05103nam 2201117Ia 450 991082398240332120240410100256.01-282-75941-897866127594130-520-93231-51-59875-916-710.1525/9780520932319(CKB)1000000000246816(EBL)254878(OCoLC)475969718(SSID)ssj0000100930(PQKBManifestationID)11124512(PQKBTitleCode)TC0000100930(PQKBWorkID)10037041(PQKB)11319200(StDuBDS)EDZ0000084755(MiAaPQ)EBC254878(OCoLC)62861572(MdBmJHUP)muse30933(DE-B1597)521028(DE-B1597)9780520932319(Au-PeEL)EBL254878(CaPaEBR)ebr10106463(CaONFJC)MIL275941(EXLCZ)99100000000024681620050414d2006 uy 0engurnn#---|u||utxtccrAlef, mem, tau[electronic resource] kabbalistic musings on time, truth, and death /Elliot R. Wolfson1st ed.Berkeley University of California Press20061 online resource (346 p.)The Taubman lectures in Jewish studies ;5Description based upon print version of record.0-520-24619-5 Includes bibliographical references and index.Front matter --Contents --Preface --1. Thinking Time / Hermeneutic Suppositions --2. Linear Circularity / (A)Temporal Poetics --3. Before Alef / Where Beginnings End --4. Within Mem / Returning Forward --5. After Tau / Where Endings Begin --Conclusion --Notes --Bibliography --IndexThis highly original, provocative, and poetic work explores the nexus of time, truth, and death in the symbolic world of medieval kabbalah. Demonstrating that the historical and theoretical relationship between kabbalah and western philosophy is far more intimate and extensive than any previous scholar has ever suggested, Elliot R. Wolfson draws an extraordinary range of thinkers such as Frederic Jameson, Martin Heidegger, Franz Rosenzweig, William Blake, Julia Kristeva, Friedrich Schelling, and a host of kabbalistic figures into deep conversation with one another. Alef, Mem, Tau also discusses Islamic mysticism and Buddhist thought in relation to the Jewish esoteric tradition as it opens the possibility of a temporal triumph of temporality and the conquering of time through time. The framework for Wolfson's examination is the rabbinic teaching that the word emet, "truth," comprises the first, middle, and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet, alef, mem, and tau, which serve, in turn, as semiotic signposts for the three tenses of time-past, present, and future. By heeding the letters of emet we discern the truth of time manifestly concealed in the time of truth, the beginning that cannot begin if it is to be the beginning, the middle that re/marks the place of origin and destiny, and the end that is the figuration of the impossible disclosing the impossibility of figuration, the finitude of death that facilitates the possibility of rebirth. The time of death does not mark the death of time, but time immortal, the moment of truth that bestows on the truth of the moment an endless beginning of a beginningless end, the truth of death encountered incessantly in retracing steps of time yet to be taken-between, before, beyond.Taubman lectures in Jewish studies ;5.TimePhilosophyTimeReligious aspectsJudaismCabalaHistoryaqiva.azriel of gerona.azriel.babylonian talmud.bahir.bahiric text.berakhah.bereshit.binah.buddhism.death.destiny.eastern philosophy.eastern religion.emet.esoteric religion.immortality.islam.judaica.judaism.kabbalah.kabbalism.medieval kabbalah.mysticism.nature of time.philosophy.rebirth.religion.religious studies.semiotics.temporality.time.western philosophy.yiddishkeit.TimePhilosophy.TimeReligious aspectsJudaism.CabalaHistory.296.1/6Wolfson Elliot R1112371MiAaPQMiAaPQMiAaPQBOOK9910823982403321Alef, mem, tau3927010UNINA