Kabbalah · 1240–≈1291
Abraham Abulafia
Prophetic Kabbalah · the way of the letters · Or HaSekhel · the Light of the Intellect · Hayei HaOlam HaBa · The Life of the World to Come
A wandering mystic who sought not a teaching about God but a direct experience – through the letters and the breath.
The essence of the teaching: The twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet are the threads from which creation is woven. By combining them, repeating the divine names, aligning the breath, the mind unties its knots and enters the prophetic state of union.
Transmission
Abulafia built no systems – he sought experience. His path he called prophetic. Take the letters, he taught, these twenty-two threads from which the world is stitched, and begin to weave them: speak them aloud, breathe in step with them, lead them around in a circle like a melody. So the mind tears free of ordinary thought, the knots within come undone, and the veil between a person and the light grows thin. This is not about knowing more about God – it is about ceasing, for a moment, to be separate from him. A dangerous path, and he warned of it: go under a teacher, with a pure heart, or the power of the words will scorch you.
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