Still Running Off at the Keyboard

UNPACKING THE AFTERWORD TO MEDITATIONS ON THE TAROT - continued

From the Afterword:

It is known how Christian philosophy was widely influenced during the Middle Ages, from Arabic sources and elsewhere, by the beliefs concerning cosmic powers or "intelligences" (conceived of partly as thoughts of God, partly as Angels).

Yes, indeed, there was an attempt to reconcile Kabbalah with Catholicism in the Middle Ages. It failed. It was firmly rejected by the Church. You can read about it in the Catholic Encyclopedia.

Kabbala

Finally, it has decidedly no right to be considered as an excellent means to induce the Jews to receive Christianity, although this has been maintained by such Christian scholars as R. Lully, Pico della Mirandola, Reuchlin, Knorr von Rosenroth, etc., and although such prominent Jewish Kabbalists as Riccio, Conrad, Otto, Rittangel, Jacob Franck, etc., have embraced the Christian Faith, and proclaimed in their works the great affinity of some doctrines of the Kabbala with those of Christianity.

Giovanni Pico della Mirandola

Despite all efforts Pico was condemned, and he decided to travel, visiting France first, but he afterwards returned to Florence. He destroyed his poetical works, gave up profane science, and determined to devote his old age to a defence of Christianity against Jews, Mohammedans. and astrologers.

R. Lully

These principles were taken up by the followers of Raymond, known as Lullists, who for a time had so great an influence, especially in Spain, that they succeeded in founding chairs at the Universities of Barcelona and Valencia for the propagation of the doctrines of the "Illuminated Doctor". The Church authorities, however, recognized the dangerous consequences which follow from the breaking down of the distinction between natural and supernatural truth. Consequently, in spite of his praiseworthy zeal and his crown of martyrdom, Raymond has not been canonized. His rationalistic mysticism was formally condemned by Gregory XI in 1376 and the condemnation was renewed by Paul IV. Raymond's works were published in ten folio volumes at Mainz, 1721-1742. There are, besides, several editions of portions of his writings. His poems and popular treatises, written in Catalonian, had a very wide circulation, in his own day, and their style has won him a high place in the history of medieval Spanish literature. The best know edition of the works in which he describes his logical machine is the Strasburg edition of 1651.

Johannes Reuchlin

The chief service of Reuchlin was his introduction into Germany of the study of Hebrew. His "De rudimentis hebraicis" (1506), containing both lexicon and grammar, was epoch-making. In 1512 he published as a manual for beginners an edition of the Hebrew text of the Penitential Psalms with a literal Latin translation. In his "De accentibus et orthographia linguae hebraicae" (1518), he treats in detail the word-accent, and more briefly the rhetorical accent and musical emphasis. Less important are his cabalistic writings ("De verbo mirifico", 1494; "De arte cabbalistica", 1517), in which he becomes lost in the abstruse problems of mysterious names and figures. Meanwhile his unfortunate quarrel with Johann Pfefferkorn and the Cologne Dominicans concerning the destruction of the Talmudic books had begun. (For a discussion of this, see HUMANISM.)

Returning to the Afterword:

Above all during the Renaissance, through the continuing influence of these conceptions, the best minds were occupied with accomIIK)dating the Jewish magical-mystical Cabbala into the Christian faith. As has now been observed [2], many of the Church Fathers had already attributed a place of honour among the heathen prophets and wise men to the mysterious Hermes Trismegistus.

The Phoenixmasonry website discusses this, to wit:

Among the fragmentary writings believed to have come from the stylus of Hermes are two famous works. The first is the Emerald Table, and the second is the Divine Pymander, or, as it is more commonly called, The Shepherd of Men, a discussion of which follows. One outstanding point in connection with Hermes is that he was one of the few philosopher-priests of pagandom upon whom the early Christians did not vent their spleen. Some Church Fathers went so far as to declare that Hermes exhibited many symptoms of intelligence, and that if he had only been born in a more enlightened age so that he might have benefited by their instructions he would have been a really great man!

In his Stromata, Clement of Alexandria, one of the few chroniclers of pagan lore whose writings have been preserved to this age, gives practically all the information that is known concerning the original forty-two books of Hermes and the importance with which these books were regarded by both the temporal and spiritual powers of Egypt. Clement describes one of their ceremonial processions as follows:

"For the Egyptians pursue a philosophy of their own. This is Hermes Mercurius Trismegistus.

Yes, Phoenixmasonry is a Masonic website. They are dedicated to “spreading the enlightenment, one web surfer at a time” according to their homepage. Isn’t it odd that a Masonic website is saying the same thing that our celebrated theologian is saying, and that it is something that Catholic theologians have not said historically?

The Catholic Encyclopedia does not discuss Hermes Trismegistus.

Back to the Afterword:

Hermetic books had already circulated in the early and high Middle Ages [3]. Later, during the Renaissance, Hermes Trismegistus was celebrated as the great contemporary of Moses, and as the father of the wisdom of the Greeks (one may call to mind the portrayal honouring him at Siena Cathedral, inset in the cathedral floor). Poets, painters and theologians drew enthusiastically and reverently from the teachings of Hermes, and from other sources of pagan wisdom, the scattered rays of divine illumination, bringing it to a focus in the Christian faith. Yet the other source from which enlightenment was gathered, the Cabbala, was, if anything, still more important (the secret, oral tradition of the Cabbala is likewise dated back to the time of Moses).

The Kaballah is a very specific branch of Jewish Mysticism. As such it has a date or time of inception. The acknowledged expert on the Kabbalah, Gershom Scholem, dates the Kabbalah this way.

The Kabbalah, literally ‘tradition,’ that is, the tradition of things divine, is the sum of Jewish mysticism. It has had a long history and for centuries has exerted a profound influence on those among the Jewish people who were eager to gain a deeper understanding of the traditional forms and conceptions of Judaism. The literary production of the Kabbalists, more intensive in certain periods than in others, has been stored up in an impressive number of books, many of them dating back to the late Middle Ages. For many centuries the chief literary work of this movement, the Zohar, or ‘Book of Splendor,’ was widely revered as a sacred text of unquestionable value, and in certain Jewish communities it enjoys such esteem to this day. (Scholem, ON THE KABBALAH AND ITS SYMBOLISM, Introduction, pg. I)

The Zohar is accredited to Moses de Leon, 13th century:

According to Gershom Scholem, most of the Zohar was written in an exalted style of Aramaic that was spoken in Palestine during the second century of the modern era. The Zohar first appeared in Spain in the thirteenth century, and was published by a Jewish writer named Moses ben Shem-Tov de Leon. He ascribed this work to a rabbi of the second century, Simeon ben Yohai. Jewish historiography holds that during a time of Roman persecution, Rabbi Simeon hid in a cave for 13 years, studying the Torah (five books of Moses) with his son Eliezar. During this time he is said to have been inspired by God to write the Zohar.

The fact that the Zohar was found by one lone individual, Moses de Leon, taken together with the circumstance that it refers to historical events of the post-Talmudical period, caused the authenticity of the work to be questioned from the outset.

Von Balthasar is disingenuous in his attribution of the “Cabbala” to Moses. Properly he should attribute it to Moses de Leon. However, were Scholem's books on the Kabbalah published after the original von B Forward was written? The original publication of MEDITATIONS is 1985. What, then was the source to which von B turned to make his claims about the Zohar? Who else was making the claim that the Kabbalah dated back to Moses prior to Scholem? Besides Albert Pike, that is...

Albert Pike speaks of the Kabbalah in numerous instances in MORALS AND DOGMA. One example:

The sources of our knowledge of the Kabalistic doctrines, are the books of Jezirah and Sohar, the former drawn up in the second century, and the latter a little later; but containing materials much older than themselves. In their most characteristic elements, they go back to the time of the exile. In them, as in the teachings of Zoroaster, everything that exists emanated from a source of infinite LIGHT.. Before everything, existed THE ANCIENT OF DAYS, the KING OF LIGHT; a title often given to the Creator in the Zend-Avesta and the code of the SABEANS With the idea so expressed is connected the pantheism of India. THE KING OF LIGHT, THE ANCIENT, is ALL THAT IS. He is not only the real cause of all Existences; he is Infinite [AINSOPH]. He is HIMSELF; THERE IS NOTHING IN Him that We can call Thou. (emphasis in original) (M&D, p. 266)

Pike does not cite sources in MORALS AND DOGMA. Was the material perhaps channeled?

Scholem makes an interesting comment on mysticism:

The most radical of the revolutionary mystics are those who not only reinterpret and transform the religious authority, but aspire to establish a new authority based on their own experience. In extreme cases, they may even claim to be above all authority, a law unto themselves. The formlessness of the original experience may even lead to a dissolution of all form, even in interpretation. It is this perspective, destructive, yet not unrelated to the original impulse of the mystic, which enables us to understand the borderline case of the nihilistic mystic as an all too natural product of inner mystical upheavals even if he was rejected with horror by all those about him. All other mystics try to find the way back to form, which is also the way to the community; he alone, because in his experience the breakdown of all form becomes a supreme value, tries to preserve this formlessness in an undialectic spirit, instead of taking it, like other mystics, as an incentive to build up new form. Here all religious authority is destroyed in the name of authority: here we have the revolutionary aspect of mysticism in its purest form. (emphasis mine) (ibid p. 11)

Scholem calls "mystical nihilism" mystical encounters that are not solidly grounded in the traditions of a religious faith.

In diametrical and irreconcilable opposition to all such attempts to relieve the tension between mysticism and religious authority stands the extreme case of mystical nihilism, in which all authority is rejected in the name of mystical experience or illumination. (ibid. p. 27)

And so he asks:

How can a mystic be a conservative, a champion and interpreter of religious authority? How is he able to do what the great mystics of Catholicism, such Sufis as Ghazzali, and most of the Jewish Kabbalists did? The answer is that these mystics seem to rediscover the sources of traditional authority. Perceiving the ancient foundations of this authority, they have no desire to change it. On the contrary, they try to preserve it in its strictest sense. (p. 7)

But what is von Balthasar proposing with this book MEDITATIONS ON THE TAROT? Nothing short of a revolution in Catholic doctrine. Is it any wonder, then, that people say of von Balthasar/von Speyer, "I didn't understand what he was saying"? Is it any wonder, too, that another's theology, based on the work of von B, might also be difficult to understand?


Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!