Hekhalot literature

The Hekhalot literature (sometimes transliterated Heichalot) from the Hebrew word for "Palaces", relating to visions of ascents into heavenly palaces. The genre overlaps with Merkabah or "Chariot" literature, concerning Ezekiel's chariot, so the two are sometimes referred to together as "Books of the Palaces and the Chariot" (ספרות ההיכלות והמרכבה‎). The Hekhalot literature is a genre of Jewish esoteric and revelatory texts produced some time between late antiquity – some believe from Talmudic times or earlier – to the Early Middle Ages.

Jewish mysticism
Forms
Prophets 800–400s BCE
Apocalyptic literature 300–100 BCE
 c. 1–200 CE
Merkabah-Hekhalot c. 100 BCE–1000 CE
Practical Kabbalah early CE-modernity
Sefer Yetzirah 200–600 CE
Chassidei Ashkenaz c. 1150–1250 CE
 c. 1175–1500s CE
Zohar 1280s-1400s CE
Cordoverian Kabbalah 1500s CE
Lurianic Kabbalah 1570 CE–today
Sabbatean sects 1665–c. 1800 CE
 1730s CE–today
Academic study c. 1920s–today

Many motifs of later Kabbalah are based on the Hekhalot texts, and the Hekhalot literature itself is based upon earlier sources, including traditions about heavenly ascents of Enoch found among the Dead Sea scrolls and the Hebrew Bible pseudepigrapha.[1]

Texts
Title Page of Hekhalot, Lvov, Poland, 1850

Some of the Hekhalot texts are:[2]

  • Hekhalot Zutartey ("Lesser Palaces" or "Palaces Minor"), which details an ascent of Rabbi Akiva;
  • Hekhalot Rabbati ("Greater Palaces" or "Palaces Major"), or Pirkei Hekhalot, which details an ascent of Rabbi Ishmael;
  • Maaseh Merkabah ("Account of the Chariot"), a collection of hymns recited by the "descenders" and heard during their ascent;
  • Merkavah Rabba ("The great Chariot"):
  • Sepher Hekhalot ("Book of Palaces," also known as 3 Enoch)

Other similar texts are:[3]

Dating and genre

The Hekhalot literature is post-rabbinical, and not a literature of the rabbis, but since it seeks to stand in continuity with the Rabbinic literature often pseudepigraphical.[4]

See also

References
  1. Scholem, Gershom, Jewish Gnosticism, Merkabah Mysticism, and the Talmudic Tradition, 1965.
  2. Schäfer, Peter (1992). The hidden and manifest God: some major themes in early Jewish mysticism. p. 7. ISBN 9780791410448.
  3. Don Karr. "Notes on the Study of Merkabah Mysticism and Hekhalot Literature in English" (PDF). Retrieved 21 December 2010.
  4. Judaism in late antiquity: Volume 1 - Page 36 Jacob Neusner, Alan Jeffery Avery-Peck, Bruce Chilton - 2001 "The Hekhalot literature is "not a literature of the rabbis, yet it seeks to stand in continuity with the Rabbinic literature" (p. 293); this literature is deeply pseudepigraphical and as such post-rabbinical."


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