Product Description

The best-selling author of The Essential Kabbalah now offers readers the best introduction to the Zohar.

The splendor and enigmatic appeal of the Zohar, the major text of the Jewish mystical tradition, has never intrigued readers of all faiths more than it does today. But how can we truly understand it?

Daniel C. Matt brings together in one place the most important teachings from the Zohar, the cornerstone of Kabbalah—described as a mixture of theology, mystical psychology, anthropology, myth, and poetry—alongside facing-page stories, notes, and historical background that illuminate and explain the text. Ideal for the first-time reader with no prior knowledge of Jewish mysticism.

Guides readers step-by-step through the texts that make up the Zohar—midrash, mystical fantasy, commentary, and Hebrew scripture—and explains the inner meanings of this sacred text, recognized by kabbalists as the most important work of mystical teaching, in a way that is both spiritually enlightening and intellectually fascinating.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #243258 in Books
• Published on: 2002-06
• Original language: Hebrew
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 135 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9781893361515
• BUY WITH CONFIDENCE, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and service to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed
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From Publishers Weekly
SkyLight Paths continues its Illuminations series with this edition of the Zohar, which series editor Andrew Harvey explains in his foreword is "the cornerstone of Kabbalah." This central text of Jewish mysticism is notoriously recondite and lends itself to multiple interpretations, making its study the life's work of many a Jewish scholar. More recently, individuals of other religious traditions (Exhibit A being Madonna) have begun to dabble in the Zohar, and this edition is particularly geared to them. It is based on short selections rather than the full text, and it offers wonderful facing-page explanations of key concepts and terms, so readers will not have to dig through endnotes looking for information. Matt, a former professor of Jewish mysticism at Berkeley and author of The Essential Kabbalah, doesn't "dumb down" the more abstruse passages of the Zohar, and he provides a very effective introduction that outlines its importance for the reader.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
There are many fine books that explain the Zohar, the mostimportant text of the mystical Jewish movement, kabbalah. This one hasseveral advantages, however, over the others. First, it has awonderful foreword by Harvey, editor of the SkyLight Illuminationsseries, of which the book is a member. In it Harvey evocativelyintroduces a kabbalist named Ezekiel, who teaches Harvey about thepossibilities and power of the mystic tradition, generally andparticularly. Interested readers will be as exhilarated as Harvey isby Ezekiel's provocative statements. Next, the solid preface explainsthe Zohar 's origins, which aren't lost in the mists of time asmany believe, and basic concepts. The text proper is the Zoharwith commentary by translator Matt that explains references to theBible and Midrash and draws on the writings of Jewish philosophers forfurther illumination. A fine starting place for most readersinterested in Jewish mysticism. Ilene Cooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About the Author
Dr. Daniel C. Matt is a highly respected authority on the Zohar and Kabbalah. He is the author of the best-selling The Essential Kabbalah (Harper San Francisco), Zohar: The Book of Enlightenment (Paulist Press), and God & the Big Bang: Discovering Harmony Between Science & Spirituality (Jewish Lights). Formerly professor of Jewish mysticism at Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California, Dr. Matt is currently living in Jerusalem and working on the first complete annotated English translation of the Zohar.

Andrew Harvey, SkyLight Illuminations series editor, was born in India and educated at Oxford. He has devoted more than twenty-five years to study and writing on the world’s spiritual and mystical traditions. He is the author of more than thirty books, including The Direct Path: Creating a Journey to the Divine through the World’s Mystical Traditions.

Customer Reviews

The finest short anthology of the Zohar
This work, a careful update of Matt's earlier edition of Zohar excerpts, provides an accurate and thoughtful translation of many of the most important sections of the Zohar, a primary text in the mystical tradition of the kabbalah. The Zohar itself is voluminous, and it has never been fully translated into English. This book, though, is short and just covers a few essential areas of the Zohar. While basic, it is not watered-down. It's a great place to start if you've recently heard about the Zohar and are wondering about it. There are a lot of unreliable and "fluffy" treatments filling the shelves these days -- this is the authentic article, prepared by one of the most highly regarded scholars in the field.

If you like this book, you might also be interested in the same translator's new, complete translation of the entire Zohar. It's being published volume-by-volume by Stanford University Press. But if you just want the highlights, if you just want to see what this text is about, then this Skylight edition is the way to go.

A Celebration of Life
Daniel Matt's beautifully annotated Zohar leads one into the depth of Jewish mysticism while celebrating the wisdom of our ancestors. Study of the Kabalah requires a teacher, one who can guide the learner deeper into Torah and Talmud, and is not for the easily discouraged. This is a complex book with multiple levels of meaning and Daniel Matt opens the door to the initiate.

Selected passages with commentary
In the Foreword, series editor Andrew Harvey relates his interesting experience with a wise man in Israel who taught him about the seven wonders of Kabbalah, whilst in the Preface Daniel Matt explains the origin of this book of commentary, drawn from his volume for the Paulist Press. These are the most powerful passages from that book in a revised translation.

The introduction deals with the history and contents of the Zohar, a commentary on the 5 books of Moses written in the form of a mystical novel. The questions of its original author/s, the language, and the Ten Sefirot are also discussed here. I found this interpretation of the first words of Genesis very interesting, as well as the insight that the Zohar urges us to regain cosmic consciousness, a closer connection to the divine.

From a linguistic perspective, it is valuable to learn of the neologisms and the use of multiple connotations, oxymorons, puns, parables and puzzles in the text. A chart of the Sefirot is provided. Chapters 1 to 17 consist of selected passages from the Zohar on the right-hand page, with commentary on the left. Chapter titles include The Essence Of Torah, The Creation Of God, The Hidden Light, Adam's Sin, The Binding Of Abraham and Isaac, Jacob's Garment Of Days, the Secret Of Sabbath, The Aroma Of Infinity, God, Israel and Shekhinah, and The Wedding Celebration.

The book concludes with notes, a glossary, a bibliography and an index of Zohar Passages. I did not find this book very clear or accessible at first. It was only after I had read The Essential Zohar: The Source of Kabbalistic Wisdom by Rav P S Berg that I returned to this one and it made sense. For the novice, I recommend the work by Berg as it is a more comprehensive and cohesive introduction to this fascinating esoteric book.

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