There are multiple examples of additions by mystics to the siddur and machzor and to the practices concerning how and when the prayers are said. The following are a few examples. Additions to the Shema The several sections from the Torah which the siddur and machzor call the Shema are recited in the [...]
Even rationalists like me can read, enjoy, and learn from the writings of mystics. We do not have to accept everything they say as being true, but there are things they say which are true. Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak HaKohen Kook was born in Latvia in 1865 and died in Jerusalem in 1935. His father was [...]
Koren Press, a prestigious publishing house, has published “The Koren Rav Kook Siddur.” Rabbi Abraham Isaac haKohen Kook (1865–1935) was the first Ashkenazi chief rabbi of the British Mandate for Palestine He was the founder of the Religious Zionist Yeshiva Merkaz HaRav. He was a Torah scholar, a decider of halakha (Jewish law), a mystical [...]
My next book, "Nachmanides: An Unusual Thinker," will be published in a few months. It is my most controversial book. Most people have no idea what this great sage actually believed, that he was influenced by mysticism. Most people read what he says but only see what they want to see, or need to see [...]
While the concept of a messiah sent to miraculously reorganize civilization and bring peace is not in the Hebrew Bible, it began to be accepted by Jews around the fourth or third century BCE, and later by Christianity. There is no single view as to how the messianic age will occur or when, and [...]
Many mystics insist that the Zohar, the most famous book on Jewish mysticism, was composed by Rabbi Simeon bar Yochai around the year 130 CE. However, there are rabbis and scholars who recognize that Moses d' Leon, a Spaniard living in Granada, wrote it around 1286, that parts of the book were added by others [...]
