A report on Four Worlds and Ayin and Yesh

Kabbalah, the fourth level of Pardes Jewish exegesis, relating to the Sephirah Chochmah-Wisdom, focuses on the esoteric supernal emanations, defining them through anthropomorphisms and metaphors. Creation is seen as Yesh me-Ayin from "below" and Ayin me-Yesh from "above"

Hasidim's founder Baal Shem Tov's shul restored. Hasidism related esoteric transcendent Kabbalah to internal perception in the soul, making devotion and Divine immanence of this material world its central values. Different Hasidic dynasties explored different aspects of Yesh-Ayin, from contemplative paradox in Chabad, existential faith in Breslav, and public embodiment in Mainstream "Practical" Hasidic charismatic doctrine of Tzadik leadership

The Tree of Life expanded to show each sefirot within the Four Worlds, an arrangement nicknamed "Jacob's Ladder"

In Hasidic interpretation, the revelation at Sinai began the union of descending Ayin spirituality and ascending Yesh physicality through the higher Divinity of Atzmut essence, equally beyond Finite-Infinite duality, reflected in the innermost Divine Will of the Mitzvot. This will be completed in this World's future Divine "dwelling place"

Jacob's vision in Genesis 28:12 of a ladder between Heaven and Earth. In Kabbalistic interpretation, the Sulam-ladder's four main divisions are the Four Worlds and the angelic hierarchy embody external dimensions of the lights-vessels, while souls embody inner dimensions

Ezekiel's Tomb in Iraq. Ezekiel's vision of the Divine Merkabah-Chariot, and Isaiah's vision of the Kisei HaKavod-Throne of Glory, are related in Kabbalah to beholding the Four Worlds from Yetzirah, and from Beriah

3) Beri'ah (בְּרִיאָה or alternatively בְּרִיָּה), meaning World of Creation. On this level is the first concept of creatio ex nihilo (Yesh miAyin), however without yet shape or form, as the creations of Beriah sense their own existence, though in nullification of being (Bittul HaMetzius) to Divinity. Beriah is the realm of the "Divine Throne", denoting the sefirot configuration of Atziluth descending into Beriah like a King on a Throne. The sefirah Binah (Understanding) predominates, representing Divine intellect.

- Four Worlds

The revelation of Divinity in the Heavenly realms is supreme, and superior to the present concealment of God in this World.

- Ayin and Yesh

3 related topics with Alpha

The sefirot consist of lights invested in vessels, similar to water poured into a glass. While taking on the shape of the glass, the water is essentially unchanged.

Ein Sof

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Understood as God prior to any self-manifestation in the production of any spiritual realm, probably derived from Solomon ibn Gabirol's ( 1021 – 1070) term, "the Endless One" (she-en lo tiklah).

Of the Ein Sof, nothing ("Ein") can be grasped ("Sof"-limitation).

In Hasidic thought, Kabbalah corresponds to the World of Atzilus, the sephirah of Chochmah and the transcendent soul level of Chayah; Hasidic philosophy corresponds to the World of Adam Kadmon, the sephirah of Keter and the soul essence of Yechidah.

Metaphorical diagram of the Kav thin line of light descending from the Ohr Ein Sof into the Khalal vacuum to emanate the concealed 10 sephirot in Adam Kadmon

Seder hishtalshelus

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Diagram of the Partzufim countenances, Reishin heads, and Dikna beard Divine aspects configurations in Atziluth

Hebrew prophets envisioned the Throne of God of Beriah with angelic retinue. In Kabbalah Isaiah 6 saw from Beriah, Ezekiel 1 saw from Yetzirah

Contemplation of Divine emanations in Theosophical Kabbalah enables the advantage of the esoteric scholar over the prophet's visions in cognitive understanding of higher levels of Divinity

In Kabbalistic and Hasidic philosophy, seder hishtalshelut or hishtalshelut (סדר השתלשלות) refers to the chain-like descent of spiritual worlds (Olam/Olamot) between God and Creation.

Ein Sof ("No End" - classic term for the Unknowable God in Kabbalah, God as Infinite lifesource continuously sustaining all Creation into Existence, above Being/Non-Being, reciprocally Becoming through the totality of Creation by the divine souls of Man )

Jewish Kabbalists portrayed in 1641; woodcut on paper. Saxon University Library, Dresden.

Kabbalah

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Esoteric method, discipline and school of thought in Jewish mysticism.

Kabbalistic prayer book from Italy, 1803. Jewish Museum of Switzerland, Basel.

Latin translation of Gikatilla's Shaarei Ora

The Ark of the Covenant in Solomon's Temple was the seat for God's presence. Ezekiel and Isaiah had prophetic visions of the angelic heavenly Chariot and Divine Throne

Grave of Rabbi Akiva in Tiberias. He features in Hekhalot mystical literature, and as one of the four who entered the Pardes

The grave of Shimon bar Yochai in Meron before 1899. A Talmudic Tanna, he is the mystical teacher in the central Kabbalistic work, the Zohar

The 13th-century eminence of Nachmanides, a classic rabbinic figure, gave Kabbalah mainstream acceptance through his Torah commentary

The leading scholars of Safed in 16th-century invigorated mainstream Judaism through new legal, liturgical, exegetical and Lurianic-mythological developments.

Synagogue Beit El Jerusalem. Oriental Judaism has its own chain of Kabbalah

The 16th-century Maharal of Prague articulated a mystical exegesis in philosophical language

Moshe Chaim Luzzatto, a leading Italian kabbalist, also wrote secular works, which the Haskalah see as the start of modern Hebrew literature

The Vilna Gaon, 18th-century leader of rabbinic opposition to Hasidism—a Kabbalist who opposed Hasidic doctrinal and practical innovations

Synagogue of the Baal Shem Tov, founder of Hasidism, in Medzhybizh (Ukraine). It gave a new phase to Jewish mysticism, seeking its popularisation through internal correspondence.

The Kabbalist (c. 1910–1920), portrait of an Hasidic man in Jewish religious clothing performed by the Austro-Hungarian Jewish painter Isidor Kaufmann (Jewish Museum, New York)

Metaphorical scheme of emanated spiritual worlds within the Ein Sof

Scheme of descending Sephirot in three columns, as a tree with roots above and branches below

In the 16–17th centuries Kabbalah was popularised through a new genre of ethical literature, related to Kabbalistic meditation

Amulet from the 15th century. Theosophical kabbalists, especially Luria, censored contemporary Practical Kabbalah, but allowed amulets by Sages

Joseph Karo's role as both legalist and mystic underscores Kabbalah's spiritualisation of normative Jewish observance

Building on Kabbalah's conception of the soul, Abraham Abulafia's meditations included the "inner illumination of" the human form

16th-century graves of Safed, Galilee. The messianic focus of its mystical renaissance culminated in Lurianic thought.

Title page of first printed edition of the Zohar, main sourcebook of Kabbalah, from Mantua, Italy in 1558

Golden age of Spanish Judaism on the Knesset Menorah, Maimonides holding Aristotle's work

Kabbalah mysticism on the Knesset Menorah, which shared some similarities of theory with Jewish Neoplatonists

Tikkun for reading through the night of Shavuot, a popular Jewish custom from the Safed Kabbalists

A version of Lekhah Dodi song to welcome the Shabbat, a cross denomination Jewish custom from Kabbalah

The structure of emanations has been described in various ways: Sephirot (divine attributes) and Partzufim (divine "faces"), Ohr (spiritual light and flow), Names of God and the supernal Torah, Olamot (Spiritual Worlds), a Divine Tree and Archetypal Man, Angelic Chariot and Palaces, male and female, enclothed layers of reality, inwardly holy vitality and external Kelipot shells, 613 channels ("limbs" of the King) and the divine Souls of Man.

They reinterpreted the theistic philosophical concept of creation from nothing, replacing God's creative act with panentheistic continual self-emanation by the mystical Ayin Nothingness/No-thing sustaining all spiritual and physical realms as successively more corporeal garments, veils and condensations of divine immanence.