** you do not have permission to see this link **

Here is the book referenced within-

** you do not have permission to see this link **

I look forward to reading it very much.  I've touched on the mythology of the Giants a bit already.  As Prof Doak discusses there is a very much obscured tradition behind the OT's occasional mention of the Giants.  And the Book of the Giants is one of those legendary lost texts we dearly wish we had.

Prof Doak got his PhD at Harvard and is professor of biblical studies and faculty fellow in the William Penn Honors Program at George Fox University in Newberg, Oregon.  There's so much evangelistic and occult nonsense out there folks.  Stick with the actual scholars. 

Moses de León, in his thirteenth-century cabalistic text ** you do not have permission to see this link **, or the presence of God. The pomegranate contains all the commandments of God in its seeds; the divine inhabits it. In this realization of sanctity and wisdom, de León establishes a link to the Song of Songs and suggests that even those who are empty are filled with the commandments, like the pomegranate. This connection between the fruit and inherent holiness adds new meaning to the Song of Songs, where the love between two people can unknowingly be a divine revelation.

And, ah, the Botticelli.

I've never been to Cairo, but I've always imagined it to be a place (like Tokyo?) of sensory overload.

Istanbul is quite the city.  I've only been once, which is downright embarrassing considering it's only about 300 miles away. However, now that we're both retired, it'll be considerably easier.  Smyrna (Izmir) and Ephesus are also of great interest as well as Cappadocia, where my wife's grandfather was from.

I found this interesting ** you do not have permission to see this link **.  Botticelli's Madonna of the Pomegranate is very beautiful. 

In my younger world traveler days I once had the opportunity to walk through an open air market in Cairo.  Nothing so grand as Istanbul but I nevertheless experienced total sensory overload.  The sights, the sounds, the smells!  And the voices.   I can imagine what it must have been like in ancient times.  

My understanding is that the healed person would have to first go to a local priest and be declared clean.  Then at some point, yes, they would have to go to the Temple in Jerusalem to make the appropriate offering.  But I'm not an expert so anybody with specialized knowledge please chime in.

And the prices.  Not even worth ** you do not have permission to see this link **about. 

By the way, in looking at Wolfson's books, I was struck by the title of the first, The Book of the Pomegranate, a critical Hebrew edition of a work by ** you do not have permission to see this link **, it's never lost its mystical allure. 

I'm a huge fan of Hebrew scholar James Kugel, and the book that did it was ** you do not have permission to see this link **.  It's a collection of essays about the different conceptions of god found in the Hebrew Bible.  (The chapter about the figure of the Angel of the Lord alone is worth the price of admission.)

Relevant to the subject of panentheism is Kugel's description of ancient Hebrew spiritual sensibility.  He describes their concept of god as a "Field of Divine Presence", not a distant, utterly transcendent ruler sitting in a remote heaven but a divine reality that is immediate, palpable, and woven into the very fabric of the world. 

To these ancients the boundary between mind and the world was porous and fluid.  Thoughts, dreams, and emotions were not viewed as internal psychological states but were experienced as intrusions from the "Great Outside".  There was no dualism here between "nature" and "supernature". The spiritual realm was as palpable as the mundane world.

This explains why the divine could condense into the physical.  God walks through the garden.   One could encounter a traveler on the road or share a meal, and only later realize you were interacting directly with god.

In his book ** you do not have permission to see this link **, Kugel examines how and why he thinks this viewpoint changed.  God became a distant, abstract, transcendent being who is encountered inwardly through prayer or conscience rather than as a stranger on a dusty road. 

Yes, ** you do not have permission to see this link **.

Thanks, Stephen.  That'll be the one I eventually get.  I'm not willing to dish out $60 for the Kindle, so I suppose I'll see if I can get it through an interlibrary loan once I'm back in the States.

I approached the subject through the writings of English visionary poet William Blake for whom imagination was a way of interpreting reality.  (Blake famously wrote that “All gods exist within the human breast.”  But for him this didn’t mean they didn’t exist!  For Blake imagination is not imaginary if you’ll pardon the intentional paradox.) 

I love Blake. ** you do not have permission to see this link ** has always been a favorite. 

Bruce, just to be nosey, in what context did you become aware of Wolfson?

I was interested in Jewish panentheism and authors who wrote about it as scholars and not as advocates.

BJH1960 said
Has anyone read anything by Elliot Wolfson? If so, is there something you'd recommend?
  

Yes, ** you do not have permission to see this link **.

When I first got into the subject of Merkabah mysticism I noticed that this book was listed in almost every bibliography I read.  That's always a good sign that it's one you'll want to get.  What particularly resonated for me in this one is that it focuses on the importance of imagination.  I approached the subject through the writings of English visionary poet William Blake for whom imagination was a way of interpreting reality.  (Blake famously wrote that "All gods exist within the human breast."  But for him this didn't mean they didn't exist!  For Blake imagination is not imaginary if you'll pardon the intentional paradox.) 

Anyway I was drawn by the subject and interested in the view from the Jewish visionary tradition.  In this book Wolfson deals with the precursors of Kabbalah (about which is an acknowledged expert) including Merkabah.  Frankly, when I first got the book I wasn't ready for this level of erudition.  This is one I definitely need to revisit now that I'm a bit further down the path.  One of Wolfson's strengths is that he is fluent in contemporary lit/crit approaches and can use them as lenses to interpret the texts. So he doesn't treat these systems as historical curiosities.    

I notice that Amazon is asking absurd prices for this one.  I paid considerable less than that.  

Bruce, just to be nosey, in what context did you become aware of Wolfson?   

More to follow. 

I’m very expansive in my outlook. But no Sasquatch please. I do draw the line there.

I take it Saskatchewan and σέσκουλα (seskoula - Swiss chard) are similarly off limits.

Stephen said
... Well in this particular thread I make no assumptions about the general awareness of a lot of these issues among whoever might be reading so I think it only fair to expand occasionally on some aspects of the subject matter. ...

And sincere thanks for that.

I'm very expansive in my outlook. But no Sasquatch please. I do draw the line there.  

Stephen said
Well in this particular thread I make no assumptions about the general awareness of a lot of these issues among whoever might be reading so I think it only fair to expand occasionally on some aspects of the subject matter.

I don’t want to clutter your very fine thread on Enoch with peripheral, even completely unrelated ideas ...

The most vocal supporter of the Neo-documentary hypothesis is Joel Baden who teaches at Yale.  For anyone interested, see The Composition of the Pentateuch: Renewing the Documentary Hypothesis.  He's also written a terrific book about David, surely one of the great characters in ancient literature, whether he was actually historical or not. He gives a good interview so a search on YouTube will produce multiple items of interest.   Baden wrote a commentary on Exodus and he has a series of video talks with John J Collins about it, produced by the Yale Divinity School.  

... I too have never completely abandoned the documentary hypothesis in the sense that there are fundamental insights that perdure despite its exaggerated applications that were rightfully rejected.

One other point about Biblical anthropomorphism.   There is still a tendency among many to regard this point of view as somehow "primitive".  it's easy to see why when you look back through a lens of Medieval scholasticism and Neo-Platonism.   But what it does is highlight the internal contradictions of Biblically "derived" Monotheism.  (One can seriously make the argument that true monotheism never actually appears in the Biblical texts.)   
Our sophisticated theologians/ministers/apologists want to eat their cake and have it.   Here's the conflict.  To the degree that you have God demonstrate preferences, wishes, desires, you cannot escape anthropomorphism.  Even "Absolute Mind" or "Ultimate Consciousness" cannot escape.  We have zero examples of mind or consciousness without bodies.  You've essentially done what the Priestly Source did.  What's not anthropomorphic about a mind, however abstract? 
But then when you try to fly beyond all that into "Ground of Being" or "Being Itself" you've completely left behind the God of the Bible altogether.  
So which is it?  Is there a connection?  If so what is it? 

This relates to our long-standing discussion of atheism vs apophatic agnosticism and the Thomistic doctrine of analogy. 

I think my point will be pretty clear. The sophisticated theologians/ministers/apologists spend most of their time talking about God as if he walks and talks and commands, but when the liabilities of this position are pointed out, they sneer at our obtuseness and they retreat to the "sophisticated" God who rises above these distinctions.  Then, when the "coast is clear", they go right back to talking about God as if he walks and talks and commands. 
Is this not an admission that the Christian monotheistic concept is internally incoherent, its propositions contradictory?  Better the mythic world of the ancients!  I have the sneaking suspicion that the gods, born within that mythic world, cannot truly live outside it.  

Like I say, I don't want to derail your excellent thread on Enoch with questions that only the heavenly Enoch himself could ever even begin to address.