Quote from Kabbalah

Kabbalah: A Very Short Introduction

by Joseph Dan

Oxford University Press, Oxford, England & New York, New York, 2006         130 pages


A visitor to the State of Israel is confronted by kabbalah several times every day. When he enters a hotel, he is obligated to face a desk, behind which a large sign reads "Kabbalah," in English, the same sign reads "Reception." When he purchases anything or pays for a service he receives a piece of paper on which the word "Kabbalah" is written in large Hebrew letters. If there is an English translation on that piece of paper, it reads "Receipt." The term will pop up in scores of contexts. If he is invited to a reception, the Hebrew term for the event is "kabbalat panim" (literally, "receiving the face"). If he wishes to visit a bank or a government office he must first check the kabalat kahal -- the hours in which clerks receive the public, the equivalent of the English "open." Every professor, of any discipline, is engaged every week in a kabbalistic hour, sheat kabbalah, that is, office hour, in which his door is open to students. The verb "kbl" is present in every other sentence in Hebrew, meaning simply "to receive." Judging by their behavior, the Hebrew-speaking Israelis seem to be oblivious to the depth of their immersion in mysticism, and treat kabbalah as a simple, mundane word in their language. In a religious context, the key sentence in which this word is used is found in the opening phrase of the talmudic tractate avot, one of the most popular rabbinic Hebrew texts, which was probably formulated in the second century CE.  (p. 1)

-- quote submitted by Jennifer Knight

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