What is Kabbalah?

 Kabbalah, what is it really? It is possible that someone once heard: "Well, that's quite a Kabbalah" or even differently: "Bet you a kabbalah?" In the first case, someone probably had in mind a problem or difficulty that someone was facing. To bet someone a Kabbalah colloquially means to lay out the cards, as in solitaire, and make a fortune. There are several different (invented) interpretations of the unfolded cards that can be found on the Internet. This information does not have to be taken seriously, but rather as something we look at with a so-called wink. However, it is true that the occult Kabbalah was used for magical, divination purposes.

What is the Kabbalah really? Well, the Kabbalah was originally a certain strand of mystical thinking. In its basic version, it is concerned with ways of translating, explaining the text of the first few books of the Old Testament, but not only. The next level of initiation is an approach more related to esotericism, and more specifically to an esoteric method of treating Old Testament texts. Particularly useful in this was gematria, the study of additional hidden meanings of words, related to their numerical value. And here a tiny word of explanation: the individual letters of the Hebrew alphabet were assigned numerals. These are, respectively: 1 to 9 (the first nine letters), full tens (the next ten letters) and 100, 200, 300 and 400 (corresponding to the last three letters).Here is an example of gematria in practice:The description of the creation of the world in Hebrew in the first book of the Bible has 434 words, and the word "delet", meaning door in Hebrew, has exactly the same numerical value. The (rabbis') allegorical explanation is that the description of the creation of the world represents a 'door' to understanding the Bible in general.Other practices relevant to the field of Kabbalah were temura and notarikon. Temura (Hebrew for 'transformation') involves rearranging the letters in a word so that a given letter corresponds to the preceding or following letter. This was used, among other things, to meditate on the nature and terms of God. Notarikon, on the other hand, is a method of developing the initial or final letters of a word into specific sentences. Both methods were used for mystical meditation, meditating on sacred texts. It was meant to enrich, to enlighten the soul of the reader (meditator), so that he or she would discover the additional meaning of the message hidden in these texts.
Other important texts for Kabbalists are the books of Sefer Yitzir, the Book of Creation, as well as the Zohar, which deals with the attributes of God, and the writings of other mystics such as the Sephardic, Zaragoza-based Abraham Abulafia and Isaac Luria. It is possible that notarikon in particular was used to create and explain prophecies based on sacred texts. In this way, the texts were linked in some way to an attempt to predict the future. Perhaps in this lies the seed of an occult branch of the Kabbalah that also served divination?

The mysticism of the Kabbalah was for a long time somehow hidden from the common man, passed on in closed circles from master to disciple. Something quite different was the Hasidic movement, once very widespread in Poland, present-day Ukraine or the former lands of Galicia. The essence of Hasidism was not intellectual deliberation, but seeking contact with the Most High through joyful, often ecstatic dancing and singing. This, too, was a form of prayer. Hasidism was very popular especially among the poor, uneducated followers of El-Shaddai, the Almighty. And here is how He was referred to in the mystical book Sefer Jecira:

"Yah, Yahweh of Hosts, the God of Israel, the Living God and King of the World, El Shaddai the Loving and Merciful, the High and Sublime, the Dweller on High and the Holy One - His Name".

Few probably know that the concepts associated with the Kabbalah have their relevance in contemporary culture, literature and film. How is this possible? Well, in hidden Kabbalistic symbolism, the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet brought to mind a golem. Who (or what) was a golem? It was a human-like creature made of earth, but without a soul. It was supposed to be animated by the letters of the divine Name, written on a piece of parchment and placed in its mouth. This is consistent with one of the tenets of the Kabbalah. It went something like this: if God creates by speaking, a mystic immersed in the Divine Spirit can do the same. This is the origin of the magic phrase we all know: abracadabra. Yes, the seemingly 'familiar' abracadabra derives from the Aramaic language, where avra k'davra means: "saying-I create".
But let us return to the golem. According to legends and tales, such a creature could move and obey commands, but was supposed to be blindly obedient to the man who directed it. An early European form of zombie, you might say, wouldn't you? In one of the more contemporary stories, such a zombie rebels against its human 'creator', and is so strong and aggressive that the only way to avoid general disaster is to destroy it. Doesn't the character of Frankenstein from Mary Shelley's Gothic novel come to mind somewhat at this point?

Cabalistic motifs can also be found in the works of Franz Kafka, Isaac Bashevis Singer and, from our native backyard, in the works of Bruno Schulz, author of The Cinnamon Shops and The Hourglass Sanatorium.
As far as films are concerned, Jan Potocki's "Rękopis znaleziony w Saragossie", directed by Wojciech Jerzy Hass (1964), has become a classic of Polish cinema. There, too, one can easily find references to the Kabbalah, both in the book and its film adaptation.
The Kabbalah is (or seems to be in its most commercial edition) also an inspiration for many quite contemporary artists of the music scene and beyond. The interest in the Kabbalah by many celebrities can be cited here. These include: Madonna, Demi Moore, Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, and, closer to home, Kayah, Otylia Jędrzejczak or Maryla Rodowicz, and more recently (probably) Małgorzata Kożuchowska. I just wonder if tying a red thread on their wrist has brought about some kind of spiritual revolution in them? The question of inner transformation is interestingly put by contemporary exponent Michael Laitman: "The path of Kabbalah is a long, difficult process of redefining the goals in a person's life, of reassessing oneself, of clearly defining the direction of a person's desires."
As a separate strand of mysticism, it has lived to see many studies. If anyone reading this text feels an inner need for further spiritual education, that is great. If you wish to learn more about the history and development of the Kabbalah, you will easily find information in both printed and electronic form. One only has to wish for perseverance in reading.