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The great Jewish
kabbalist, Rabbi Isaac ben Solomon Luria
(surnamed Ashkenazi), lived from 1534 to 1572. He was called the Ari
(Lion) Zal (Of Blessed Memory) by his followers. He was born in the Jewish
community in Jerusalem. In his 20s he spent seven years in seclusion,
intensely studying the kabbalah.
He settled (c.1570) at Safed (Tsfat) in the north of the Holy Land, where he
became the teacher and leader of a large circle of students who formed an
important school of Jewish mysticism. Combining messianism with his new
insights into kabbalistic doctrines from an earlier period, Luria sought to
understand the nature and connection between earthly redemption and cosmic
restoration. He taught that our thoughts, speech and actions are linked
to the secret processes of G-d's continuous creation of the spiritual and
physical worlds, and are thus an integral part of the cosmic drama. Our
positive deeds work toward Mankind's redemption by aiding in the restoration of
the cosmos to its original state, before the first sin of Adam in the Garden of
Eden. He taught that it is our adherence to G-d's commandments,
communicated to Moses at Mt. Sinai and embodied in traditional Jewish Torah
Law, which will effect this restoration and thereby bring forth the Messiah as
the consummate act of earthly redemption. The Ari Zal's kabbalistic doctrines were
passed down through the numerous works of Rabbi Hayim Vital, his chief
disciple. A foundational teaching of the Ari Zal about the apparent
concealment of G-d's Essence from the created realms was misinterpreted by some
leading Rabbinical scholars in the 1600s and 1700s. It was Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi
who correctly interpreted and expounded the Ari Zal's teaching in a logically
consistent and practical way. |
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