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Isaac Luria - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Isaac Luria
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Arizal" redirects here. For the Indonesian film director, see Arizal (director).
Isaac (ben Solomon) Luria Ashkenazi (1534[1] July
25, 1572) (Hebrew:

Yitzhak Ben Sh'lomo Lurya Ashkenazi), commonly known

RabbiIsaac

as "Ha'ARI"[2] (meaning "The Lion"), "Ha'ARI

Ha'ARI
Ha'ARI Hakadosh
ARIZaL

Hakadosh" [the holy ARI] or "ARIZaL"[3] [the ARI, Of

Blessed Memory (Zikhrono Livrakha)], was a foremost
rabbi and Jewish mystic in the community of Safed in the
Galilee region of Ottoman Syria. He is considered the
father of contemporary Kabbalah,[4] his teachings being
referred to as Lurianic Kabbalah. While his direct literary
contribution to the Kabbalistic school of Safed was
extremely minute (he wrote only a few poems), his
spiritual fame led to their veneration and the acceptance
of his authority. The works of his disciples compiled his
oral teachings into writing. Every custom of the Ari was
scrutinized, and many were accepted, even against

The grave of Isaac Luria in Safed

Personal details

previous practice.[3]
Born

1534
Jerusalem

Died

July 25, 1572

Safed

Buried

Old Cemetery of Safed

Luria died at Safed on July 25, 1572 (5 Av 5332). He was

buried in the Old Cemetery of Safed.[3]

Contents

(ben Solomon) Luria

Ashkenazi

1 Early life
2 Fellowship, leadership, and discipleship
3 Teachings
4 See also
5 Notes
6 References
7 External links

Early life
Luria was born in 1534 in Jerusalem[1] in what is now the Old Yishuv Court Museum[3] to an Ashkenazi
father, Solomon, and a Sephardic mother.[5]
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Sefer HaKavanot U'Ma'aseh Nissim records that one day Luria's father remained in the Beth kneset alone,
studying, when Eliyahu HaNavi appeared to him and said, "I have been sent to you by the Almighty to bring
you tidings that your holy wife shall conceive and bear a child, and that you must call him Yitzchak. He
shall begin to deliver Israel from the Klipot [husks, forces of evil]. Through him, numerous souls will
receive their tikkun. He is also destined to reveal many hidden mysteries in the Torah and to expound on the
Zohar. His fame will spread throughout the world. Take care therefore that you not circumcise him before I
come to be the Sandak [who holds the child during the Brit Milah ceremony]."[3]
While still a child, Luria lost his father, and was brought up by his rich maternal uncle Mordechai Frances, a
tax-farmer out of Cairo, Egypt. His uncle placed him under the best Jewish teachers, including the leading
rabbinic scholar David ibn Zimra.[5] Luria showed himself a diligent student of rabbinical literature and
under the guidance of another uncle, Rabbi Bezalel Ashkenazi (best known as the author of Shittah
Mekubetzet), he became proficient in that branch of Jewish learning.[6]
At the age of fifteen, he married a cousin and, being amply provided for financially, he was able to continue
his studies. Though he initially may have pursued a career in business, he soon turned to asceticism and
mysticism. Around the age of twenty-two he became engrossed in the study of the Zohar (a major work of
the Kabbalah that had recently been printed for the first time) and adopted the life of a recluse. Retreating to
the banks of the Nile for seven years, he secluded himself in an isolated cottage, giving himself up entirely
to meditation. He visited his family only on Shabbat. But even at home, he would not utter a word, even to
his wife. When it was absolutely necessary for him to say something, he would say it in the fewest number
of words possible,[3] and then, only in Hebrew. Hassidism believes that he had frequent interviews with the
prophet Elijah through this ascetic life, and was initiated into sublime doctrines by him.

Fellowship, leadership, and discipleship

In 1569, Luria moved back to the Ottoman Palestine Eretz Israel; and after a short sojourn in Jerusalem,
where his new kabbalistic system seems to have met with little success, he settled in Safed.
Safed, over the previous several decades, had become something of a lightning-rod for kabbalistic studies. "
[S]pawning an astounding array of impressive religious personalities [including] ... Rabbi Moses Cordovero,
Rabbi Shlomo Alkabetz, Rabbi Jacob Berab, Rabbi Moses di Trani, Rabbi Joseph Caro, Rabbi Hayyim
Vital, Joseph ibn Tabul, Rabbi Abraham ben Eliezer ha-Levi Berukhim, Rabbi Israel Najara, Rabbi Eleazar
Azikri, Rabbi Eliyahu de Vidas, and Rabbi Moses Alshech;"[7] including some lesser known figures such as
Rabbi Joseph Hagiz, Rabbi Elisha Galadoa, and Rabbi Moses Bassola.
In this community, Luria joined a circle of kabbalists led by Rabbi Moses Cordovero. "Cordovero was the
teacher of what appears to have been a relatively loose knit circle of disciples, of which the most noteworthy
were Elijah de Vidas, Abraham Galante, Moses Galante, Hayyim Vital, Abraham ben Eliezer ha-Levi
Berukhim, Eleazar Azikri, Samuel Gallico, and an important kabbalist who studied with Cordovero for a
short while in the 1560s, Mordechai Dato."[8]
There is evidence to suggest that Isaac Luria also regarded Moses Cordovero as his teacher. "Joseph
Sambari (16401703), an important Egyptian chronicler, testified that Cordovero was 'the Ari's teacher for a
very short time.'[9] ... Luria probably arrived in early 1570, and Cordovero died on June 27 that year (the
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23d day of Tammuz).[8] Bereft of their most prominent authority and teacher, the
community looked for new guidance, and Isaac Luria helped fill the vacuum left
by Cordovero's passing.
Soon Luria had two classes of disciples: (1) novices, to whom he expounded the
elementary Kabbalah, and (2) initiates, who became the repositories of his secret
teachings and his formulas of invocation and conjuration.

Ark in the Ari

Ashkenazi Synagogue.
While Luria, the
"Lion", gave the
complete traditional
system of Kabbalah.
Maimonides,
Judaism's greatest
Rationalist, is called
the "Great Eagle",
both images taken
from the Merkabah
vision of Ezekiel.

However, the most renowned of the initiates was Rabbi Hayyim Vital, who,
according to his master, possessed a soul which had not been soiled by Adam's
sin. With him Luria visited the grave of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai and those of
other eminent teachers; it is said that these graves were unmarked (the identity of
each grave was unknown), but through the guidance given by Elijah each grave
was recognized. Luria's kabbalistic circle gradually widened and became a
separate congregation, in which his mystic doctrines were supreme, influencing
all the religious ceremonies. On Shabbat, Luria dressed himself in white and wore
a fourfold garment to signify the four letters of the Ineffable Name.
Many Jews who had been exiled from Spain following the Edict of Expulsion
believed they were in the time of trial that would precede the appearance of the
Messiah in Galilee. Those who moved to Palestine in anticipation of this event
found a great deal of comfort in Lurias teachings, due to his theme of exile.
Although he did not write down his teachings, they were published by his
followers and by 1650 his ideas were known by Jews throughout Europe.[10]

Teachings
Luria used to deliver his lectures extemporaneously and did not write much, with a few exceptions,
including some kabbalistic poems in Aramaic for the Shabbat table. The real exponent of his kabbalistic
system was Rabbi Hayyim Vital. He collected all the notes of the lectures which Luria's disciples had made;
and from these notes were produced numerous works, the most important of which was the Etz Chayim,
("Tree of Life"), in eight volumes (see below). At first this circulated in manuscript copies; and each of
Luria's disciples had to pledge himself, under pain of excommunication, not to allow a copy to be made for
a foreign country; so that for a time all the manuscripts remained in Palestine. At last, however, one was
brought to Europe and was published at Zolkiev in 1772 by Isaac Satanow. In this work are expounded both
the theoretical and the devotional, meditative teachings of Lurianic Kabbalah based on the Zohar.

See also
Ari Synagogue
Ari Ashkenazi Synagogue

Notes
1. ^ a b Fine 2003, p. 24 (http://books.google.com/books?id=B2o8vqvrQOcC&pg=PA24)
2. ^ Derived from the acronym for "Elohi Rabbi Itzhak", the Godly Rabbi Isaac or "Adoneinu Rabbeinu Isaac" (our
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master, our rabbi, Isaac).

3. ^ a b c d e f http://www.safed-kabbalah.com/Arizal/Biography.htm
4. ^ Eisen, Yosef (2004). Miraculous journey: a complete history of the Jewish people from creation to the present
(http://books.google.com/books?
id=7lsVajEtaQ0C&lpg=PP1&dq=%22yosef%20eisen%22&pg=PA213#v=onepage&q=&f=false) (Rev. ed.).
Southfield, Mich.: Targum/Feldheim. p.213. ISBN1568713231.
5. ^ a b Fine 2003, p. 29 (http://books.google.com/books?id=B2o8vqvrQOcC&pg=PA29)
6. ^ Fine 2003, p. 31 (http://books.google.com/books?id=B2o8vqvrQOcC&pg=PA31)-32
(http://books.google.com/books?id=B2o8vqvrQOcC&pg=PA32)
7. ^ Fine 2003, p. 1 (http://books.google.com/books?id=B2o8vqvrQOcC&pg=PA1)
8. ^ a b Fine 2003, pp. 80 (http://books.google.com/books?id=B2o8vqvrQOcC&pg=PA80)-81
9. ^ Sambari 1673, p. 64
10. ^ Armstrong, Karen, The Battle for God: A History of Fundamentalism, Ballantine Books, 2001, pp. 8-14

References
Fine, Lawrence (2003). Rodrigue, Aron; Zipperstein, Steven J, eds. Physician of the Soul, Healer of
the Cosmos: Isaac Luria and His Kabbalistic Fellowship (http://books.google.com/books?
id=B2o8vqvrQOcC). Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. p.480. ISBN0-8047-4826-8.
Retrieved 2010-08-16.
Eliahu Klein: Kabbalah of Creation: The Mysticism of Isaac Luria, Founder of Modern Kabbalah:
Berkeley: North Atlantic Books: 2005: ISBN 1-55643-542-8
Yosef Avivi: Kabbala Luriana. 3 Vol. Jerusalem, Ben Zvi Institute 2008. ISBN 978-965-235-118-0
(in Hebrew)
Joseph ben Isaac Sambari (1994) [1-23-1673]. Sefer Divrei Yosef. Jerusalem: Ben Zvi Institute.
Troy Southgate: "Luria the Mystic: Medieval Kabbalah in Jewish Tradition" in Le Salon: Journal du
Cercle de la Rose Noire, Volume 2 (Black Front Press,2012).

External links
Short biography of Rabbi Isaac Luria - The Ari Hakodosh (http://www.chabad.org/library/article.asp?
AID=111878)
Video lecture on Rabbi Isaac Luria (http://jewishhistorylectures.org/2014/01/09/rabbi-isaac-luria-thearizal-jewish-biographies-lecture/) by Dr. Henry Abramson
OU page on the Ari (http://www.ou.org/about/judaism/rabbis/ari.htm)
Traditional Sphardi Singing of Luria's Yom Zeh L'Yisrael (http://hibba.org/node/399)
Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Luria, Isaac ben Solomon". Encyclopdia Britannica (11th ed.).
Cambridge University Press.
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Categories: Isaac Luria 1534 births 1572 deaths 16th-century rabbis 16th-century theologians
Burials in Safed Jewish religious leaders Jewish theologians Kabbalists Rabbis in Jerusalem
Rabbis in Ottoman Palestine Rabbis in Safed
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