Zvi Leshem: Jewish Mysticism and Redemption

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The opening of this shiur, in 18Forty’s own words — taken from the captions, so names and Hebrew terms may be approximate.

Rabbi Dr. Zvi Leshem, such a privilege and pleasure to be sitting with you here in Jerusalem. You have such a distinguished career in education through so many different institutions, on the rabbinic side, on the educational institution side, culminating with really leading the greatest collection of Jewish mysticism in the world in one place, which is the Gershom Scholem Collection housed in the National Library of Israel. Thank you so much for joining us. It's my pleasure. So as the person that really oversaw all of this, what is Jewish mysticism? That of course depends on how you define mysticism, which is obviously a topic of much discussion. But I think the simplest definition of mysticism would be a very intense personal encounter with the Divine, with Hashem, which goes beyond what we would usually, maybe call a spiritual experience. A mystical experience is a more intense experience of breaking down the boundaries between the individual and the Creator. And Jewish mysticism shares some characteristics with other general mysticisms but has also a lot of unique characteristics in the context of the world of the Jewish religion, of Torah study, and prayer, and mitzvot, and Jewish theology. Amazing. So how did you get into this? How did you personally become so interested in Jewish mysticism? I think it started when I was a student in New York and I reconnected with my Hasidic family in Brooklyn. And [I] spent a lot of Shabbatot

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1. 0:01Rabbi Dr. Zvi Leshem, such a privilege and pleasure to be sitting with you here in…
2. 3:18vision then I guess I would say that everyone should be mystics in some way, on…
3. 7:13And we were taught how the Baal Shem Tov suggests doing that and to try to…
4. 10:36men and women as the same? Jewish mysticism views men and women very differently. Jewish mysticism…
5. 14:33by the Ramchal, among others, talked about God creating the world because teva hatov lehativ. The…
6. 17:52Jewish people, but all of reality will continue as it is now. For example, so based…
7. 21:44think all of those things that have challenged us for a long time. I mean, I…
8. 25:04This is a huge topic, and if you go to the Scholem library you'll see a…
9. 28:59we do it on perhaps such a general level or not on such a deep level…
10. 32:16comes to mind or Hasidic idea that either is a favorite of yours or just comes…

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