Kabbalah and Postmodernism: A Dialogue (Studies in Judaism)

358 Pages·2009·3.294 MB·English

by  Sandford L. Drob

3
studies in judaism / 3
Kabbalah and Postmodernism: A Dialogue challenges certain long-held
philosophical and theological beliefs, including the assumptions that the
insights of mystical experience are unavailable to human reason and inex-
pressible in linguistic terms, that the God of traditional theology either does
or does not exist, that “systematic theology” must provide a univocal account D
R
of God, man, and the world, that “truth” is “absolute” and not continually
O
subject to radical revision, and that the truth of propositions in philosophy Kabbalah
B
and theology excludes the truth of their opposites and contradictions. Read-
/
ers of Kabbalah and Postmodernismwill be exposed to a comprehensive mode AND
K
of theological thought that incorporates the very doubts that would otherwise
lead one to challenge the possibility of theology and religion, and which both a Postmodernism
b
preserves the riches of the Jewish tradition and extends beyond Judaism to
a non-dogmatic universal philosophy and ethic. b
a
Sanford L. Drob holds doctorate degrees in l
a
philosophy from Boston University and in clinical
h
psychology from Long Island University. He is on
the core faculty of the clinical psychology doc- A
N
toral program at Fielding Graduate University in
D
Santa Barbara, California, and on the faculty of
P A Dialogue
New York University Medical Center. In addition to
o
numerous publications in clinical, forensic, and philosophical psy-
s
chology, Dr. Drob is the author of two previous books on the Kab-
t
balah as well as articles on Jewish philosophy that have appeared m
in various journals, including the New York Jewish Review, for which he
o
served as editor-in-chief for several years. Dr. Drob’s recent work explores d
Carl Jung’s intimate but highly ambivalent relationship to Judaism and Jew- e
ish mysticism, the connection between the Kabbalah and axiological ethics, r
n
and the role of the coincidence of opposites in mysticism, philosophy, and
i
psychology.
s
m
S A N F O R D L . D R O B
M
O
C
.
G
N
A P
RL ETE
E R
ET LA
P N
.W G
W
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3
studies in judaism / 3
Kabbalah and Postmodernism: A Dialogue challenges certain long-held
philosophical and theological beliefs, including the assumptions that the
insights of mystical experience are unavailable to human reason and inex-
pressible in linguistic terms, that the God of traditional theology either does
or does not exist, that “systematic theology” must provide a univocal account D
R
of God, man, and the world, that “truth” is “absolute” and not continually
O
subject to radical revision, and that the truth of propositions in philosophy Kabbalah
B
and theology excludes the truth of their opposites and contradictions. Read-
/
ers of Kabbalah and Postmodernismwill be exposed to a comprehensive mode AND
K
of theological thought that incorporates the very doubts that would otherwise
lead one to challenge the possibility of theology and religion, and which both a Postmodernism
b
preserves the riches of the Jewish tradition and extends beyond Judaism to
a non-dogmatic universal philosophy and ethic. b
a
Sanford L. Drob holds doctorate degrees in l
a
philosophy from Boston University and in clinical
h
psychology from Long Island University. He is on
the core faculty of the clinical psychology doc- A
N
toral program at Fielding Graduate University in
D
Santa Barbara, California, and on the faculty of
P A Dialogue
New York University Medical Center. In addition to
o
numerous publications in clinical, forensic, and philosophical psy-
s
chology, Dr. Drob is the author of two previous books on the Kab-
t
balah as well as articles on Jewish philosophy that have appeared m
in various journals, including the New York Jewish Review, for which he
o
served as editor-in-chief for several years. Dr. Drob’s recent work explores d
Carl Jung’s intimate but highly ambivalent relationship to Judaism and Jew- e
ish mysticism, the connection between the Kabbalah and axiological ethics, r
n
and the role of the coincidence of opposites in mysticism, philosophy, and
i
psychology.
s
m
S A N F O R D L . D R O B
M
O
C
.
G
N
A P
RL ETE
E R
ET LA
P N
.W G
W
W
Kabbalah and
Postmodernism
Studies in Judaism

Yudit Kornberg Greenberg
General Editor

Vol. 3

PETER LANG
New York ! Washington, D.C./Baltimore ! Bern
Frankfurt am Main ! Berlin ! Brussels ! Vienna ! Oxford
Sanford L. Drob

Kabbalah and
Postmodernism

A Dialogue

PETER LANG
New York ! Washington, D.C./Baltimore ! Bern
Frankfurt am Main ! Berlin ! Brussels ! Vienna ! Oxford
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Drob, Sanford L.
Kabbalah and postmodernism: a dialogue / Sanford L. Drob.
p. cm. — (Studies in Judaism; v. 3)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Cabala—History. 2. Mysticism—Judaism. 3. Postmodernism—Religious
aspects—Judaism. 4. Judaism—Doctrines. I. Title.
BM526.D756 296.1’6—dc22 2008016026
ISBN 978-1-4331-0304-9 (hardback)
ISBN 978­1­4539­0365­0 (eBook)
ISSN 1086-5403

Bibliographic information published by Die Deutsche Bibliothek.
Die Deutsche Bibliothek lists this publication in the “Deutsche
Nationalbibliografie”; detailed bibliographic data is available
on the Internet at http://dnb.ddb.de/.

The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability
of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity
of the Council of Library Resources.

© 2009 Peter Lang Publishing, Inc., New York
29 Broadway, 18th floor, New York, NY 10006
www.peterlang.com

All rights reserved.
Reprint or reproduction, even partially, in all forms such as microfilm,
xerography, microfiche, microcard, and offset strictly prohibited.

Printed in the United States of America
To the loving memory of my father,
Frank Ephraim Drob

Table of Contents
Preface.........................................................................................................xiii
Introduction...................................................................................................1
A Mysticism of Ideas...............................................................................................1
Bilinear Thinking....................................................................................................5
Rational Mysticism..................................................................................................8
Kabbalistic Forms of Consciousness.....................................................................10
The Philosophical Status of the Kabbalists’ Basic Metaphor................................10
Kabbalah, Deconstruction, Hegelianism...............................................................13
Towards a Contemporary Kabbalistic Theology...................................................16
1. Postmodernism and Jewish Mysticism..................................................19
The Tenor of Post-modernist Thought: Multiple Narratives and the Loss of
Center..........................................................................................................19
The Lurianic Kabbalah..........................................................................................25
The Shattering of the Foundations.........................................................................28
Overcoming Binary Oppositions...........................................................................30
The Role of Negation............................................................................................31
The Infinite Play of Significance...........................................................................32
Domination and the Dissolution of God and Self..................................................33
Nihilism and Negation...........................................................................................35
Ethnocentrism and Multi-Culturalism...................................................................36
The Need for Universalism and Difference...........................................................37
Lurianic Kabbalah and the Syntax of Classical Narrative.....................................38
Kabbalah as a Hermeneutic Methodology.............................................................40
Tropological vs. Metaphysical Mysticism.............................................................42
Exile as a Condition of Human Existence.............................................................43
viii Kabbalah and Postmodernism

The Dissolution of the Transcendental Signified and the Autonomous
Subject.........................................................................................................45
2. Derrida and Jewish Mysticism...............................................................48
Derrida, Judaism and the Kabbalah.......................................................................48
Wolfson and Idel on Derrida and the Kabbalah....................................................50
The Last of the Jews..............................................................................................55
Jabes’ The Book of Questions...............................................................................56
Sollers and Scholem..............................................................................................60
A Philosophical Accord.........................................................................................62
3. Tzimtzum and Différance.........................................................................65
The Doctrine of Tzimtzum.....................................................................................65
“Différance”..........................................................................................................67
Différance, “Presence” and “Absence”.................................................................69
The “Trace”...........................................................................................................69
Différance is “Not”................................................................................................70
Does Différance Create?........................................................................................71
Différance and Negative Theology........................................................................71
Derrida and Mysticism..........................................................................................73
The Thing is Hopelessly Divided Against Itself....................................................74
The Demise of Différance.....................................................................................75
Différance, Space and Time..................................................................................76
Différance and the Doctrine of Tzimtzum..............................................................76
Writing and Tzimtzum............................................................................................77
Kabbalah, Logocentrism and the Philosophy of Presence.....................................78
Who or What Differs?...........................................................................................80
Differences Between Différance and Tzimtzum.....................................................81
Différance, Freud and the Unconscious.................................................................82
Creation and the Lie..............................................................................................83
“Khora”.................................................................................................................85
A Cartographic Analogy........................................................................................86
Providing Place......................................................................................................87
Différance and God...............................................................................................88
4. The Shevirah and Deconstruction..........................................................91
The Breaking of the Vessels..................................................................................92