PROJECT FOR A JUDAISM-INSPIRED TRANSPERSONAL

PSYCHOLOGY

YAACOV LEFCOE

A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO

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DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

GRADUATE PROGRAMME IN PSYCHOLOGY

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This dissertation provides a psychological account of serial changes occurring in the course of Jewish (or panentheistic more generally) meditative practice by bringing some sophisticated meditative manuals of early 19th century Chassidic mysticism into dialogue with contemporary psychology. Object relations theorists of religious development have enriched our understanding of how the internalized representation of

God lives and evolves within the psyche, and within psychotherapy, yet have not produced theoretical accounts of deeper or more advanced meditative-mystical states.

Transpersonal psychologists, on the other hand, have modelled psycho-developmental processes occurring in serious and sustained meditative praxes, yet generally rely on

Buddhist or Hindu-inspired conceptions that do not sufficiently account for the psychological implications of a personal God relationship. Scholars of comparative religion and mysticism have provided additional insights into meditative-mystical experience, yet often with a more literary, or philosophical, rather than with a clinically- relevant, psychological emphasis. In this dissertation all of these literatures (the

Chassidic, the object relational, comparative mysticism, and transpersonal psychology) are brought together in an integration that promises an alternative psychological approach to human development on a meditative-mystical path, an approach that synthesizes theistic and unitive, intentional and non-intentional, relational and nondual, God-object relational and what I am calling n-Object (for 'panen-Object', or 'not-an-Object') relational elements into a unified conceptual structure.

iv Acknowledgements Thank God for granting me the ability to reason and to understand; to receive knowledge from teachers, colleagues, clients and friends; and for enabling me to reach the occasion of the completion of this work. I would like to express my life-long gratitude to my extraordinary wife Batsheva Schur-Lefcoe, who has undoubtedly sacrificed more than anyone else for this work to be completed. I am also deeply indebted to my long­ time teacher and mentor, Dr. David L. Rennie, whose masterful supervision, with a steady hand of guidance and encouragement, as well as extensive critical and editorial work on this essay, have made the dissertation possible (as well as the two theses that have preceded it). To my parents Dr. Michael and Barbara Lefcoe, for their generous and unwavering moral and material support in this, and every other project of my life. To Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh for introducing me to the key Chassidic texts of this dissertation, and for providing a living example of what they teach. To the late Dr. David Bakan a "h, for introducing me to rational mysticism, and the connections between Freud and Maimonides, and for providing—together with his life partner Dr. Mildred Bakan a"h—a formidable figure of old European-style scholarship. To my Supervisory Committee, Drs. Thomas Teo and Frederic Weizmann, and Dr. Martin Lockshin of the Examining Committee, whose detailed critical feedback stimulated and compelled me to make this essay into something more significant than anything I had envisaged when I started the project. To Dr. Yitzchak Block at the University of Western Ontario for his instruction, inspiration and encouragement. To the moderator Dr. Eliezer Shore, and members of the bneiheichala ("Children of the Palace") listerv (for instructors of Chassidut and Kabbalah), who have provided needed intellectual community. To my brother-in-law Dr. Israel Schur for his generous grant towards completing the project. To

v my brother-in-law Rabbi Yoni Schur, for providing me with the use of his apartment with an expansive view of the Old City of Jerusalem for a writing retreat at a critical juncture in the preparation of this manuscript. To my friends Baruch Shapiro and Shaul Ellenbogan for your encouragement. To liana Attia of Be'Or HaTorah journal, for her continuing interest in my work. To my former bandmates Lazer Lloyd and Moshe Yankovsky in the YOOD power rock trio for encouraging me to go back and finish the Ph.D. To the Lady Davis Fellowships of Hebrew University, and the Canadian Friends of Hebrew University for supporting the creation of the first draft of this dissertation. Thank you all.

vi Table of Contents

Abstract iv Acknowledgements v Table of Contents vii Chapter One: Introduction 1 Meta-theory 5 Mysticism and epistemology 7 Method 9 Personal reflection 11 Chassidism and Jewish mysticism 12 The psychology of mysticism 19 The psychology of meditation and transpersonal approaches 24 God as a relational object 31 References to Chabad meditation 42 Chapter Two: The Chabad School 45 The Chabad approach to Chassidism 45 Chabad as psychology 47 The sefirotic faculty psychology 50 Situating Chabad theoretically as a psychology 55 Chapter Three: Hitbonenut 61 The maamar: Unit of contemplation 64 Immanence, transcendence, essence 66 Bittul 67 Self abnegation and mental health 71 Three general stages of meditation 72 Chapter Four: Discerning Motives 77 The stratification of motive 79 Yeshut-narcissism 83 The "black bile" 89 The "scientist" metaphor 93 Ohn-hispaalus: Beyond ecstasy 95 Chapter Five: Insight and Personality Change 99 Acknowledgment: Hoda-a 100 From God Object to "n-Object" 104 From intentionality to non-intentionality 107 Higher religio-developmental stages through hitbonenut 108 The "good thought" 108 Ecstasy in the heart 110 Intention in the heart 112 Simple will 114 Processes of internalization 115

vii Chapter Six: Discussion: Outline of a Jewish Transpersonal Psychology 123 Shiura: The malleable measure of God 124 The integrative model 126 Two-eyed discernment: The model applied 131 Relational meditation: Extending the transpersonal paradigm 134 Ascribing meaning to meditative experiences 138 Transcendence of the therapeutic 141 Implications of the current study 142 Object relations of the God relationship 142 Transpersonal psychology 143 Comparative mysticism 143 Limitations of the study 146 Conclusion 149 References 151 Glossary 172

List of Tables Table 1: Stages of Ecstasy (.Hitpaalut) 115 Table 2: God-object, n-Object integrative model 130

viii ...the roots of the need for religion are in the parental complex... grand sublimations of father and mother...

Freud (1910, p.12)

...lest you act corruptly and make yourselves a graven image, the likeness of any shape; a form, male or female...

Deuteronomy, 4:1 Chapter One: Introduction

This dissertation is intended to contribute to psychology's ability to comprehend

what the modern psychology of religion, following William James, has considered the

quintessential religious experience: ecstatic mysticism. The task set here is to provide a

clinically-oriented introduction to the unique 'psychology of meditation' of Jewish

mysticism, as developed by the Chabad Chassidic school with its hitbonenut meditation,

and to relate the unique insights of this school to the psychology of religion,

transpersonal psychology and object relations literatures. Hitbonenut, a reflexive gerund

derived from the three-letter Hebrew root word by"n, connoting "to understand," is

usually translated as contemplation, or contemplative meditation (e.g. Elior, 1993;

Loewenthal, 1990). It is a form of mystical-meditative practice that takes a "path through

the intellect" (Leshan, 1974) and which grew out of the Chassidic movement, as will be

explained at length in what follows.

There has been resurgence lately of the study of spirituality in the discipline of

psychology (Shafranske & Sperry, 2005). Following an early period (in the late 19th and

early 20th centuries) when virtually all of the founders of the modern discipline of

psychology felt the need to address the uniquely human activity of religion in one way or

other1, there ensued a period of increasing emphasis of positivism and behaviourism that

1 Belzen (2009a) provides a partial list that includes: Wundt, Flournoy, James, Hall, Freud, Miinsterberg, Janet, Karl and Charlotte Biihler, Stern, and the later writings by Allport, Fromm, Maslow, Jung, and Skinner. Carl Jung's (1986) overriding emphasis on the religious nature of the human psyche, and his attempt to account for it theoretically, are particularly noteworthy in this history. Jung was an early and strong advocate of the view that the religious impulse was irreducible, and must be accounted for in any comprehensive scientific psychology—an approach that ultimately led to his historic break with Freud in 1913. Freed of the constraints of classical Freudian Libido theoiy, seemed to correlate with a reduction of interest in religion as a topic for psychological inquiry. In recent years, however, it appears that a realization has occurred that spirituality does not disappear (as some may have hoped!) just because psychologists choose not to look at it. People go on having numinous feelings; they undertake psychologically significant spiritual practices such as prayer, traditional yoga or various kinds of meditation; they talk of God, or Allah or Christ or Gaia as an active participant in their lives; they continue to have good old-fashioned "conversion" experiences now and again, and when they fall on hard times and seek psychological help, they remain understandably reluctant to 'check' their spirituality at the consulting room door

(Shafranske & Speny, 2005). The need for the practicing psychologist to contend, theoretically and practically, with human spirituality—in all its "troubling transcendence" (Garret, 1974)~should arguably be seen as a core competence of the discipline despite the inherently esoteric aspects of the field (Lukoff & Lu, 1999).

When psychotherapists are uncomfortable dealing with spiritual material, either for personal reasons, such as inflexible ideological pre-commitments or biases, or simply due to a lack of training in how fruitfully to engage this material, the result can be the client feeling truncated (Shafranske & Sperry, 2005; Spero, 1986, 1992). Anti-religious biases or blind spots can lead to thorny counter-transference issues when working with devout clients (Spero, 1986), or even in extreme cases to unethical acting out by the therapist

Jung went on to form his "analytical psychology" which located the religious impetus in a transpersonal "collective unconscious," populated by universal archetypes fundamental to human meaning and symbolization—especially, though not exclusively, religious symbolization. For a concise review of Jung's thought and its later elaborations by generations of Jungian theorists, see Frager and Fadiman (2005). 2 (Greenberg & Witzum, 1991). Whether the spiritually-referenced material represents healthy or problematic, manifest or hidden, ego-syntonic or dystonic aspects of the client's personality, the psychologist should be sufficiently equipped with conceptual tools to 'see' the issue, and address it appropriately (Lukoff & Lu, 1999).

More subtle issues of conceptualization and empathy may come into play with clients who maintain some kind of systematic, in-depth spiritual practice. Eigen (1998) describes two cases of individuals who engaged in advanced meditation within Eastern disciplines, and where one was a teacher in his discipline. Both men suffered with Axis I and Axis II psychopathologies that were intricately entangled with their meditative practice, including troublesome issues with the way in which the cultivated meditative field of consciousness was being incorporated into their personalities. In both case studies it is evident that the relevant knowledge of the therapist and his keen appreciation of the meditative traditions' processes and goals helped him to attune to some depth dynamic issues that needed to be teased out and addressed. The existence of a developed literature on the relationship between Eastern disciplines of meditation and Western psychology also likely played a role. The same type of resources are not yet available for similar cases in a Jewish context, however, a lacuna the present study is intended to redress.

Not every psychologist needs to be a 'specialist' who can take on cases of people who are engaged in depth spiritual work on the level of a 'primary religious personality', just as not every psychologist is expected to have specialized knowledge and skill sets to service military test pilots, or elite athletes. But some do. And at least some familiarity with these issues is advisable, as there are many people likely to turn up for general in- or

3 outpatient therapy with significant spiritual commitments.

This dissertation is intended to broaden our discipline's understanding of some profound psycho-developmental changes along a serious and sustained Jewish meditative path. As such, it contributes both to our ability to conceptualize such changes at the level of the basic theory of mysticism generally, and to work with individuals who are engaged in Jewish spiritual practices. Considering the place of Judaism as a major world religion, and a matrix of at least two other major world religions, the absence in the psychological literature to date of a theoretical framework along these lines is difficult to account for but, for whatever reason, the lacuna exists.

In what follows, some surprisingly 'psychologically-minded' early 19th century

Chassidic manuals on meditation that describe a detailed stage model of Judaic spiritual advancement through meditation will be presented and explained with the intention of starting to fill this gap. These texts and their relevance to psychology will be explicated by making considered use of contemporary psychological terms and metaphors to reveal the 'psychology of meditation' contained therein. As we proceed, the insights of this tradition with respect to understanding psychological changes in depth meditative work will be brought into dialogue with the contemporary psychology of religion, transpersonal psychology, and object relations literatures. Thus, this dissertation is to be understood as a form of theoretical 'basic research,' which lays the necessary groundwork for a longer-term program of study intended to construct a Jewish-oriented form of transpersonal psychology.

4 Meta-theory

Following Garret (1974)~and analogously, as we will see, in the psychoanalytic

realm, Spero (1990)—I have opted for the non-reductive meta-theoretical stance of

"phenomenological numinalism" (Garret, 1974, p. 173). This means practically here that:

1)1 accept the authority of the Chassidic meditative adepts as experts in their field of

endeavour, fully capable of representing their own inner experience. 2) I also accept that

these experiences are numinous in quality, i.e., they are mysterious, non-rational, and

fascinating experiences that are "religious," in the sense of an irreducible category of

human experience (Otto, 1958). 3) As a psychological theorist and not a philosopher nor

theologian, I will not be directly engaging arguments about the ultimate ontological status

of the experiences described, nor will I address potential epistemological claims that may

or may not flow from this experiencing. I will however give myself license to tentatively

"...construct theories compatible with claims to the existence of such [ontological,

theological] realities" (Hood, 2009, p.332, see also Garret, 1974, p.168).

My non-reductive approach to the spiritual practices and phenomena of interest

places this study within the general field of inquiry of transpersonal psychology.2

Transpersonal psychology has grown out of the encounter between Western Psychology

and various "wisdom traditions" from around the world, and especially those of Asia,

over the last century (Walsh & Shapiro, 2006). Rather than dismissing or reductively re­

interpreting the mystical accounts of these traditions (whether, for example, entailing

2 Transpersonal", or "beyond the personal," is a term apparently independently introduced by William James and C.G. Jung to refer to spiritual experience (Krippner, 1998). 5 either psychological [Freud, 1968/1927] or physiological [Leuba, 1925] reductionism) transpersonal psychologists have attempted to learn from these traditions—at times by immersing themselves in them over many years—and then to try to integrate their insights with the concepts of contemporary Western psychology. As a therapy approach or orientation, transpersonal practitioners are concerned with bridging psychology and spirituality, either by directly facilitating spiritual growth, or by attempting to facilitate the healthful integration of spiritually-referenced experiences into adaptive psychological adjustment (Hutton, 1994; Walsh, 1992). Although some transpersonal practitioners actively employ meditation, visualization and similar techniques in their practice, what is really definitive of the approach is its openness to the transpersonal per se, rather than allegiance to any specific technique (Hutton, 1994).

Transpersonal approaches generally share the conception of a "perennial" (Huxley,

2004) or a "primordial" (Smith, 1976, 1987) philosophy, which is argued to be held in common by all of the major mystical-meditative traditions around the world. Rothberg

(1986) characterizes the philosophical stance of this world view as a "hierarchic ontology," which implies a layering of reality into "higher" (more real, good and true), and "lower" aspects. Within the individual self or soul there are corresponding levels or layers, such that there is a close correspondence between psychology and ontology (or cosmology). Higher dimensions of both world and self emanate and subsume lower dimensions, and a goal of human spiritual practices is seen to be the becoming conscious of higher levels of reality. Wilber (1995), whose work represents the most erudite and ambitious contemporary English language expression of transpersonal philosophy, calls

6 this ontological layering a "holarchy", as in a holistic hierarchy (p.7). The theosophical system that informs the Chabad meditative practice is of this general type. The transpersonal philosophical approach has been criticized on a number of grounds, yet it is capable of being restated in contemporary terms and defended (Rothberg, 1986).

Mysticism and epistemology. The term mysticism in the contemporary psychology of religion is used to denote

...those aspects of the various religious traditions that emphasize

unmediated experience of oneness with the ultimate reality, however

differently conceived (King, 2004, p.109)

The similarities between mystical writings from around the world and from different epochs have been used as prima facie evidence for a "common core" of experience underlying these accounts (Huxley, 2004; Smith, 1976). The exponents of the perennial philosophy were criticized, however, for glossing over important differences between various mystics in a premature rush to demonstrate such a universal core (Katz,

1978; Proudfoot, 1986). As constructivism propagated from analytic philosophy throughout the humanities and social sciences in the latter part of the last century, it began to be applied to mysticism, and perennialism3 was for the most part pushed aside for want of an articulated epistemological response (Forman, 1999).

In recent years this debate has tightened around the specific issue of the possibility of a "pure consciousness event" (PCE). Called "introvertive" states of consciousness by

Stace (1960), these are meditative trance states that mystics East and West describe in 31 will utilize the non-hyphenated spelling "perennialism" as is customary in this literature (e.g., Forman, 1999). 7 terms which suggest that they consist of consciousness devoid of content, including any sense of a separate self, or of time and space:

There is allure and terror in mystical portrayals of nothingness: Eckhart's

Nichts, John of the Cross's nada, the Taoist wu, the Buddhist sunyata...

ayirt (nothingness) in Jewish mysticism (Matt, 1990, p. 121).

In defence of a common core approach to these experiences (and he adds several contemporary accounts of these states, including his own), Forman (1999) argues that constructivism was developed to account for normative states of consciousness, and its applicability to altered states of awareness such as PCEs has never been argued. In his seminal article aiguing the constructivist position Katz (1978) simply asserts as axiomatic that"There are NO pure (i.e. unmediated) experiences" (p.26). Forman returns to Kant,

Brentano, Husserl and Wittgenstein's contributions towards understanding how human mental life is bound to mediating frameworks of space and time, intentionality and linguistic reference, and builds an argument that these insights were addressed to a class of human experiences, and never to special states of consciousness cultivated with the express intention of de-automatizing (Deikman, 1971) perceptual and linguistic constructive activities of the mind.

The fields of anthropology, cultural psychiatry and the neuropsychology of religion all tend to support the notion of some sort of universal common core of spirituality

(Bartocci & Dein, 2005; Newberg & d'Aquili, 2000). In particular, the study of the physiological correlates of meditative states has progressed through several phases since

Benson (1975), Fischer (1971) Gellhorn and Kiely (1972) and others in the 1970s began

8 to isolate biological markers for these states (see Walsh, 1983 for a review). Recently, this literature has entered a new phase with the implementation of more rigorous experimental designs, and the incorporation of advanced diagnostic imaging such as fMRI, PET,

SPECT, as well as advanced EEG monitoring of meditating subjects in laboratory conditions. As a result, much more precise data are now available which suggest distinctive neurophysiological profiles correlating with specific meditative states measured in vivo in a laboratory setting (Cahn & Polich, 2006; Newberg & d'Aquili,

2000).

On balance, it appears that the "common core" thesis underlying transpersonal psychology remains a viable, and vital, school of thought in the new millennium. This dissertation is intended as a contribution to that school of thought.

Method

As indicated, this project is theoretical in nature and the method used is hermeneutical in the traditional sense in that it involves the interpretation of text. It repeatedly asks, and then develops an answer to the question: "How do the meanings used by tradition A to interpret the phenomenon relate to the meanings used by tradition

B to the same end?" Or also: "How can psychology best formulate the psychological process that is being described by this text."

For example when, later on in Chapter 41 interpret the Chassidic concept of

"yeshut," which literally means "somethingness," in terms of the psychoanalytic concept of "narcissism," I clarify that I am using that concept in a particular way, namely, general-developmentally as distinct from pathologically-diagnostically. With this

9 clarification, I have essentially isolated what 1 consider to be one area of definite shared meaning between the two traditions. And when the texts are describing a process of an experience being internalized and becoming part of a person's character (as will be seen in Chapter 5), I seek appropriate psychological analogies and terms with which to try and elucidate the process being described.

My approach is to start with some background and introductory material (Chapters

1 and 2), and then to move to a direct interpretive encounter with the particular Chassidic source texts of interest, focusing on analyses of specific key concepts (Chapters 3,4, and

5). In Chapter 6 an integrative model of meditatively-forged religio-developmental processes is proposed, as an example of a higher-order integration of psychology and the contemplative hitbonenut meditation, built from more specific instances of shared meanings presented in the earlier Chapters 3,4 and 5.

The purpose, in turn, of these later higher-order shared statements or representations is to provide a general conceptual framework for approaching the psychology of meditation (both theoretically and practically) that is coherent and comprehensible within both the Chassidic-Judaic and psychological worlds of discourse.

This is the end point of what I am describing as "basic hermeneutical research," intended to produce a basic "map," a bilingual, "Judaic-meditative/psychoanalytic" map of the terrain covered when an individual undertakes the type of long-term meditative endeavour known as hitbonenut. Although I will make scattered references to application, the central task here remains the hermeneutic one: the drawing up of a shared representation on the conceptual-theoretical level.

10 Personal reflection. In the context of this method, and in lieu of a section on

"instrumentation" a few words about my personal relationship with hitbonenut and the project I have outlined are in order. To help the reader better appreciate and assess this project as a whole I shall make a few remarks about what brought me to it.

Since my later teen years I have been interested in spirituality, experimenting with meditation, practicing yoga, reading transpersonal psychology, and eventually travelling to South East Asia to seek instruction, first in a Thai Buddhist monastery, and then in a

Tibetan meditation centre in Dharamsala, India. My path eastwards soon turned back however, as I visited Jerusalem, and became aware for the first time of the mystical- meditative aspects (up to then completely unknown to me) within my own Jewish tradition.

Since the time of my initial interest in Judaism about 23 years ago until this writing,

Chassidic philosophy and practice have remained of central concern and interest, particularly during my 5-year period of traditional yeshiva study in Israel. Following this, throughout the ensuing years of immersion in study and training in clinical psychology, the relationship between this discipline and the Chassidic teachings was never far from my mind. This concern is reflected in a number of academic essays, and two (Honours and MA) theses preceding this dissertation.

The present project thus represents in many ways the culmination of a process of incubation—intellectual, emotional, and spiritual—over this entire period. It is informed in part by my own inner struggles to understand and to implement these traditional practices in a manner true to their original intention, with modern psychology as a friend and

11 advisor.

Chassidism and Jewish mysticism

Jewish mysticism is a blanket term for a variety of schools of thought and practice within Judaism, with significant strands of continuity passing through periods of change and innovation, over approximately three millennia. Thus, any discussion of Jewish mysticism needs to reach back to the prophetic 'academies' of the Judean desert in biblical times. As demonstrated by Kaplan (1978), the biblical prophets were accomplished meditative mystics with a native Hebraic meditation-terminology, and techniques for cultivating prophetic states of consciousness. Thus, in this its earliest, paradigmatic 'prophetic' form, Jewish mysticism contributed to the world:

...the idea of equality before the law, both divine and human; of the

sanctity of life and the dignity of the human person; of the individual

conscience and so a personal redemption; of collective conscience and so

of social responsibility; of peace as an abstract ideal and love as the

foundation of justice, and many other items which constitute the basic

moral furniture of the human mind (Johnson, 1988, p. 585).

Some basic introduction to Judaism as a religion is in order. It is predicated on the idea of One, imageless God as the creator of the world; the Torah text and the oral tradition of its interpretation as the revealed will and wisdom of this creator; the land of

Israel as the land promised by God to the biblical Jacob's descendants; the coming of the messiah to usher in an age of peace, and other important beliefs. The large cultural diversity amongst Jewish communities across the ages is thus somewhat deceptive: these

12 Jewish settlements or subcultures shared a common discourse on matters of belief and observance both general and specific, as demonstrated by their learned correspondence and debate through Jewish history.

Since the Diaspora of the Jewish people following the Roman conquest of Judea and the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem in 70 c.e., Judaism has been primarily focused on the study and observance of biblical law as recorded in the Babylonian and

Jerusalem Talmuds, which are repositories of what were once the strictly orally transmitted teachings known as the oral tradition (Torah she-be'al peh). Over this 2000- year period, new movements have arisen in keeping with new trends of thought or emphases in practice, some of which were incorporated to varying degrees into mainstream Judaism, and some of which were rejected or died out. A brief survey of some significant examples of such movements will provide a backdrop to understanding the place of Chassidism in this history.

The Karaite movement was a medieval sect of Jews which rejected the authority of the oral tradition to interpret biblical Law, and which—somewhat like the Protestant movement—attempted to approach the Torah literally. Unlike Protestantism however, this movement—like others before and after it—was unsuccessful in convincing a decisive number of Jews to abandon the traditions that had been received from earlier authorities.

The Karaite influence on the further course of Jewish history was thus quite limited.

Also in the medieval period, contact with Greek philosophical writings in Arabic translation led to a movement of Jewish scholars expounding on Jewish beliefs and doctrines in terms of Greek philosophical concepts while at the same time engaging in a

13 mutually enriching dialogue with a variety of Islamic and Christian thinkers. The resultant Judaic philosophic mysticism aroused debate and resistance within Judaism yet, over time, the writings of scholars such as Bahya Ibn Paquda, Maimonides, Gersonides,

Nachmanides, Judah the Prince and others were accepted as legitimate expressions of

Torah hermeneutics, despite their drawing upon Greek philosophical terms and assumptions, and contemporaneous Sufi terminology (Lobel, 2007). The works of these authors thus entered the mainstream of Jewish thought and doctrine and—especially in the case of Maimonides—had an important impact on the later Kabbalistic and Chassidic schools (Waldman, 2009). As we will see further on, the Chabad meditative school in particular represents a synthesis of ecstatic Kabbalism and the intellective mysticism of the medieval Jewish philosophers, Maimonides in particular. Maimonides also had a significant influence on the development of Western philosophy and psychology, up to and including Freudian psychoanalysis (Bakan, 1989,1993; Bakan et al., 2009). These relationships will become important in Chapter 6 below, where I propose a model of psycho-development through meditation based on a synthesis of Chabad Chassidism and psychoanalysis, resting in part on the shared intellectual roots of these traditions.

With respect to the Kabbalah: During the 16th century in the northern Israeli city of

Tsfat, scholars of the carefully concealed, esoteric traditions of Judaism gathered, and there ensued a period of great creativity and expansion of these traditions (Kaplan, 1982).

The term Kabbalah, taken from the root kb 7 meaning "to parallel" or "to correspond", alludes to this discipline's tendency to seek out correspondences and inter-inclusion between apparently disparate elements—an opposite yet complementary tendency to the

14 logical-analytic dissections of the Talmud (Ginsburgh, 1993). The Kabbalah is part of the oral tradition (Torah she'baalpeh), parts of which are recorded in a number of primary and secondary texts. Together with its associated traditions and practices, the Kabbalah expresses a view of the Torah and the world that can be described as mystical, metaphysical and theosophical. These traditions include, for example, mystical exegeses of the Torah text itself (recorded primarily in the foundational Kabbalistic text, the Zohar

[Book of Illumination]); explanations of processes and abstract structures underlying created reality (recorded in such texts as the Sefer Yetizrah [Book of Formation] and the

Sefer HaBahir [Book of Brightness]); and a variety of other theosophical, meditative and even magical themes (see Kaplan [1982] for a review of these literatures in relation to meditation). Most prominent among these gathering scholars at that time was Rabbi Isaac

Luria, whose novel, detailed interpretations of earlier Kabbalistic teachings attracted much attention. Despite some resistance, this movement's inteipretation of Jewish sources was also ultimately accepted by a decisive majority of Rabbinical authorities across the world, and the Lurianic approach to the Kabbalah thereafter became a standard part of the Rabbinic corpus.

Later, in the 17th century, the messianic Sabbatian movement arose, centred on the personality of Shabbtai Tzvi. This movement drew upon mystical teachings—especially particular teachings of the Lurianic Kabbalah--to fashion a sharply antinomian4 philosophy that for a time attracted a large number of Jews. However, Shabbtai himself

••"Opposed to or denying the fixed meaning or universal applicability of moral law." ("Hie American Heritage Dictionaiy of the English Language, Fourth Edition [2009]). With respect to antinomianism and Sabbatianism see Scholem (1974/1937)- 15 turned out to be a false messiah, converting to Islam under threat of death, and never actualizing the messianic prophecies that many had come to believe he would shortly fulfill.

This latter episode was a particularly painful one in Jewish history, as Shabbtai's brand of popularized Lurianic Kabbalah had captured the imagination and raised the hopes of many Jews, both learned and unlearned alike. His sudden discrediting was traumatic and left unfulfilled dreams and aspirations in its wake. Another outcome of this episode was an attitude of extreme caution towards, and even a backlash against the

Lurianic Kabbalah amongst many Rabbinic scholars. For these authorities, mystical

Torah teachings were understood to be best kept carefully hidden from the masses because their popularization had been associated with the Sabbatian debacle.

In addition to the great Sabbatian disappointment, another context for the rise of the

Chassidic movement was the horrific Chmielnicki massacres of 1648-49 (Loewenthal,

1990). Cossack leader Bohdan Chmielnicki led a Ukrainian peasant uprising against the ruling Polish nobility and his forces carried out systematic killings and forced conversions of Jews in areas of Poland and the Ukraine which fell under his control.

Estimates of the number of Jews murdered by Chmielnicki's irregular army vary between tens of thousands to over 100,000, with as many as 300 Jewish communities destroyed

(Clodfelter, 2002; Lagasse, Goldman & Hobson, 2000).

Thus, the mood of late 17th-century Jewish Europe was grim, given the recent failure of Sabbatian messianism to bring the promised redemption, as well as the ever- present danger of further pogroms. Also significant for the mood of this period were

16 traveling preachers, called "Maggidim" ("Speakers"), who exhorted the masses to repentance, under the assumption that the sins of the Jewish people had brought about the recent tragedies. The style of these preachers was "fire and brimstone"; they emphasized the many purported sins of the Jewish villagers, and cast dire warnings of terrible punishments that would befall them if they would not immediately and fully mend their ways.

At this time—the latter half of the 17th century—what was later to become known as the Chassidic movement consisted of a closed, secret society of Kabbalistic mystics, whose members met in private to plan how to improve their Jewish brethren's physical and spiritual situation. According to the Chassidic lore, the members of the society traveled across Europe, often posing as regular "Maggidim," yet conveying a quite different message. Their approach was to offer encouragement to the simple Jewish folk of the European countryside by expressing admiration for their piety, and articulating an approach to daily life and religious observance emphasizing joy and spontaneity. It was a positive message that eventually won the hearts of much of European Jewry.

Eventually the guiding hand behind this message which was at odds with the stern piety of the usual Maggidim became attributed to the last leader of the secret Maggidim society, Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov ("Good Master of the Name"). Correspondingly he was acknowledged as the founder of the Chassidic movement as we know it after his role was publicly revealed in either 1734 or 1736 (Loewenthal 1990; Faierstein, 1991;

Schneerson, 1942/1988).

17 From the beginning, the Chassidic movement under the leadership of the Baal

Shem Tov was associated with popularizing Jewish mysticism, putting the movement at

odds with elements amongst the established rabbinical authorities. Nevertheless, rumours

and stories about him and his new style of Jewish practice spread across Europe, whence

he was visited by an increasing flow of curious scholars and simple folk alike. Many of

these people in turn became members of the nascent Chassidic society.

Some dismayed, leading European rabbis began to make public pronouncements

against the Baal Shem Tov initiating an often bitter bitter dispute between the two groups:

the Chassidim ("Pious") and the Misnagdim ("Opposers"), a dispute that at one stage led

to the issuance of a writ of rabbinic excommunication against the Chassidim. Eventually,

however, it became clear that despite its novelty Chassidism was nevertheless grounded

in normative Judeo-legal observance and belief, and the writ was quietly shelved. The

differences in approach between Chassidim and Misnagdim became an accepted part of

the Jewish landscape, signified by the two groups' begrudging respect for and tolerance

of each other.

Today there are dozens of Chassidic "courts," each led by a "Rebbe," who stands in

a line of transmission of Chassidic teachings extending from the Baal Shem Tov. The

Chabad5 school of Chassidism is one such "court," which has had a total of seven Rebbes

5 Strictly speaking, the actual Chassidic "court" of Chabad today is called Lubavitch. As we will see below, the name Chabad is a reference to the unique approach to Chassidism propounded by the Lubavitcher Rebbes. However, at different times there have been other Chassidic courts—such as that of Staroselye and Kopust—that shared the Chabad approach. Nevertheless, the usual usage today is to refer to the Lubavitch dynasty simply by the name Chabad, and this is the convention we will employ here.

18 from the 18th century to the present.

I will return to this narrative when describing the Chabad School in greater detail in

Chapter 2. At this point, having provided some basic historical background, I can now

turn to a review of several literatures of relevance to this project.

The psychology of mysticism

In his classic work The Varieties of Religious Experience4 William James

(1902/1985) proposes two primary and two secondary qualities characterizing mystical

experience across cultures and historical epochs. The primary qualities are ineffability

meaning that the experiences are intrinsically inexpressible in language and a noetic quality meaning that the experiences are felt to be a source of knowledge. The two secondary qualities are transiency6, and passivity (the mystic has a sense of surrendering

to, and being taken up into the experience). These qualities were apparently intended by

James as heuristic and pragmatic and as an attempt to mark off a field of inquiry for psychology; he did not mean them to be definitive categories of a universal common core

(as they were often interpreted by later authors [King, 2005]).

Stace (1960), an influential common core theorist, distinguished between two general types of mystical experience cross-culturally, namely the extrovertive and the introvertive states. The extrovertive states concern an experience of oneness with nature and the world. The world in all its multiplicity is perceived as being part of a cosmic unity that includes the self. Drawing examples from Eckhart's writings, Stace emphasizes that in the extrovertive type of experience, the many things of the external, physical 6 This was later contradicted by examples of sought-for permanent changes of consciousness (see Forman [1999] and King [2005]). 19 world, "...blades of grass, wood, stones etc" are "...nevertheless perceived—seen by the eyes-as all one... simultaneously many and one" (p.64).

The introvertive states, by contrast, are those wherein the mystic experiences an ineffable unity of consciousness that excludes empirical content and multiplicity of any kind:

Since the experience has no content, it is often spoken of by the mystics as

the Void or as nothingness; but also as the One, and as the Infinite... there

are no distinctions in it... it is an undifferentiated unity (Stace, 1960,

p.86).

A psychological test, the Mysticism Scale, has been produced (Hood, 1975) based on this dual typology of mysticism, and has been applied to Christian, Muslim and Hindu subjects located in the U.S.A, Iran and India (Anthony, Hermans & Sterkens, 2010; Hood et al., 2001).

Zaehner (1961) also produced a typology of mysticism using three categories: a

"panenhenic" experience of oneness with nature that is not necessarily of a religious sensibility (a type of secular mysticism); a "monistic" experience of self-annihilation in a unity of consciousness beyond time and space; and a theistic experience of communion with a divine presence which remains distinct from the self (cited in Gellman, 2010).

Zaehner considered the theistic experience to be the most developed form of mysticism, a position that has been criticized as having been unduly influenced by his polemical aims on behalf of Catholicism (Hanhart, 1961; Katz, 1978). In a later contribution along similar lines, Wainwright (1981) subdivided the panenhenic, (or extrovertive in Stace's

20 [1960] terms) type of experience into four sub-types, whilst retaining the introvertive and

theistic categories.

As pointed out by Hood et al. (2009) there is disagreement about the nature of the relationship, if any, between the extrovertive and introvertive types of experiences. Stace

(1960) considered the extrovertive type of experience to be an "...incomplete, or lower degree" of the introvertive state. The mystic first comes to see a unity in the cosmos before progressing to a fully undifferentiated "unitive" state. Forman (1999) has argued, however, that the extrovertive state actually represents the fruition of the endeavour of introvertive mysticism because only once the introvertive experience comes to be fully habituated does it become integrated as a permanent feature of consciousness in a

"dualistic mystical state" (p. 153). As addressed in Chapter 3, the Chassidic sources speak of a progression of three general levels, each more advanced than the previous, which appear to correspond to the extrovertive, Zaehner's (1961) "theistic", and the introvertive states respectively. A fourth state corresponding to Forman's "dualistic mystical state" is also evident as will be referenced in Chapter 3.

Fischer (1971), a research psychiatrist, produced what he called a "cartography of the ecstatic and meditative states" which has been widely cited to this day (Forman,

1999; Hunt, 2007). The model consists of a continuum of conscious arousal differentiating classes of mental phenomena associated with vaiying levels of sympathetic versus parasympathetic nervous activity. In the middle of the continuum are normal waking states and perceptual operations. Moving towards the

"ergotropic" (implying elevated sympathetic arousal) side are, first, states of heightened

21 sensitivity, responsivity, and creativity; then anxiety; then hyper-aroused psychotic states that become catatonia; and finally ecstatic "mystical rapture" such as the kataphatic7 visionary experiences of St. Theresa of Avila and others (p. 900). As the sympathetic arousal increases to high levels, the subject becomes increasingly unresponsive to external stimuli, resulting in "...'unlearning' of the constancies of the physical dimension" (p. 900). This description may imply a hallucinatory state within catatonia, or~and this implicitly could often be merely a matter of interpretation-a state of visionary, "ergotropic" mysticism. On the "trophotropic" side (of increasing parasympathetic dominance) are first relaxed states, followed by deeper states of tranquil awareness such those cultivated in apophatic meditative disciplines, then finally profoundly hypo-aroused states which Fischer connects with the unitive "Yoga samahdi" state of inner quietude.

In a review of laboratory studies of meditating yogis Gellhorn and Kiely (1972) found that states of both ergotropic and trophotropic dominance were compatible with full awareness. They also discuss the observation of a sudden shifting to ergotropic cortical arousal and increased heart-rate within the trophotropic state, with no increase in muscle tone, a pattern that was associated on debriefing with the onset of meditative ecstasy within the depth of the meditative state. The relationship of meditative quietude followed by the onset of ecstatic feelings is a central topic of concern in the Chassidic

7 "Kataphatic" mysticism uses positive language about attributes of God, and various practices involving movement and increased stimulation to bring about the ecstatic state. This term is opposed to "apophatic" mysticism [see above], which utilizes the language of negative theology, and such practices as fasting, slowed breath and isolation to lower stimulation while heightening awareness (Bartocci & Dein, 2005; Gellman, 2010). 22 meditative texts that will be covered from Chapter 4 on.

Fischer's model provides occasion for noting some connections between at least some psychotic states and the hyperaroused, rapturous, visualizing mysticism exemplified by figures such as Julian or Norwich and Mechtilde of Magdeburg (Forman,

1999). Meanwhile the relationship between psychopathology and mysticism has been of interest to psychology at least since James (1902/1985) discussed the maladies of the

"sick soul" who struggles with the unique psycho-emotional challenges James called

"theopathies." Maslow and Wilber used the term "metapathologies" for the mental health maladies that arise or are associated with spiritual practices and ultimate concerns (see

Hunt, 2007, p. 209). Among these are the classical "dark night of the soul" of St. John of the Cross, described as a sudden profound loss of felt meaning while on a spiritual path, associated with potentially severe anhedonias as are observed in the negative symptom sets of schizoaffective disorders (Hunt, 2007). However, these types of cases are remarkable for the degree to which the sufferer is able to continue to contribute to society, often in significant and creative ways (see Hunt, 2007, who invokes the examples of Nietzsche, Thoreau, Jung, Heidegger and Gurdjieff [p.209]).

Based on his clinical exposure to such "spiritual emergency" cases Lukoff (1985) and colleagues proposed a new DSM diagnosis of "Mystical Experience with Psychotic

Features." A revised version of this initiative was eventually incorporated into the DSM-

IV as "Religious or Spiritual Problem (Code V62.89)." The transpersonal psychologists who initiated this nosological change have continued to work on identifying and categorizing various kinds of "religious or spiritual problem" cases. An analysis of relevant cases referenced in the PsycINFO database yielded 23 categories of cases that were documented in the literature by the late eighties (Lukoff, Lu & Turner, 1998).

The psychology of meditation and transpersonal approaches

Direct reference to Chabad hitbonenut meditation in the psychological literature is virtually non-existent, a neglect that the current project is intended to help remedy. In his review of meditative practices from around the world, Leshan (1974) classifies Chabad contemplative meditation with other meditative systems which take a "path through the intellect" (as distinct from paths through emotion, the body, and action). There are scattered references to Kabbalah or Jewish mysticism in the transpersonal psychological literature but these are invariably so unelaborated (e.g., Walsh & Shapiro, 2006; Wilber,

1998, p. 339) as to be hardly worthy of mention.

The contemporary psychological literature on meditation can be roughly divided into two streams. One stream entails an interest in adapting meditation for use as a tool in psychotherapy. The focus is on the potential of meditative practices to induce states of deep relaxation, increased concentration, lowered blood pressure, and other psycho­ physiological changes of immediate therapeutic relevance. Benson (1975) was a pioneer of the adaptation of Eastern practices to therapeutic ends, when he stripped the Hindu

Transcendental Meditation (TM) practice of its devotional trappings and applied it as a purely therapeutic concentrative technique to evoke what he called the "relaxation response." More recently the focus of this stream of the literature has shifted to

Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction (MBSR) and related techniques based on Buddhist vipassana ("insight") meditation, which has now been extensively validated as an

24 effective therapeutic technique for a variety of problems (for recent reviews, see Salmon

et al., 2004, and Ivanowski & Malhi, 2007).

In these applications meditation has been researched as a "self-control strategy" and

compared with other techniques such as muscle relaxation and biofeedback (e.g., Kabat-

Zinn, Lipworth, Burney, & Sellers, 1987; Shapiro, 1982). In these studies and treatment

regimes, simplified meditative techniques are normally 'prescribed' for a fixed period of weeks or months (not the many years that they would normally be cultivated in their

original forms), with a research focus on outcome in terms of symptom relief. This stream of the literature is thus medical in its conception of meditation, and the origin of these practices in the spiritual strivings of wisdom traditions, while acknowledged, is considered largely irrelevant to the clinical task at hand.

This "de-contextualization" of meditative practices has indeed enabled the isolation and investigation of specific aspects of meditation with therapeutic relevance, and yet it has also been criticized for obscuring the broader psychological resources of the traditions that produced these practices (Walsh & Shapiro, 2006). In this work these authors quote medically-oriented meditation researchers who have cautioned that the failure to pay greater attention to the original contexts of these practices will ultimately result in a "limit[ed], distort[ed] and ethnocentric" view of meditation in the clinical field

(p. 224). Correspondingly, Hood et al. (2001) in their questionnaire research on mystical experiences, found indications that an Interpretation factor, implying the availing oneself of mystical teachings from within an established faith tradition, may protect against an elevation of psychological dysfunction associated with the potentially disorienting

25 "introvertive" form of mystical experience. Also, Marsella (1998) laments the

"colonization of the mind" that he contends has characterized Western psychology's approach to these "other psychologies", and advocates a "global-community psychology" that will be more truly inclusive and multicultural (pp. 1282,1286). From this perspective, then, the contemporary effort and intention to legitimate and give voice to non-Western psychologies resonates with the broad intellectual movement of postcolonialism in philosophy, art, and literary theory (Said, 1979; Young, 2001).

A different line of approach to meditation and one which primarily interests us here is that of the transpersonal psychology literature. Transpersonal theorists have developed basic psycho-structural and psycho-developmental models which incorporate into

Western psychology the phenomenological data derived from meditative practices. An early example is Assagioli's (1965) famous "egg diagram," which added a "Higher

Unconscious" and a "Higher Self' to the Freudian Unconscious and Preconscious. This higher level of the psyche is seen as the repository of all higher human functions, such as genius, artistic inspiration, altruism, and mystical awareness (Assagioli, 1965).

Contemporary followers of Assagioli's "psychosynthesis" approach have outlined developmental models that include a transpersonal dimension in addition to the personal

(normative, psychological) one, and have applied these models to the understanding of mid-life existential-spiritual crises and related issues (Firman & Vargiu, 1996).

Both meditative traditions and psychology employ linear stage models of personality development. Thus, for example, the various accounts of "stages of enlightenment" models employed by some Eastern systems, and the stages of object

26 relational development of psychoanalytic theorizing, share the common conceptual structure of describing linear, incremental developmental changes through a series of discrete qualitative steps or stages. A significant aspect of later transpersonal psychological writing involves the attempt to capitalize on this conceptual similarity, and to fashion an integration of Eastern meditation and Western psychology based on an interpretive fusion of their developmental models. In Chapter 61 propose an integration of this general sort, based on parallel concepts between Chabad Chassidism and object relations theory.

In some of the more recent and complex transpersonal developmental theorizing along these lines, the two-tiered, personal/transpersonal structure of the early psychosynthesis approach has expanded into a three-tiered, prepersonal/personal/ transpersonal structure. The current 'gold standard' of this theoretical approach is

Wilber's "full spectrum" developmental model (Wilber, 1980,1995; Wilber, Engler &

Brown, 1986), which integrates Piagetian, object relations, existential, and contemplative-transpersonal concepts into a nine-stage model of human development.

The "prepersonal" developmental stages in this model are the sensori-physical; phantasmic-emotional; representational mind; and the rule/role mind (these being derived primarily from Piaget, and object relations theory). These stages are followed by the

"personal" levels, namely the formal-reflexive, and vision-logic (the latter concept being synthesized from theories of advanced creative thought processes such as those of gifted scientists or artists, and from existential psychology). And finally there are the three transpersonal levels of consciousness/personality derived from an interpretive collation of

27 numerous meditative-mystical systems: the psychic, subtle and causal.

The description of these various levels raises an interesting issue of application: Do the therapeutic elements of traditional forms of meditation obviate the need for conventional psychotherapy to address issues of deficits at the "prepersonal" or

"personal" levels of development, or is serious meditation really only appropriate for the already "well-integrated," mature individual without significant psychological issues?

In accord with the sequential, "building-block" implications of his maturational model, Wilber and his associates (Wilber, Engler & Brown, 1986) endorse the view that developmental deficits at any stage must be addressed by means appropriate to that stage.

In short: meditative practice, appropriate to transpersonal levels of development, cannot substitute for traditional psychotherapy when needed to address "personal" or

"prepersonal" psychological problems. They accordingly provide criteria for assessing the suitability of individuals for meditative work.

Tart and Deikman (1991) took up this debate about the role and scope of meditative versus Western psychotherapeutic disciplines. They considered this issue of prerequisite levels of functioning for meditation practice along with related topics such as transference entanglements with meditation teachers, and the notion of the observing self or ego in both meditation and therapy. Deikman (Tart & Deikman, 1991) opines—in accord with Wilber et al. (1986)—that psychotherapy and spiritual work do not substitute for each other. Based on his clinical experience, he holds that many people should not pursue intense spiritual practices such as meditation until they have dealt with basic psychological issues. Tart, on the other hand, entertains the possibility of replacing

28 traditional talk therapy in toto with traditional meditative disciplines (Tart & Deikman,

1991). Epstein (1986) also addresses this issue by arguing that meditative disciplines can

have a positive impact on even significant (narcissistic-range, or what in Wilber's terms

would be called "prepersonal") psychopathology. He attempts to demonstrate how

traditional Buddhist meditation can access and transmute infantile levels of intrapsychic

disturbance by effecting radical disidentification (a term used broadly in the transpersonal

literature, derived from the Buddhist ideal of "nonattachment") from narcissistically

invested internal objects. He holds that a "fully developed" meditative practice can thus

indeed obviate the need for any other therapy. The Dialectical Behaviour Therapy of

Linehan (1993) represents a successful adaptation of insights and attitudes derived from

Buddhist sources and applied to this range of personality pathology.

The bulk of the literature, however, appears to follow the former view. Among

writers who tend in this direction is Alpert (1982), who wrote that in 1973 he felt that, as

his meditation deepened, his personal problems would "fall away." By 1982, older and

wiser, he observed that it did not work that way: meditation did not cure him of his

personal problems. Also Russell (1986) cites teachers and initiates in Tibetan, Zen, and

Theravadan Buddhist, as well as Hindu, meditative training, who agree that a person

needs to be "...fairly well integrated psychologically to meditate effectively" (p. 58).

Vaughn (1991) describes in detail a number of pitfalls associated with the underdeveloped personality undertaking intense meditative work.

Engler (1984) writes in the same vein that Eastern schools "...assume a level of personality organization where object relations development...is already complete" (p.

29 39), and that this assumption can lead to problems if it is made incorrectly. He argues that the disidentification of the self from its objects through Buddhistic meditation should not be undertaken until a mature and stable system of object identifications is in fact in place.

If such is not the case, then psychotherapy may be indicated, whereas meditation is not.

He succinctly summarizes the prevailing view on this matter in the transpersonal literature with his oft-cited phrase: "You have to be a somebody before you can be a nobody" (p. 31).

Research into transpersonal constructs has been limited by the difficulty in defining and accessing the referents of spiritual experiences, all the while needing to defend their basic validity (Walsh, 1992; West, 2004). West (2004) has argued for the use of qualitative research approaches such as grounded theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967), heuristic research (Moustakas, 1990) and human inquiry (Reason, 1988) to preserve the richness and depth of spiritual and religious experiences being studied. Wilber (1995), on the other hand, has argued that the meditative schools themselves can be legitimately considered communities of empirical inquiry, in that anyone willing to cultivate a meditative practice can learn to access and interpret for themselves the referents of terms

(such as "nothingness") commonly used by these schools. He compares those who dismiss meditatively-derived knowledge without taking up the practice themselves to the

Churchmen who dismissed and condemned Galileo, while refusing to peer through his telescope.

Traditional experimental research into meditation has failed to bear out the somewhat messianic claims for its therapeutic effects that were common in the early

30 research of the late 1960s (Walsh, 1992). However, as cited at the beginning of this section, today there is a respectable body of research attesting to a variety of therapeutic benefits. When viewed in its original context as a long-term practice geared to global personality change (rather than to the alleviation of specific symptoms) the highly suggestive research of Brown (1986) bears mention. Brown (1986) pooled the results of three Rorschach studies of meditators of various levels of proficiency or "enlightenment," and demonstrated a pattern of variation across groups consistent with traditional claims about the longitudinal effects of serious and sustained meditative practice.

The area of transpersonal psychology remains an active and increasingly sophisticated branch of contemporary psychological theorizing. The area evidences a process of maturation over the years, as early idealism has been seasoned with clinical and meditative experience. The tendency towards deeper and more detailed dialogue and integration with other developmental and clinical theories is also a sign of the increasing maturity of this literature, and bodes well for the eventual incorporation of core transpersonal insights and contributions into the 'mainstream' of academic psychology.

Another indication of this trend is the recent inclusion of transpersonal psychology into the humanistic division (Division 32) of the American Psychological Association. As mentioned, we will return to some of the themes of the transpersonal literature in later chapters.

God as a relational object

As explained and documented in some detail further on, the Chassidic approach to meditation is embedded within a theological framework which, seemingly paradoxically,

31 embraces both the concept of a relationship with a personal deity, and an annihilating

mystical 'union' which negates the duality required for the concept of 'relationship.'

According to this tradition, meditation begins, and evolves, within a fundamentally

relational frame, and yet because the object of the meditation—God-ontically subsumes

the self, the greater and more immediate the awareness of the object, the more the self is

experienced to be nullified of its separateness and merged into an intersubjective, unitive

field of awareness.8

When attempting to interpret and understand the psychological processes involved

in meditative Jewish spirituality, we need to do justice to both its relational and its unitive

aspects. In so doing, we come up against difficulty in the transpersonal psychology

literature on meditation reviewed above, namely the paucity of attention paid to the rich

psychological implications of a relationship with a personal God. The majority of the

recent psychologically sophisticated transpersonal writing is grounded in a Buddhist

philosophy which in general neither requires nor endorses a role in meditation for God in 8 The subtle combination of relational and unitive aspects in Chassidic meditation— an aspect of what has been termed the "panentheistic" theology of this tradition (Lamm, 1971)—has confounded the academic interpretation of Jewish mysticism within the field of the psychology of religion. Part of the difficulty appears to have begun with Scholem (1941), who denied the existence of a full unio mystica in classical Jewish mysticism, a misapprehension later decisively corrected by Idel's (1988) studies of the ecstatic stream of the Kabbalah. Scholem's misapprehension was relied upon, however, by both of the major protagonists in the contemporary constructivist versus perennialist debate about mysticism, namely S.T. Katz (1977) and W.T. Stace (i960). Elior (1993) points out how, in his pivotal 1978 essay, Katz relied heavily on Scholem's mischaracterization of Jewish mysticism when he used it as an example of how the mystic's cultural expectations—in this case, purportedly that no consummate unio mystica will occur—shape and construct what the mystic's experience ultimately will be. Stace (i960), building on Buber's (1947) account of his own unitive experiences and his interpretation of them, comes closer to appreciating the dual relational-absorptive quality of Jewish mysticism, and yet he too relies on Scholem when he characterizes the absorptive loss of self in Chassidism as an "aberration" within Judaism. It is hoped that the current study will shed further light on the relationship between the relational and "mystical" elements in the psychology of Jewish meditation. 32 any traditional Western sense. Thus, there is a need to seek elsewhere for a theoretical psychological base upon which to ground this important aspect of our inquiry. Such a base is provided by the contemporary object relations theories of the God relationship.

Later psychoanalytic theorists have taken an interest in constructing depth psycho- structural and developmental accounts of the relationship with God, contributing thereby both to the theory and practice of psychotherapy, and to the broader modern dialogue of psychology and religion (Meissner, 1984; Pruyser, 1977; Rizutto, 1980). These efforts have also influenced the development of statistically-based measures of the God concept

(Brokaw & Edwards, 1994; Lawrence, 1997). While focused on traditional theistic religiosity in general rather than meditation specifically, this literature has much to contribute to the understanding and theoretical conceptualization of psycho-development on a Jewish meditative path. My approach has been to focus on perhaps the most prolific, synthesizing contributor to this body of literature, psychologist and object relations theorist MosheSpero (1980,1982,1986,1987, 1990,1992).

Rizutto (1981) observes that just as in any other object relationship, a client's experience of God is coloured by a complex of pre-understandings, desires and expectations derived primarily from early object relations and transitional phenomena

(Meissner, 1992; Winnicott, 1971), and crystallized in the form of the God imago or object representation. This of course is an updated version of the same basic observation that informed Freud's psychologistic reduction of religion to a projection of infantile needs and conflicts (Freud, 1968/1927, 1975). Nevertheless, by drawing upon Winnicott's

(1971) concept of the transitional space, Rizutto is able to soften the reductive edge of

33 Freud's formulation, and to embrace the notion of God as a transitional "illusion" in the same categoiy as any cultural product such as art, science or literature. Drawing upon a century of psychoanalytic theorizing since Freud, and especially the object relations theorists, she adds layers of complexity to our understanding of the variety of influences that can inform the idiosyncratic imago of God in the psyche, beyond the specific

"exalted father" of Freud's (1910, p.123) original formulation.

Spero modifies and adds to Rizutto's account by conceptualizing two parallel dimensions in the psychic representation of "divine objects". The first is the

"anthropocentric" dimension, consisting of intrapsychically-derived projections coalescing into (small "g") god-representations (essentially the object relations equivalent of Freud's projected deity [Spero, 1990, pp. xiv-xvii]). The second is the "deo-centric" dimension, consisting of non-transferential perceptions and resulting object representations of an objective God, mediated through such avenues as prayer, ritual, ethical life, the perception of divine providence in one's life, and the like (Spero, 1990).

This two-fold model of psychic structure—encompassing the anthropocentric and deocentric object relational domains—will henceforth be referred to as the duo- dimensional model.

Most analysts accept in principle that a non-transferential therapeutic alliance exists alongside the analytic transference. More broadly, then, they make a distinction, both in terms of content and of quality, between relatively realistic relationships in the client's life, and pathological or transference-ridden relationships. In the same vein, argues Spero, this distinction applies to the client's religious/spiritual life. In adopting this stance, Spero

34 (1987) takes pains to distance himself from other approaches to spiritual material in therapy that may "...encourage interpretations that simply appear mystical or religiously

'loaded'..." (p. 68). He presents his model as driven by the logical requirements of object relations theory, and by his understanding of the technical requirements of 'analytic neutrality' with respect to the externa! referents of religious belief.

Spero (1992) places his proposal in historical context by tracing the evolution of psychoanalytic thought about religion. He sees irony in the fact that despite psychoanalysis's evolution away from an emphasis on subjective, internal determinants of conflict, towards an emphasis on relations with objective, external others, in the domain of experience with religious "objects" such as God, the reality of the object is not considered. Instead, a fully reductive interpretive stance that would be familiar to Freud is retained. According to Spero (1990), this ontological bias may artificially limit and possibly distort the therapeutic process:

The remnants of psychologism in advanced object relations theory of

religious experience may confound the psychotherapist's ability to explore

the patient's reality, such that the fullest value of paying attention to the

central dimensions of religious experience may never be achieved, and the

unique relationship between the individual and the Object called God may

go unexplored (p. 54).

It is in relation to this theoretical/clinical problem set that Spero articulates his approach to conceptualizing religious phenomena. This approach involves working non- reductively, yet psychologically, and interpreting in like manner to the client. Thus, Spero

35 works therapeutically according to traditional analytic principles but accepts God as a

'legitimate' relational object in therapy. He does this essentially by not trying to interpret

the existence of God in the psyche as toe/f indicative of projection. His published case reports (e.g., Spero, 1980, pp. 150-153; 1987; 1992, pp. 156-182) illustrate how the therapist can fully engage the religious experience of the client non-reductively, while fully retaining the analytic posture. "On an ultimate level there may be present the influence of objective divine objects. But because this is psychotherapy, such influences are submitted whenever possible to analytic scrutiny" (Spero, 1990, p. 68). This open yet

'work-focused' stance allows the client to use therapy to deal in depth with religious experiences which may be entangled with neurotic conflicts or characterological issues.

The intention is to make psychotherapy a venue wherein the client or analysand can be helped to develop and mature in his or her relationship with God, evolving representations of God in increasingly complex, integrated and authentic directions.

Furthermore, Spero (1987) proposes that changes seen in religious object relationships occurring over time can be fruitfully described as falling into a fundamentally orderly sequence, based upon by Mahler, Pine and Bergman's (1975) separation-individuation model. Like other similar models based on the work of Mahler et al. (1975), this religious change model assumes that the separation-individuation process is recapitulated at developmental crisis points such as adolescence (Bios, 1979), adult love relationships (Gilfillian, 1985), and other adult transitional experiences

(Edward, Ruskin & Turrini, 1981). Each of the Mahler group's six separation-

36 individuation sub-phases (namely: normal autism9, symbiotic phase, differentiation, practicing, rapprochement, and individuation or emotional object constancy) is re­ interpreted to describe the vicissitudes of the development of one's relationship to God, and to the religious or faith community.

The following chart outlines Spero's (1987, 1990) account of the separation- individuation process in relation to God, placed in parallel with the Mahler et al.'s (1975) original separation-individuation sub-phases of the infant in relation to its mother. Italics are direct quotations from a similar, though more complex chart from Spero's (1990) book (pp. 66-69).

Mahlerian sub-phase Infant-Mother Dyad Quality of God Concept

Autism (0-4 wks.) -absence of cathexis of external stimuli-autistic "omnipotence"

Protective, all -good God concept, largely made up of intrapsychically derived object representations or grandiose self-object representations, fueled by narcissism.

Symbiotic phase (1-5 mos.) -state of "fusion" with mother, a "dual-unity" -start of

"cracking" of infant's autistic "shell" (the "stimulus barrier")

Profound sense of union with God ( "I needn't speak or even pray; God understands my thoughts."); perception of having sinned gives rise to intense feelings of self-annihilation. God as "experience" rather than an entity. 9 The problematic concepts of "normal" autism and symbiosis are addressed presently. 37 Differentiation (S mos. on.) -"hatching" process: attention moves beyond the

"symbiotic orbit" of mother -dawning awareness of separateness from mother

Begins to think about God and to recognize the fact that God is not an aspect of self At this stage, the religionist may alter between fusion with God so as to experience greater independence from [the faith] community and vice versa.

Begins to experience God less as "all good" or "all bad" and less as fantastical, but still as mysterious.

God as an iconic image, of introject quality.

Practicing (10-15 mos.) -"spurt in autonomy" comes with locomotion -much exploratory activity, alternating with periods of emotional "refueling" with mother.

Heightened interest in the symbolic aspects or explanations of God.

Tends to fantasize God's acceptance and approval, expressed in notions of divine providence guiding the religious odyssey.

Religious doctrine and God's influence seen as potentially enslaving, yet there is fear of attempting to escape. Such feelings used to be transformed into a more mature sense of commitment.

God experienced as benevolent, ever-present father figure, a less threatening image than would be provided by maternal God concepts at this stage.

Revises God representations along lines more in accord with a distinct self-other relationship; begins to sense responsibility to God.

38 Rapprochement (15-22 mos.) -increased mobility and cognitive spurt increases

"awareness of separation" from mother -"the rapprochement crisis": the lure of regressive symbiosis versus a heady increasing autonomy -period of potential "splitting" of "good" and "bad" mother/self representations. Return to conception of God as mysterious, all-encompassing, and understanding force.

Conceptions of God become almost completely internalized, and relationships based more and more on a model of reciprocal relations. Expectations of magical help become more entrenched in complex ideology or theological mechanics, with greater emphasis on the role of the individual's behaviour.

Increasing sense of self-worth which the individual is capable of separating from imagined "divine judgements."

Danger ofsplitting between "good" and "bad" God introjects, and pathological internalized relationships with "bad" God concepts or narcissistic mirroring before

"good" God self-objects, etc.

Individuation: (22-36 mos.) Towards emotional object constancy

-consolidation of unified self-image and maternal introjects.

Individual is on the road to experiencing a relationship with God not based wholly in anthropocentric experiences.

39 Within the terms of Spero's model, therefore, a profound sense of idealized union with God, and a primal and perfect merging with a new religious community following a conversion experience can contain elements of a regressive narcissistic 'fusion.' Later, in phases of adjustment and development analogous to the "practicing," "rapprochement" and "separation-individuation" sub-phases, the individual, compelled by the inevitable disappointments and complexities imposed by reality, begins haltingly to achieve a more realistic, less projective relationship with the religious objects. This would be exemplified for example in the abandonment of unrealistic, idealizing identifications with religious leaders and mentors in exchange for movement toward more complex and integrated religious identifications.

One problematic point in Spero's Mahlerian formulations that he does not appear to address is the empirical literature which has thrown into question the concepts of autism and symbiosis as normative stages in human development (see Stern, 1985). Mahler herself is reported to have later acknowledged this problem and repudiated this aspect of her work later in life (Coates, 2004). Mahler's collaborator Pine (2004) has argued that experimental evidence of cognitive differentiation of perceptual objects (and especially faces) in alert, wakeful states in early infancy does not necessarily preclude the existence of symbiotic functioning at other times. Meanwhile, Silverman (2005) reviewed the empirical literature and concluded that although on its basis "...we cannot rule out a subjective experience" of infantile meiger, nevertheless "[the] burden of proof might well rest on the assertion" of its existence (p. 246).

40 My take on this controversy is that I agree with Blass and Blatt (1996) that when the term "symbiotic" is taken fully out of its biological roots and used metaphorically, it is clear that a variety of experiences throughout life, whether in sexual ecstasy, "highs" in sports, and mystical or mystical-like states, can be described as symbiotic. This, then, will be the type of usage of this term that will be employed here. As for the term autism, this term was coined by Eugen Bleuler in reference to a non-normative, pathological withdrawal in adult schizophrenic states (Kuhn & Cahn, 2004). The term has currency in the present project because the general idea of this type of withdrawal (rather than a more refined meaning of autism in terms of contemporary diagnostic schemata) has relevance in discussions of grandiose, delusional and megalomanic religiosity mentioned in the

Chabad writings and explored in later chapters.

Thus, I am inclined to work with Spero's model despite the challenges to it. This inclination is adumbrated by my earlier research on baalei teshuva or returnees to

Judaism (Lefcoe, 1998), my personal experience as a baal teshuva, and my experience in this area as both a consumer and a provider of psychotherapy in Israel. In the light of these experiences I find Spero's formulations of various types of religious experiencing to be highly suggestive qualitative descriptions with significant heuristic value for clinicians. For this reason, then, in what follows I retain Spero's Mahlerian terminology despite the significant challenge to the empirical validity of its application to infancy, with the caveat that my use of these terms shall relate descriptively to aspects of adult religiosity, while making no claims with respect to linear developmental stages in infancy. Thus, Spero's formulations provide one of the pillars of an integrative "object

41 relations/Chassidic" model of psycho-development in Jewish meditation which I sketch in Chapter 6.

References to Chabad meditation

In the fields of Jewish philosophy and history, there are treatments of the Chabad

School which touch on its meditative aspects to varying degrees. Elior (1993) has offered perhaps the most complete academic interpretation to the overall theosophy and theology of Chabad, including a short chapter placing the contemplative discipline of Chabad into this overall framework.10 Also, in his historical work, Loewenthal (1990) argues for an interpretation of the Chabad School in general in terms of an "ethic of communication" of the previously largely hidden teachings of Jewish mysticism. His book contains rich descriptions of the Chassidim who engaged deeply in the Chabad meditation, as well as some translation and interpretation of primary source material related to hitbonenut.

Foxbrunner's (1992) work is similarly historical in orientation, providing a thorough review of the founding of the school and its character in the first generation. Any of these three works provides a substantial introduction to the fundamental concepts and concerns of Chabad.

Both Kaplan's (1978,1982) and Verman's (1996) surveys of Jewish meditation contain only passing reference to Chabad hitbonenut, focusing rather on a wide variety of

Kabbalistic meditative practices, which for the most part are apparently no longer part of

lo I use the term "theosophy" to refer to any system of thought describing an emanation of reality from the Godhead. The Theosophical Society of the 19th century was occupied with Buddhist and Brahmanic teachings along these lines, yet the term theosophy itself may be used to refer to any system of thought along these lines. With respect to the theosophical dimension of contemporary transpersonal psychology, see Rothberg (1986). a practical living tradition. It is difficult to understand the reasons for this omission. It seems likely that both scholars' main expertise simply lay in areas of Judaism other than

Chassidism and Chabad. Thus Verman's earlier work (1984,1992) was on medieval schools of Kabbalah, a background that is amply and fruitfully reflected in his History and Varieties of Jewish Meditation (Verman, 1996). In his definitive historical survey

Kaplan (1982) also emphasizes earlier Kabbalistic traditions and, when he does broach

Chassidism, seems partial to the teachings of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov—whose self- secluding (hitbodedut) meditation is focused on spontaneous, free-associative prayer— rather than the very different studious-contemplative emphasis of Chabad.

Besides all of these secondary materials, there are an ever-increasing number of

English translations of primary Chabad texts being produced by the active Chabad publishing house, Kehot. The foundational text of Chabad Chassidism, the Tanya of

Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, has been in an English translation for a number of years

(1796/1981). A number of works of later Chabad Rebbes have also appeared in translation, including both formal Chassidic teachings, as well as memoirs, biographies, manuals of Chassidic customs and traditions, and so on.

Also from within the Chassidic tradition, the Gal Einai publishing house in Israel has put out a wealth of material—both in English and Hebrew-on hitbonenut and

Chassidic philosophy in general. This includes previously unpublished hand-written manuscripts from private Chassidic collections, otherwise out-of-print books, as well as contemporary interpretations and applications of hitbonenut based on the lectures of the prominent Chabad Chassidic teacher Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh. I was privileged to study with Rabbi Ginsburgh for several years in Israel as a student at the Od Yosef Chai yeshiva (Talmudic academy) at the Tomb of Joseph in Shechem, where he served as

Dean, and I am indebted to him for much of my own appreciation of these sources and their application, beyond any specific citations to his published works to follow.

This completes the review of the relevant literature. I will now move to a general introduction of the Chabad School.

44 Chapter Two: The Chabad School"

The Chabad approach to Chassidism

The particular style or approach to Chassidism propounded by R. Shneur Zalman

(b.1745) became known as Chabad, which is a Hebrew acronym for the words chochma

(wisdom or insight), binah (understanding), and daat (knowing). This name reflects the intellectualist approach to Chassidism of R. Shneur Zalman-strongly influenced by

Maimonidean thought—in contrast to the more emotive form of ecstatic religiosity that tended to characterize the other branches of the Chassidic movement. Much more detailed history is known about this particular branch of the Chassidic movement than others due to the strong interest of its adherents in maintaining historical records

(Faierstein, 1991).

R. Shneur Zalman guided his adherents in a contemplative meditation called hitbonenut, which derives from the Hebrew root by"n meaning "to understand." The

Chabad chassid was expected to spend long periods of time concentrating on a concept or theme drawn from the elaborate Chassidic teachings. The goal of this meditation was to internalize—gradually, in repeated experiences over years—a heightened perception of

Divine omnipresence, culminating in self-abnegation and utter absorption in the Divine

(Elior, 1993; Ginsburgh, 1993; Shneuri, 1831/1991,1820/1995).

The main source material for these meditations is Chassidic discourses

(maamarim). These discourses are a composite of Kabbalistic, Talmudic and philosophic "Where not otherwise cited, the following summary account is based on the historical work of Foxbrunner (1992), Loewenthal (1990) and Schneersohn (1988) 45 teachings, woven round the central point of Divine omnipresence. The discourses are erudite and intellectually demanding, while being centred upon mystical themes. They represent a paradoxical yet strangely satisfying hybrid or synthesis of the mystical and the rational, the Kabbalistic and the philosophical. For many, lengthy, in-depth analysis of these discourses begins to invoke an altered state of awareness. The meditative discipline of Chabad is more intellectually demanding of its adherents than other approaches, yet also provides more material with which to work, in the form of the discourses.

R. Shneur Zalman was succeeded by his son, Dov Ber, generally known as the

Mittler ("Middle") Rebbe (henceforth "Rabbi Dov Ber"). He also instructed the Chabad adherents in the ways of hitbonenut meditation, publishing a number of foundational texts on the subject (two of which are central to my own inquiry), and prescribing individualized regimens of study and practice. Older and more experienced Chabad adepts were also encouraged by Rabbi Dov Ber to instruct newcomers, and important teachers arose from amongst this latter group who began to publish their own redactions of Chassidic teaching and practice. (One of these individuals in particular, a chassid known as Hillel of Paritzch, became the pre-eminent practical educator of meditation in

Chabad. His writings provide important points of reference in the following chapters).

There have been seven Chabad Rebbes in all, since Rabbi Shneur Zalman's time to the present. All have expounded new teachings and have provided leadership in the circumstances of their particular generation (e.g., under the trials of Czarist, and later

Bolshevik repression, and then the very different challenges encountered in America and modem Israel). With regard to hitbonenut, however, the fundamental texts upon which I

46 rely have remained paradigmatic.

Chabad as psychology

The Chabad literature and associated oral traditions are uniquely psychological in a number of important ways. In general, as with all other Chassidic offshoots of the Baal

Shem Tov's legacy, Chabad is concerned with the inner orientation, the inner gesture informing Jewish life, as much as with the outer practices and laws of Judaism. (It was partly this emphasis which placed Chassidism at odds with some Rabbinic authorities, who considered it a threat to the exoteric structures of Judaism). Party to this emphasis is a concern with psychological states accompanying religious activity and life in general

(actually, the two are synonymous in Judaism), such as underlying states of motivation, authenticity, enthusiasm or the lack thereof, concentration, and emotion. The Chassidic discourse on authenticity, and "vividness of personal experience," along with anti- hierarchical themes, have given rise to interpretations of the 18th century movement as evidencing strikingly modern and humanistic trends (Blumenthal, 1982, p. 195). I believe that the psychological perspective and emphasis of the key texts we will be examining should also been seen in this modernist, humanistic light.

This general psychological concern of Chassidism was reflected in the way previous teachings of Jewish mysticism were interpreted and incorporated into Chassidic thought. The Lurianic Kabbalah communicates metaphysical ideas using a complex system of metaphors based on the human body. Thus, a simple example is that the "right hand" represents "giving" whereas the "left hand" represents "judgement" or

"withholding." A basic principle of Chassidism is to understand each specific Kabbalistic metaphoric element in terms of an inner human experience, thereby recasting the entire

Torah teachings into a dimension or frame of reference called "nefesh," meaning soul, or psyche12 (Ginsburgh, 1996). Thus, in the above example, the Chassidic interpretation retains the original Kabbalistic terms of reference, but adds that the emotion of "love" corresponds with the right hand and with giving, whereas "fear" corresponds to the left hand and withholding. In each case, it is the inner experience (in this case emotional)—the inner, psychological concomitant of "giving," or of "withholding"~which is stressed (i.e., one gives when one loves; one withholds when one fears that giving may be destructive13).

Chassidism can be described as psychological both in terms of its overall orientation and emphasis as well as, in the case of Chabad, its detailed hermeneutical re- envisioning of previous systems of Judaic thought. In Chabad Chassidism there was also an additional catalyst to the development of an elaborate psychological discourse. This was the practical project of applying the meditative discipline of hitbonenut to people of all walks of life.

The accrued experience in this project over the early years in Chabad taught that there were many factors which could affect the way any given individual would react upon attempting to apply seriously the demanding Chabad meditative practice. Thus there

12 Nefesh' really includes the meanings of both 'soul' (as a more spiritual aspect) and 'psyche' (more practical and embodied). Both the Hebrew nefesh and the Greek psyche relate to root-words meaning "breath."

13 Of course, one can give, or withhold, for many other reasons. These characterizations represent the "fully rectified" situation (olam ha-tikkun), whereas there is another scheme for unrectified or "fallen" emotional attributes. 48 began to emerge a body of "clinical lore" which took account of such factors as intelligence, emotional reactivity, age, characterological features, place of residence (e.g., urban or rural), motivation, etc. Also, people who came to Chabad suffering from what is now called psychopathology, such as depression (mara shechora), anxiety (itzavon), or even what we might now call personality disorders (sheker atzmi, "self falsehood"), were essentially "psycho-analyzed" in Chassidic terms, and advised on how to proceed in their meditative work (Loewenthal, 1990; Shneuri, 1831/1991).

The major source texts of this tradition thus represent the fruit of an intense dialectical exchange between theory and practice in the application of meditative teachings. Contributing to theory are arrayed the deep and broad resources of 3000 years of Judaic intellectual heritage, starting with the Torah itself, and including the Talmudic,

Midrashic, Responsa, Zoharic, Lurianic, and Jewish philosophical literatures.14 On the practical side are empirical (or "clinical") observation (e.g., of new students in the

Chassidic academy), along with introspective and empathic analysis of cognitive and

14 A brief summary of the meaning of these terms is called for. The 'Torah' refers mainly to the Pentateuch, or more broadly to the entire Hebrew Bible including the Prophets and the Writings, or even more broadly, to the entire tradition of Torah thought. The 'Talmudic'literature, consisting of the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmuds, records the oral tradition of homiletic and legal exegesis of the Torah, primarily in the form of the debates and teachings of the leading Jewish scholars of the first several centuries of the common era. The Midrash is also a collection of oral teachings recorded in the same period, where these have a markedly more allegorical and homiletic than a legal emphasis. The Responsa literature consists of responses of later Rabbinic authorities to queries of Talmudic law. The Zoharic literature is the main repository of the mystical interpretation of Torah: the Kabbalah. The "Lurianic" Kabbalah is a later approach to the Zoharic literature, originating in the teachings of Rabbi Yitzchak Luria, who established a mystical school in the Jewish community of Tsfat in northern Israel in the 1500s. As indicated above, the Jewish philosophical literature includes authorities such as Maimonides, Nachmanides, Bachya and others, who developed religious philosophies addressing theological issues in terms of the Greek philosophical systems as known at the time.

49 emotive processes arising from the contemplative meditation process itself (e.g., Shneuri,

1831/1991). Experience is captured and expressed through hallowed concepts and ideas, and hallowed concepts and ideas are in turn made the intimate companions of personal experience.

The sefirotic faculty psychology

All of the above factors led, over the generations, to the progressive development of a unique type of psychological discourse in Chabad. The classical psychological ideas of

Jewish philosophy are synthesized with concepts drawn from the Kabbalah to form what

I would like to call a "sefirotic faculty psychology.'"5 This psychology then serves both as a key metaphor for understanding the Kabbalistic theosophy, and as a source of the basic conceptual tools for understanding the processes of hitbonenut motivationally, ideationally, emotionally and behaviourally. This corpus in turn serves to inform self- analysis and training on the Jewish meditative path. The following summary of the approach draws on the works of Shneur Zalman of Liadi (1796/1981), Shneuri

(1820/1995), and relies for its systematic presentation on the concise summary of

Ginsburgh (1996).

The sefirotic faculty psychology recognizes five general levels of psychic function: the un- or super-conscious ("hidden", ne-elam); the ideational (muscal); the affective

(murgash); the habitual-behavioural (mutba)\ and the expressive psychic

15 This term "sefirotic" is a reference to the Kabbalistic doctrine of the "ten illuminations" (Hebrew [plural]: "sefirof), as basic units in the metaphysical account of creation found in the Kabbalah. The ten "sefirof function as a kind of "general systems theory" that can be applied to any structure—physical, temporal or abstract—in reality, including the psyche (which is what the Chabad sources focus on). 50 "garments" (levushim, namely: thought, speech, and action). Each of these five levels or layers of function in the psyche-ne/es/i has subsidiary "triplets" of specific faculties (or what are called "garments" in the case of the latter, expressive level), for a total of 15 aspects.

The three un- or super-conscious ("hidden," neelam) faculties are, from higher to lower14: faith or trust (emuna), pleasure (taanug), and will {ratzori). Everything to do with motivation, desire, pleasure, and simple being or bliss, relates to these three levels. These three faculties are also considered to be "general" or "all-inclusive" (Mali), in the sense that they are understood to underlie and to activate or motivate all the other, derivative faculties holistically.

The next group of three faculties is the ideational17(muscat) grouping, consisting of wisdom (chochma), understanding (binah), and knowing (daat). "Wisdom"—as chochma is invariably translated— is really a very partial translation of the key concept of chochma in formal Chassidic-Kabbalistic thought. First of all, whether or not someone is wise he or she at least possesses a faculty of chochma, which represents at root the ability of the mind to "gaze" (histaclut) with intelligence upon an object or idea. Leibniz and Wundt's use of the term apperception (see Fancher, 1996), as the intelligent gaze of the mind, captures this important aspect of the term chochma. The Arabic al-aqal, usually

16 See Rothberg (1986), and in the previous chapter, for insight on the meaning of "higher and lower" in this type of theosophical system.

17 I'm using 'ideational' and not 'cognitive' in order to connote the classical Greek eideia, as something existing beyond the mind but that the mind can grasp (see the following section). 'Idea' seems to me to be a good translation of the Hebrew muscal, although tiie somewhat cumbersome 'intelligible' (as a noun, as in Bakan's [1993] "incorporeal intelligibles") is a better literal translation. The following subsection will address some related issues. 51 translated as Reason, is the term used by the medieval Jewish philosophers such as

Bachya, Maimonides, the latter's son Abraham, and the Pietist movement of philosophic mystics which followed them (Blumenthal, 1988; Fenton, 1981; Lobel, 2007). For both the philosophers and for the Chassidim, chochma is a key concept because it is considered the bridge or portal by way of which the individual connects to Godly wisdom and Presence.

A wise person, in this understanding, is he or she for whom this visual-ideational faculty is highly developed and dominates his or her personality. The individual seems to operate through intelligent "sight", without the need for discursive analysis. Chochma always retains the quality of being a "visual" faculty, in the sense of seeing the point of something, of "insight," of being enlightened, and thereby attached to Reason in a transcendent sense." It is associated in the Lurianic Kabbalah with the right side of the brain or mind (moach yemini).

The next ideational faculty is "understanding", binah, associated with the left brain

(moach smali). Classical Rabbinic commentary associates binah with the notion of

18 The Samkhya Yogic philosopher Patanjali describes a level of pure ideation "...beyond discursive thought or language", wherein "...the mirror of the mind simply takes the form of the subtle object, without label or comment" (Pflueger, 19981P- 65). Chochma implies precisely this type of immediate and intimate "seeing" of an ideational form, transcendent of any enclothement (hitlabshut) of the idea in "letters of thought" (as we will see presently with respect to the faculty of binah, understanding). Wilber's (1995) term "vision logic", based on research into the post formal (i.e. beyond the Piagetian level of formal operations) thinking processes of creative artists and scientists, appears to be similar to the term chochma as used in the psychological context in Chabad (the term also has much broader meanings). Pacual-Leone (2000) has attempted a complex neuroscientific modelling of the emergence of these post-formal levels of cognition through both natural life experience and meditative disciplines.

52 "building" or "constructing" something.19 The English word "conceptualize" also translates aspects of what is meant by binah in Chassidic texts. In binah, the appereeived object of the "eye of wisdom" is given new dimensions. The object is analyzed, formulated, given expression in language—what are called "letters of thought." Binah thus "constructs" the object in a manner that allows for its assimilation into the person's inner world of meaning. Nevertheless, at the core of binah, the logos-point of intended meaning (called the nekuda) drawn from chochma, remains.

In one parable binah is called "mother," and chochma "father," and the relationship between the two faculties is understood in terms of "conception" as in "to conceive an idea." The "seed" or holistic-essential point of meaning of the idea emerges from father- chochma into the "womb" of mother-Zw'naA. The subsequent elaboration of the idea—into

"letters of thought," examples, and so on—in binah, is spoken of in terms of gestation

(ibur).20

The faculty of knowing, daat, associated with the midbrain (moach emtzai) in the

Lurianic system, is of central significance to hitbonenut. Daat is defined as psychological connectedness, hitkashrut. The main source text for daat is in Genesis (4:1): "And the

Adam knew his wife Eve, and she conceived, and gave birth to Cain..." Thus, daat implies an intimate knowing, a kind of creative union with the known object. Some

19 See for example the Talmudic tractate oiNiddah, 45b, and the exegesis of Rashi on Exodus 32:5.

20 Bakan (1975), in comments for a 1973 APA symposium on "Speculation in Psychology," observed that: "Our language is filled with terms for the knowledge process which connote eroticism: ideas are "conceptions," some we characterize as "pregnant," we attend "seminars" and "disseminate" knowledge, some minds are more "fertile" than others, etc... It would be reasonable to suppose that the general forces of sexual repression are operative in preventing the development of knowledge" (p.23). 53 important meanings apparent in related Chabad discussions are memory, cathexis, and empathic awareness (as will be shown in later chapters). A deficit in the faculty of daat implies an immaturity, showing as a superficiality of engagement with objects. There is also a "fallen" form of daat (associated with the "Tree of Knowledge [daat] of Good and

Evil of Genesis) in which one "knows"—invests in, cathects, connects with—one's own

"somethingness" or yeshut at the expense of responding to others (Shneuri, 1991). In

Chapter 4 below I will argue that in important respects this concept of "somethingness" is isomorphic with a version of the concept of narcissism in contemporary psychoanalysis.

After the three ideational faculties come three affective faculties, the level of murgash ("felt"). These are lovingkindness (chesed), strength or stringency (gevurah), and mercy or sympathy (tiferet-rachamim), and they represent three fundamental relational orientations to the object, namely, drawing near to or giving to a loved object; pushing away or withholding from a feared object or outcome; and the overriding of the latter tendency to allow for connection with an object despite elements that complicate simple giving. These three are thus precisely thesis, antithesis, and synthesis in the emotional domain. The stable emotional tendencies of an individual-what is called

"character"—are called "measures," middot.

The fourth triplet of faculties is the habitual or behavioural, mutba domain. The word mutba, with its Hebrew root-word tb"a, connotes an impression, like a coin

(matbea) that has a picture impressed on it. Tb"a is also the root meaning "nature."

Mutba thus connotes action tendencies, behavioural predispositions that have been

"impressed" and become a person's "nature." The three mutba behavioural tendencies

54 are confidence {netzach-bitachori), acknowledgment {hod), and verification (yesod-emet).

Here again, the first represents a tendency towards expansive movement outwards, the second a pulling back in deference to and acknowledgement of some other agency, and the third a pushing towards "making true" or actualizing something (that is what is meant here by "verification") despite a mitigating other (or opposing) force. Once again: a thesis, then antithesis, and then a synthesis which emphasizes continued relationship despite mitigating factors.

Coming out of all these faculties, there is actual expression. This aspect is understood to include what are called three "garments" of the psyche, namely, thought, speech, and action. The reason why "thought" appears here as an expressive "garment" of the psyche, when "ideational" faculties have already been discussed, seems to be because not all thought is considered ideational, i.e., referring to or grasping an intelligible idea.

For example, hirhur refers to a kind of mental speech, a type of thought that is not ideational in the (classical) sense implied here.

Situating Chabad theoretically as a psychology

It is evident that Chabad psychology shows the basic features of what would be called a "faculty" approach to psychological theorizing, such as is found in classical

Greek psychology, in Maimonides, and the Scholastic philosophers up to Brentano (who instructed both Freud and Husserl). Bakan21 has recently advocated a return to this

S1 In 1995 or 1996,1 had in my possession a brief, rough manuscript given to me by the late Prof. Bakan, which provided a point-form sketch of theoretical foundations for a renewed faculty-based psychology. I later misplaced the manuscript, and Prof. Bakan (personal communication, July, 2000), while still endorsing the approach, was unable to locate a copy of this document. 55 classical approach to psychology, elements of which are evident in the contemporary modularity hypothesis (Fodor, 1983, and see Reber, 1985, under "module").

An important element of this classical psychology is the notion of the intentional object taken up from neo-Aristotelian Scholasticism by Brentano (1973) in turn linked to the lekton in the terms of the ancient Stoic philosophers (see Bakan, 1993). Brentano argues that all mental acts are intentional by which he means that they always have an object. Thus, if I say the word "crown," I have in mind what I mean by that. The speech act itself, as a mental act, is only comprehensible in terms of this intended meaning or object. Thus, I may mean the crown on my tooth, the crown on the queen's head, or the owner of a national park ("crown land"). It is the same with all psychological acts, such as emotions and actions. The reflex kick of the leg in response to the doctor's rubber hammer would not therefore be considered a "psychological act" for Brentano, neither would the unworked perceiving of formless colour, or contextless sounds (even a musical chord) and the like, whereas kicking one's little brother would be (Brentano, 1973;

Forman, 1999).

To appreciate the contrast with other modern schools of thought we may take as a case in point Radical Behaviourism, which attempts to construct psychology without recourse to an intentional object. Accordingly to this school, I said "crown" strictly because emitting this sound was rewarded in some way in the past, and not because of any inner "intention" or meaning. The sound is the fully determined result of a learning history, and thus is in principle fully comprehensible in terms of this history alone, without any necessary reference to "meaning" per se. The computer model of mind of

56 cognitive psychology similarly has no room for a core concept of intended meaning, preferring instead a similarly mechanistic, deterministic mode of explanation.

Brentano influenced his student Husserl's (1973) development of philosophical phenomenology where the intentional object is now thought of as a phenomenon and where the procedure of "bracketing" (the putting to one side presuppositions about a given phenomenon) is used to enable a description of the essence of the phenomenon.

This development in turn helped to lay the framework for a broader inquiry into the notion of human meaning by the humanistic and existential schools (Bakan, 1993). In classical psychoanalysis, echoes of Brentano's "intentional object" can be discerned in the object of the desirous "wish," the cathected object, which in later psychoanalytic theorizing becomes the focus of the array of motives and internal representations of concern to the British "object relations" school. These theories describe the rich dynamic interplay of the self and other representations which inhabit—and in important ways are constitutive of— the human personality (in terms of the sense of identity, transference, habitual patterns of emotional and behavioural responses, and so forth). As we will see in some detail further on, Rizzuto (1981) argues that people in the western world as a rule tend to have an object representation of God, a "God representation'—whether they are nominally religious believers or not—which abides in the psyche to be related to or ignored or embraced or denied in idiosyncratic ways.

In the neo-Aristotelian22 style in which we find it in Chabad, this faculty

22 The corpus of Aristotle available in Arabic in the medieval period included an apocryphal work called The Theology of Aristotle, actually authored by Plotinus, which contained many neo-Platonic elements. We will follow here the terminology of Blumenthal (1982) whereby the term "neo-Aristotelian" refers to the medieval thinkers

57 psychology regards the mind as an organ that directly apprehends its intentional object- intelligible form (the Greek /og

Precisely because the essence [of an object in the world] does instantiate

an order [logos], it is intelligible. Mind can grasp the order manifested in

an essence, and thus we can give an account or a definition of

it...Aristotle thinks the very same logos present in the form [of the object],

and in the definition: that is why the definition is a definition...[The logos]

is that which is realized..in natural organisms, it is that which a single

definition can capture as the essence of these organisms, it is that which

the mind can apprehend (p. 29).

This great (pre-Kantian) confidence in the ability of the mind to grasp and fuse with intelligibility comes to Chabad in part through the vehicle of classical Jewish philosophy of Maimonides, with its emphasis on intellectual endeavour as the primary vehicle for drawing oneself, through wisdom and knowledge, finally to a direct, ecstatic contact

(wusul in Arabic) with the "Active Intellect" or Divine Mind.23 The founding Rabbi of

Chabad, Shneur Zalman of Liadi, (1748/1981) emphasizes this aspect of union (yichud) of the mind with the idea or intentional object that is sought through intellectualist contemplation, such that: who relied upon this text for the their understanding of Aristotle.

33 On Maimonides' rational mysticism see for example Blumenthal (1988), and Bakan, Merkur and Weiss (2009).

58 Any mind when apperceiving and comprehending an idea, grasps and

surrounds it, and the idea itself is grasped and surrounded, and enclothed

in the mind that comprehended and apperceived it. The mind is also

enclothed in the idea, while comprehending and grasping it... This is a

wondrous union—the likes of which and the degree of which are not to be

found at all in physicality—to become one, utterly unified, from every

angle and aspect (pp. 17-18).

When ultimately the intentional object that is contemplated (or felt emotional about, or acted in reference to) is God, all of this takes on some rather intriguing implications.

When contemplating God, the noetic "union" of the mind (and by extension the entire psyche) with the intentional object is understood to imply unio mystica, or deveikut to use the Hebrew term favoured by the Baal Shem Tov and his students, with the mind becoming the faculty mediating that union. In this case of the intentional "Object called

God" (Spero, 1990, p. 54), the internal object representation that potentiates this union is always of necessity incomplete.24 Nevertheless, the growth in apprehending God is accompanied by growth in the degree of union with God. The effort along these lines is what is called hitbonenut.

This broadly "object relational" orientation of the Chabad sefirotic faculty psychology, in part a derivative of its neo-Aristotelian Maimonidean pedigree, provides for a core compatibility with other systems with which it shares this geneology of ideas, such as the Scholastics, and from there to Brentano, Freud, and the object relations 24 In the same vein Leibniz opined that God—characterized in his philosophy as the "supreme monad"—is apprehensible, but only incompletely (Fancher, 1996). 59 theorists (and with humanistic psychology through Husserl) (see Bakan, 1993). This orientation is relevant throughout this study, and in particular to the integrative model to be proposed in Chapter 6.

In Chapter 5, with respect to more advanced, trance-like stages of this intellectualist mystical path, we will acknowledge an evolution in the applicable notion of intentionality, as the subject-object dualism it requires gives way, in the final stages of bittul (self-abnegation or self-annihilation [Elior, 1993; Matt, 1990]), to a unified field of consciousness in the divine ayin (possibly related to what has been called a "pure consciousness experience" [PCE] [Forman, 1999]). Thus, it will be shown how the

Chassidic psychology incorporates both intentional, and non-intentional modalities of functioning in its account of different phases on the meditative path. For now, however, having provided an overall sketch of the Chabad School with a view to its intellectual lineage and psychological emphasis, the way is now clear to take a closer look at the practice of hitbonenut itself.

60 Chapter Three: Hitbonenut25

A prominent early 19th-centuiy Chabad adept and teacher of its meditative praxis

writes that the practice of hitbonenut evolved through three major phases in the history of

the movement (Hillel ben Meir of Paritch, undated manuscript). In the first generation of

Chabad, the senior Chassidim following Shneur Zalman (known as the "Alter Rebbe" or

"Old Rebbe") were themselves accomplished masters of the classical Kabbalah, who would normally be expected to utilize the complex cavanot or meditative "intentions" of the Lurianic theurgic system during prayer. Thus, meditation in the time of Rabbi Shneur

Zalman was directly associated with the concentration, during prayer, on the deeper

Kabbalistic allusions of the prayers themselves, along with a sense of Chassidic enthusiasm and excitement.

In the second generation of Chabad Rabbi Dov Ber of Lubavitch produced several expositions of Chabad meditation, most importantly for our purposes the Kuntres Ha- hitbonenut (Shaar Ha-Yichud), [The Tract on Meditation (Gate of Union)] 1820/1995),

as With respect to this, and ensuing chapters which deal directly with the practice of hitbonenut meditation, the issue was raised during editing of the use of masculine-only pronouns—both in the primary sources themselves, and in my explication of them—to refer to the individual applying these practices; the "meditator." After some consultation with present-day Chabad teachers (male and female), it was determined that to add feminine pronouns in this context would be to fail to represent these sources accurately, and the Chassidic tradition in practice, which both understand hitbonenut as described here as something that is generally done by men. This issue is embedded of course in the more general issue of the gender spheres and spirituality in Judaism. These gender spheres have been the subject of divergent interpretation and much debate in recent years between traditionalist and feminist authors. It is not my intention to enter this debate here, although I do recommend Kaufman's (1993) The Woman in Jewish Law and Tradition for a good introduction to the Torah source texts that are brought to bear on these issues.

61 and the Kuntres Ha-Hitpaalut, [Tract on Ecstasy] (1831/1991).* In Rabbi Dov Ber's time, the time and focus of meditation shifted from the actual prayers themselves, to immediately preceding the formal prayers (but see Loewenthal, 1990, pp. 160-161), and consisted of an intense, concentrative engagement with the Kabbalistic-Chassidic teachings which describe in great detail the emanation of existence from ayin, Godly

"nothingness" (akin to the perennialist "holarchy" [Wilber, 1992, p. 7], or "hierarchic ontology" [Rothberg, 1986]).

Amongst the Chassidim of Rabbi Dov Ber were those who would spend hours in trance-like states, moving in the mind's eye through the various levels of the Kabbalistic-

Chassidic system from the Essence of God down to the physical world (Loewenthal,

1990). This process was to proceed until the specific terms and meanings informing the initial studious contemplation would become so suffused with the "Light" (ohr) of direct pneumatic insight, that they would give way to the silent intellective "gazing" (histaclus) of the "eye of wisdom", and ultimately to the introvertive unio mystica of deveikufi1

("joining" or "bonding" with God28, which as mentioned was a key Kabbalistic term of the Baal Shem Tov). The discipline that this lengthy detailed iprati) meditation demanded

26 The latter text has been translated into English by Louis Jacobs (Shneuri, 1831/1963). However, only brief selections of the two, crucial commentaries on the text by Rabbi Dov Ber Of Lubavitch's prime disciple, Hillel Paritcher, were translated. In general the text does not translate well due to its inherent subtlety and use of a technical Kabbalistic terminology and an allusoiy usage of classical Hebrew.

27 As discussed in a footnote to the subsection God as a relational object in Chapter 1, contrary to Scholem (1941), who was relied upon by Stace (i960), and Katz (1978) deveikut here is most definitely an absorptive Jewish unio mystica. For self-annihilation in Chassidism see Matt (1990) and Elior (1993).

28 The allusion to the psychological "bonding" of an infant to its parents, forming the matrix out of which the personality is formed, is intentional. 62 of Rabbi Dov Ber of Lubavitch's Chassidim became legendary in Chabad, as did the piety and inspiration that it instilled in them.

By the time of the third generation in Chabad, led by the Rebbe known as the

Tzemach Tzedek (after a Judeo-legal work he penned of that name), most Chassidim were no longer able to concentrate with the requisite intensity and duration that was demanded by the detailed (prati) form of hitbonenut. Thus there was another shift in emphasis, such that the focus of meditation became the individual Chassidic discourse, the maamar. The Chassidim were no longer expected to review the entire theosophic downchaining of worlds (hishtalshelut ha-olamot) before the morning prayer service.

They were still expected to have knowledge of this overall "map" (Schneerson,

1942/1988) but it was to become rather like a "background," while the specific level or topic of the specific maamar would now become the "figure" or focus of meditation. This is in contradistinction to Rabbi Dov Ber of Lubavitch's Chassidim, who would subsume the specific topic of that day's meditation into the overall panentheistic "Lurianic-Hasidic landscape" of their meditation (Loewenthal, 1990, p.125; Hillel ben Meir of Paritch, undated manuscript). The term "panentheism," meaning "All is in God"~as distinct from both pantheism and theism—has been used to characterize this Chassidic theology

(Blumenthal, 1982; Lamm 1971; for broader treatments of the term "panentheism," see

Cooper, 2006 and Hartshorne, Hartshorne, & William, 1953).

Despite all such later developments and shifts of emphasis, the fundamental parameters of the meditative process, and its purposive impact on the personality, are understood in Chabad according to the paradigmatic treatments of Rabbi Shneur Zalman,

63 and Rabbi Dov Ber of Lubavitch (Shalom Dovber, 1924/1988). Accordingly, my focus in what follows is on hitbonenut as expounded in the classic early texts, with periodic references to later works and commentaries where appropriate.

The maamar: Unit of contemplation

The basic unit of these teachings for meditative work is, as mentioned, the maamar, the Chassidic discourse or sermon. Hitbonenut begins with study of, then deeper contemplation and visualization of the Kabbalistic-Chassidic teachings of the maamar.

Deeper levels of meditative work that ensue from this studious beginning are discussed in subsequent sections.

A maamar typically begins with a subject such as an aspect of Jewish life or practice, perhaps a current festival, or a biblical or Talmudic passage related to the weekly Torah Reading29. This initial topic is then problematized in some way, with a question or series of questions being asked about it. Then it is proposed that in order to understand this topic another topic needs to be understood. There may be several such digressions, until the maamar ultimately returns on itself, addressing the initial questions and paradoxes, yet often in manner that compels the mind to sustain paradox in order to understand the resolution.

These teachings describe a continuous emergence of being from God's essence. At times they are concerned with varieties of Infinities, a kind of Aristotelian typology of the

29 According to ancient custom the entire text of the Pentateuch is divided into portions, which are read in the synagogue each Sabbath morning.

64 unlimited (with resonances with Cantorian group or set theory30), or of Nothingnesses

(ayin). There are many Infinities, many Nothingnesses to be studied in great detail. It is difficult to describe how, upon protracted analysis, the Chassidic-Kabbalistic teachings begin to change the way the mind deals with paradox, the paradox of being and non- being, finitude and infinity, oneness and multiplicity, existence and essence.31 Here

James' "ineffability" is thrown into sharp relief, realized with uncanny immediacy in the mind of the intellective mystic.

Thus, the Chabad meditative path has been aptly described as a "paradoxical ascent to God" (Elior, 1993). Things that cannot be thought, are. In a process that must bear similarities to that of acquiring knowledge of quarks and other paradoxical quantum phenomena in modern physics, one is gradually trained to "see" gradations, distinctions, degrees in the quality of reality, where initially there had been only what comes to be seen as a crude, binary opposition: it is or it isn't.

It would not serve my purpose here to begin to tiy and provide detailed examples of

30 This connection is developed by the mathematician Z.V. Saks (1990) in a compelling article entitled Applications of mathematical infinity in Jewish philosophy. In his introduction, he writes: My field of expertise is topology, and the best way that I have of describing my work is to say that I did research into abstract infinite space. In fact, I used to say that my doctoral thesis and the research that followed it had no known relationship with the physical world. Many people used to ask me to speculate on what possible application there might be for this work, and I had no meaningful answer. Thus it came as a great surprise to me when I began to study Torah, and in particular Chassidic philosophy, and specifically the description of the creation of the world by God, that I felt that this was indeed the actual application of the mathematical work which I had done (p. 125).

311 have found interesting echoes of aspects of this evolution in Wilber's (1995) discussion of "vision-logic," as cited earlier in reference to the Chabad sefirotic faculty psychology.

65 these teachings, which would require extensive introductions to the usage of Kabbalistic

metaphoric language, its Chassidic adaptations, and the overall theosophical framework. I

trust that the reader who wishes to enter the "mystical garden" of such matters will find

his or her way. My concern here is a specific one: the psychological description of the

process of developing insight, as recorded in the Chassidic texts of interest, and

interpreted within the framework of contemporary psychological terminology. For this

purpose it will be sufficient to give only a general, capsule treatment of fundamental

Chassidic-Kabbalistic teachings, as a necessary background to understanding the context

of hitbonenut and the psychological vicissitudes it entails.

Immanence, transcendence, essence

The Chassidic philosophy informing hitbonenut revolves around a three-fold

proposition about the relationship between the cosmos (and by implication the meditator

as part of the cosmos), and its ontological source (Hillel, 1868/1995). This general

teaching (the core basis of the more detailed theosophical expositions of the Chassidic

corpus) is that: a) God fills the world (memalei col almin); b) transcends the world (sovev col almin); and c) relative to God's essence the world is considered as nothingness ("cula kamei cela chashiv," "all is considered naught before Him").

With respect to immanence, "filling the world," the oft-cited biblical proof-text states simply: "...the heavens and the earth I do fill (ani maleh)" (Jeremiah, 23:24). In the terms of the foundational Kabbalistic work, the Tikunei Zohar [The Accessories of the

Zohar] this is phrased as: "There is no place devoid of Him" (Tikun 57, p. 91b).32 This

32 See also Shneur Zalman of Liadi (1796/1981), p. 166 (p. 315 in the English

66 teaching goes hand in hand with the complementaiy teaching of "continuous creation" (Shneur Zalman of Liadi, 1796/1981), namely that reality and eveiything in it is being continuously created moment by moment out of absolute nothingness by God. Both teachings relate to the aspect of divine immanence, or the "light33 that fills all worlds" (ohr ha-memalei col almin).

Then there is transcendence, the "light that surrounds all worlds" (ohr ha-sovev col almin). God's infinite (en sof) transcendent light is said to subsume the immanent light such that the latter and its derivatives (i.e., all reality) are relatively "naught" in the transcendent light. Yet, by virtue of its relation—even by transcendence—with the world, the transcendent light still evidences some common reference-frame with created reality.

Not so the essence (atzmut) of God, which is the Unknowable, and to which even the appellation "Infinite" cannot be attached (Hillel, 1868/1995). This three-level conceptual structure (immanence, transcendence, and essence) recurs in different guises throughout the Chassidic teachings.

Bittul

Each of these three aspects (immanence, transcendence, and essence) is relatively nullified (batel) in the next higher (ontically superior) one. This concept of nullification

(bittul) requires explanation because of its central importance to the goals of hitbonenut. bittul does not imply nullification in the sense of destruction. The main Chabad Chassidic translation), and his citation there oiZohar, Ray a Mehemna on the Torah portion of Pinchas.

33 "Light" here is to be interpreted as 'divine creative consciousness.'

67 parable for the notion of bittul is that of a ray of light while still in the body of the sun

(Shneur Zalman of Liadi, 1796/1981). Such a ray exists, but it is relatively nullified and absorbed in the sun. The ray "doesn't come up by name" (p. 155); it has no quality of separateness; it is so suffused and surrounded and outshone by its source that it recedes to absolute insignificance by comparison.34 It is infinitely humbled, yet is still existent. It is not destroyed.

With respect to meditation, it needs to be appreciated that according to this philosophy all reality is always completely nullified in God; there is only God. When the

Chassidic sources speak about hitbonenut as a means to bring about bittul in the individual, the intention is not to bring about this ontic bittul which is understood to already be the case regardless (Shneur Zalman, 1796/1981). Instead, the intention of hitbonenut is to enable the individual to become conscious of the a priori bittul; to see, appreciate, to live out this ever-present reality through a gradual, cultivated process of internalization at every level of the psyche.

We could say simply that hitbonenut is this process of internalization. This is succinctly expressed in the following exegetical comments of Hillel Paritcher on the opening paragraph of the Code of Jewish Law (Shulchan Aruch, 1:1). The Code quotes the biblical verse "I have placed God before me always" (Psalms 16:8) and declares that the Jew should think of God as a "great king" who "stands over him and observes his activities." Through this awareness "...fear [of God] will come to him," and he will

34 Thus it is clear that 'nothingness' here is always a relative term. I suspect that this may be an important point of distinction between hitbonenut and some schools of Eastern meditation, although I'm not schooled enough in Eastern sources to assert that definitively. 68 therefore measure his words and deeds carefully. This classic opening passage frames the entire endeavour of Jewish observance, detailed in the rest of the Code. On this key passage, Hillel Paritcher comments:

They [the authors of this Judeo-legal teaching] have spoken, however,

exoterically... therefore they have written "...stands over him," which

implies [God is] like an 'other' [zulato] who stands over him. But the truth

is that he is not separate from Him at all, and is nullified in Him

absolutely, since He flows into his entire inner being, and his innermost

inner being, and is bringing him into existence, and vitalizing him every

instant. We find [therefore] that the human being is not outside of Him at

all, and consequently the matter of "fear" is to be interpreted not

according to the simple meaning, that he "fears" something that is outside

of himself. Rather, its interpretation is 'abnegation' [bittuf); namely that

"fear will come to him," meaning to the point where he becomes

completely self-abnegated to Him, not being an existent unto himself at

all, in any way... And this is the ultimate intention [of Judaism], as it is

written: "The end of the matter, when all is said and done: Fear God

etc.." (Ecclesiastes, 12:13) (Hillel, 1868/1995, p. 342).

The deeper meaning of the very first law of the Code of Jewish Law, in its

reference to the "fear of God" is interpreted here as an injunction to become increasingly aware that one is not separate from God. ("Fear", from the Hebrew root ra "h, is often

connected homiletically in Rabbinical texts with the verb "to see", from the root yr"a).

69 This progressive growth in awareness correlates with a reduction in the degree of reality,

let's say the 'ontic priority' that one ascribes to oneself relative to God ("until he becomes

completely self-abnegated to Him, not being an existent unto himself at all, in any

way..." [Hillel, 1868/1995, p. 342]).

This process is the meditative process, it is being explained by this exegete as

something fundamental to Jewish practice, and its goals, psychologically speaking, could

not be more ambitious:

"And know this day, and take upon your heart, that the Lord is God, in the

heavens above, and on the earth below, there is nothing

else" (Deuteronomy 4:39). The intention here is not a superficial knowing,

which stands apart from the person himself (bechinat makkif) [literally:

"in a manner of surrounding"]. Rather [the intention is] a knowing and

feeling that is like an internalized light bechinat ohrpnimi), until all the

faculties of the psyche [nefesh] are drawn along after it (Hillel,

1868/1995).

An alternative, psychologically rich and suggestive analogy for bittul (besides that

of the ray of light in the sun), can be based on the Kabbalistic-Chassidic concept of

"second gestation" (ibursheini) (e.g., Epstein, 1918/1971) occurring through hitbonenut.

The fetus is considered to be in a relation of bittul to its mother, much as the ray is

nullified in the sun, and the meditator in God. Following the terms of this analogy, we are

all like fetuses that have developed the flawed impression that we exist on our own. Even as we are living, being carried, nourished, enlivened within the very body of another, we

70 are without any concept of that (m)other, let alone appreciate the immediate, profound, encompassing connection with her.

Meditation in terms of this analogy is directed towards becoming aware of the

"mother," to appreciate that we are connected to her, in fact derivative of her, or simply her . We develop "reality testing" in the womb so to speak, appreciating our ever-present state of bittul-gestation. Note here the simultaneity of the recognition of Other, and the nullification of self.

Self abnegation and mental health. Some manner of self-abnegation in an introvertive mystical state is to be found in wisdom traditions the world over (Forman,

1999; Stace, 1960). The cultivation of these states, when intensive and sustained, is not without certain risks. Hood et al. (2001) found that reported introvertive mystical states were correlated with elevated levels of psychopathology. However, elevated scores on an

"Interpretation" factor measuring the degree to which subjects' inteipreted mystical experiences using traditional religious terms were correlated with better mental health. It may be that recourse to a tradition, to a system which provides an interpretive framework for integrating potentially disorienting experiences in meditation, is beneficial for the mental health of people engaged in these types of practices.

Jewish intellectualist mysticism provides its practitioners with a pervasive conceptual medium into which numinous experiences of various types and levels may be readily incorporated as they arise. This can help to maintain a healthy balance between assimilation of, and accommodation to new experiences, as the deeper meditative goals are approached in a grounded manner over years. On the Chassidic path, the strong

71 emphasis on family life, communal involvement and mentorship" also provide a moderating context, while yet supporting the ambitious spiritual endeavour. Thus, a family and community showing understanding for someone who misses the Sabbath meal due to being immersed in meditative prayer are nonetheless still there when that person comes home later on. The differences psychologically between such a traditional context for depth spiritual work, and the more isolated, urban 'new age' type of involvement where experiences and their interpretations may tend to be more idiosyncratic and less stable over time (Granqvist et al, 2007), are potentially highly significant in their implications for the type of burden placed on a psychotherapy.

Knowledge of the different types of "spiritual emergencies" (Lukoff, 1985; Lukoff

& Lu, 1999; Hunt, 2007) that can arise in the context of mystical involvements will assist the psychologist and his or her client to weather their journey with greater confidence.

Three general stages of meditation

The cultivation of meditative insight in the Chabad system—seen as a progressive awakening to bittul— is described in terms of three general stages corresponding to the three levels of immanence, transcendence and essence of the hierarchic ontology outlined above (e.g., Hillel, 1868/1991; Schneuri, 1831/1991). Each stage marks a shift in focal awareness. Although I will discuss these in greater detail later on (with several sub-stages

35 The role of the Chassidic counsellor/mentor or "mashpia" in guiding the Chassidic initiate in meditation, although not made a specific focus of inquiry in this dissertation, is highly relevant to this issue of groundedness. The mashphia provides a culturally- endorsed, yet individually responsive interpretation (A la Hood's I-Factor) of the chassid's experiences in meditation, and assists in the healthful integration of these experiences with a life a responsibility and communal involvement (see Lefcoe, 1998, and Schachter-Shalomi, 1991). 72 added), it is worthwhile to summarize them briefly in this connection.

The first stage—corresponding to the level of immanence—is inaugurated with the

placing of initial studious-meditative attention on the notion of one's having a continuous

ontological Source.36 With this "turning," one automatically begins to form some

understanding, some type of internal representation, however primitive, of that Source

and one's relationship to it. This turn represents a strong movement towards a "God

concept", over and beyond the God imago formed in early childhood, in Rizutto's (1981)

object relational account. (Later on I propose that the Hebrew term "shiura" [literally

"estimation"] may be adapted from the relevant source texts as a workable parallel to the

internal object representation of God).

The limitations of the human intellect being what they are, all such 'estimations' are

of course never up to the task of capturing the Infinity, let alone the Essence of God.

Their goal ultimately is one more of "being captured" than of capturing. This first stage

culminates in a noetic-pneumatic "perception" of continuous creation (hithavut temidit)--

apparently analogous to Stace's (1960) extrovertive type of experience—a transcendence

of the initially purely conceptual contemplation, and the first plateau in growth of

consciousness of one's Source. In terms of the "second gestation" metaphor described

above, we could say that the "fetus" has begun to "see" that there is a cord here, and that

life is flowing through it.

In the second stage—corresponding to transcendence—the focus shifts to a direct and general appreciation of the Source of being, beyond the specific relationship of creating 36 In the sense of the omnipresent agent of the "continuous creation" process (hithavut temidit) mentioned above. 73 and enlivening the meditator. I believe that this shift should be understood as representing a shift from an extrovertive (oneness-in-multiplicity) focus, towards an increasingly direct focus on the Source of nature and self, with the latter two increasingly receding from focal awareness. This stage is associated with states of profound longing, compared in the Zohar to the loving gaze (histaclut) of the dove upon her mate-for-life (Ginsburgh,

1993). The descriptions of these states are reminiscent of Zaehner's (1961) accounts of theistic meditative states.

The early Chassidim described a meditative state of uncertainty of one's own existence, or the sense of being a "possible existence" (efsharut hametziut) (Ginsburgh,

1997)37. The total immersion in the meditative experience at this stage seems to correlate with the accounts of deep, oblivious trophotropic (Fischer, 1971) trance states during meditative prayer amongst the Chabad Chassidim, as documented by Loewenthal (1990).

The third and final stage—corresponding to essence—represents the full fruition of the meditative realization of bittul. At this stage—which is clearly related to Stace's

(I960) introvertive mystical state, or Forman's (1999) "pure consciousness experience"- all sense of there being a separate self is suspended, as the experience of one's bittul in

God is actualized in consciousness. This result is called yichud, unification38, or deveikut,

"joining" or "binding," in the terms of the Baal Shem Tov (drawing from earlier

37 Ginsburgh (1997) points out that the description of these states is reminiscent of the idea of the "uncertainty principle" in quantum physics—one "could" exist. For an elaboration of similar themes in relation to Eastern meditation, see Capra's Tao of Physics (1975).

38" Yichud" is also the Hebrew translation of the Arabic tawchid, a term used by both Jewish and Islamic medieval rational mystics to denote the knowing of God's oneness.

74 Kabbalistic sources). The meditator is understood to 'live God', as it were, entering the

"flow of the Infinite" (neviat ha En So/), and—momentarily at least-experiencing Divine

"thought" and "emotion" as "internal" factors.3®

The emergence from this state—it is not meant to be permanent~is called second birth, laida shniya, whereby one re-enters one's own 'separate' mind and emotion, except that now these are explicitly and continuously perceived as part of a unified field with their ultimate ontic Source (Epstein, 1918/1971; Hillel, 1868/1991). This new, permanent state of mind wherein the unitive consciousness has become a normative feature of daily life appears psychologically homologous with Forman's description of the "dualistic mystical state" (1999). The direction of motivation now turns to expression within the world, which is no longer perceived as a barrier to the perception of its Source.

Thus, with respect to the typologies of mysticism discussed in Chapter 1, and the debate about sequencing as well as the status of the extrovertive state, as appears in the

Psychology of Mysticism subsection there: the Chassidic sources describe a clear and normatively fixed series of three phases of "ascent", and a fourth permanent state through which the consummate Jewish contemplative passes. These are: 1) Movement from a

39 Lobel (2007) illustrates this basic idea from the medieval Jewish ethical classic in the philosophic tradition, the Chovos Ha-Levuvos [Duties of the Heart]. Showing that "union" is not a late "aberration" of the Chassidic movement (Stace, i960, based on Scholem, 1954), she carefully analyzes this text in its original Arabic, showing that through cultivated awareness (Arabic: muraqaba) of God's awareness of the meditator (God being "on the lookout" in terms of the borrowed Sufic anecdote in the text), one may achieve a state of "communion" wherein the meditator: ...will enter the highest ranks of the companions of God...he will see with no eye, and hear with no ear, and converse with no tongue, and feel things with no senses...(p.49). Lobel suggests that what is described here is "...a kind of intersubjectivity—a sharing of consciousness, if not union" (p. 49). 75 profound intellectual absorption, which is studious-contemplative, to an extrovertive mystical experience of the meditator and world in all its multiplicity being unified in a common ground of being (Stace, 1960) that is dynamically animated in a continuous creation process (Shneur Zalman, 1803/1986); 2) a theistic meditative experience

(Zaehner, 1961) of intensifying mystical intimacy with the source of this creative cosmic flow or activity; and 3) a state of consummate introvertive (Stace, 1961), intersubjective union, that is, the self-annihilative bittul in a unified field of consciousness with this source; and 4) a permanent "dualistic mystical state" (DMS, [Forman, 1999, p. 130]) wherein the subject is aware of and can interact with the multiplicity of natural and social worlds while perceiving this multiplicity as continuously subsumed and ontologically nullified in the source.

This completes the survey-as partial as any such survey must be—of basic themes and orienting concepts of the Chabad hitbonenut praxis. Having touched upon hitbonenut in its ideal form, I now turn to a number of issues closer to the psychotherapy-meditation borderland, relating to the struggles, pitfalls, and hazards along the way.

76 Chapter Four: Discerning Motives

As mentioned briefly in Chapter 2, Chassidism in general and Chabad in particular place significant emphasis on the inner authenticity of the religious act. What is required is called erentskeit in Yiddish,40 earnestness, and to be emesdik, or truthful ("...down to his fingernails" [Schneerson, 1942/1988, pp. 30, 93,125]). Chassidic stories and discourses are replete with the theme of distinguishing genuine and heart-felt from false or hypocritical piety, and the virtues of the simple but sincere Jewish peasant are raised above those of leaders and more scholarly types who may be prone to feelings of self- importance or "yeshut"--the opposite of bittul. This anti-hierarchical theme and the emphasis on personal authenticity in Chassidism has led to interpretations of the movement as precociously modernist and humanistic (Blumenthal, 1982).

It is in relation to meditation, however, that this overall Chassidic sensibility receives its perhaps most elaborate and exacting expression. One of the pillars of the

Chassidic meditative literature, Rabbi Dov Ber of Lubavitch's Tract on Ecstasy [Kuntres

Ha-Hitpaalut] (Shneuri, 1831/1991) is not primarily concerned with the process of meditation itself (the subject of his Gate of Union [1820/1995]) but rather with the analysis of personal experience—including motivation, feeling states and imagination—in meditation, and their impact on meditative process and outcome. The Mittler Rebbe

(Shneuri, 1831/1991) makes clear that his purpose in this text (henceforth referred to

40 As will be apparent, most important 'nodal* concepts in this literature were expressed in the colloquial Yiddish, as well as in Hebrew. The Chabad Rebbes record their fundamental teachings in Hebrew, but will break mid-text into Yiddish, drawing upon the latter's rich and salty expressive possibilities to drive home a point. The existence of this unique Yiddish discourse on meditation is to my knowledge virtually unknown outside of Chassidic circles. 77 simply as the Tract) is to instruct the reader to discern ("havchana," p. 63—from the

Hebrew root word used for the modern term for "psychological assessment") between authentic and imaginary spiritual states in meditation, with motivation (at times unconscious, as we will see) as a pivotal factor in this analysis.

Were hitbonenut simply a matter of technique, of applying a certain set of instructions or procedures, the life of the meditative chassid would be straightforward.

But it is not so simple. As seen above, the changes sought through hitbonenut meditation are global changes, affecting the entire breadth, depth and length of the psyche. For this reason, the engagement of the more external, "behavioural" levels of the psyche—as is implied by a set of procedures to be implemented-is insufficient to bring them about. It is rather the inner orientation to the work, the overall degree of alignment of the various levels of the psyche with the central goals of meditation that is paramount.

When the proper motivational set is in place, then avoda, meditative "work," can proceed and have a good prospect of meeting with success. Otherwise, Rabbi Dov Ber warns (Shneuri, 1831/1991), the person is "fooling himself' (Yiddish: "naaren zich") (p.

162)—a key pejorative phrase-and to such an individual he applies the verse: "Why is the price of acquiring Wisdom in the hand of the fool, but the heart not?" (Proverbs, 17:16).

If one's heart is not in the work and in the right way, then all of the prescriptions and procedures will come to naught.

From the perspective of the history of psychology, there are passages in Rabbi Dov

Ber of Lubavitch's Tract on Ecstasy which are remarkable for their sophisticated

"dynamic" analyses of complex human motivational states, made within a self­

78 consciously 'psychodiagnostic' context. I believe we will also be able to see that some of these formulations are highly relevant to the challenge of understanding and practicing meditation today.

The stratification of motive

Among the "motivations" that inform, or have relevance to meditation in the Tract, and Chabad Chassidic literature in general, are the motive to become unified with one's

Source; to understand God; to understand reality; to die, that is, suicidal motivation; to experience pleasurable ecstatic states; to gain prestige among other people; to be a teacher to others as a role or an identity. Each of these motives is analyzed in the Tract with respect to its particular standing in relation to meditative process and outcome, as considered below.

An additional factor at play in this account is imagination, dimayon, in relation to motive. That is, people can be motivated in one way, while maintaining an internal image of themselves (nidme lo) as being motivated in another way. This is also sometimes referred to in the relevant texts colloquially as naaren zich, fooling or tricking oneself.

Finally, there is the factor of "revealed" (galui) versus "hidden" (helem) motivation.

This distinction seems to be used in two ways. In one usage, the hiddenness or revealedness of the motive applies to the outside observer, not to the meditator himself.

To the observer (we could say "assessor"—usually this would be the mashpia, the

Chassidic counsellor or mentor), the meditator appears at first glance to be motivated in a certain way but on deeper assessment is discerned (havchana) to be motivated differently.

In another usage, this distinction applies to the meditator himself, and here the terms

79 "revealed" and "hidden" appear to denote "conscious" versus "unconscious" motivation respectively (a usage that may be of interest to historians of psychoanalysis).

As understood in the Tract, motivational sets may differ depending on the level of layer or the psyche in which they are sourced and may have simultaneous and conflicting impacts on meditative progress. This is what I am calling the "stratification of motive".

Let's take a composite example based on the Tract. This is an individual who appears to be deeply engaged in meditation. He sits for hours, wrapped in a prayer shawl, still and silent after a previous period of study and contemplation. He is experiencing what he feels is a profound union with elokut, "Godliness." He understands himself as desiring this union, and having actualized it through hitbonenut. Nevertheless, in Rabbi

Dov Ber of Lubavitch's approach to assessment, the following could actually be happening: This person imagines (nidme lo) that he is motivated to unite with Godliness, a self-representation existing on the psychological level of imagination (dimayon). We may call this motive "level one." The "level two" motive is the active motive at this moment, which is the desire for the pleasurable feeling that accompanies the unitive state

(e.g., Tract, p. 68; Hillel, 1868/1991, p. 72). This level-two motive is be'helem, literally

"hidden," and to be interpreted as "unconscious" (or potentially "be'helem achar helem"

"hidden beyond hidden" [Tract, p. 181]). Lastly, there is a "level-three," even deeper level of hiddenness, helem, wherein the person is in fact motivated towards the

"closeness of God" (Tract, p. 179). Thus, the second- and third-level motives are not the same as the conscious, imagined motive but they can be regarded as mixed or compounded with it, like gold mixed with dirt ("taarovet" [Tract, p. 78; Hillel,

80 1868/1991, p. 77]).

Rabbi Dov Ber takes pains to try and explicate bow it is that this psychological analysis (his use of havchana~oi the rtefesh-psyche—could well be translated contextually as 'psychological analysis') is carried out. For level one of course, you can simply ask the person what his experience was. As the ultimate teacher of hitbonenut,

Rabbi Dov Ber would have been party to his chassidim's understandings of their experiences, which they would otherwise generally be reluctant to share with others. So this is straightforward.

Inferring the level-two, active but hidden motive, is somewhat more complicated.

The reasoning runs along these lines: on the one hand, when a person's meditation moves him towards true bittul, upon completing the meditation and moving on with the day an impression (reshimu) of this bittul should be apparent in one's attitudes and behaviour.

Those whose meditation is of this quality will naturally tend to feel themselves to be less important, less central—simply "less"—than they did before they meditated {Tract, p.

179). On the other hand, if the individual shows any signs of: a) increased desires for personal pleasures (taavot atzmo [Tract, pp. 63,167]), such as food; b) criticalness towards others (kepaida); c) an increased "need" to teach or influence others (taavat ha- rabbanut [Tract, p. 178]), or d) increased—rather than reduced-sensitivity to critical feedback (shar [Tract, p. 178]), in short, any tendency bespeaking an increased sense of one's own self, one's desires, one's position vis-a-vis others etc—then we are forced to infer that the impact of the meditation has been the opposite of what was intended. We infer that the meditation itself has fed into this person's "somethingness," the natural

81 narcissism or yeshut. (Conversely, one can discern in the experienced, properly motivated

meditator a quality of "true lowliness," or literally "nothingness"--" in Yiddish-

following meditation [Tract, p. 179]).

But how can we say that the meditation itself has done this? Did the person not

study what he was supposed to study? Did he not go to the ritual bath (mikve), and give a

coin to the needy before meditating? Did he not enwrap in the prayer shawl, and deeply contemplate the teachings, and visualize them, and so on? In short, did he not follow the entire "procedure" or "techniques" from beginning to end? The answer is yes he did, but there was a flawed motive. Because of it the whole project is tainted41, and the taint

becomes manifest to the attuned eye after the meditation, in the tone, words, facial

expression, posture, emotional reactions, etc, of the meditator. What we see is an

attitude—of some degree of subtlety or another—of yeshut, somethingness or narcissism

{Tract, pp. 177-178).

How do we come to assume, despite all of this, the existence of the redeeming

"level-three" motive of unio mystical Rabbi Dov Ber explains this only very briefly,

unlike the level-two issues, which he deals with at some length. He says simply that the

very choice to be involved in hitbonenut ("ikar bechirat ha-esek ba-hitbonenuf')

indicates that at a deeper level this person is in fact motivated to become one with

Godliness. Were his only desire selfish and/or imaginary, he would not maintain the discipline. The main active desire is for a feeling, but underlying it all there is the desire

41 "Until it spreads decay [tichla] throughout..." (Tract, p.181; based on Babylonian Talmud Tractate Chullin 64b). The Mittler Rebbe goes on to state that the most problematic motives ultimately are known retroactively when the person abandons meditation entirely. 82 that it be a "...feeling with reference to Godliness" nonetheless (Tract, p. 78).

In the case brought here, the level-two hidden motive was a pleasure state, a kind of spiritual charge or ecstasy associated with the heightened sensations of the meditative state. However, I could have used an example using a different motive, such as the motive to "feel oneself on a spiritual level" ("lehargish atzmo be 'madraiga" [Hillel,

1868/1991, p. 74]). Here the motive would have more to do with pride, related to a desire to feel attractive and to boast ("lehitpaer") and feel greatness ("lehitgadeF), rather than an immediate "sensation" per se (Hillel, 1868/1991, p. 71). As mentioned, the common denominator of both problem motives is the factor of "somethingness," yeshut, the opposite of bittul, which engenders a separation (pirud) between the meditator and the

Object of meditation (Tract, pp. 63-64). As with its opposite, bittul, this concept of yeshut is a linchpin concept.

Yeshut-narcissism

Whether in its more extreme or subtler manifestations, it seems to me that no

English term in current usage more accurately captures the richly textured meaning of yeshut, "somethingness," than the term "narcissism" as it is used in contemporary psychoanalytic discourse.42 Indeed, were I to formulate the problem set of the Tract in the terms of the latter, I would speak broadly of a tendency to "use" the dimly and unempathically perceived object (Evans, 1972; Kemberg, 1989; Kohut, 1971)—whether a person, an affiliation, an involvement such as meditation (Eagle, 1981) or God (Spero,

44 See Morrison (1986) for a collection of key articles on the topic of narcissism.

83 1990)--for some manner of self-gratification.43

The term 'narcissism' is being used here in a universal sense, and not as a categorial diagnostic distinction. Freud (1914) recognized an idea of universal (as distinct from a specifically pathological) narcissism, and the idea of a basic narcissistic dimension, stage or developmental line is common currency in contemporary psychodynamic psychology

(see Morrison, 1986). yeshut similarly carries this connotation, of something natural and relatively universal, yet more prominent in some people than others. The Chabad literature suggests that in the specific context of meditation, however, an otherwise

"normal" or "healthy adult narcissism" may become a major stumbling block on the way to authentic progress.

Some of the basic features of the concept of yeshut in this context can be brought out by considering a further case from the Tract. Rabbi Dov Ber distinguishes between the complex and subtle type of motivational profile described above-the yeshut factor of which may be unapparent to even the most sensitive of senior Chassidim (Tract, p. 63)— and a more gross, obvious type of problem that he calls "a completely foreign fire" ("eish zara le'gamre?\ Tract, pp. 61-63,11).M The latter is the case of those whose entire motivation from the very beginning of their involvement in spiritual practice has been

43Pertinent are Eagle's (1981) succinct comments on "narcissism and interests": A critical feature of this narcissistic style... is a relative lack of interest in the object per se. Rather, interest is dictated mainly or entirely by the aims of self-enhancement and self-aggrandizement...For example, when an individual seems to relate to an object (e.g., music) only or mainly for the purpose of self-aggrandizement, lie genuineness of the interest in that object can then be questioned (pp. 547-548).

44 The phrase "foreign fire", eish zara, is an allusion to Leviticus 10:1, and is often used to describe an improper attempt to reach spirituality.

84 "false." They cannot be said to have engaged in meditation at all really. Their activity is

rather one of trying to arouse directly a kind of spiritual enthusiasm (namely the "fire")

associated with positive feelings and energy, without any concept of, or inner movement

towards, an Object of meditation ("...in his mind there is no... meditative concept of God at all, only in the most general way" [Tract, p. 61]).

Rabbi Dov Ber elucidates the basic motivational profile here using the verse, "The fool desires not understanding, but rather the revelation of his own heart" (Proverbs,

18:2; Tract, p. 63). The gist seems to be that this person entered into meditation as a means of self-expression ("..the revelation of his own heart."). Thus, there is little or no real investment in trying to meditate in the sense of hitbonenut, which as indicated throughout, is centred on understanding ("...desires not understanding").

A simple analogy might be "falling in love" without any real thought about whom the person is with whom you're falling in love. The result is an imaginary, highly projective infatuation that begins, and shortly ends, without empathy or relationship with the other, as "other," having occurred at any point.45 There is a lack of a genuine referent towards which intention (kavana) or passion (hitpaalut) are directed. Recall that hitbonenut means a focused effort at cultivating and integrating an overall understanding or "sA/wra"~estimation or concept—of God (Zohar, 1:103; Shneur Zalman, 1796/1981, pp. 4,124). This process never begins in this case-why should it when the motivation is the substantiation of the self, with the ostensible relationship with God providing merely

45 I'm reminded here of a quotation I heard in the name of the late Shlomo Carlebach, to the effect that idol worship—the replacing of God with an image—also takes place between people.

85 the "venue" for this? It seems appropriate here to speak, in object relations terms, of a

lack of an integrated object concept of God (Spero, 1990,1992). In the absence of this

necessary focus, the meditative work does not bring to the "inner hearing" (Yiddish: der

heren*) of the Object that is its goal, but rather to the (pejorative) "hearing oneself' ("der

hert zich" [e.g., Tract, p. 62]).

Rabbi Dov Ber (Tract, p. 63) cautions against the kind of vain ("havlei shav") and superficial ("chitzoni") spirituality involved in the "foreign fire". He recommends, not suiprisingly, distancing oneself from this type of individual, and observes that anyone with even the slightest sensitivity to genuine inner work will react with immediate, visceral aversion to any such manner of quasi-spirituality (Tract, pp. 63,181). He warns

(p. 63) that if left unchecked, this can deteriorate further into overt, grandiose delusions, such as "There is I, and none else" (Isaiah, 47:8,10; Zephania, 2:15). At this furthest extreme, the initially somewhat flawed orientation has taken on truly pathological momentum, at which point one could begin to speak of not only of pathology but of a type of idolatry, in the form of "worshipping oneself' (Hebrew: "oved es alzmo"; Tract, p. 62).

The above, therefore, is the more "extreme" case. In the original composite profile-with the complex, layered motivation—we can discern in the primary, active

(level-two) motive a somewhat diluted admixture of the same self-focus of yeshut which is so pronounced here. Whereas here we have a "florid" narcissism-overlaid by a mere pretence of reaching for the Object—in the original case there is a serious meditative 46 As distinct from simply "hearing" (heren), the Yiddish term der heren implies an inner hearing, an understanding, getting the "point" (nekuda) of insight. 86 effort, subtly undermined by a tacit motivational duplicity within the act of meditative focus and contact. The person feels himself feeling the Object, rather than having a feeling that stems "from the essence of the good thing he is connecting to" (Tract, p. 67).

It is this narcissistic "two-step," this added membrane of once-removedness, that seems to be the heart of the concept of pirudseparation—a concomitant of yeshut—as used in the Tract (pp. 63-68; Hillel, 1868/1991, p. 67). At the moment of what would have been the consummation of the meditative process, in the moment of joining, deveikut, the person stands just outside, "feeling himself on a level," "feeling himself in this" (Hillel, 1868/1991, p. 72). In this way duplicity enters and ultimately undermines, the meditative endeavour, like the dancer who momentarily seeks to look at his movement from the "outside"-down at his feet—and falls.47

To summarize and consolidate this section and its key hermeneutic linkage of yeshut and narcissism, I will list some of the ways that the term "yeshutas utilized in the meditative context of the Tract, shares specific connotations with the term

"narcissism" as commonly used and understood in psychoanalytic parlance:

1). Inflated sense of self. (American Psychiatric Association, 2000; Reich, 1960)

"Haughtiness, with an aspect of innocence, such that he is not even aware of it" (Tract, p.

178).

"Boastfulness" (Hillel 1868/1991, p. 71).

"He desires to attain the 'level' of bittul, because [he considers] this all he is

47 I'm thinking here of the psychological research by Csikszentmihalyi (1975) on the deeply engaged, "flow" experiences of athletes, artists and others, which evince the same quality of "absorption" as do trance-states related to hitbonenut. lacking" (Tract, p. 178).

2). Neglect of real aspects of relational objects (Stolorow, 197S).

"He has no contemplative understanding of God at all in his mind" (Tract, p. 61).

3). Potential for deterioration into overt grandiosity, even delusions (Kernberg,

1970).

"There branches off from this falsehood and vain imagining, to the extent that he imagines he has left his body, and he sees confused and awesome visions etc... and of fools such as these there is no need to speak" (Tract, p. 182).

"There is I, and nothing else" (Tract, p. 63).

4). Exploitive orientation towards the object (American Psychiatric Association,

2000; Cooper, 1986).

"His main intention is only for the feeling he wants [from the meditation]" (Tract, p. 68).

5). Desire for validation of 'special' status (American Psychiatric Association,

2000).

"And from this [desire to feel complete and superior], there branches off the great lust to teach and influence others, in the error that he tricks himself into thinking that it is for the good of the other" (Tract, p. 178).

6). Intolerance of criticism or slight (Cooper, 1986).

"The truth is that [his desire for bittul] is the nth degree of pridefiilness, the proof being that when insulted he is so affected that he may become ill" (Tract, p. 178).

7). Relative immaturity on a developmental line (Kohut, 1971).

"...The older [Chassidim], who accepted every bitter taste for the sake of Chassidism, do

88 not intend [in their meditation] to arrive at a 'level,' or for their own pleasure, but rather they desire the closeness of God, for its own sake...and the sign is that after [meditation] they come to true lowliness (nishtkeit)" (Tract, p. 179).

"The younger ones, who lack the natural melancholic disposition'*...are surely fooling themselves greatly, and the sign is that as soon as [the meditative experience] passes, they come to the self-feeling (yeshut) from this itself. To another person, he will appear like a real animal" (Tract, p. 177).

Note that the connection being made here between personal maturity and the effectiveness of meditative practice is in broad concurrence with Russell's (1986) findings based on interviews with Eastern (Buddhist and Hindu) meditative adepts (see also Vaughn's [1991] and Tart and Deikman's [1991] treatments of this issue).

I believe that the appropriate question that arises at this point is this: "But isn't some degree of self-interested motive intrinsic to being human? Is it really possible for persons to transcend their natural yeshut or narcissism to such an extent that they are truly free of these motives? When is one free of the self-referential motives that—at the end of the day—are to some extent inseparable from living one's life as a human being?" This question takes us to the "black bile."

The "black bile"

One answer to our query can be found in Rabbi Dov Ber's writings, which deserves to be quoted at some length:

I heard [about] this matter explicitly from the mouth of my father [R.

48 This intriguing reference to melancholy will be addressed in the next section. 89 Shneur Zalman of Liadi], who heard it in the House of Study from the

Maggid [of Mezrich, successor to the Baal Shem Tov] [namely that]: No

one can truly receive the secrets of the Torah, and the apprehension of the

true depths of the Infinite such that it becomes stably set in his soul, unless

he has the natural, essential melancholy, that is rooted in him specifically

from his youth... True, natural "brokenness" [Yiddish: tzu brochenkeit], to

the extent that he genuinely detests his life, continuously, hour by hour-

Then...in hitbonenut..he is given a true revelation in his soul, so long as

his heart worries within him...Then his sighing, and his above mentioned

natural melancholy will be transformed into joy and pleasure—only due to

the Godliness that palpably rests on his soul {Tract, p. 169).

Thus, one answer to the question is clear: one may transcend motives inherent to living one's life when one can seriously question whether or not it is worth living. The person who is not merely transiently "dysphoric," but who suffers rather from a protracted, pervasive, dispositional anguish ("to the extent that he genuinely detests his life, continuously, hour by hour..."), is, not surprisingly, the prime candidate for being motivated towards the different manner of life opened up through meditation. Also older more seasoned Chassidim, those who have accepted "...eveiy bitter taste" for the sake of their spiritual goals, and whose motivation has settled onto these goals rather than things such as "...honour, fine garments and fine foods"~these too are considered to have great potential for deep meditative work (Tract, pp. 179-180).

90 With respect to the melancholic types, Rabbi Dov Ber considers and rejects the thesis that such a pervasive depression could be something physiological (which in this context would apparently imply an excess of the bodily humour of black bile) declaring that "...it is not in its nature [i.e. of the natural soul/psyche] to become depressed except in the face of some tangible bodily lack..." (Tract, p. 168). When no such lack is apparent, and the depression is "ethereal, general, and essential [Yiddish: essentzia]", so one may infer that this melancholy has nothing to do with "bile" per se, but rather is function of

"...the bitterness of the soul at the imprisonment of the physical body," and that meditation is the appropriate response (Tract, p. 168).

This pervasive melancholy or "black bile" (the literal translation of "mora shechora" in the preceding quotation, and throughout the Chassidic literature) thus emerges as a major pre-requisite for consummate meditative work as understood in the

Chabad tradition. It is painful, it is unpleasant, but it nevertheless bodes well for meditation. I have not seen in any of the literature reviewed for this dissertation a parallel to this emphasis on depression49 as a pre-requisite and facilitator of depth spiritual work.

The usual emphasis is on depression as a way station along the path, as in the classic

"dark night of the soul" (see Hunt, 2007), or on meditation as treatment for depression

(Ivanowski & Malhi, 2007; Salmon et al., 2004), but has anyone considered the idea that depression can help with meditation? The question seems deserving of exploration by

491 use the term "depression" here in a broad an indeterminate sense, as there is no reason to suppose—without further exploration that is beyond my scope here—that historical medical references to melancholy can with any precision be identified with contemporary diagnostic nomenclature.

91 interested psychologists, to extend our understanding of the apparently complex system

of relationships between mood issues, spirituality and meditation.

Rabbi Dov Ber presses his point here, going so far as to state baldly that the

naturally cheerful, sociable individual (the "white bile", mara levana, personality) will

get nowhere in meditation (Tract, p. 169)! Whatever genuine experiences the latter has

will be transitory, and ultimately the non-melancholic meditator will "walk in darkness,"

and succeed only in "fooling himself completely" (Tract, p. 169)! In his commentary ad

locum, Hillel Paritcher softens and qualifies his Rebbe's statements (Hillel, 1868/1991, p.

171), noting that even the naturally outgoing cheerful type also has a deeply unconscious

("be- helem meod", "very concealed") latent melancholy, which can be "brought out from

hiddenness [ helem] to revealedness [giluf\,"--namely brought to conscious experience-

by an intense introspective process "at set times." Here we are even trying to induce

dysphoria to facilitate meditation!

The reference to "set times" relates to the optional midnight prayer service of

traditional Jewish liturgy, the tikkun chatzot, which is designed to invoke a state of

bitterness and anguish at the Exile in general, and one's personal existential isolation

from God in particular.50 This bitterness is intended to then fuel the absorption into study and contemplation that is meant to follow upon the midnight service. Thus, a person lacking the natural depressive disposition who nevertheless wants to meditate must first induce the mood of the tikkun chatzot service—basically a state of existential angst informing a spiritual longing—as an essential pre-requisite to authentic involvement in 50 Some key references regarding the tikkun chatzot prayers are to be found at Shneur Zalman of Liadi (1796/1981, pp. 192-193,198; 1996, p. 370) and Hillel (1980). 92 meditation. Later generations of Chabad have de-emphasized these requirements, and have even discontinued the midnight service altogether .

Altogether, I think that we can speak in Chabad of a kind of "meditation-readiness," expressed in the Kabbalistic terminology of whether or not an individual is a

"vessel" Ckir) for meditative insight {Tract, p.169). I see this as analogous to the current idea of "reading readiness," meaning that some children are simply not ready to read, such that the pedagogic efforts expended on them—however ingenious or high-tech—are essentially wasted efforts. In the absence of certain pre-requisites (neurological, emotional, motivational), even if they are made to decode certain syllables, they will not really read on their own. The child must be ready-in Chassidic terms, must be a

"vessel"—for reading. Similarly, the existentially or spiritually referenced depression, the mara shechora, at least on some latent level, constitutes an important element for consummate meditative work as understood in Chabad.

The "scientist"metaphor

Other important features of the requisite motivational set for meditation are brought out by Hillel Paritcher in his commentaiy on the Tract on Ecstasy (Hillel, 1868/1991, pp.

68-75). He elaborates on a metaphor of a research scientist, an astronomer (tochein) to be exact. He describes how the successful astronomer needs to be utterly "given over" (Yiddish: ibergegeben) to the goal of grasping the "workings of the heavens" in order for the truth of the subject to be revealed to him.

What distinguishes this individual is a pronounced and pervasive singularity of purpose to understand, to interweave and bind the mind firmly with the object of enquiry.

93 Competing motives, such as the motive to achieve fame ("lehitgadeF0 and so on are notably absent, such that this person does not care a whit if he achieves the desired knowledge by his own efforts, or if someone else achieves it, and teaches it to him

(Hillel, 1868/1991, p. 72).

The integration and organization of the entire personality by singularly grasping an object of contemplation is essentially a preparatory form of bittul where one is devoid of self-directed motivation (yeshut), the entire "life" is lived in reference to the object Hillel

Paritcher explains that this emptying out of the self potentiates the birth of the object of insight into consciousness (Hillel, 1868/1991, p. 71). It is as if the bittul creates the

"space" for the insight (similar to how the "emptiness" of melancholy signifies that the individual has become an "empty vessel" that is fit to receive—see the section on "Black bile" above).

We may recognize echoes of this character in the stereotype of the "absent-minded professor," who somehow gets through the day despite parking in the wrong spot, losing his keys, his students' term papers, and so on along the way. Similarly, one storied

Chabad meditator of the previous generation is known to have distractedly "walked into walls" periodically in the course of his contemplations.51 Needless to say, this kind of person may appear to others as somewhat eccentric (much as, perhaps, the biblical prophets were viewed by their contemporaries as "crazies" ["meshuga"]--even as they

51 This was related by his granddaughter, Leah Morosov, a guest at our home in Israel from a local seminary, who added that she hoped to find a marriageable young man who was similarly "pnimT (serious and "internal"), but who would nevertheless navigate the world a little better! respected them as prophets. See: Hosea, 9:7; Kings II, 9:11; Jeremiah, 29:26). He doesn't care enough to get his name onto publications, has no time for departmental politics, forgets things, etc. All communications remotely connected with his topic of interest are imbued with a sense of urgency and excitement, whereas all other aspects of life are carried out with peripheral attention at best. Hillel Paritcher views his "scientist" metaphor as well-aligned with the overall psychological profile of the person destined for the deepest sort of success in Jewish meditation.

When one's focus on the Object of the meditation permeates one's life in this way, then all the more so, within meditation itself, the mind and "heart" or emotional- motivational centre can be fully focused, concentrated and engaged. The ability not only to achieve, but to maintain, this concentrative state is crucial, and is denoted in Chabad by the Yiddish phrase halten kop, "to hold one's head," meaning to maintain the frame in the inner, concentrative "war" of hitbonenut (Shneur Zalman, 1748/1987, Part 3, p. 143 and Part 4, p. 68, based on Zohar III, 243a).

Ohn-hispaalus: Beyond ecstasy

This overall motivational/concentrative set is important in reference to potentially distracting feeling states encountered in the course of meditation. As discussed earlier, a pitfall awaiting even the relatively serious meditator, with mixed though basically good intentions, is the focus on a feeling state (hitpaalut: affect, passion, or ecstasy). When the active (but not necessarily "conscious," "galuf') motivational focus falls upon acquiring a pleasurable feeling, a mere derivative of the connection to the object of meditation, the meditation falls short of its true goal, which is traded off for a momentary excitement or

95 "high."

Rabbi Dov Ber is careful to point out that feeling states aroused in meditation, the hitpaalut, are not in themselves a negative thing. The opposite is the case in that the arousal of strong feelings, he explains, is a sign that the meditation is penetrating to lower centres of the person, ultimately effecting a re-orientation of the emotional pre­ dispositions or "character" (middot). True hitpaalut of this sort thus signifies

"movement," "tezuza," on the overall road to transforming the personality as a whole, bringing the "guts" of the person into alignment with the subtle insights of meditation

{Tract, p. 82; Hillel, 1868/1991, p. 78). The subtlety of this consists in allowing the feeling to "occur" without it becoming an intentional focus of its own. It is when feeling becomes a focus of its own that separateness, pirud, is introduced, and there is a falling away from the primary goal. The overall motivational set we have been discussing

(dysphoric disposition, singularity of purpose, desire to understand) fortifies the meditative process by enabling the person to maintain the meditative focus, even as feelings aroused secondarily to the process threaten to overwhelm the field of awareness.

Because the feeling is not the focus motivationally, the person is not waylaid by it experientially {Tract, pp. 67-68). It falls into place as a by-product, not the focus or goal.

When this attitude becomes a stable characteristic of a person, it is referred to as "ohn- hispaalusmeaning literally "unexcitability," and implies an unshakable attachment to a spiritual goal or referent, reflected in stoicism and emotional restraint in all circumstances. This, anecdotally, is the classic Chabad personality "type."52

52 The significance of this concept of dhn-hispaalns--which is attributed to the Baal

96 However, within meditation itself, discerning in oneself whether one's focus is on

the feeling or not is not necessarily straightforward, given that there are levels of some

subtlety here. To help make this self analysis, Rabbi Dov Ber (Tract, pp. 63-68) advises paying close attention to the sequencing around emotional arousal in meditation. Was the

"spiritual feeling" in awareness at the moment of its emergence, or was it merely

"noticed" afterwards? If the feeling arose automatically, like the person who jumps up and claps his hands reflexively at the moment of hearing good news, then the feeling is a positive thing. If the feeling emerged with awareness already focused on it, waiting for it, then that is a sign that it contains elements of "artificial ecstasy" ("gemachte hispaalus" in Yiddish, literally "manufactured" or "made" ecstasy). It is to be rejected in the fashion of a "piece of non-kosher meat" (Ginsburgh, 1997)!

Shem Tov—obviously goes beyond meditation alone. A legendary example of ohn-hispaalus in Chabad is recounted in a story dating from the Napoleonic Campaign in Russia of 18x2. Chabad tradition records a number of interesting episodes from this period, which was during the leadership of Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi. Rabbi Shneur Zalman backed the Czar of Russia in this war, unlike the Polish Chassidic leaders, who backed Napoleon (their argument being around whether Napoleon's libertarian policies would ultimately be good for the Jews living under his regime). The story is told that as part of his assistance to the Russian military, R. Shneur Zalman managed to send one of his Chassidim as a spy, who infiltrated the French headquarters by establishing and maintaining close relations with ranking members of the French military leadership. On one occasion this chassid was meeting with his contacts when Napoleon entered the room. He strode in amongst his generals, then— apparently reacting to the appearance of a new face— suddenly turned and placed his hand firmly on the chassids chest, looked into his eyes and said: "You are a spy!" The chassid realized at that instant that Napoleon was feeling to see if his heart would miss a beat, and that if it did his life would be in grave danger. Remaining utterly calm, he protested his innocence, along with his acquaintances in the room who explained the material assistance that he had been providing to the French forces. Napoleon let him go, and the chassid was allowed to continue in his work for the French—and of course for Rabbi Shneur Zalman. The chassid later explained that it was his practice of hitbonenut on Chassidic teachings that had given him the ability to remain totally calm and coUeded—ohn-hispaalus—in this moment of sudden grave danger, and that this had actually saved his life (from Tauber, 1994). 97 This "sequencing test" adds another conceptual tool with which to assess the

validity of meditative experiences, one that complements the more externally observable

criteria mentioned earlier (those following upon the meditation such as enhanced desire

for physical pleasures, criticalness, lust to teach and influence, etc.., or conversely the sense of lowliness and abnegation,"nishtkeif'). Taken together, and applied with both psychological acumen and sensitivity to the processes and goals of hitbonenut, we have a fairly comprehensive and potentially powerful set of conceptual "diagnostic tools" for assessing a person's overall "meditation-readiness," as well as the current dynamic impact of their practice vis-a-vis the goals of hitbonenut. I submit that these tools-- especially when seen in psychological terms as has begun to be undertaken here—could be adapted for use in educational and therapeutic Jewish meditative contexts, and more broadly in any setting where the psychology of meditation is of relevance.

98 Chapter Five: Insight and Personality Change53

According to the Tract, an individual who engages in hitbonenut while maintaining a "good enough" motivational set along the lines discussed above may begin to traverse a series of religio-developmental stages that represent the progressive realization of bittul in the psyche. It is this series of stages, and some relevant qualitative features of the processes involved in their traversal that I address in this chapter.

We have looked at rough starts and pitfalls in Jewish meditation as discussed with reference to two basic psychological profiles of meditators: the frankly insincere or self- deceiving meditator, and the meditator with a complex stratification of motive that complicates progress. The former case—the "completely foreign fire"--is not considered a

"stage" of hitbonenut in the Tract given that, as described, it represents really not more than a pseudo-involvement in meditation.

The latter type of case, despite its problematic aspects, is presented in the Tract as showing sufficient engagement of the meditative process to warrant consideration as a

"stage" of meditative development—even if as more of a stage to be overcome than as something desirable in its own right. This stage, henceforth 'stage one,' is given the name

"intention towards ecstasy" ("kavana le 'hitpaalut"), a reference to its main problematic motivational feature, as discussed above. The next stage or station that comes into view at this point is called "acknowledgment," hoda-a in the Hebrew terminology of Rabbi Dov

Ber of Lubavitch. 53 The basis of this chapter is Chapter 2 (pp. 77-89) of the Tract. Only direct quotes or references to other works will henceforth be cited inside the text. 99 Acknowledgment: Hoda-a

Hoda-a, "acknowledgment" represents the first stop or plateau that is beyond the

"taint" of the kinds of motivational issues discussed in the previous chapter. This stage of acknowledgment is crucial as a transitional stage, wherein the basic psychological ground is laid for all subsequent developments, and the contours of the personality changes potentially wrought through hitbonenut begin to be discerned.

At this stage of acknowledgment, there is a stable (i.e., not just during meditation) apperception54 of the absolute ontic superiority of the Object of meditation relative to oneself. This is accompanied by a similarly stable, pervasive shift in motivation, such that the meditator's "...main goal and will" is to achieve "closeness to God" through the meditation (Tract, p. 80)~a desire that is neither conflicted nor duplicitous. At the same time there is, third, a sharp sense of one's as yet continuing "distance"55 from true insight.

Thus, the achievement of this stage of "acknowledgment" implies an ability to tolerate a tension between a prevailing sense that the Object of meditation is "more precious than all existent things, since they are as naught relative to Godliness," and the concomitant experience of one's alienation or "distance" from God. To recognize and acknowledge this alienation is painful, if also potentially hopeful.

A parable given for this stage is that of a poor man who contemplates the honour, wealth and splendour of a king. He develops a strong appreciation for these things,

54 Regarding the use of this term, please see my reference to Fancher (1996) in the section on the sefirotic faculty psychology in Chapter 2 above.

55 As discussed in Chapter 3, there is no real 'distance' of course, but rather an illusory perception of distance that is overcome through the hitbonenut.

100 greatly values and desires them, but does not feel he has any personal connection to them at all (Tract, p. 82). Viewed in contrast to the "foreign fire" and "intention toward ecstasy" described previously, we discern here a crucial shift from a more or less subtly narcissistic orientation to the Object (and to the practice of meditation itself; see Eagle,

1986), to a mature stance of recognition of the Other as other, yet standing in some realistic relation to oneself. In this context of "...the unique relationship between the individual and the Object called God," (Spero, 1990, p. 54) this relation is interpreted as that of bittul: the (as yet unactualized) abnegation and relative unreality of the self in relation to God.

What has been achieved here at stage two seems entirely analogous to what Spero

(1990) has described as the work of separation-individuation in relation to "the God

Object." In British object relations terms, we could speak of a "depressive position" in relation to God (Klein, 1984). The recognition of the other as separate from the self opens up the possibility of relationship, together with a new galaxy of experiences such as interpersonal 'distance', longings, guilt, reparation and so forth (Grotstein, 1981). We can now truly begin to speak of a relationship with God, whereas previously we had a relationship with projected aspects of the self. In object relations thought, the depressive position is understood to continue in various forms for the rest of one's life, the stuff of human relationships. In Spero's version—in parallel with that of Mahler et al. (1975)—this achievement is also the developmental stage in the God relationship that will continue to evolve within fundamentally the same framework through life. In Chabad hitbonenut this stage of hoda-a is understood to be an important plateau, a platform upon which the

101 meditative endeavour will now build.

At this point of hoda-a, acknowledgment, what is implied is only the initial apperception of this relationship, a first real glimpse of what insight implies. This is the falling away of an illusion, of an imaginary or fantasized relationship, a disenchantment which gives way to a new beginning on firmer ground. Hoda-a implies simply: "You're right, I'm wrong"; "You're real; as for me: I'm no longer so sure"; "My existence depends on You, not Yours on mine"; "I was mistaken."'56 In this unique relationship, the

God relation, the centre of value and of the sense of reality in general, shifts decisively to outside the self, to God. What remains is to actualize this relation in consciousness more fully, which is the course of subsequent meditative-developmental stages.

A parable for this crucial personality shift occurring through hitbonenut was discussed by the contemporary Chabad authority Yitzchak Ginsburgh,57 quoting Hillel

Paritcher. The parable is of a person walking towards a carousel. While drawing nearer, one observes the people riding the toy horses going around and around. Then the person actually steps onto the carousel, and suddenly the people and toy horses stop moving, and the earth where he or she had been standing initially begins to circle. This is the "shift."

All of the initial elements remain, what has changed is the experience of the centre, and along with that the experience of "Whom is orbiting whom." There is a change in the 56 Hie last Lubavitcher Rebbe (Schneerson, 1970) clarifies from a Talmudic source that the term "hoda-a" does not connote simply that one has come to agree that the other is right, in which case both parties now share one perspective. Rather, hoda-a implies that one surrenders or nullifies one's perspective in the face of a superior intellect, even though one cannot "see" the perspective of that intellect due to its being transcendent of one's own by a gap of depth or profundity.

57 At a Chassidic gathering, a "ferbrengen", in 1996 or 1997 in Toronto.

102 sense of where contingency, and where permanence are to be found~a type of Gestalt

"figure-ground" reversal.

What emerges from this crossroads of acknowledgment is a desire and a will

directed towards an overriding goal: to overcome the distance, to close the gap, to deepen

the hitbonenut until the actual "...closeness of God will be fixed in his psyche" {Tract,

81). The profound valuing of the Other, of God, and an unconvicted desire to connect

with God through the meditative practice: these make this stage of hoda-a "...the real

beginning for those who seek out and demand God in truth and sincerity, with a proper

intention towards Godliness specifically" {Tract, p.81).

Several 'clinical notes' come to mind as deserving of mention here. This key

transitional stage, hoda-a, seems to represent a very significant personality shift. One

could imagine at least a temporary dip in the level of interest in previously enjoyed

activities, an increase in time spent in devotional activities, a dip in social rapport and

responsiveness, any of which could engender concern in others and potentially lead to

professional contact of some kind. The experience of a sense of 'distance from God'

which is described as opening up at this point is consistent with the descriptions of

aspects of a classic "theopathic" depressive reaction, along the lines of a "dark night of

the soul", or an anhedonic reaction (Hunt, 2007; James, 1902/1985). We may surmise that

the induced sense of the relative 'unreality of the self could even, in vulnerable individuals, lead to a temporary destabilization of reality testing in some variant of a

"spiritual emergency" (Lukoff, 1985). In short, the "spiritual emergence" of this new stage—particularly were it to arise idiosyncratically, outside of a traditional context with

103 built-in mentoring and other supports—could be misinterpreted by mental health professionals, running risks of pathologization, psychological misdiagnosis, and iatrogenic complications of what is an essentially spiritual-existential rather than a psychiatric crisis (Lukofif et al., 1998).

From God Object to "n-Object"

The higher stages of development on the path of hitbonenut represent a progressive closing of the gap between the meditator and the realization of bittul. To this point, of hoda-a, the meditator has been occupied with the formation of a stable internal referent around which the inner orientation, or kavana, of the meditation can crystallize. With this achieved 'God object constancy,' as it were, as the basis, the meditator may now begin

'moving' (hazaza) progressively towards the bittul state of self-abnegation in the divine

"nothingness", the ayin (Blumenthal, 1982; Elior, 1993; Hillel, 1987; Matt, 1990).

Viewing the psychological aspect of the process described in the Chassidic writings from this point onwards brings us face to face with the difficulties encountered by mystics throughout the ages in describing ineffable and paradoxical experiences (James,

1902/1985; Proudfoot, 1986). These same difficulties begin to trouble the psychological description of these texts. The challenge is to discuss the psychology of the mystical as far as possible without mystification. Essentially, there is a process here that needs to be described theoretically that involves, in the first case, the God Object of Rizutto (1981) and Spero (1990), and resolves ultimately in something sharing key formal characteristics with the unitive state of introvertive mysticism (Forman, 1999; Stace, 1960) (which neither of the above-mentioned theorists have contended with in any depth in their

104 published psychological works). Duality will be overcome, not by a global withdrawal from object relating (as seen, perhaps, in pantheist, or monist meditative traditions) but rather by the intensification of focus on a singular Object that both suffuses and transcends the self and the world (in this Judaic, />a«e«theistic context).

Part of what troubles here—in the advanced meditational stages to be described presently—is the shifting meaning and quality of what we have been referring to, following the object relations theorists of religion, as the God Object, or God imago. By this I mean both the primal imago that emerges in early childhood (at least in the West), as well as the more sophisticated God "concept" that builds upon this imago, enriching it through philosophical or theological inquiry (Rizutto, 1981).

The sense of the image or referent of God that emerges from these mystical- meditative texts is of a different quality than either of these. Moving beyond image, beyond intellectual concept, in these latter stages described in the Tract we end up in

"..the simple will...from whence the intellect is born" (Tract, p. 89). The final lap of the journey of hitbonenut involves a shift to a transrational mode of connection and contact.

In the Chassidic theology the realization that is sought and expected through the meditation is that "all is in God" (panentheism; pan, "all", en, "in", theos, "God"); the world and the meditator are realized to be nullified and absorbed in a higher reality, like the ray of light while still in the sun. In the terms of this metaphor (as discussed in

Chapter 3 in the section on bittul), hitbonenut carries one closer and closer to the sun, with the goal of being absorbed into the sun. So the sun here is the object that is being moved towards, or being introjected. In the case of God, in this theology, the metaphor is

105 inexact in that we are always "in" the sun, always in God. The progression is not an actual change of some sort of proximity, but rather an awakening to a here and now reality of bittul, self-abnegation and absorption in the divine (Shneur Zalman of Liadi,

1796/1981).

What this means is that in these latter stages of unfolding meditative union, the God

Object begins to shed qualities of an object, and take on qualities of a unified matrix within which the self is itself situated. As Hillel Paritcher explains (as quoted in foil in

Chapter 3), God is only ever metaphorically, "exoterically"...

...like an 'other' [zulato] who stands over him. But the truth is that he is

not separate from Him at all, and is nullified in Him absolutely, since He

flows into his entire inner being, and his innermost inner being, and is

bringing him into existence, and vitalizing him every instant. We find

[therefore] that the human being is not outside of Him at all (Hillel,

1868/1995, p. 342).

And yet, the sense from the Chassidic texts is that God does not stop being God as we realize this. In some paradoxical way, the Object remains an Object while ceasing to be part of a subject-object duality. How can we capture this sense of the meditative "aim" or "intentional object," the kavana, of being both an Object and not an object at the same time?

My proposal is that from the second stage of hitbonenut, of hoda-a, on through to the ultimate sixth stage called "simple will" (below), we begin to speak, in place of the psychological God Object, of an "n-Object." The "n" here is to be taken as denoting the

106 "panen" of panentheism: pan "all", en "in"; an Object in which all is included and absorbed. The "n" can also allude to the word "not", as in "not-an-object," a reference to the loss of dualistic object-ness. The n-Object retains the full, even heightened, ecstatic, psychoemotional relevance and impact of a real relational object, while shedding subject- object dualism by virtue of its entirely suffusing-while-transcending the subjectivity of the meditator. The term n-Object is intended to evoke the uncanny paradoxicality of the

Chassidic text as it describes the ultimate Other, the God of monotheistic religion, turning out to be not "...other [zulato]" at all (Hillel, 1868/1995, p. 342). With its paradoxical meaning-nondual relationship—the term n-Object could arguably be viewed as what

Proudfoot (1985) refers to as a "placeholder" for an ineffable core category in a mystical discourse that repels final determinate meaning, while connoting and evoking desired themes and lines of thought (p. 127).

From intentionality to non-intentionality. In Chapter 1 we considered the relationship of the Chabad "sefirotic faculty psychology" to Scholasticism, in particular with regards to the way it treats intentionality. At this point what comes into view is the integration, within the Chassidic philosophy and psychology (following in this respect the medieval philosophic mystics [Blumenthal, 1988; Lobel, 2007]) of a form of mystical non-intentional psychology alongside the intentional one (rooted, perhaps, in

Maimonides allusions to a post-intellectual, transrational mode of relating to God, the trans-intellective ishq, or "longing" in Arabic [see Blumenthal, 1988]).

Forman (1999), in his rebuttal of constructivist epistemology as applied to mysticism, aigues for the non-intentionality of the "pure consciousness

107 experience" (PCE). He contends that mystical-meditative sources, and numerous documented contemporaiy accounts, flatly contradict the assumption that consciousness must always be consciousness "of' something. Like Newtonian mechanics which retains copious explanatory power for the broad range of "usual" phenomena, yet breaks down at the quantum and cosmic margins, so too, argues Form an, does the intentional account of consciousness break down when the psychological construction of intentional objects is purposefully de-automatized (Deikman, 1971) by mystical praxis and thereby suspended at the margins of human experience.

Using the textual sources of Chassidic mysticism I believe we can take a further step, towards a psychological gloss on the transition from intentional to non-intentional experiencing at the margins. The higher stages of hitbonenut that will be introduced presently provide, I believe, a kind of 'play-by-play' of the transition from intentional

(here: theistic) to non-intentional (panentheistic-unitive) consciousness; from Object to

"n-Object"; from intellective contemplation to consciousness arriving finally, and nesting, within an "...essential and simple will... from whence the intellect was born and branched out..." (Tract, p. 89).

Higher religio-developmental stages through hitbonenut

The "goodthought". The third stage following the important transition stage of hod-a-a is called "the good thought" (machshava tova). Relative to this third stage, the second stage of hoda-a discussed above is called "cold thought" (machshava kara), in that the person has not yet deepened meditation to the point of inducing a sense of actual contact, accompanied by the numinous arousal called hitpaalut. At this stage of "good

108 thought" there begins to be real hitpaalut, however, at this stage the hitpaalut is experienced in the "mind" (moach) alone, having not yet permeated to the "heart", the emotional centre. This is a felt, numinous contact at the leading edge of the meditation: the concentrating mind.

Unlike the parable of the person longingly contemplating the honour and wealth of the king from afar, where the emphasis is on the specific felt lack of a direct personal connection to the desired object, the meditator with the "good thought" is taken up with something that "touches him" ("nogeia lo," Tract, p. 82) specifically, personally. His personal connection to the object causes a preliminary degree of "union" (deveikut) with that object on the level of thought. The person is active and excited in the engagement of it, and is "moved" (hazaza) by the experience. Examples provided in the Tract include receiving news of a promotion to a position of great honour, or of success in a profitable enterprise.

This element of movement, hazaza is important. It represents what would be called

"structural change" in psychotherapy. There has been an insight, together with a sense of its personal significance (nogeia lo, "touches him"), and accompanied by affect

(ihitpaalut). The result of these elements coming together is movement, hazaza, by which we mean a measure of genuine change/transformation on the road to greater realization of bittul in the psyche.

As mentioned, however, the insight, although holding great personal relevance, is not yet internalized emotionally. The state of mental "preoccupation" ("tirda"), which is induced at this stage according to the Tract remains somewhat abstract. The working-

109 class person is told: "You just won the lottery, it's twelve million dollars.

Congratulations! Can I have your full name please?" The 'news' in hitbonenut is similarly described as 'too good to be true' initially, it is a "good thought," it fully grabs one's attention, but the full emotional impact, the myriad implications for one's life, have yet to be appreciated. There is a road still to travel to achieve full appreciation of what has just begun to be grasped. The annihilative/absorptive quality of the n-Object of attention has now been contacted at the leading edge of meditative awareness, and will begin-with sustained effort—to propagate through the psyche in three additional phases.

Ecstasy in the heart. Stage four is called "hitpaalut ba'lev," an emotive numinous arousal or "ecstasy in the heart." At this stage, there has been a deepening of the meditative experience, with a fuller measure of apprehension and internalization5® of the n-Object. This fuller internalization is reflected in a fuller emotional response, such that we now begin to see hitpaalut in the emotional centre, the "heart," and not in the mind alone. We now have a real, felt "emotion" towards God; a unique sort of "love" ahava,59 that is described in the Tract as a derivative response of the emotional centre of the psyche to the emergent awareness of bittul.

The involvement of the emotional centre at this stage also signifies

"internalization" (pnimiut, Tract, p. 87), meaning that the meditative experience has

58 The quality of this apprehension/internalization,"klita," is the subject of a later section.

59 This is why hitbonenut is called a "labour of love" {Zohar, 55b; Tract, pp. 55,85). According to Rabbi Dov Ber, this stage represents the fruit of this "labour," a true fulfilment of the biblical injunction to "love God with all your heart" (Deuteronomy, 6:5).

110 "settled" to the point where it pervades emotional life, and by extension outer behaviour and lifestyle as well. This is in contrast to the dissociation between the meditative practice and the conduct outside meditation which characterized stage one, "intention towards ecstasy" (Jcavana le'hitpaalut).®°

Thus we are speaking here of a major re-orientation of the entire system of wants and desires, a culmination of the shift that came into view at stage two

(acknowledgment), and was experienced with actual insight and numinous excitement in the mind at stage three (the "good thought"). Here at stage four, the analogy is

"...someone truly passionately [hitpaalut] involved in an enterprise, such that he does everything that helps this enterprise with desire and alacrity...and distances and guards himself from anything that can harm it, with similar passion" {Tract, p. 87). This is a person whose meditatively-forged piety is active, heartfelt, and authentic.

In terms of eveiything we have discussed in both this, and the previous chapter, stage four represents an authentic, and in many ways whole and complete, meditative outcome. In evidence here are a) a strong attachment or "intention" (kavana) towards the n-Object of meditation, undergirded by a studiously, and then meditatively-forged estimation/representation ("shiura") of God; b) arousal of affect (hitpaalut), on both the mental and emotional levels; and c) stable, global impact on the personality as a whole, including mental set, emotion, and behaviour, such that "...all of the horses are running in the right direction" (Ginsburgh, 1997).

60 The "crisis of duality" between meditative practice and daily life was taken up by Boorstein (1994) in relation to Mindfulness (vipassana) meditation. In a later section I will discuss some specific views on this problem in terms of hitbonenut.

Ill And yet there remain two additional stages.

Intention in the heart. At the previous stage four, as seen above, the focus of meditative consciousness, the n-Object, rests in the mind, whereas its derivative emotional effects are felt in the heart, that is, the "ecstasy in the heart." This is not an inauthentic hitpaalut such as at stage one, this is valid hitpaalut that relates to the emergent panentheistic awareness that 'all is in God.'

The Mittler Rebbe insists that there is room to go further, however. The appearance of this felt emotion at stage four signifies not only that there has been insight, but also that there is still consciousness that is available for—or perhaps to some degree invested in—having such an emotion. This aspect of consciousness is called the "mind that is in the emotions" (mochin she'ba'middot ). In the context of hitbonenut, this aspect is also referred to as the "bechairi" the "therefore" of the meditation, in the sense that the emotion is underlaid, driven, by a perceived meaning or implication~a 'personal' implication—of the meditative experience that one is having. The bechain thus bridges the mind and the heart: the mind in contemplation of "what is," the heart with one's own, personal reaction to that.

The apportioning of awareness to emotion in this way is understood to imply necessarily an "abridgement" or a "synopsis" (kitzur) of the full expanse of the meditative landscape or intention—the kavana. It is a mere reflection of the foil kavana— one which displaces to some degree the full kavana in awareness. The Mittler Rebbe's analysis is that there must have been a partial "coming out" of the meditation, a constriction of its dimensions and withdrawal from its field, which enabled the emotion

112 to emerge.

In the light of all this, stage five, called "intention in the heart" (kavana be'lev), is about the transcendence of this abridgement of the intentional n-Object signified by the bechain. At this stage we begin to see the full and utter immersion and absorption (bittul ve 'hitcalelut) of the meditator in the n-Object of meditation: "His entire psyche is drawn after it, such that he cannot yet bring it into his heart emotionally because his mind and heart are completely preoccupied... This is called 'expanded consciousness' [mochin de 'gadlut, literally "great mind"]" {Tract, p. 88).

In this state of complete psychic engagement with the n-Object, there is no psychic

"space" whatsoever available for an emotion to be felt. Some kind of proto-emotional impression is present however—emotion that is in a state of potentiality or latency

(be'helem). An analogy here could be that of a soldier in combat61 who experiences events laden with profound, life-altering implications, however at the time of their experiencing the urgent and utter immersion of the soldier in combat precludes feeling any emotion whatsoever. The events enter awareness, enter memory, and there is some kind of tacit emotional "registering" or impression, but the emotional impact may remain latent until some time long afterwards.

At this stage, then, the meditator is choosing to continue "moving" (tezuza) on

'into' the n-Object, riding a momentum of ever-expanding insight that suffiises the psyche, leaving no room for even reflexive emotional reactions of the self to this

61 As mentioned in another context earlier: "The time of prayer is a time of war" (Shneur Zalman, 1748/1987, Part 3, p. 143 and Part 4, p. 68, based on Zohar III, 243a).

113 experience itself. The n-Object—in its full 'unabridged' form—pervades both "mind" and

"heart" (moach and lev), leaving no "vessel" for emotion. The full meditative expanse, the kavana, is thus "in the heart" as well as in the mind, hence the name of this stage:

"intention in the heart" (kavana be lev).

Simple will. The sixth and final stage is called "simple will" (ratzon pashut). This is the terminology chosen by Rabbi Dov Ber of Lubavitch in this context to represent the

Chassidic bittul, and deveikut, the annihilation of the self in union with divine ayin (see

Elior, 1993) (the psychologization of the metaphysical ayin of classical theosophic

Kabbalah [Matt, 1990]). "Simple" will, I contend (based on parallel sources, e.g. Hillel of

Paritch, 1987) is will without an object; intentionless intention. "Simple" here is the opposite of "composite", or compound. We have arrived at something having important formal qualities in common with the consummate "pure consciousness event" (PCE) of the psychology of religion literature (Forman, 1999).

Rabbi Dov Ber says very little about this stage, which he characterizes as

"...completely beyond hitbonenut," an "...essential and simple will, due to which, and from which, the intellect was born and branched out..." (Tractt p. 89). The meditator has transcended the need for meditation, the 'fact' of bittul is seen and lived naturally. This suggests the extrovertive form of mystical awareness that follows (rather than precedes, as in Stace [I960]) the introvertive state, or what Forman (1999) refers to as the "dualistic mystical state" (DMS) (p. 130). Psychologically speaking, it is clear that at this stage we are talking about a major re-organization of the psyche on the order of Freud's characterization of the "mystical method" as effecting "...the erasure of the psychical

114 topographies..." (Freud, 1989/1932, cited in Botella & Botella, 2005, p. 141).

Table 1 summarizes the religio-developmental stages of hitbonenut that I have discussed in this, and the previous chapter, from the "non-stage" of "completely foreign fire," through the "simple will" that we have just seen:

Table 1: Stages of Ecstasy (Hitpaalut) Foreign fire Eish zara 1. Intention towards ecstasy kavana le'hitpaalut 2. Acknowledgment (cold thought) Hoda-a (machshava kara) 3. Good thought Machshava tova 4. Ecstasy in the heart Hitpaalut ba 'lev 5. Intention in the heart kavana be 'lev 6. Simple will Ratzon pashut

Processes of internalization

As indicated, a central parameter in the Chabad account of psychological changes cultivated through hitbonenut is the description of progressive emotional—or more accurately 'characterological'--internalization and integration of meditative experiences.

What is desired is 'movement' (tezuza) towards stable, global, personality change: "set in the psyche" ("kavua be'nafsho" [Shneuri, 1831/1991, p. 51]). A meditative 'state' is expected to be transmuted into a personality 'trait.' The Chabad adepts are not interested in merely 'collecting experiences' as a tourist snaps photographs. The psychological process of internalization (klita) thus becomes a subject in its own right in this literature.

What is the nature of this internalization, and how does it come about?

115 Characteristically, the Chabad approach to addressing this concern is first and foremost to build a detailed understanding of the basic psychological processes involved in terms of the sefirotic faculty psychology. One important factor affecting this internalization—namely motivation—was explored in Chapter 4. There we saw how an appropriate motivational set must underlie and inform hitbonenut in order for the latter to be successful. In Chapter 3 we explored some of the parameters of the contemplative process itself, and here in Chapter 5, we have been looking at the stages of personality change.

In Chapter 2, in the subsection on situating Chabad psychology theoretically, I concluded with some comments on the manner in which the contemplative mind in

Chabad is understood as a potential agency or venue for union (deveikut) of the meditator with the Object of meditation. The capacity of the mind to become profoundly unified with its objects translates, in the context of meditation on God, into the capacity to actualize psychologically the a priori, ontic relation of bittul between God and the meditator. Obviously this bittul is not meant as an intellectual insight alone, but rather a state of being. This distinction between understanding something intellectually—even very deeply—and living it out, being it, becomes a focus of analytic interest in Chabad.

This matter is discussed in Rabbi Dov Ber of Lubavitch's Gate of Union [Shaar

Ha-Yichud], henceforth simply the Gate (Shneuri, 1820/1995) and in Hillel Paritcher's commentary on the same (Hillel, 1868/1995). What follows is based on pp. 219-222 of

Hillel's ad locum commentary on the Gate. In the terms of analysis of the Gate, introjection of the meditative n-Object to become character structure (middot)—as distinct

116 from mere intellectual understanding—is called literally "absorption,""klita" which is a function of a psychological faculty called tevuna. Tevuna is not readily translatable, however it is etymologically related to the word "understanding" (binah), and of course

"contemplation" (hitbonenut). Tevuna is also normally translated as "understanding," which does not distinguish it from binah—a. distinction that is crucial here.

Tevuna does not appear among the ten faculties described in Chapter 2 because it is actually considered to be an aspect or sub-faculty of binah, understanding (all ten faculties have complex arrays of such sub-faculties). It is described as the most "external" or concretizing aspect of binah. It will be recalled that wisdom, chochma, represents the initial apperception of a mental object in the mind, whereas binah represents the faculty of abstract reasoning, analysis, and formulation of the apperceived object using "letters of thought." The end of this process of understanding is called "settling" (hityashvut) which denotes the stabilization of a mental object into a certain satisfying formulation or meaning-structure. Tevuna, as the agency of "absorption" ("klita"), represents a type of internalization that is qualitatively distinct from this "settling." The object is not merely mentally grasped and "settled" by the faculty of understanding, but is rather actually incorporated into the "heart," which is considered the main seat of the person him or herself as a distinct being (Aharon HaLevi, 1820/1970; Ginsburgh, 1993; Hillel,

1868/1995).

Tevuna is thus called an "intermediary" or "interface" ("memutza"; Gate, p. 220) between the abstract mental world of binah, and the world of personal affect and character (middot). Through the agency of tevuna an idea becomes drawn down into the

117 emotions, as the "mind that is in the emotions" (Gate, p. 220; and as we saw in connection with stage 4, "hitpaalut ba 'lev" in the previous two sections). This "mind in the emotions" is to be understood as a meaning-structure that organizes and determines the stable emotional reactions that constitute a person's character—in a manner providing striking comparisons (worthy of further research) to the contemporary concept of a cognitive-affective schema (e.g., Greenberg, Rice & Elliot, 1996). The term middot

(usually translated as "emotions," as in the aforementioned phrase), it must be remembered, means literally "measures" or "dimensions" and refers not to emotions as

"states," but rather to stable emotive dispositions or tendencies.

Pulling together all of these elements, I propose that the term "introjection" as used by the British object relations school, or the self-psychological "transmuting internalization" (Kohut, 1971), expresses the meaning of tevuna's function of "klita" more accurately than does its literal translation of "absorption." What we are talking about here could be stated somewhat baldly as "introjecting God." By introjection we mean the internalization of our experience of the other in such a way that this experience becomes constituent of our own self. We become like the other, or to draw upon Kohut's suggestive language: we incorporate the other into ourselves as a "selfobject" (Kohut,

1971, p. 3).

A sign given for a rudimentary level of "introjection," effected by tevuna, is the capacity to transpose or apply (hava-a, to "bring to bear") the absorbed idea or insight into "a separate matter" ("inyan nivdaV [Gate, pp. 220-221]). An example that is given for this is the use of a metaphor, whereby an abstract idea is concretized (hagshama),

118 delimited (hagbala), and transposed (hava-a) into an entirely different context (Hillel,

1868/1995, p. 314). The degree of mastery of the idea required to do this is considered to

necessitate internalization at the level of tevuna, and not "understanding", binah, alone.

The "settledness" achieved through the agency of "understanding" implies only that the

idea has been grasped in its original context, at its original level of abstraction, whereas

the "introjection" (klita) of tevuna implies that the idea has become part of the person's

overall, pre-reflexive mode of meeting the world, in all times and places.

Rabbi Dov Ber and Hillel Paritcher develop this psychological account of

introjecting a mental object, with a view to applying it in the special case of "...the Object

called God" (Spero, 1990, p. 54). We can now understand more clearly how, when the

mental object is a meditatively-forged realization of God as subsuming the self (in the

relation of bittul), and when one is working within the ontological assumption that God

in actuality subsumes the self, then the implication of a cognitive-affective introjection of

this Object or idea represents the actualization of an ontological bittul in the psyche.

When insight is introjected by repetitive experiences—as in a mature, sustained meditative

practice-then one may become characterologically pre-disposed to be "Godly," which

includes experiencing God at all times and places, and not only in the specific context of

meditation (as in the "dualistic mystical state" [Forman, 1999]). This is the implication of

tevuna—a much more profound level of integration of meditative insight than that implied

by "understanding" (binah) alone.

In order for the capacity of tevuna to be actualized in this way, however, it must be accompanied by its companion faculty of "knowing," daat. In Chapter 21 presented daat as one of the sefirotic faculties, and as implying an intunate, creative union with the known object. Also, the discussion of motivation in Chapter 4—especially the subsection concerned with yes/iitf-narcissism—is intertwined with the subject of daat, although I did not approach matters there in terms of daat.

The "knowledge" or "knowing" that is implied by the term daat captures only a small aspect of what is meant by this term in the Chassidic writings. In the present context, daat is defined as feeling (hargasha), recognition (hacara) and connection

(hitkashrut) (Gate, p. 221). Its erotic connotation was commented on in Chapter 2. The best English term I have found to encapsulate the various nuances of daat is "cathexis," in the general psychoanalytic sense of a psychological "investment."62 Daat has to do with what one cares about ("nogeia lo," "touches him"), where one's life is invested, what one values, empathizes with, feels; where one "is." It is also significant that daat is considered to be the faculty that potentiates memory, in that one tends to remember that which one values and which touches one.

All of these meanings of daat are pertinent to meditation. In order for the psychological processes of internalization to take place, the person has to care, as discussed at length in Chapter 4. Also, when meditation deepens to experiential levels of direct contact and consciousness that are beyond the initial intellectual contemplation

(e.g., the second phase, of "gazing," in the general framework discussed in Chapter 3 in the subsection Three general stages of meditation), so it is the faculty of daat that enables

6aIn addition, daat carries a sexual connotation as does "cathexis" as in the paradigmatic source text of daat: "And Adam knew his wife Eve, and she bore him a son..." (Genesis 4:1).

120 'feeling' and contact with the Object in the intimate meditative embrace beyond thought

(Hillel, 1868/1995; Shalom Dov Ber, 1887/1974).

In connection with tevuna and its power to engage meditative insight in new contexts (e.g., the metaphor), the aspect of daat that comes to the fore is memory.

Memory can be understood as the persistence of a connection to something that is no longer immediately present or obvious. It is this mnenic connection that underlies and empowers the activity of tevuna, as will be shown presently.

The relevance of "memory" may be understood here through introduction of yet another usage of the term daat, namely as a "conviction," in the sense of a stable opinion or belief. In this vein, Reb Hillel Paritcher discusses daat as having three metaphoric dimensions: depth, breadth and length. With respect to depth and breadth, he explains that when a person is immature (katan), the "depth" of his attachment to his opinions is less than when he is mature (gadol) and that the "breadth" dimension of one's daat—what we would call 'broad-mindedness' or 'tolerance'~is derivative of this depth dimension. He writes:

...the immature one, even though he is easily swayed to the opinion

opposite to his own [due to his lack of "depth"], so long as he has not been

so swayed, he cannot tolerate [lo yisbol] the opposite opinion. Not so the

mature person: even though he will not be swayed from his opinion

because of the depth of his daat, this itself provides that he is nevertheless

able to tolerate the opposite opinion, while not being moved from his

place at all (Hillel, 1868/1995, p. 304).

121 In a good example of an application of the Chabad sefirotic-faculty psychology to an empirical psychological phenomenon, Hillel Paritcher has explained the dynamic whereby an underlying weakness of conviction is inversely reflected in a superficial pseudo-strength of conviction (or rather: a vociferousness) that expresses an acute lack of tolerance for an opposing idea (Freud spoke of this phenomenon in terms of "reaction formation;" [see Laplanche & Pontalis, 1973]). Thus, the dimensions of daat emerge as a measure of one's capacity for having real convictions.63

The "length" dimension of daat, also derivative of the "depth," is bound up with our main concern here of memory. The "length" of one's daat implies the degree to which one can remain connected to an object or idea in the face of an overwhelming flow of unrelated, or even antithetical experiences. So here we may discern the necessity of the intersection of daat and tevuna: tevuna as the cognitive-emotional capacity to transpose insight into ever-changing and shifting life contexts; daat as the capacity to care enough to remember, and to utilize this capacity. It is as if daat underlies and activates tevuna's integrative function. Both are merely 'potentials'—an alternative translation of the term kochot for "faculties"—that may or may not be used at all, and may or may not be used in relation to God.

63 We could interpret narcissistic disorders as reflecting an impairment of precisely this capacity. See Chapter 4 above, the section on yeshus and narcissism. 122 Chapter Six: Discussion: Outline of a Jewish Transpersonal Psychology

In the preceding chapters I have explored the psychology of meditation of the

Chabad Chassidic tradition, and found a range of meanings and concerns that are shared with contemporary psychology. This exegesis has laid the groundwork for making a

Judaism-informed or inspired version of transpersonal psychology.

Among the meanings we have examined are the levels or stages through which the

Jewish mystic progresses from extrovertive to increasingly introvertive states, through ecstasy; the notion of greater or lesser authenticity (erentskeit) in one's meditative involvement and/or relationship to God; the idea of discernible, qualitative developmental "stages" in this relationship; intrapsychic structural accounts of God- object relations; the concept oiyeshut which I have linked with narcissism; the idea of a distinct existential or transpersonal depression (mara shechora atzmit); a notion of

"meditation-readiness" linked with specific developmental prerequisites for depth meditative work; a concept of psychological assessment (havchana); a concept of intrapsychic layers or strata, in particular as related to complex and conflicted motivational sets; and a distinction between conscious (galui) and unconscious ( helem) experience and motivation.

I submit that both the number, and depth of the resonant elements we have seen between psychology and hitbonenut make for a strong kinship among these traditions, traceable to their common roots in medieval philosophic mysticism (Maimonides and the

Scholastics), from whence key terms and conceptions passed into Chassidism on the one

123 hand and phenomenology on the other, wherein both streams influenced Freud and in his wake object relations theory.

The function of this final chapter is to organize the themes emergent from this psychological reading of hitbonenut, into a more detailed synthesis of Judaic and psychological thought. To achieve this organization, in what follows I first integrate aspects of hitbonenut with the contemporary object relations of religious experience as propounded by Spero (1992). I see this as merely one example of many possible integrative models that could be harvested from the interplay of psychology and

Chassidism. This specific model hinges on a shared theoretical understanding of intrapsychic God representations.

From there I proceed to put forward a new general approach to integrating meditation and psychotherapy. This approach will be defined in dialogue with and as a counterpoint to the dominant approach to this integration in the current transpersonal literature.

First: the specific synthesis with Spero's God-object relations.

Shiura: The malleable measure of God

In the section entitled Situating Chabadpsychology theoretically in Chapter 2,1 demonstrated the broadly "object relational" approach of the Chabad classical "faculty" psychology, while in the penultimate chapter we have seen the Chabad psychology of meditation describing a series of intrapsychic changes that progress in correspondence with how the person envisions, experiences, "measures" God. Each of the six "stages" described consists of a complex array of motivational, cognitive, affective, and

124 behavioural qualities, integrated into a kind of overall relational "posture" characterizing that stage. A key interpretive linkage of my integration is my contention that this complex relational posture, with its array of elements as explicated in the initial (0,1 and 2) stages of the Tract, the Gate and related texts, can be considered functionally isomorphic with what is referred to in contemporary psychology as an intrapsychic "object representation" (see Greenberg & Mitchell, 1983) or "selfobject" (Kohut, 1971).

As indicated in the previous chapter, at the higher levels of religious experience, as its numinous and absorptive qualities become salient, the quality of the God Object changes to become an n-Object. At the earlier (aish zara, kavana lehitpaalut and hoda-a) levels—those which are more commonly found, and hence more likely to be addressed by psychology—the notion of a basic, well-developed "God concept" is at issue. There I also utilized the term shiura as the "God object representation," based on the Zoharic reference in Tanya that I mentioned in passing in the section entitled Three General

Stages of Meditation in Chapter 3:

Colchada ve'chada lefum shiura dilei; col chada vechada lefum mah

de 'meshaer be 'libei. [God is revealed to] each individual 'according to his

measure'; meaning, to each individual according to how he measures [or

"estimates" God] in his heart (Shneur Zalman of Liadi, 1796/1981, pp. 4,

124, based on Zohar, 1:103; and see Frisch, 2003, ad locum).

This concept of the shiura, which includes the three levels of God imago, God concept and n-Object, has provided the basic anchor for my thinking on a number of

125 topics in and around the borderland between psychology and mysticism.641 favour this term because it is grounded in the primary sources; it can comfortably accommodate some of the more explicit and elaborate psychological meanings evident in Rabbi Dov

Ber of Lubavitch's (and his prime interpreter, Hillel Paritcher's [Hillel, 1991]) writing on psychological change through hitbonenut. It also provides a ready tool for the integration

I make below.

When contemporary object relations concepts were applied to religious experience and the internalized imago of God in particular—as Rizutto (1980), and Spero have done— the resulting object relational, religio-developmental stage model resonates remarkably well with the Chassidic account of meditatively-forged personality changes that we have been examining, each adding to and complementing the other. It now remains to exploit this resonance by constructing a system of correspondences between the stages of personality change in meditation as described in Chapter 5, and Spero's religio- developmental model.

The integrative model

In Chapter 1 (section: God as relational object) I reviewed Spero's two theories of the God relationship, namely his psycho-structural model based on a distinction between anthropocentric and deocentric God representations, and his Mahlerian religio- developmental scheme which traces God-object relational development through a series of six separation-individuation sub-phases. A careful reading of Spero's main relevant

641 think of this shiura as including what is called in Kabbalah and Chassidut a full partzuf—a full array of related psychological qualities. I prefer the term shiura, however, because it is used explicitly in the context of meditation. Moreover, it has been used in relation to a full partzuf, for example the term shiur koma, which means a full "stature." 126 texts (1987, 1990,1992) reveals that, although he is open to elements of real deocentric experiencing (i.e., some manner of actual direct experience of God), his Mahlerian religio-developmental scheme is fundamentally ordered in terms of anthropocentric God representations, and not primarily deocentric ones. As he states with reference to his developmental model, it is only after having traversed all six sub-phases (culminating in the stage of "individuation" or "emotional object constancy" in relation to the God representation), that the individual is "...on the road to experiencing a relationship with

God not based wholly on anthropocentric experiences" (1987, p. 66).

Spero's Mahlerian model thus tracks the development of the anthropocentric God representations to the point where they are no longer necessarily decisive in determining the individual's perception of God. Until that point, the person mainly "uses" God (as the narcissistic individual "uses" other people) as a projective screen upon which the drama of the unresolved struggle of separation-individuation is played out. The intrapsychic material edited and integrated through this process is of course derived primarily from experiences with the parents, and/or other significant love or early transitional objects. As is clear, where Spero differs from Freud is that he is open to a real God 'waiting' beyond the projections; a real God who potentially can become known in an authentic relationship—internalized in the form of deocentric experiences—once the individual has developed the capability to acknowledge and relate to God as an Other, distinct from the self. Freud's fully reductionist stance leaves no room for such a possibility.

With the achievement of this sense of separation from God, the individual has begun to grant God at least the degree of acknowledgment that we would ordinarily

127 expect in a human relationship.65 Although Spero does not elaborate his reference to

"reciprocal relations," we can imagine that this person lives with a stable sense of God as a participant in his or her life. God can be taken account of, spoken to. When God might be understood or experienced as 'disagreeing' with something the person is doing, there is a sense that the relationship can 'contain' the negative feelings that result. God's

'integrity' is respected, we might say. These changes thus represent the activation of a more complex and differentiated God-object than was the case when God was experienced narcissistically, as merely a derivative adjunct of the self.

The connection between this religio-developmental achievement, and the first non- narcissistic (non-yeshut) religio-developmental stage outlined in the Tract on Ecstasy of

Rabbi Dov Ber of Lubavitch—namely that of acknowledgment (hoda-a)—is manifest. In both cases there is a transition from a mode of relating to God that is wholly or in large part determined by one's urgent need to complete the self in some way, to a mode of relating based on genuine curiosity and openness—setting the stage for reverence and awe—towards the Other. As indicated in earlier chapters, in the Chassidic writings a self- expressive64 or self-aggrandizing motivation is precisely what undermines the meditative progress at the earlier (Foreign Fire and Intention towards Ecstasy), pre-

Acknowledgment stages. My contention is that both discourses are describing essentially the same significant object relational shift.

65 "Would it only be that your fear of Heaven would be as your fear of flesh and blood" (Talmud, Berachot, 28b).

66 "The fool desires not understanding, but rather the revelation of his own heart" (Proverbs, 18:2).

128 What lies "beyond" this stage of acknowledgment? Spero, in his 1987 paper, opines

that "...some ultimate manner of perceiving God may transcend the terms of object

relations and other psychological theories" (p. 63). However, his 1990 paper contains this

intriguing comment: "Following a sufficient number of experiences with special

perception (such as prophecy) of the objective divine object, one could imagine the direct

internalization of an ideal 'divine' representation" (p. 59). The goals of hitbonenut of

course centrally include the cultivation of precisely this kind of repeated experience of a

"special" (i.e., meditative67) perception, and subsequent internalization of the referent of

these experiences (as discussed in particular with respect to tevuna in the previous

chapter). What the Chabad meditators described "down the road" from the stage of

acknowledgment are five additional stages of development in the God relationship, as

outlined in the last chapter.

Table 2 displays the proposed system of correspondences between Spero's God-

object relations, the religio-developmental concepts found in the key Chabad texts, and

some corresponding characterizations drawn from the psychology of mysticism literature

and my own notion of the n-Object.

67 Spero mentions "prophecy" as an example of a form of "special perception." It is relevant in that connection that Rabbinic sources (such as Maimonides, 1963) as well as etymological-historical analysis of the biblical text (Kaplan, 1978) clarify that the prophetic "states" of the First Temple Judean and Samarian prophetic schools were cultivated through various forms of meditation. 129 Table 2: God-object, n-Object integrative model

God-obiect Relations fSoerot: Chabad hitbonenut: Explanatory notes:

Anthropocentric Relating: 1. Normal autism I Foreign fire Ergotropic self-stimulation 2. Symbiotic phase!

3. Differentiation I 4. Practicing • 1. Intention to ecstasy- • Complex, unresolved 5. Rapprochement I motivational sets

Transitional Stage: 6. Individuation • 2. Acknowledgement God Object ciystallizes (emot. obj. const.)

Emergence of n-Object

Deocentric Relating: "..direct internalization 3. Good thought -Intellective numinosity (extrovertive) of an ideal divine 4. Ecstasy in the heart— - Emotional numinosity (extrovertive) representation." 5. Intention in the heart- -Nascent introvertive absorption 6. Simple will - Consummate introvertive absorption

Represented here are three general phases of religio-meditative development shared by both discourses. These are the "pre-acknowledgment" phase, the "acknowledgment" transitional phase, and the "post-acknowledgment" or "deocentric" phase. The pre- acknowledgment phase is subdivided in the Chabad texts into two sub-phases, or types of yesAwf/narcissistic relational orientation, namely the foreign fire, and the intention towards ecstasy. The same pre-acknowledgment phase as described by Spero is differentiated into five separation-individuation sub-phases. The acknowledgment phase itself is a qualitative shift in both systems, and flagged by both as a key, transitional

130 phase. The post-acknowledgment phase is referred to by Spero in scattered, general references to that which lies "down the road" from anthropocentric relating, in terms of

"special perception," "direct internalization" and so forth (Spero, 1990, p.59). In Chabad this range of experience is differentiated into four advanced levels of God-object (or n-

Object) relational development cultivated through a mature meditative practice of hitbonenut.

As explored in the previous chapter, what is most interesting about these latter four levels in the Chabad texts is how they represent both the deepening of a relationship and, simultaneously, the progressive negation of the duality required by the entire concept of

"relationship." The absorption into the Other, the fruition of a relational movement of meditational embrace and self-surrender, is not the negation of relationship, but rather its climax. The actualized bittul of "simple will" is thus not the end of Object-relating in the sense of the latter being "over," finished; it is rather a teleological "end" and purpose of meditation as a modality of relating to God.

Two-eyed discernment: The model applied

This integrative theoretical framework helps to refine the mental health practitioner's ability to make distinctions with respect to issues such as meditation- readiness, authentic versus inauthentic religiosity, and tacit emotional/motivational schemata related to a client's religious life. The synthesis of the two discourses offers both a full-spectrum Judaic transpersonal model, and a more penetrating, "stereoscopic" vision applicable to both clinical and didactic work where spiritual work and a God relationship are at issue whether explicitly or implicitly.

131 Let's take a closer look at some of the conceptual tools provided by this integration.

As discussed in Chapters 4 and 5, when individuals undertake hitbonenut with a degree

of narcissistic (i.e., pre-acknowledgment) motivation, they encounter difficulties such as

those involved in the two stages called foreign fire and intention towards ecstasy. The former represents a fully false meditative involvement, the latter a troubled and complex, though evolving one. These two, preparatory, stages of hitbonenut can be better understood and articulated by using Spero's formulations in reference to his corresponding levels. Specifically, the autistic and symbiotic phases are those wherein the individual has not achieved any sense of emotional differentiation from the Object.68 Sub- phase 3, differentiation, represents a halting, dawning awareness of the Object as an object. Following this, at sub-phases 4 and 5, practicing and rapprochement, the individual oscillates between recognition of otherness and a regressive egocentrism. The hitbonenut pseudo-stage of foreign fire, wherein there is "no meditative concept of God at all" {Tract, p. 61) can be understood in terms of Spero's religio-developmental phase of autism. This is an un-difFerentiated fusion with the Object as seen, for example, in psychotic religiosity that precludes having a God-object representation in the cultivated sense intended by hitbonenut. The object of an autistic relation is an "object" in name only. The grandiose delusion that "There is I, and none else"69 (linked in the Tract with the foreign fire) can certainly be characterized as "autistic" in the broad sense intended

68 In Chapter l, in the section God as a relational object, I insert the caveat that these phases do not relate to normal developmental stages in childhood.

69 See Chapter 4, the sub-section Yesftuf-narcissism, for the relevant citations here.

132 here.

At the stage of intention towards ecstasy, however, there is a minute oscillation between a nascent recognition of the Object and a regressive narcissistic "refuelling," whereby a (broadly interpreted) symbiotic contact with the Object provides a "feeling of oneself feeling this." As developed in Chapters 4 and 5, this symbiosis provides pleasure whether simple or a self-expansive grandiose feeling. Nevertheless this person is working meditatively with some genuine experiential referent that may form the basis for the crucial shift to the stage of hoda-a, acknowledgment, wherein the meditator "...demand[s]

God in truth and sincerity, with a proper intention towards Godliness specifically" [Tract, p. 81]). Spero's post-differentiation sub-phases of practicing and rapprochement similarly represent a relation to God that climbs haltingly towards the stage of individuation, implying real recognition and Object constancy. The regressive need for the Object to be a part of the self, to avoid a painful recognition of one's separation, gradually gives way to an acceptance of—a rapprochement with—the idea of a separate, yet still potentially available Object. The oscillation between the promise of individuation and mutuality on the one hand, and the pull of idyllic symbiosis on the other, characterizes these two sub- phases. An inner representation of God as Object competes with a primal, animistic union; the two intertwine and colour each other, and yet there is a sense that great strides have already been made. The sense of an ongoing process, of real "work" (avoda) dominates, unlike autism and symbiosis, with their intimations of an easy eternity.

Intention to Ecstasy is thus included as a stage, a "getting to the starting gate," a groping towards God through a haze of conflicting desires and intentions.

133 The above account adds to the object relational account of religious experience by providing a relatively elaborate description of its deeper "deocentric" aspect over and beyond its "anthropocentric" one (Spero, 1990). It thus represents a useful bridge between psychology and depth religious experience, a zone of human experience that has confounded psychology with its "troublesome transcendence" (Garret, 1974), even engendering the intimation that it may be beyond the reach of any psychological theory to describe (Spero, 1987). This account describes hitbonenut along traditional lines, while opening up broad horizons of understanding with a large body of psychological theory and therapy lore. Conversely, it enables conceptualization of subtle religio-developmental issues in psychotherapy, while retaining a firm footing in traditional spiritual and meditative teachings of broad relevance to Jews and surely to others as well.

Relative to what could be done along these lines in the future, this framework is just an example, a beginning. The Chabad corpus contains hundreds of volumes of material related to hitbonenut that are psychological in the ways we have been elucidating. This literature, I submit, is a most natural "point of fusion" whereby Judaism and modern psychology can meet, dialogue with, teach, and learn from each other.

Relational meditation: Extending the transpersonal paradigm

The relational-panentheistic model of the psychology of meditation articulated here expands the psychology-meditation interface by providing a theoretical framework for thinking about meditative psycho-development that is fimdamentally relationally oriented. The integration of God-object relations and meditative mysticism makes possible a more precise understanding of clients whose transpersonal experiencing is

134 oriented to a Western understanding of God, whether consciously or unconsciously. This approach can thus provide an alternative theoretical iens' for transpersonal practitioners which complements transpersonal theorizing that draws upon Buddhist-inspired conceptions and developmental assumptions.

As mentioned in Chapter 1, a key concept in the transpersonal literature on meditation-psychotherapy integration is "disidentification," meaning that meditation is seen as a process of disengagement of cathexes from relational objects in aspiration to a stance of Buddhistic quietude or "non-attachment" (e.g., Engler, 1984; Epstein, 1986).

The purpose of a Judaically-informed meditative practice, by way of contrast, is not to disengage from attachments but rather, as we have seen at some length, to form one. In fact, "attachment" is a fairly good literal translation of the Hebrew term deveikut, which is the term most used in Chassidic mysticism for unio mystica, the "bonding" of oneself to God that is the goal of hitbonenut.70 Jewish hitbonenut is thus a "reaching towards", an insistent search (derisha [Gate, Title page]), informed by a longing for the Object of

70 Furthermore, in contrast to the Eastern traditions of a renuncient (e.g., the Hindu sanyassin, or sadhu) or a monk (Radakrishnan, 1996), in a Jewish context there is no such monastic ideal. Meditation, including that of the deepest sort, is to take place within a net of familial and communal 'attachments.' Any withdrawal from family and community is temporary, and tactical only (an example would be the 40-day isolation retreat [ar. halwa] of the medieval philosophic mystics led by Maimonides' descendants. See Fenton's Forward to A Maimonides' Treatise of the Pool [1981]). This communal sensibility shaped the development of the Kabbalah, and contrasted with the both Sufi and Christian mystical fellowships (Idel, 1988). An approach to the psychology of meditation informed by this sensibility has the advantage of being more in accord with how most Western meditators approach their practice. Most meditators do not aspire to become monks, and most try to integrate their meditative practice with a normal life of relationships and other involvements. If we view meditation as a process of'connecting to' something—however we choose to speak about the 'something'—rather than a 'de-taching from' things, we can avoid setting up what may be an unnecessarily harsh duality between our meditative goals, and our lives in general (see here Boorstein's [1994] Jewish-Buddhist discussion of this issue). 135 meditation. Buddhist vipassana meditation cultivates an attitude of neutral, bare attention that seeks ultimately to extinguish all longing or craving for objects of any kind. These are potentially significant psychological differences.

n-Object relations can help clients who experience dissonance between their theistic religious orientation—whether latent or manifest—and an interpretive framework for meditative work built upon Buddhist-inspired concepts such as disidentification. It can help us to 'see' this dissonance, and to help such clients to better integrate their deepest spiritual goals within a meditative practice that is guided and supported by a transpersonally-oriented psychotherapist or consultant.

As we have seen, Spero (1992) in his psychoanalytic work is concerned, like the

Chassidic contemplatives, with the quality and form of relational "attachment" to God.

The contrast here with the dominant transpersonal theorist, Ken Wilber (1995,2000), is instructive. Wilber appears unconcerned about relational entanglements with God.

Although he uses the term "God," he does not seem to be talking about the God that the

Jew alternatively cajoles, reveres, or invites to dinner on weekends. Wilber (1995), who has described his own meditation as within a Buddhist tradition, uses the term God to denote an abstract "Spirit of Evolution." When applied to meditation, this type of theology seems to envision a different psychological problem set than that addressed by

Spero, or by the Chassidic contemplatives.

The approach to modelling meditative involvement that I am proposing here consists, as we have seen, of a synthesis of object-relations concepts and a psychologically-oriented reading of the Chabad system. This approach yields a view of

136 the meditating personality that is relational (if ultimately in a non-intentional modality),

developmental, and firmly interwoven with Judaic thought.

With respect to the integration of psychotherapy and meditation: In much of the

later, clinically-sophisticated transpersonal writing (authors such as Boorstein, 1994;

Engler, 1984; and Walsh, 1992), psychotherapy is understood to work within object

relationships and identifications, whereas meditation effects "disidentification." One

consequence of this conception, as developed in particular by Engler (1984), is that

meditation—even of the deepest sort—can be considered a 'clinical' endeavour. Drawing

upon Buddhist concepts, Engler proposes that meditation be viewed as treatment for the

purported "faulty reality testing" and "sufFering" that are said to characterize normal

everyday consciousness and ego-functioning (Engler, 1984). The rationale here is:

psychotherapy helps to get one to the level of "normal" adult functioning, which is in turn

seen as a type of "pathological condition" and a "state of arrested development" to be

treated by meditation (p. 50).

An alternative approach to this integration that arises from this dissertation is to

view both psychotherapy and meditation as intended to facilitate relationship, by

enhancing one's capacity for relationship. Good therapy—including and especially

therapy that deals professionally and directly with the God relationship in the way that

Spero's case reports demonstrate can be done (e.g., Spero, 1980, pp. 150-153; 1987;

1992, pp. 156-182)--helps to clear the decks of limiting or toxic transferential object relations, enabling a fuller range of perception of and responses to relational objects including God. Meditation may then draw upon these expanded psychological resources,

137 and provide tools for focusing them towards a fuller and more profound engagement in the God relationship, up to and including panentheistic (n-Object) unitive experiences.

This then is the approach to the psychotherapy-meditation interface emergent from this study. It offers transpersonal psychology an approach to facilitating the relationship with God for those who seek one. It thus adds a new dimension to what has grown out of the intriguing and fruitful interaction of psychoanalysis and Buddhism.

Ascribing meaning to meditative experiences.

Expanding on this emergence, I shall now deepen my comparison of the Judaic hitbonenut and Buddhist vipassana schools of meditation. In doing this, I am aware that both Buddhism and Judaism engender vast, diverse and complex civilizational systems, and cannot in any way be reduced to particular examples from selected sources. My interest here is focused on how these systems are brought to bear, or may be brought to bear, on contemporary transpersonal psychological theorizing. For that fairly delimited purpose, a comparison based on a key transpersonal paper by Engler (1984), representative of a stream of Buddhist-inspired transpersonal writing, is instructive.

As described by Engler (1984), Buddhist vipassana or "mindfulness" meditation seeks to cultivate an awareness of the "radical impermanence of all events." Both reality and self are regarded as illusory, imaginary constructions growing out of the misperception that successive moments form a continuous stream of being.

...a self representation is constructed in each moment as a result of an

interaction with an object, and only as a result of such an interaction...

[Through meditation] I begin to perceive that there are strictly speaking no

138 constant end-products of representation; there is only a continual process

of representing... When this total moment-to-moment "coming to be and

passing away" (udayabbaya) is experienced, there is a profound

understanding of the radical impermanence of all events. Not only do I no

longer perceive any durable "objects," but even the processes of thinking,

feeling, perceiving and sensing themselves come to be and pass away

without remainder... I become aware of the selflessness (anatta) of mind,

body, external objects, and internal representations (pp. 46-47).

Thus for Engler (1984) the important thing is the quality of negation, of separation, a continuously repeating disintegration of self and reality. Non-being, and "no-self' are the true reality. Self and objects are illusory. Engler (1984) compares the perception of a continuity of being to

...the tachistoscopic flicker-fusion phenomenon which produces the

illusion of an object when discrete and discontinuous images are flashed

too quickly for normal perception to distinguish them... (p. 45).

A parallel to this ontology can be seen in hitbonenut in that the first of the three general levels of hitbonenut (in the general framework introduced in the last section of

Chapter 3) culminates in a direct perception of "continuous coming-into-being" (hithavut temidit in Hebrew) (Shneur Zalman, 1803/1986). In Chassidic-Kabbalistic terms, reality is said to constantly "pulsate" (dofek) in and out of nothingness every moment (Hillel,

1868/1995)—an apparently similar, or even identical perception to the oscillation described by Engler as "coming to be and passing away" (udayabbaya). In fact, the

139 Chabad founder R. Shneur Zalman explicitly mentions this meditative perception specifically as being known to the 'Vise amongst the nations" (Shneur Zalman,

1803/1986, p. 568).

It is this similarity in the quality of the meditative perception itself that makes the divergence in the meaning ascribed to it so telling. Whereas Buddhism as expounded by

Engler (1984) emphasizes the aspect of negation, the "passing away" part of the "coming to be and passing away," Jewish meditation emphasizes the "coming-to-be." This

"coming to be" (hithavut) is seen as a process of continual, moment-by-moment rebirth and re-creation ex nihilo (briahyesh mi-ayiri) (Shneur Zalman, 1796/1981).

When reality and self are thus perceived as being constantly re-created every moment from non-being and non-self, the question that then arises within a Jewish sensibility since Abraham is: "Who or What is making this amazing thing happen?"71 And furthermore: "Why is this being done?" With these questions at the fore, Jewish meditation takes on its defining characteristic as an all-embracing inner movement of search for the invisible Source of this perceived cosmic creative activity; a search for

God.72 In the course of this meditative search, the relational posture of acknowledgement emerges as an important plateau on the way to deeper and deeper immersion and bittul in the Object of meditation, as discussed at length in earlier chapters.

71 The Name of God in the Torah, what is referred to as the Tetragrammaton or Name of four letters, is literally translated as "Brings-into-being."

72 "With all my heart I have sought You" (Psalms, 119:10). This verse is quoted, as definitive of Jewish meditative endeavour, on the opening page of the Tract on Meditation of Rabbi Dov Ber of Lubavitch (Shneuri, 1820/1995).

140 Thus, in contrast to the deconstructionist view captured by Engier's (1984) tachistoscopic metaphor, whereby all objects and self are reduced to a series of disconnected perceptual fragments, the Chassidic metaphor of a "pulsation" (dofek) of reality in and out of being implies a process of creative construction. The pulse "in" to life, objects, being, ultimately overpowers the pulse "out"; the pregnant pause between heartbeats. A Judaic meditation requires that these moments, these ontic "pulsations," be interpreted in terms of an overall continuity and intention—even a Divine "desire" or

"craving"73—and not merely in terms of their micro-discontinuity. We might say that the

Judaic meditator would choose to re-interpret Engier's (1984) "tachistoscopic display" of apparently disconnected frames as a movie, with a plot, characters, a moral, and above all a Director, an Author.

Transcendence of the therapeutic. When we regard the common everyday perception of continuity and solidity of being—normal, integrated ego functioning— as being ultimately at least as legitimate as the cultivated meditative perception that all constantly emerges from and returns to nothingness, we then have no impetus to pathologize this everyday consciousness. We no longer have a need to interpret even long-term, aspirational meditation in clinical terms, as a "cure" for the "pathology" of normal adult adjustment (Engler, 1984). Nor do we have to look upon meditation as an activity specifically adapted and applied for therapeutic purposes, only. When long-term serious meditation is regarded in this way, as a "prescription," so then life in general may

73 "God craves (nit'ava) a dwelling place in the lower worlds" (Midrash). A comparison with Buddhist concepts around the notion of'craving'—as the source of all suffering—would be interesting. However this is beyond both my thesis and my current level of knowledge of Eastern systems. 141 take on the aspect of "...one long, drawn-out period of convalescence" (M. Abehsera,

personal communication). Rather than surrender to this "triumph of the

therapeutic" (following Rieff & Lasch-Quinn, 2006), we could choose to preserve a

distinction between therapeutic meditation, and meditation that is a getting on with the

business of life.

Implications of the current study

In this section I will spell out some implications of the current study for the three general streams in the extant literature that were reviewed in the Introduction, namely: the object relations literature on the personal God relationship; the psychology of religion literature that deals with the phenomenon of mysticism in general; and the transpersonal psychology literature with its accounts of higher human development, and its clinical dimension.

Object relations of the God relationship. By distinguishing deocentric from anthropocentric God representations, Spero established a new, non-reductionist theoretical framework for thinking about how different sources of God-related imagoes or concepts may live and evolve in the psyche. The deocentric category is thus fundamentally a transpersonal one, even though Spero has not labelled it as such. His detailed Mahlerian scheme enriches our understanding of developmental changes at the anthropocentric level of god-representations, however he has not dealt in any depth or detail in his published writings with analogous processes of the deocentric dimension. In preceding sections of this chapter I have proposed to extend the object relations line of enquiry by conceptualizing Spero's (1990) deocentric dimension in terms of a series of

142 stages of cultivated n-Object relational development. This new theoretical lens—inspired

by the Chassidic sources-through which to view the n-Object relational dimension of

human spirituality makes more salient the possibility that a deocentric (and hence

transpersonal) level of intrapsychic God representation will be attained by the client of

psychological services.

Transpersonal psychology. In the section of this chapter entitled Relational

meditation: Extending the transpersonal paradigm I have explained how the n-Object

relational framework contributes to transpersonal theory by providing a rationale for a

tighter integration of theistic and nondual, "mystical" aspects of meditative spirituality.

Here I'd like to note how this framework, in an assessment context, has the potential to

illuminate the relationships between spiritual insight, spiritual crises, and

psychopathological states seen in the type of complex clinical pictures discussed by

authors such as Eigen (1998), Grof and Grof (1989), Hunt (2007) and LukofF et al.

(1988). In keeping with Wilber's (1995) caution to avoid the "pre-trans fallacy," the n-

Object relational qualitative stages offer additional alternatives to conceptualizing a

spiritually-valenced loss of personal boundaries in pathological terms, as dissociative,

narcissistic, manic and so on. Concomitantly, the "stratification of motive" discussed

extensively in Chapter 4 allows for differentiated formulation of personality structures

involving complex interrelations of object, God-object, and n-Object relations.

Comparative mysticism. Both the psychology of religion and transpersonal

psychology literatures have drawn upon the knowledge and practices of various "wisdom traditions" as primary sources informing our psychological understanding spiritual life

143 (Walsh, 1992). In this connection this dissertation has given voice to a wisdom tradition which has been insufficiently heard and considered in contemporary discussions of typologies of mystical states and related stage models.

Specifically, as seen in Chapter 3, the definitive Chassidic texts on meditation expound a 4-phase epigenetic stage model that includes several types of mystical states that appear to be analogous to or identical with states discussed in the academic literature.

The Chassidic understanding of the sequencing of these states (in the psychology of religion's terms) is that the committed meditator progresses first to an extrovertive (Stace,

1961), then to a theistic (Zaehner, 1961), and then to an introvertive trance state (Stace,

1961), which when strongly habituated ("fixed in the soul", "kavua be 'na/sho" [Shneuri,

1831/1991, p. 51]) can eventually be maintained continuously in an integrative "dualistic mystical state" (DMS; Forman, 1998, p. 130).

These sources thus shed light on a specific issue (noted by Hood et al., [2009]) that arose between Stace and Forman (discussed in Chapter 1 in the section The psychology of mysticism) about whether the extrovertive type of experience is merely a prelude to the introvertive type (Stace, 1961), or represents rather the fruition of the introvertive path, when the latter becomes fully integrated with daily consciousness (Forman, 1998). Is the experience of a cosmic unity-in-multiplicity a mere prelude, or an end state? The

Chassidic texts (as referenced in the section Three general stages of meditation in

Chapter 3, and the sub-section on Simple will in Chapter 5) answer that it is both. As spelled out in those sections, these texts recognize a less-advanced, extrovertive state of perceived cosmic unity (discussed in terms of divine immanence, memalei col almin) that

144 is a way-station to a deeper introvertive state of utter annihilation of separate self and world (bittul), which in turn ultimately re-incorporates a perception of multiplicity and self that is (paradoxically) subsumed within a core introvertive mystical state (analogous to Forman's [1998] DMS).

Another element of the Chassidic texts worthy of note in this context is how the

Chabad masters were fiankly dismissive of ecstatic mystical states arrived at by means of direct, artificial "ergotropic" stimulation (Fischer [1971]; and see references to the

"foreign fire" throughout this work). On its face, hitbonenut would seem to follow a pattern of trophotropic nervous arousal similar to that of Eastern concentrative systems

(Fischer, 1971; Gellhom & Kiely, 1972). As seen in Chapter 1 in the section The psychology of mysticism, this pattern involves increasing parasympathetic dominance in the concentrative state, leading to deeply hypo-aroused states, within which sudden spikes of ergotropic cortical (without neuromuscular) arousal may occur correlating with ecstatic feelings associated with a loss of self. My assumption is that these spikes would correlate with the hitpaalut (ecstasy) which according to the Tract must emerge automatically from within the concentrative trance in order to be considered "authentic."

See Chapter 4, for the fully referenced discussion of this patterning. A suggestion for future research arises from this, i.e. to try and confirm this hypothesized pattern in a laboratory study of Chassidic meditators, modelled on Gellhorn and Kiely's (1972) definitive studies of meditating yogis.

Another area worthy of future clarification is the entire question of the relationship between mood and meditation. As reviewed in Chapter 1, meditation has entered the

145 mainstream of clinical treatment for mild to moderate depression. I have not seen any direct discussion of the relationship between that demonstrated efficacy, and the idea of a

"dark night of the soul," a depressive reaction occurring sometime after the commencement of spiritual/meditative work (e.g. Hunt, 2007; Lukoff et al., 1998). And now, as seen in the section The black bile in Chapter 4, we find that the Chassidic adepts actually viewed a depressive disposition as being a prerequisite for in-depth meditative work. There are three different posited relationships here between mood and meditation that are worthy of further study.

On another front: From the perspective of the history of psychology and of Jewish studies, I believe that the texts referred to in the subsection The stratification of motive in

Chapter 4 show a unexpectedly 'modern' awareness of an unconscious mind that can have an impact on behaviour. I believe that it would be a worthy undertaking to better determine the exact nature and significance of these references in the context of a comprehensive reading of Chassidic and Kabbalistic thought, which could then be placed within the history of the development of the concept of the unconscious in 19th and early

20th century European thought (see Ellenberger, 1981).

Limitations of the study. This study is limited in its ability to make strong reliability or validity claims, by virtue of the inherent esotericism of its subject matter, and the limitations of this author as a meditator and as a student of the diverse literatures required for this type of interdisciplinary enquiry. In my ambitious undertaking here I have relied on the license enjoined by Bakan (1975) with his call for psychologists to "speculate," and not to be overly bound by methodological constraints, in order to allow room for

146 thinking and discovery. Speculation, he reminds us, while by definition entailing risks, may also return great profits.

Another potential limitation of the study is that it will be seen as a psychological account that is strictly of parochial interest, for Judaism alone. This limitation would of course be in the eye of the beholder. From my standpoint, the texts of medieval mysticism drawn upon in the present study have shown me that certain ideas were picked up, developed or improved upon, and then traded off again, between the philosophic mystics of different religious traditions, all of whom were also committed to the science of the time. There seemed to have been an understanding that important elements—and psychological elements in particular—of the spiritual quest are held in common across these traditions (Avraham ben HaRambam, 1998; Fenton, 1981; Lobel, 2007). I believe that at root the processes described here carry relevance for spiritually-striving individuals and those who wish to understand them, from a wide variety of religious and cultural backgrounds.

That said, in my attempt to glean from these sources their psychology of meditation, I have purposely avoided any elaboration on the close connection that exists in the original texts between psychology and cosmology, where each level and stage of

"psychological" states or traits is linked with a corresponding level or aspect of the detailed Chassidic-Kabbalistic theosophical system. I have felt during the editing and supervisory process that aspects of my project were already being perceived as esoteric enough, without trying to introduce the system of complex and interlocking conceptual correspondences of the Kabbalah [the word Kabbalah, from the Hebrew root kb "I, means

147 "to parallel" or "to correspond"], which interprets reality through an integrated 3- dimensional prism of space (olam, literally "world"), time (shana, literally "year"), and soul or psyche (nefesh) (analogous to Wilber's [1995] hugely ambitious—some would say overreaching [see the debates in Rothberg & Kelly, 1998]~efFort to construct such a universal system of correspondences). I stand strongly by my decision to filter, for the sake of clarity, brevity, and psychological relevance, my presentation of these sources so as to bring out their well-defined psychological dimension, while yet being aware that it in some ways sacrifices a more holistic encounter with the Jewish mystical sources. The reader who is interested in a more comprehensive and holistic encounter of this sort is encouraged to take a closer look at any of the many primary Kabbalistic and Chassidic sources cited in the present project, as well as the many secondary sources cited such as those by Kaplan, Verman, Ginsburgh, Elior, Matt, and others too numerous to name here.

148 Conclusion

An implicit contention of this dissertation is that human mystical transcendence, although perhaps relatively rare in its more advanced stages in the general population, nevertheless teaches us important lessons that are relevant to everyone to some degree or another. The immeasurable historical impact of meditative mysticism on who we are today; the profound lessons that the psychology of meditation teaches us about the human condition and human potential; the global impact on the personality that serious and sustained mystical practice can have, including everything from psychopathology to ecstasy to morality to identity to noesis; from our attitudes towards death and hence towards life; to the meaning of our most intimate relationships, including and especially our relationship to God, or ultimacy in some form—all of these make it inconceivable that the study of mysticism and meditation will not remain topics of ever-increasing interest to psychology in the years to come. My goal has been to contribute to this conversation by drawing upon some mystical strands of the Jewish tradition, weaving these together with some corresponding strands of contemporary psychological thought, and offering the result to my teachers, friends and colleagues for your consideration.

The way in which the imago of God becomes integrated into the human psyche is both analogous to, and profoundly different from, the way in which other important relational objects are so integrated, especially in the context of the heightened sensitivity of meditation. In a cultivated discipline especially, there seem to be processes of internalization that are qualitatively distinct from object representation as normally understood, processes that involve an opening up to something new that I have tried to

149 indicate with the term n-Object relations. I hope thereby to have added some perspective that can further our understanding of the remarkable human predilection to reach for and

'envision' that which is transfinite and unrepresentable, and to encourage psychology's use of this broadened understanding to enhance and expand the possibilities of individuals both within and beyond psychotherapy.

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University Press. Glossary ahava love aishzara foreign fire al-aqal (Arabic) reason, wisdom anatta (Pali) selflessness atzmut essence avoda work, service ayin nothingness baal teshuva returnee, penitent batel (v'nichlal) nullified (and absorbed be-helem meod very hidden be'helem achar helem hidden beyond hidden bechain the "therefore" (as a noun) bechinat makkif a 'surrounding' mode or aspect bechinat ohr pnimi an 'internal' mode or aspect binah understanding bittul self-abnegation or self-annihilation bittul ve'hitcalelut nullification and absorption briah yesh mi-ayin creation ex nihilo kavana intention kavana be'lev intention in the heart kavana le'hitpaalut intention towards ecstasy chassid, (pi. Chassidim) the pious cheifetz desire chesed lovingkindness chitzoni external, superficial chochma wisdom; apperception; Reason klali general; holistic kli vessel kochot (plural) faculties; powers kula kamei kela chashiv "all is as nought before Him" daat knowing; knowledge der heren inner hearing; insight der hert zich 'hearing oneself derisha demand; seek; meditate deveikut union; unio mystica dimayon imagination dofek pulse efsharut hametziut possible being; potential eish zara le'gamrei a completely foreign fire elokut Godliness emesdik truthful emuna faith En Sof Infinite erentskeit (Yiddish) earnestness essentzia essence ferbrengen a Chassidic gathering gadlut ha-mochin expanded consciousness gadol big; mature galui revealed gemachte hispaalus artificial ecstasy gevurah strength; stringency gilui revelation hacara recognition hagbala delimitation hagshama concretization halten kop sustain concentration halwa (Arabic) isolation; seclusion hargasha feeling hava-a transposition havchana discern; distinguish havlei shav vanities hazaza causing movement helem hiddeness hirhur thought; mental speech hishtalshelut ha-olamot the downchaining of worlds histaclut gazing hitbodedut seclusion; prayerful meditation hitbonenut contemplative meditation hithavut coming into being; creation hithavut temidit continuous creation hitkashrut connection hitpaalut numinous ecstasy; passion hitpaalut ba'lev ecstasy in the heart hityashvut settling hod glory hoda-a acknowledgement iber gegeben (Yiddish) given over; fully committed ibbur gestation ibbur sheini second gestationn ikar bechirat ha-esek ba-hitbonenut the basic choice to be involved in meditation inyan nivdal a separate and distinct matter ishq (Arabic) longing itzavon anxiety; sadness katan small; immature kepaida scrupulousness; judgementalness kavua be'nafsho set in the psyche/soul kitzur abridgement; summary klita absorption; 'introjection' laida shniya second birth lehargish atzmo be'madraiga "to feel himself 'on a level'" lehitgadel to self-inflate lehitpaer to boast lev heart; mental-emotional centre levushim garments lo yisbol will not tolerate maamar sermon machshava kara 'cold thought' machshava tova 'good thought' maggid; pi. maggidim preacher makkif surrounding; transcending mara levana white bile; phlegm mara shechora black bile; melancholy mara shechora atzmit essential, spiritual melancholy mashpia, pi. mashpi-im Chassidic counsellor matbea coin memalei col almin the Immanent in all worlds memutza intermediary meshuga crazy middot character traits Misnagdim opposers mivne structure moach brain; mind; consciousness moach emtzai mid-brain moach smali left brain moach yemini right brain mochin brains; mind; consciousness mochin de'gadlut expanded consciousness mochin she'ba'middot mind in the emotions muraqaba (Arabic) cultivated awareness murgash felt; emotional muscal intelligible mutba impressed upon; behavioural naaren zich (Yiddish) fooling oneself ne-elam hidden; concealed nefesh soul; psyche nekuda point netzach-bitachon eternity-confidence neviat ha-En Sof flow of the Infinite nishtkeit (Yiddish) (feeling of) nothingness; self-abnegation nitava desired nogeia lo 'touches him'; personally significant ohn-hispaalus stoicism ohr light olam world omek depth oved et atzmo self-worship partzuf visage; human form pirud separation pnimiut internality

175 prati specific; detailed ratzon will ratzon pashut simple (non-composite) will Rebbe Chassidic leader reshimu impression sefira, pi. sefirot luminary; sphere shana year; time shar (Yiddish) rebuke sheker atzmi self-falsehood; inauthenticity shiur koma foil human stature shiura measure; estimation sovev col almin surrounds all worlds taanug pleasure taarovet admixture taavat ha-rabbanut the desire to teach taavot atzmo personal pleasures teshuva return; penitence tevuna understanding tezuza movement tichla decay tiferet-rachamim beauty-mercy; empathy tikkun chatzot the Midnight Rectification tirda preoccupation tochein astronomer Torah she'baal peh the Oral Torah tzaddik righteous tzu brochenkeit (Yiddish) brokenness ubbar fetus udayabbaya (Pali) coming to be and passing away vipassana (Pali) insight meditation wusul (Arabic) spiritual bond; union yeshut somethingness; narcissism yesod-emet foundation-truth yichud union