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Just that, mysticism, esoteric commentary on Torah. Usuitable for new or weak believers as it assumes a strong knowledge of Torah and in many cases the rest of the Tenakh. Hermetic Kabbalah (usually spelled with a 'C' or 'Q') is not what I am referring to.

Sweet, check it out here

That is completely untrue. What is popular amongst celebrities is not true Kabbalah, it is witchcraft. There is so much rampant misunderstanding of Kabbalah it is riduculous.

That is sick. I live amongst this kinda stuff, the idea that anyone would openly encourage it and go so far as to publish a magazine galmorizing it is sickening. This is a destructive lifestyle and it is claiming a very large number of American youth via AIDS, drug addiction and violence. Absolutely appalling, words cannot convey the anger I am feeling right now at these people. I see these kids every day on my street peddling their sickness. I have helped them only to have them pull weapons on me to take what they could when it was opportune. I have seen them get AIDS, lose all hope and commit suicide. I've seen very, very young children, I'm talkin like 7-8 years old being not only brought up around this junk but encouraged to participate, acting as lookouts, going along on drug deals to theoretically endure the safety of their parent, even selling drugs themselves.... it is a SERIOUS problem. I have had nights when I could not get into my apartment because the front door was taped up, the sidewalk out front a murder scene! Read "The Corner : A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Neighborhood" it available on Amazon for like $5, excellent book and it gives a very real and disturbing picture of what is going on in inner city neighborhoods. I really don't think most Americans grasp this fully yet, but you will when it is your corner. Not to bash anyone personally here, I just really don't think this is clear to most Americans.

Um...much of the Jews "taking over businesses" had to do with the fact that anti-semites had made it illegal for the Jews to take up any other profession, effectively forcing them to create monopolies in certain markets. Amazing that anti semites today use the actions of anti semites of yesterday to validate their hateful propaganda.

I think that Arthur Green's stuff is pretty good (I'm not 100% that I have read that particular book). He is well reconized and respected by the majority of Jews and I tend to like his writing style very much. The books I reccomended to you are less Kabbalah and more general Jewish thinking though some Kabbalah it present as it is pretty crucial to a Jewish understanding of God.

Fiosh, and excellent book to read if you really want a good understanding of Judaism is Moses Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed. If you'd like something that was written a bit more recently and thus reads a bit easier Aryeh Kaplan's "The Handbook of Jewish Thought" is excellent. Yomo You asked what Kabbalah is. The short answer is that it is Jewish Mysticism and is not at all something should should be taken lightly. Effectively in its simplist form it is a method of interpreting Torah that is supposed to give on a greatwr insight into the nature of God. The chief texts of Kabbalah are: the Zohar, an esoteric mystical Aramaic commentary on Torah, and the Sefer Yetzirah (Book of Creation). The Bahir and Sefer Raziel HaMalakh are also pretty important texts in Kabbalah. All of these (like nearly al other Jewish mystical writings) are written in such a way as to seem nonsensical to one who does not have a strong understanding of the Tenakh (Old Testament). It is similar in nature to the 14th Christian theologian Gregory Palamas idea that God in unknowable in His essence but knowable in His energies. Essence being His true nature and energy being the way in which He interacts with His creation. These energies in Palamas' mind were not separate from God, they were God. He was also careful to distinguish between this idea and the idea of Trinity.

There are some halfway decent Kabbalah books available on bookshelves, though 95% are utter nonsense. It soundsl iek you were reading some of that "practical Kabbalah" stuff. I must say though that Kabbalah isn't really something you should be studying unless you have a very firm foundation in scripture. I cannot stress that very enough, it can be dangerous stuff.

Well, it is good that she has chosen to place her faith where it a should be placed. As for fictionalized accounts of things that happened in the life of Messiah ~2000 ago and as far as anyone knows weren't recorded at all....leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

I did a quick edit, cropped thei mage n circled the Hebrew. The middle row looks vaguly Hebrew, I'm not sure as the writing is kinda sloppy. http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y63/cyber...er/Pc220047.jpg

TT, you've gotta understand the priesthood and the sacrificial system to really get a good grasp on just what the Messiah did and how it atoned for all of us. Understanding Torah is key to understand the NT. The Temple, the feasts, all of it. It is difficult to understand exactly how a man (not to deny His divine nature here) being nailed to a cross and then resurrecting makes atonement without a good understanding of those things.

Yeh this is a great example of why the patent system here in the US needs to be reworked.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/20...ene_patent.html Stefan Lovgren for National Geographic News October 13, 2005 A new study shows that 20 percent of human genes have been patented in the United States, primarily by private firms and universities. The study, which is reported this week in the journal Science, is the first time that a detailed map has been created to match patents to specific physical locations on the human genome. Researchers can patent genes because they are potentially valuable research tools, useful in diagnostic tests or to discover and produce new drugs. "It might come as a surprise to many people that in the U.S. patent system human DNA is treated like other natural chemical products," said Fiona Murray, a business and science professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, and a co-author of the study. "An isolated DNA sequence can be patented in the same manner that a new medicine, purified from a plant, could be patented if an inventor identifies a [new] application." continued at link

Just out of curiosity, which city might that be? I was under the impression that Catalhoyuk in Turkey was the oldest known city.

Why do we need to explain it away?