Torah and Jewish Idea > Torah and Jewish Idea
Who wrote the Zohar - Rashbi or Moshe de Leon?
q_q_:
<snip>
--- Quote from: Sefardic Panther on November 07, 2008, 01:22:14 PM ---As I said before Moshe DeLeon oviously had access to earlier valid Toranic teaching. There are many other discussions of creation in Torah which refer to black holes. For instance Bereshith 1:2 “Weha'arets hayetah tohu wavohu wehoshech al-peney tehom” (the universe was chaos and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep). The Bahir says that “bohu” is a void in which is substance. Rambam said in Moreh Nevuchim 2:30 that “hoshech” is not simply an absence of light but black fire. Tehom is an abyss, something with no bottem.
You may dispute the reference to black hole in the Zohar itself, but when you corralate it with other references to black holes in other discussions of creation it becomes indisputable.
Shabat Shalom
--- End quote ---
you think the earth was a black hole?
you think the torah says it, and that science says it ?
i'm intrigued to here of where you think there are other black hole references in tenach?
There is a kabbalistic idea that the heavenly torah is written with black fire upon white fire. Do you seriously think it's talking about black holes?
You are making the mistake of tying everything up to thinks you relate to. So you choose the closest thing you are familiar with, instead of admitting that it's more likely that this mystical text is not referring to something you read about in the newspaper last week. If you go up to an Alien and tell him about a Computer (and thinking you are helping, you use terms he is familiar with), and he says "oh, we have exactly the same thing.. Here".
Chances are he is wrong and it'll be completely different.
Sefardic Panther:
Science does infact say that the earth (and the rest of the matter in the universe) was once compressed into a black hole which then somehow expanded in the big bang.
The only black hole reference in the Tanak I know of is as I mentioned Bereshith 1:2 and the Rabinic commentary I mentioned as well as Midrash Tanhuma which says “The heaven was originally as small as the pupil of the eye, still I caused it to stretch over all the world from one end to the other”. Not only does this sound like the big bang but the “pupil of the eye” is a black hole.
One interesting fact about Ktav Ivri. A black hole rotates and resembles a golden mean spiral in curved space. Such a spiral resembles a different Ktav Ivri letter when viewed from 22 different angles.
Anyway we are getting sidetracked from the main discussion of who wrote the Zohar. One other advanced scientific fact (advanced for the middle ages) in the Zohar is that the earth is a rotating sphere and people in different countries experience day and night at the same time.
What makes me think the Zohar is not entirely authentic is that it mentions the crusades and there is a story that after Moshe De Leon’s death a rich man offered his wife money for the original manuscript. She then said that her husband himself was the real auther.
muman613:
--- Quote from: Sefardic Panther on November 09, 2008, 10:59:36 AM ---
<snip>
What makes me think the Zohar is not entirely authentic is that it mentions the crusades and there is a story that after Moshe De Leon’s death a rich man offered his wife money for the original manuscript. She then said that her husband himself was the real auther.
--- End quote ---
Shalom Sefarfic Panther,
I have looked into some of the issue which you bring up. This is a very difficult thing to question the authenticity of such a central piece of Chassidus but it is required to at least answer the doubts.
I have found a good internet discussion of the points which you reveal here. I think some of your questions are dealt with at this site:
http://www.chayas.com/tetsaveh.htm
Here is an interesting quote:
--- Quote ---
These arguments and others of the same kind were used by Leon of Modena in his "Ari Nohem" (pp. 49 et seq., Leipsic, 1840). A work exclusively devoted to the criticism of the Zohar was written, under the title "Miṭpaḥat Sefarim," by Jacob Emden, who, waging war against the remaining adherents of the Shabbethai Ẓebi movement, endeavored to show that the book on which the pseudo-Messiah based his doctrines was a forgery. Emden demonstrates that the Zohar misquotes passages of Scripture; misunderstands the Talmud; contains some ritual observances which were ordained by later rabbinical authorities; mentions the crusades against the Mohammedans (ii. 32a); uses the expression "esnoga" (iii. 232b), which is a Portuguese corruption of "synagogue," and explains it in a cabalistic manner as a compound of the Hebrew words and ; gives a mystical explanation of the Hebrew vowel-points, which were introduced long after the Talmudic period (i. 24b, ii. 116a, iii. 65a).
Moses de Leon Not the Author.
These and other objections of Emden's, which were largely borrowed from the French ecclesiastic Jean Morin ("Exercitationes Biblicæ," pp. 359 et seq., Paris, 1669), were refuted by Moses ben Menahem Kunitz, who, in a work entitled "Ben Yoḥai" (Budapest, 1815), endeavors to show the following characteristics: that the vowel-points were known in Talmudic times; that the rites which Emden claimed to have been ordained by later rabbinical authorities were already known to the Talmud; and that Simeon ben Yoḥai, who before taking refuge in the cave was designated only by the name of Simeon, is credited in the Talmud with many miracles and mystic sayings. Another work in favor of the antiquity of the Zohar was published by David Luria under the title "Ḳadmut ha-Zohar" (Königsberg, 1855 [?]). It is divided into five chapters, in which the author gives proofs that Moses de Leon did not compile the Zohar; that the Geonim in Babylonia cite cabalistic doctrines from a certain "Midrash Yerushalmi," the language of which strongly resembles that of the Zohar; that the work was compiled before the completion of the Talmud; that a great part of it was written in the period of Simeon ben Yoḥai; and, finally, that the Aramaic language was used in Talmudic times as well as in the geonic period. Of these proofs only those showing the inadmissibility of the authorship of Moses de Leon deserve consideration, the others being mere quibbles; for even if it be conceded that the Talmud knew of the vowel-points and that the Aramaic was commonly used, there is no evidence whatever that Simeon ben Yoḥai or his immediate disciples were connected with the Zohar. As to the identification of the Zohar with the so-called "Midrash Yerushalmi," the single fact that most of the passages quoted are not found in the Zohar, as Luria himself admits, is a sufficient proof that the two works can not be identical. However, Luria has quite as much warrant for asserting, on the ground of his proofs, that a great part of the Zohar was written by Simeon ben Yoḥai as have Jellinek, Grätz, Ginsburg, and many others for maintaining that it was wholly composed by Moses de Leon on the ground that in the works of the last-named there are passages which are found verbatim in the Zohar. These scholars seem to shrink from the idea that Moses de Leon should have been guilty of plagiarism, but they are notafraid to charge him with forgery, and that of so clumsy a nature as to arouse at once the suspicions of the reader. For Moses de Leon could not have supposed for a moment that the insertion in the middle of an Aramaic sentence of two verses from Ibn Gabirol's "Keter Malkut" (which, being recited in the synagogues, were known to every Jew) could have escaped detection; nor could he have thought that a quotation from the Cuzari, which was so much read and commented upon at that time, would pass unperceived by his contemporaries.
Not the Work of a Single Author or Period.
Had Moses de Leon, who was a talented writer and an able scholar, wished for mercenary purposes to forge a work in the name of Simeon ben Yoḥai, he would have been more careful in his statements and would certainly have employed the Hebrew language, first, because the tanna would have written in that language, and, second, because a work in Hebrew, being easier to understand, would have gained a far wider circle of readers, and consequently a larger number of purchasers, than would one written in a peculiar Aramaic dialect that was accessible to only a few. Were the pseudepigraphic "Sefer Yeẓirah," "Pirḳe de-Rabbi Eli'ezer," "Sefer Hekalot," "Sefer ha-Bahir," etc., any the less believed to be the works of those to whom they were attributed simply because they were written in plain Hebrew and not in Aramaic? But apart from all these considerations, the contents of the Zohar clearly indicate that the work is the production not of a single author or of a single period, but of many authors, periods, and civilizations; for it combines the most puzzling incongruities and irreconcilable contradictions with lofty ideas and conceptions which would do honor to a genius of modern times, and also mystic teachings of the Talmudic period with those of the Geonim and later Cabala. To determine the country in which the work originated and the time at which its teachings began to develop, it is necessary to ascertain where and when the Jews became intimately acquainted with the Hindu philosophy, which more than any other exercised an influence on the Zohar. As an instance of Hindu teachings in the Zohar may be quoted the following passage:(Zohar, iii. 9b).
"In the book of Hamnuna the Elder we learn through some extended explanations that the earth turns upon itself in the form of a circle; that some are on top, the others below; that all creatures change in aspect, following the manner of each place, but keeping in the same position. But there are some countries on the earth which are lighted while others are in darkness; and there are countries in which there is constantly day or in which at least the night continues only some instants. . . . These secrets were made known to the men of the secret science, but not to the geographers"
--- End quote ---
So yes, there are questions about the authenticity of the Zohar. At this time I still respect it as a source of wisdom.
muman613
Sefardic Panther:
Toda muman613
Some very wise Hakamim accept the Zohar and some very wise Hakamim don't.
The Sefer Yetzirah most certainly is authentic
Kahane-Was-Right BT:
--- Quote from: q_q_ on November 08, 2008, 07:17:18 PM ---There is a kabbalistic idea that the heavenly torah is written with black fire upon white fire. Do you seriously think it's talking about black holes?
--- End quote ---
Actually, that idea is from the midrash (Midrash Tanchuma), and it is quoted by Rashi in his commentary on the Chumash. (parshat vzot ha'bracha). It was a comment on the words of the Torah: "aish da'at" which was explicit in the parsha describing Hashem's "fiery law" (or 'law of fire?' The translation I have is 'fiery law'), which he gave to the Jewish people.
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