What Is Kabbalah?
The Jewish mystical tradition — the inner Torah, esoteric and beautiful, central since the 13th century.
Summary. Kabbalah (literally “that which is received”) is the Jewish mystical tradition. Its core text is the Zohar (13th century, traditionally attributed to Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai of the 2nd century, critically attributed to Rabbi Moshe de Leon of 13th-century Spain). The system of the ten Sefirot, the doctrine of Ein Sof, the practice of meditative intentions (kavvanot) in prayer, and the cosmic drama of tzimtzum, shevirat hakelim, and tikkun are its distinctive teachings. Lurianic Kabbalah (16th-century Safed) is the dominant form. Kabbalah is the inner Torah; the outer Torah remains its precondition.
The Texts
Sefer Yetzirah (Book of Formation) — the earliest mystical text, possibly 2nd century CE, treating the creation through 10 sefirot and 22 letters.
Sefer haBahir (Book of Brightness) — 12th-century Provence; the earliest Kabbalistic text proper, the first to teach the Sefirot in their developed form.
Zohar (Book of Splendor) — the central work, traditionally Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, critically Rabbi Moshe de Leon, late 13th century Spain. The Pritzker Edition (translated by Daniel Matt) is the great contemporary scholarly translation.
Etz Chaim — the systematic exposition of Lurianic Kabbalah, compiled by Rabbi Chaim Vital from the teachings of Rabbi Isaac Luria (the Arizal).
Sha’ar haGilgulim — the Lurianic Gate of Reincarnations.
Tanya — Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi’s philosophical exposition of Chabad Kabbalah.
The Sefirot
The ten Sefirot are the divine attributes through which Ein Sof (the unknowable infinite) becomes knowable and through which the world is created and sustained. They are: Keter (Crown), Chochmah (Wisdom), Binah (Understanding), Chesed (Loving-kindness), Gevurah (Severity/Strength), Tiferet (Beauty/Truth), Netzach (Eternity/Endurance), Hod (Splendor), Yesod (Foundation), Malchut (Kingship). The Sefirot are arranged in a tree-shaped diagram (the Etz Chaim) familiar from any Kabbalistic image. They are not separate beings; they are the modes through which the One acts.
The Lurianic Drama
The Arizal’s system: tzimtzum (divine contraction making space for finite being), shevirat hakelim (the shattering of the vessels of creation as the divine light overflowed), the scattering of the sparks into the realms of impurity (klipot), and the work of tikkun (repair) accomplished through the mitzvot of every Jew.
How to Begin
A widely cited injunction is to study Kabbalah only after age 40, after thorough grounding in Tanakh, Mishnah, and Talmud, and ideally with a teacher. The grounding and the teacher are sound advice; the age bar itself is later and less settled than it sounds. The Talmud and the Rambam set a standard of readiness rather than of age, and forty enters through a note of the seventeenth-century Shach, who reports it in the name of earlier authorities. It was unevenly observed — the Arizal did not live to forty. For an introduction without violating that injunction: read Arthur Green’s A Guide to the Zohar, Daniel Matt’s The Essential Kabbalah, or DovBer Pinson’s introductions. For the meditative dimension, Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan’s Jewish Meditation and Meditation and the Bible are excellent.
Where Denominations Diverge
Kabbalah is foundational in Hasidic Judaism, central in Sephardic Judaism, and historically respected though not always central in Lithuanian Mitnagdic Judaism (the Vilna Gaon himself was a master Kabbalist). Conservative thought has engaged Kabbalah seriously through Heschel and others. Reform classically rejected Kabbalah as obscurantist; current Reform is increasingly hospitable. Renewal Judaism is the most explicitly Kabbalistic of the non-Orthodox movements. Madonna’s Kabbalah Centre and similar enterprises are not regarded as serious Kabbalah by any traditional authority.
Sources
Zohar (Pritzker Edition, trans. Daniel Matt, 12 vols.).
Arizal (via Chaim Vital), Etz Chaim; Sha’ar haGilgulim.
Sefer Yetzirah; Sefer haBahir.
Shneur Zalman of Liadi, Tanya.
Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism.
Moshe Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives.
Is Kabbalah for Everyone? (Is there really a ban on Kabbalah before the age of 40?) — Chabad.org.
The Age to Study Kabbalah — OU Torah.
Kabbalah: The Ten Sefirot of the Kabbalah — Jewish Virtual Library.
Isaac Ben Solomon Luria — Jewish Virtual Library.
Further Reading
Arthur Green, A Guide to the Zohar.
Daniel Matt, The Essential Kabbalah.
DovBer Pinson, Reincarnation and Judaism.
Aryeh Kaplan, Jewish Meditation.