The Palm Tree of Devorah By Rabbi Moshe Cordovero Two books by two men called Moses describe proper behavior from the two ends of polar reasoning: Moses (Hebrew, Moshe) Cordovero tells what he considered how God wants people to act and think from a mystical perspective in his “The Palm Tree of Deborah [...]
Does the Prayer Book teach the Truth? From time to time, I receive excellent questions. I added explanations of Hebrew words in parenthesis. Here is one of them and my reply: In a recent blog you wrote: "The central part of Israelite life after the redemption from Egyptian slavery was [...]
Review by Israel Drazin The two volume series Speaking Torah by Arthur Green collects generally mystical comments and commentaries from over forty Chassidic rabbis who lived during the first three generation of the Chasidic Movement, from 1740 to 1815. I described the history of the Chassidim during this early period [...]
The First Ten Days By Rabbi Yaacov Haber Torah Lab, 2010, 88 pages There are essentially four different ways that people use to try to learn the truth about the world: religion, mysticism, philosophy and science, and a mixture of two or three of the previous methods. All should be lauded, for people should try [...]
Maimonides’ Confrontation with Mysticism By Menachem Kellner Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2011, 343 pages Anyone, of any religion, agnostic, or atheist, wanting to understand the truth about life, the ideas taught by the great philosopher Moses Maimonides (1138-1204), should read this splendid easily comprehensible book first published in 2006, reprinted because of its [...]
The Treaties of the Pool By Obadyah son of Abraham son of Maimonides Translated with commentary by Paul Felton The Octagon Press, 1981, 146 pages Maimonides (1138-1204), was the rationalist par excellence, the greatest Jewish thinker. Yet neither his son Abraham nor grandson Obadyah, who wrote this book, nor any of his descendants, [...]
