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Kabbalah and Contemporary
Spiritual Revival:
Historical, Sociological and
Cultural Perspectives
International Workshop
funded by The Israel Science
Foundation, The
Goren-Goldstein Center for
Jewish Thought, and Ben
Gurion University
Ben
Gurion University, May
20-22, 2008
Participants
Yaakov Ariel is a
professor of Religious
Studies at the
University
of
North Carolina
at
Chapel Hill. He
is a scholar of Religion in
America,
with special emphasis on
Jewish-Christian relations
and New Religious Movements.
His book, Evangelizing
the Chosen People won an
annual prize for best books,
given by the American
Society of Church History.
Yoram Bilu holds a joint
appointment at the Hebrew
University of Jerusalem in
the Department of
Psychology, where he is the
Sylvia Bauman Professor, and
in the Department of
Sociology and Anthropology.
A clinical psychologist
turned anthropologist, he is
interested in the interface
of culture and psychology as
reflected in mental health,
folk-religion, and altered
states of consciousness.
Bilu is the co-editor (with
Eyal Ben-Ari) of Grasping
Land: Space and Place in
Contemporary Israeli
Discourse and Experience.
Albany: SUNY Press (1997), and the author of Without
Bounds: The Life and Death
of Rabbi Ya'aqov Wazana, Detroit: Wayne State University Press (2000).
He recieved the Bahat
Prize for his The Saint
Impresarios: Dreamers,
Healers, and Holy Men in Israel’s Urban
Periphery (Hebrew)
Haifa University
Press (2005).
Shlomo
Fischer holds the
Horowitz Post-Doctoral
Fellowship in the department
of Sociology and
Anthropology at Tel
Aviv
University. He was awarded
his Ph.D. in June 2007 from
the Department of Sociology
and Anthropology in
Hebrew University in
Jerusalem.
His dissertation was
entitled Self-Expression
and Democracy in Radical
Religious Zionist Ideology.
Fischer is the co-editor
(together with Adam Seligman) of The Burden of Tolerance:
Religious Traditions and the
Challenge of Pluralism,
published (in Hebrew)
by the Van Leer Jerusalem
Institute and by HaKibbutz
HaMeuchad in 2007. Other
recent publications include:
"Nature, Authenticity and
Violence in Radical
Religious Zionist Thought",
in Hannah Herzog, Tal
Kochavi and Shimshon
Zelniker (eds.),
Generations, Locations,
Identities: Contemporary
Perspectives on Society and
Culture Culture in Israel,
Essays in Honor of Shmuel
Noah Eisenstadt.
Van Leer Jerusalem
Institute and Ha Kibbutz
HaMeuchad, Tel Aviv 2007
(Hebrew); "Excursus:
Concerning the Rulings of R.
Ovadiah Yosef Pertaining to
the Thanksgiving Prayer, The
Settlement of the Land of
Israel, and Middle East
Peace", Cardozo Law
Review vol. 28 (1) 2006;
"'The Image of God'
and 'Walk in His
Ways': Liberal and
Republican Conceptions of
Human Dignity and
Citizenship," in Yosef David
(ed.), A Question of
Honor: Human Dignity as a
Supreme Moral Principle in
Modern Societies, Israel
Democracy Institute and
Magnes Press, Jerusalem 2006
(Hebrew).
Jonathan
Garb is a Senior
Lecturer at The Department
of Jewish Thought,
Hebrew
University. His Research
Interests are: Kabbalah,
Mussar, Comparative
Mysticism, Religious Studies
Theory and Methodology. His
recent publications include:
Studies in Twentieth
Century Kabbalah (Carmel
Press, Jerusalem, 2005; Yale
University Press
(forthcoming); 'Powers of
Language in Kabbalah:
Comparative Reflections',
in: S. De
La Porta
and D. Shulman (eds.),
The Poetics of Grammar and
the Metaphysics of Sound and
Sign, Brill, 2007; 'The
Cult of the Saints in
Lurianic Kabbalah',
Jewish Quarterly Review
98 (2008).
Wouter J. Hanegraaff
is full professor of History
of Hermetic Philosophy and
related currents at the
University of
Amsterdam,
the
Netherlands,
President of the European
Society for the Study of
Western Esotericism, and a
member of the
Royal Dutch Academy
of Sciences. He is the
author of
New Age Religion and Western
Culture: Esotericism in the
Mirror of Secular Thought
(Leiden 1996/ Albany 1998),
Lodovico Lazzarelli
(1447-1500): The Hermetic
Writings and Related
Documents (Tempe 2005;
with Ruud M. Bouthoorn),
Swedenborg, Oetinger, Kant:
Three Perspectives on the
Secrets of Heaven (West
Chester 2007), and numerous
articles in academic
journals and collective
volumes. He is the main
editor of the
Dictionary of Gnosis and
Western Esotericism
(Brill: Leiden 2005), editor
of
Aries: Journal for the Study
of Western Esotericism
and the “Aries Book Series:
Texts and
Studies in Western
Esotericism” (both Brill),
as well as of five
collective volumes on the
study of religions and the
history Western esotericism.
Graham Harvey is Reader in Religious Studies at the Open
University, UK. His most
recent research has been
about indigenous religions,
especially revisiting
"animism", but he has also
researched among Pagans and
Jews. His publications
include Animism: Respecting
the Living World (Hurst
2006), Listening People,
Speaking Earth: Contemporary
Paganism (Hurst 2007, 2nd
ed.), and The True
Israel
(Brill 1996).
Boaz
Huss is a Professor of Kabbalah at the
Goren-Goldstein Department
of Jewish Thought at
Ben-Gurion
University of the
Negev. His
recent publications include:
`"All you Need is LAV":
Madonna and Postmodern
Kabbalah`, The Jewish
Quarterly Review 95,
2005; `The New Age of
Kabbalah: Contemporary
Kabbalah, The New Age and
Postmodern Spirituality`
Journal of Modern Jewish
Studies 6, 2007;
"’Authorizes Guardians’: The
Polemics of Academic
Scholars of Jewish Mysticism
Against Kabbalah
Practitioners,”
O. Hammer, K. von
Stuckrad eds. Political
Encounters: Esoteric
Discourse and its Others
Brill: Leiden and
Boston, 2007 and Like the
radiance of the Sky:
Chapters in the Reception
History of the Zohar and the
Construction of its Symbolic
Value, Ben Zvi Institute
and Bialik Institute 2008
(Hebrew). He is currently
engaged in a 4 year research
project `Major Trends in 20th
Kabbalah`, funded by Israeli
Science Foundation`
Tamar Katriel
is a Professor at the
Department of Communication
& Department of Leadership
and Policy in Education,
University
of
Haifa.
Areas of research:
Ethnography of
Communication, Israeli
Culture. Her recent
publications include:
Dialogic Moments: From Soul
Talks to Talk Radio in
Israeli Culture,
Detroit: Wayne State University Press 2004
Adam Klin Oron
is a PhD candidate in the
Department of Sociology and
Anthropology at the Hebrew
University of Jerusalem, and
also a member of 'Ascending
and Descending' research
group at the
Scholion
Interdisciplinary Center for Jewish Studies. He wrote his
master's thesis on the
recreation habits of
Ultra-Orthodox Jews in
Israel ("Sun, Sea and
Shtreimels - Haredi
Vacations in Israel"); and
is writing his doctorate on
channeling in Israel
("Beyond the Self:
Local and Personal Meanings
of Channeling in Israel").
His research interests
include new religious
movements, fundamentalism,
tourism and leisure, altered
states of consciousness,
globalization and
localization and cargo cults
and apocalyptic thinking.
His publications are: "End
of Days Visions in 20th
century Channeling: From the
Age of Aquarius to the New
Age", in Rachel Elior (ed.),
Paradise Traditions in
Israel and Abroad, 2008
(forthcoming, in Hebrew);
With Marianna Ruah Midbar:
"Jew Age: Jewish Praxis in
Israeli New Age Discourse",
Journal of Alternative
Spiritualities and New Age
Studies, 2008
(forthcoming).
James R. Lewis
is a lecturer in the
University
of
Wisconsin
system. He has wide-ranging
interests in the field of
New Religious Movements. He
is the author and editor of
numerous studies in the
field of New Age and New
Religions movements, which
include: The
Oxford Handbook of New
Religious Movements;
Controversial New Religions;
The Encyclopedia of
Cults, Sects and New
Religions; Odd Gods,
and Perspectives on the
New Age. His Recent
publications include: The
Invention of Sacred
Tradition (co-edited
with Olav Hammer) and the
Handbook of New Age
(co-edited with Daren Kemp).
Joseph Loss
is a PhD candidate at the Department of Sociology
and Anthropology in
Haifa
University. The title of
his PhD dissertation is: "Universal
Experiences in
Israel:
On Local Modes of Adoption
of the Global Path of the
Buddha".
His interests are: Cultural
Globalization, Buddhism
Beyond Asia, Religion in
late Modernity and History
of Anthropology. His review
of Tavory, Iddo (ed.)
(2007). Dancing in a
Thorn Field: The New Age in Israel.
Tel-Aviv: Hakibbutz
Hameuchad is scheduled to be
pulished in Israeli
Sociology (Hebrew).
Zvi
Mark is a Senior Lecturer at
the Department
of Hebrew Literature in
the
Bar-Ilan University. His
areas of specialization are
Literature of the Jewish
People and Jewish Thought,
particularly Hasidic
literature and thought and
modern Hebrew literature.
His publications include:
Mysticism and Madness in the
Work of R. Nahman of
Bratslav, Shalom Hartman
Institute Press, Am Oved,
Tel Aviv 2003 (Hebrew);
Scroll of Secrets –
The Hidden Messianic Vision
of R. Nahman of Bratslav,
Bar-Ilan University
Press, Ramat-Gan 2006
(Hebrew).
Jonatan
Meir, is a PhD
candidate in the Department
of Jewish History at the Hebrew University.
His recent publications
include: 'The Revealed and
the Revealed within the
Concealed: On the Opposition
to the 'Followers' of Rabbi
Yehuda Ashlag and the
Dissemination of Esoteric
Literature', Kabbalah
16 (2007) (Hebrew);
'Wrestling with the
Esoteric: Hillel Zeitlin,
Yehudah Ashlag, and Kabbalah
in the Land of Israel',
Judaism, Topics, Fragments,
Faces, Identities: Jubilee
Volume in Honor of Professor
Rivka Horwitz, eds.
Ephraim Meir and Haviva
Pedaya (Beer Sheva, 2007)
(Hebrew).
Jody Myers is Professor of Religious Studies and Director of
the Jewish Studies Program
at
California
State
University,
Northridge.
Her research has
focused on modern
transformations of
traditional Jewish culture.
She has written
extensively on the messianic
idea and religious Zionism,
including Seeking Zion:
Modernity and Messianic
Activism in the Writings of
Tsevi Hirsch Kalischer
(Littman Library, 2003).
Her other area of
research is on contemporary
religious expression, and
she has published articles
on new women’s writings on
the mikveh, midrash, and
ritual innovations.
Her current area of
research is contemporary
Kabbalah.
Kabbalah and the
Spiritual Quest: The
Kabbalah Centre in
America
(Praeger, 2007) is her most
recent book.
Marianna
Ruah-Midbar is
the head of the BA Program
of Mysticism
and Spirituality (being
established) at Zefat Academic
College. She is also a
post-doctoral fellow at the
University
of
Haifa, a
lecturer at Tel-Aviv University, and a researcher at the
Center for Advanced
Studies of Shalom Hartman.
Her interests are: New Age
culture, its interaction
with Judaism and Israeliness,
and Internet Spirituality.
Her Dissertation (2006) was
about "The New Age Culture
in
Israel"
and contained a
methodological introduction
and a model of "the
Conceptual Network". She has
written several articles
about the encounter of
Jewish-Israeli culture with
the New Age.
Omri
Ruah Midbar
is a Ph.D. candidate in the
Science, Technology and
Society program at
Bar
Ilan
University
and
a research fellow at the
Center for Futurism in
Education at Ben-Gurion
University (recently he has
been a post doctoral fellow
at Tel Aviv University).
His dissertation (sub judice) discusses the
Digital Culture's
characteristics and their
expression in popular music.
His research interests
include:
popular music, new media and
internet
culture and computer
music. He
is currently writing a few articles on
the politics
of academic discourse
relating to New Age music,
music
composing in the digital
age and the "Vocal Cyborg".
Michele Rosenthal
is a lecturer in the
department of communication
at the University of Haifa.
Her research focuses
on the intersections between
media, religion and culture
in the
United States
and Israel. She recently published a
book entitled American
Protestants and TV in the
1950s: Responses to a
New Medium (New
York:
Palgrave Macmillan,
2007).
Her current project
with Rivka Ribak is
tentatively entitled,
Unplugged:
Media Ambivalence and
Avoidance in Everyday Life.
Chava Weissler is Professor of Religion Studies at Lehigh University,
where she holds
the Philip and Muriel Berman
Chair of Jewish
Civilization.
Her book on the
religious lives of Jewish
women, Voices of the
Matriarchs, was
published by Beacon Press, Boston, in 1997. Among her
recent publications is "Art
is Spirituality!
Practice, Play, and
Spirituality in the Jewish
Renewal Movement," in
Material Religion,3
(2007) 354-376.
Currently, she is
writing a book on Jewish
Renewal in
North America.
Rachel
Werczberger
is a PhD candidate in the
Department of Sociology and
Anthropology at the Hebrew
University of Jerusalem. She
is writing on Jewish
Spiritual Renewal in Israel and the
New Age Movement. Her
research interests include:
New Age spirituality, new
(religious) social
movements, gender and
religion and sociology and
anthropology of Judaism. Her
publication are: “On
Femininity and Messianism:
an Ethnography of Ba’alot
Tshuva in Habad” in Cohen T.
(ed.) To be a Jewish
Women: Proceedings of the
Fourth International
Conference of Kolech-Religious
Women’s Forum, 2007 (in
Hebrew), and co-authored
with Azulai Na’ama, “Jewish
Renewal in
Israel
as a New Social Movement.”
(Under review, in Hebrew)
Philip
Wexler is Professor
of Sociology of Education
and Bella and Israel
Unterberg Chair of Social
and Educational Jewish
History, at the Hebrew
University of Jerusalem. He
is the author of a number of
books, including: Social
Analysis of Education;
Critical Social
Psychology; Holy
Sparks, and Mystical
Society, which was
recently published in
Hebrew, by Carmel Press, in Jerusalem. His additional new books (2007)
are: Symbolic Movement:
Critique and Spirituality in
Sociology of Education
(Sense) and Mystical
Interactions: Sociology,
Jewish Mysticism and
Education (Cherub).
Elliot R. Wolfson
is the Abraham Lieberman Professor of
Hebrew and Judaic Studies at
New York
University. His
publications include
Through a Speculum That
Shines: Vision and
Imagination in Medieval
Jewish Mysticism;
Along the Path: Studies in
Kabbalistic Hermeneutics,
Myth, and Symbolism;
Circle in the Square:
Studies in the Use of Gender
in Kabbalistic Symbolism;
Abraham Abulafia:
Kabbalist and Prophet:
Hermeneutics, Theosophy, and
Theurgy; Alef, Mem,
Tau: Kabbalistic Musings on
Time, Truth, and Death;
Venturing Beyond—Law and
Morality in Kabbalistic
Mysticism; and
Luminal Darkness: Imaginal
Gleanings From Zoharic
Literature.
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