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Hekhalot/Merkabah transmitted within the European manuscript tradition. This disparity between its “Oriental” literature and “European” branches suggests that RA‘ANAN S. BOUSTAN Hekhalot literature circulated in a wide variety of forms along different regional trajectories. Hekhalot literature represents the earliest Hekhalot literature cannot simply be divided extensive collection of Jewish mystical writings into stable “works,” but represents a relatively from Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages. open-ended set of compositions that remained Hekhalot compositions are characterized by in flux as they were transmitted and actively a unique, if eclectic, literary style. These texts refashioned by later scribes (Scha¨fer 1988). The consist variously of detailed descriptions of the complex literary and scribal processes that topography and denizens of the heavenly shaped this literature complicate any attempt realms, the elaborate protocols for the liturgy to reconstruct its formative literary and textual performed by the angels before God, as well as history. the actual hymns of praise of which this heav- Absolute criteria for delimiting the bound- enly liturgy consists, and, most distinctively, aries of the Hekhalot corpus on internal, formal ritual instructions to enable the practitioner grounds also prove elusive. The following com- either to ascend to heaven or to bring angels positions are generally considered to belong to down to earth. The term hekhalot comes from Hekhalot literature proper: 3 (Hebrew) Enoch; the Hebrew word for the celestial palaces or Hekhalot Rabbati (“The Greater [Book of temples (sing. hekhal) within which God and Celestial] Palaces”); Hekhalot Zutarti (“The his angelic host reside. The form of religious Lesser [Book of Celestial] Palaces”); Ma‘aseh praxis and experience described in Hekhalot Merkavah (“The Working of the Chariot”); literature is often also referred to as “Merkavah Merkavah Rabbah (“The Great [Book of] the mysticism” because it draws upon the prophet Chariot”); and, finally, a series of relatively Ezekiel’s vision of the divine chariot-throne autonomous adjurational complexes known (the merkavah of Ezek 1:10). as Sar ha-Torah (“Prince of the Torah”), This diverse literature resists easy geo- texts that promise the practitioner angelic graphic and chronological classification. Writ- assistance in acquiring and retaining knowl- ten in Hebrew and Aramaic, with traces of edge of Torah. Embedded within or appended Greek, Latin, and Persian influence, Hekhalot to these major literary units are a number of literature developed in the major centers of formally distinct texts, most significantly the Jewish learning – Palestine and Iraq. While Shi‘ur Qomah (“The Measure of the [Divine] the corpus may contain traditions from the Body”) materials that catalogue the sizes and second to fifth centuries CE, it emerged as names of the limbs of God’s gargantuan body. a recognizable and distinct genre of literature While Hekhalot literature does exhibit certain only during the second half of the first millen- formal and thematic affinities to ancient nium (Boustan 2006). Jewish magical texts, the two corpora employ Modern scholars have access to Hekhalot appreciably different ritual techniques and, texts primarily through manuscripts from most likely, reflect distinct sociological profiles medieval western Europe produced in the (Bohak 2008: 329–39). twelfth century and after (Scha¨fer 1981). In The authorial voice of Hekhalot literature is addition, more than twenty fragments of anonymous and collective, as is typical for Hekhalot texts have been retrieved from the much rabbinic literature. Rabbinic figures CAIRO GENIZAH (Scha¨fer 1984). Significant dif- from second-century Palestine – most com- ferences exist between the materials contained monly, Rabbi Ishmael and Rabbi Akiva – in the Genizah fragments and those that were serve as the protagonists of Hekhalot literature

The Encyclopedia of Ancient History, First Edition. Edited by Roger S. Bagnall, Kai Brodersen, Craige B. Champion, Andrew Erskine, and Sabine R. Huebner, print pages 3099–3101. © 2013 Blackwell Publishing Ltd. Published 2013 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd. DOI: 10.1002/9781444338386.wbeah11111 2 and the tradents of its esoteric teachings. This influenced by the scholastic culture of the pseudonymous framework serves as an autho- rabbis, they found themselves excluded from rizing strategy to anchor Hekhalot literature to rabbinic institutions of learning and thus the increasingly hegemonic rabbinic tradition. resorted to magical means for acquiring mas- Hekhalot literature centers upon two tery of Torah. James Davila (2001) argues principal themes, heavenly ascent and angelic that Hekhalot literature and the Jewish magical adjuration. Gershom Scholem (1965) accorded texts, when taken together as a coherent cor- temporal and thematic priority to the ascent pus, reflect the religious vocation of a guild of narratives; the heavenly journeys continue the Jewish shamans whose transformative experi- form of ecstatic mysticism attested in earlier ence of mystical ecstasy empowered them as Jewish (and Christian) apocalyptic writings healers and ritual experts. Rachel Elior (2004) and in the Dead Sea Scrolls, while the believes that Hekhalot literature preserves “magico-ritual” elements found in the corpus a continuous stream of ancient priestly tradi- mark the subsequent degeneration of its orig- tion intended to compensate for the loss of inal “mystical” impulse. More recent scholar- the sacrificial cult following the destruction ship has emphasized the degree to which ritual of the Jerusalem temple in 70 CE. Scholarship practice pervades every facet of Hekhalot liter- has only just begun the interrelated tasks of ature. In both ascent and adjuration, move- situating Hekhalot literature within its (chang- ment between the earthly and heavenly ing) sociohistorical context(s), defining its realms is achieved through the meticulous per- relationship to other branches of Jewish liter- formance of ritual speech and action. And even ary culture, and analyzing the religious phe- the aim of the ascent process has been pro- nomena it both describes and embodies. foundly shaped by a ritual-liturgical sensibil- ity: the culmination of the ascent, as conceived in Hekhalot literature, primarily consists in the SEE ALSO: Akiba, Rabbi; Apocalypses, practitioner’s participation in the heavenly lit- Christian; Apocalypses, Jewish; Enoch, urgy (unio liturgica) and his commission by Books of (1, 2, 3 Enoch); Magic, Jewish; Piyyut God to communicate his abiding love for his (Jewish liturgical and secular poetry); people Israel (Scha¨fer 2009: 243–330). Prayer, Jewish; Shi‘ur Qomah (Jewish The heterogeneity, fluidity, and pseudo- mystical texts). nymity that characterize Hekhalot texts create formidable obstacles for determining the Sitz- REFERENCES AND SUGGESTED READINGS im-Leben of this literature with any precision. It is perhaps not surprising that theories have Bohak, G. (2008) Ancient Jewish magic: a history. nevertheless multiplied. Scholem situates Cambridge. Hekhalot literature within the main currents Boustan, R. S. (2006) “The emergence of of rabbinic Judaism from the second century pseudonymous attribution in Hekhalot onward. In sharp contrast, David Halperin literature: empirical evidence from the (1988) detects in this literature the populist Jewish ‘Magical’ corpora.” Jewish Studies ideology of the Jewish masses, who sought an Quarterly 13: 1–21. accessible – and immediate – path to the rev- Davila, J. R. (2001) Descenders to the chariot: the people behind the Hekhalot literature. Leiden. elation of Torah. Michael Swartz (1996) inter- Elior, R. (2004) The three temples: on the emergence prets the Sar ha-Torah literature as an of Jewish mysticism. Oxford. expression of the aspirations of “secondary Halperin, D. J. (1988) The faces of the chariot: early elites” who served Late Antique Jewish com- Jewish responses to Ezekiel’s vision.Tu¨bingen. munities as minor religious functionaries; Scha¨fer, P., ed. (1981) Synopse zur Hekhalot- while these low-status scribes were deeply Literatur.Tu¨bingen. 3

Scha¨fer, P., ed. (1984) Geniza-Fragmente zur Scholem, G. G. (1965) Jewish Gnosticism, Merkabah Hekhalot-Literatur.Tu¨bingen. mysticism, and Talmudic tradition, 2nd ed. Scha¨fer, P. (1988) Hekhalot-Studien.Tu¨bingen. New York. Scha¨fer, P. (2009) The origins of Jewish mysticism. Swartz, M. D. (1996) Scholastic magic: ritual and Tu¨bingen. revelation in early Jewish mysticism. Princeton.