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1. DefinitionThe term Judaism (Hebr.  yahadut) denotes both the community and social lifestyes of the Jews (Jewish society) and the religion and culture created by them; the latter is discussed here. The word  Judaism is derived from the endonym  yehudi (plural  yehudim); it goes back the eponymous tribal patriarch Yehudah (Judah), his tribe, and the subsequent state of Judah. In addition the bibical endonym “people of Israel” ( Am Yisrael) is still in use. Since the Enlightenment, other terms have also been coined (see 7.2. below)Karl Erich Grözinger10. The QabalahAs in contem…

1. IntroductionThe Greek word  theología (discourse/teaching concerning God and divinity) was used by Aristotle for the highest level of philosophy, so-called metaphysics ( Metaphysics 11.  7, 1064 b 1–3). In late antiquity, Christians used it initially for statements about the nature of God, while using the Greek word  oikonomía (household management) in the sense of “order of salvation” for God’s action in the world as Creator and Redeemer [2. 1081 f.]. In the 12th century, when theology was used for Christian theology rather than purely philosophically as…

1. General remarks The terms  rational religion and  natural religion refer to the notion of a knowledge of God and consequent worship of God given to every human being solely by virtue of his or her intellectual capacity (Reason). Its substance is identified with a general commandment of obedience to God’s will realized concretely in an obligation to lead a moral life (Ethics). The roots of this idea go back to antiquity via the natural law of the Middle Ages (Natural theology); in Christianity, it has…

1. IntroductionThe noun mysticism, a general term dating from the 17th century, eluded all attempts of students of religion and the psychology of religion to define it in the 19th and early 20th century [1]; [3]; [5]. More recent researchers therefore use it only as a heuristic term for highly diverse phenomena of an intense individual experience of bonding or union (Latin  unio mystica) with God, the divine, the holy, etc. – always in specific cultural and social contexts. These phenomena are never accessible directly, since we know of them only through (…

1. ConceptQabalah (or Kabbalah; Hebrew “reception,” “tradition”) has, since the 13th century, been the technical term for the esoteric theology of Judaism that first emerged in the mid-12th century in southwestern Europe (especially Spain). The Qabalah is primarily a theological doctrine, reflected in its own terminology for itself, “true Torah” or “hidden wisdom,” and to varying degree also a tradition of mysticism [18]; [12]; [13]; [9].Karl Erich Grözinger2. Forms 2.1. FoundationsOver the seven centuries of its creative phase (c. 1200-c. 1900), Qabalah spl…