February 16th @ 4 PM
STEM 202 | 817 W Franklin
Most students of Kabbalah find themselves “visualizing” its cosmogonic and cosmological teachings. The iconic “Tree of Life” is certainly the best-known kabbalistic symbol and is often the first thing conveyed to those being exposed to this lore. What few realize is that complex graphical scrolls have been a genre of kabbalistic literature in their own right since the Renaissance, and that from the late seventeenth century such scrolls became indispensable to Lurianic kabbalists. In this presentation, Professor Chajes will introduce this little-known genre and explain the origins and functions of these amazing kabbalistic artifacts.
J.H. (Yossi) Chajes, Ph.D., focuses on the intersection of Kabbalah, magic, and science in Jewish cultural history. He has written on spirit possession and exorcism, egodocuments, women’s religiosity, Jewish attitudes towards magic, and most recently, on the visualization of knowledge. Chajes’s recent book, The Kabbalistic Tree, has been lauded as a “monumental achievement that will be valuable to scholars and general readers interested in Judaism, religion, and art history.”
Free and open to the public
Find more information on this event here.
