalah is two-dimensional spiritual ignorance; but, as ignorant as it is, it is not as ignorant as those who claim to know about it and go on to denounce it.
As Otto von Bismarck supposedly said (paraphrase): Law and sausage are two things you do not want to see being made.
Kabbalah is quite similar – you stuff a lot of pork into a pig’s intestine and call it edible.
However, I have heard the grossly ignorant assign things to kabbalah that greatly offend scripture itself, attributing the very works of the Ruach to Kabbalah. For instance, one commentator recently claimed that the placing of the tav on the forehead marks 6-6-6, because the tav itself is made up of three vavs, each holding a gematria of six, therefore 6-6-6 was placed on the forehead to ensure that a Gollum would stay functioning.
Yechezq’el (Ezekiel) 9:3b-4
And he called to the man clothed with linen, which had the writer's inkhorn by his side; 4 And Yahuah said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Yerushalayim, and set a Tav upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof.
So, Yahuah himself commanded the man clothed with linen to set a tav (and yes, that is the exact word in the Ivriyt (Hebrew) used in this passage). Upon the foreheads of those men who would not be slaughtered with the slaughter weapons. Is this kabbalah? To the ignorant, apparently so.
Next, the letter tav was assigned the number 6-6-6, by claiming that the letter is made up of three vavs. Let’s look:
ת
For those who know the Babylonian Hebrew letters, this is actually a resh and a vav, not three vavs. If you want to try and construct a three vav letter it would more likely be the chet (and even that is more of a dalet and a vav):
ח
But, since we are speaking from complete ignorance, let’s then assign the numbers 6-6-6 to the letter tav (which is the mark of salvation, by the way).
Never did scripture provide in any construct other than poorly delivered language and banal interpretation, the number 6-6-6. The language in Chizayon (Revelation) 13:18 assigns a Greek gematria to the Greek letters χξϛ. These letters were given the numerical values of six hundred, sixty, and six – not six, six, six. If you want to assign this mark to a name or a letter or something else, the first part must have a numerical value of six hundred, the second part, sixty, and the third part, six.
Here we see the superstitions of the ignorant rise up in denunciation of an artificial construct about which they know nothing, in order to justify the burning at the stake of those they can label with the moniker “kabbalah.” The Dark Ages are returning quickly.
So, let’s clear up a couple of things concerning kabbalah. Kabbalah emerged after earlier forms of Jewish mysticism, in 12th- to 13th-century Southern France and Spain. Ginzberg, Louis; Kohler, Kaufmann (1906); "Cabala". Jewish Encyclopedia. Kopelman Foundation. Dennis, Geoffrey W. (18 June 2014). "What is Kabbalah?". ReformJudaism.org. Union for Reform Judaism. Dennis explains that the term “Kabbalah” applies only to writings that emerged in medieval Spain and southern France beginning in the 13th century.
Any assignment of Kabbalah to earlier writings is pure ignorance and is, as a matter of definition, wrong.
Further, even if those who are looking to burn others at the stake out of their own morbidly obese ignorance want to do so by branding the “kabbalah” stigma on the face of others, one would hope they would distinguish between the post-14th century practices to discern which form of Kabbalah they are discussing. Do they mean the Hechalot mystics? Or is it the German Pietists? I suspect they refer generally to the Zoharic Kabbalah, but I don’t know that. Maybe they are denouncing the ecstatic school of Abraham Abulafia. However, most of the lump-‘em-all-in-the-same-vat-of-bigotry-and-ignorance denunciation is directed at the teachings of Isaac Luria – a lawless convert to Islam who was rejected by the Kabbalists in Safed, and whose teaching of lawlessness mirrored similar teaching coming from Martin Luther at the same time. Finally, of course, they may be discussing the Kabbalah practiced by some but not all involved in Chasidism. Most of those denouncing Kabbalah have never made any such distinguishing.
Isaac Luria (1534-1572), Yitzhak Ben Sh'lomo Lurya Ashkenazi, is considered the father of Kabbalah; Lurianic Kabbalah was popularized in the form of Hasidic Judaism from the 18th century onwards. During the 20th-century, academic interest in Kabbalistic texts led primarily by the Jewish historian Gershom Scholem inspired the development of historical research on Kabbalah in the field of Judaic studies.
Lurianic Kabbalah is based on the Zohar. I have never read the Zohar, nor do I intend to. My reason is the same concerning the Talmud. Both the Talmud and the Zohar attempt to justify pedophilia, which is a grievous transgression among men.
Mattithyahu (Matthew) 18:5-10
And whoso shall receive one such little child in my name receives me. 6 But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea. 7 Woe unto the world because of offences! for it must needs be that offences come; but woe to that man by whom the offence comes! 8 Wherefore if your hand or your foot offend you, cut them off, and cast them from you: it is better for you to enter into life halt or maimed, rather than having two hands or two feet to be cast into everlasting fire. 9 And if your eye offend you, pluck it out, and cast it from you: it is better for you to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into the fire of Gey Hinnom. 10 Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven.
Yet I have been condemned by those quoting from the Talmud, and have been called a kabbalist by the same people. Let them adopt every word of the Talmud, and it be assigned unto them in the heavens.
Why do I call Kabbalah ignorant? Several reasons.
First, no man who denies Mashiach has true knowledge, and every word that proceeds from his mouth is suspect, because it does not rest on ultimate truth. Ben Luria was such a man; as was Maimonides (the likely author of the Zohar).
Second, the teaching of Kabbalah is overtly two-dimensional. I do not live a two-dimensional understanding, but border on a fourth dimensional understanding. For instance, in reading the command to construct a menorah, I don’t see where the instruction says: “and line them all up in a two-dimensional row”. I missed that part. But the ignorance of man can be readily seen throughout history and is evidenced by the artwork created over the centuries, where three-dimensional perspective did not emerge until the modern epoch. The sephiroth, for instance, is hopelessly impotent to describe creation and the workings of the aleph-beyt.
Consider Salvador Dali’s work declaring the fourth dimension here:
As my friend Eric Bissell has put it: “The great mystery of the meaning of the Ivriyt (Hebrew) Aleph-Beyt letters are that they identify the Mashiach of Yashar’el, Messiah of Yashar’el. Yahusha is the embodiment of the Aleph-Tav, which is alliterated as the Aleph-Beyt. The Aleph-Beyt is the “Word” which became manifest as a Human Incarnation.”
Kabbalah does not reflect the Mishkan pattern of the Aleph-Beyt, and can’t understand it, because it is buried in the denial of the Name and the denial of Mashiach. Instead, the two-dimensional sephiroth is given and the workings of the Aleph-Beyt is delivered in the same two dimensions – because they do not reflect the Word made flesh. And this is the case with all the forms of Kabbalah described above.
Mishlei (Proverbs) 30:4-6
Who has ascended up into heaven, or descended? who has gathered the wind in his fists? who has bound the waters in a garment? who has established all the ends of the earth? what is His name, and what is His Son's name, if you can tell? 5 Every word of Eloah is pure: he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him. 6 Add not unto his words, lest he reprove you, and you be found a liar.
If you don’t know His name and His Son’s name, then you walk in the darkness of ignorance.
And what is the Talmud, if not an addition to the Word of Yahuah?
I will leave Kabbalah to those who spend their time incorrectly teaching the occult practices contained within the darkest forms of Kabbalah, all while denouncing the same.
My journey is concerned with revealing the light of the name – whose brilliance is believed to be too much for the people at the base of Chorev to witness. “You go” they say; “we will stay here and make a golden calf as our witness.”