Physical
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168 ff., 311:196 mm., light age staining, wide margins, stamps on title, several crude erasures affecting letters on several ff., final f. restored with small loss, old hand on f. 4v. A very good copy bound in modern half leather and cloth boards.
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Detailed
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Elucidation of all the tenets of the Kabbalah, such as the doctrines of the sefirot, emanation, the divine names, the import and significance of the alphabet, etc. Title page in a beautiful architectural border. Includes many Kabbalistic diagrams and charts.
R. Moses b. Jacob Cordovero (1522–1570), the outstanding kabbalist in Safed before R. Isaac Luria. His birthplace is unknown, but his name testifies to the family's Spanish origins. He was a disciple of R. Joseph Caro and of R. Solomon Alkabez, and a teacher of R. Isaac Luria. His first large systematic work is Pardes Rimmonim, which R. Cordovero completed by the age of 27. Ten years later he finished his second systematic book, the Elimah Rabbati, and also wrote a lengthy commentary on all the parts of the Zohar which has been preserved in manuscript in Modena.
The doctrine of R. Cordovero is a summary and a development of the different trends in Kabbalah up to his time, and his whole work is a major attempt to synthesize and to construct a speculative kabbalistic system. This is done especially in his theology, which is based on the Zohar, and in particular on Tikkunei Zohar and Ra'aya Meheimna. Since R. Cordovero considered these texts to be by one and the same author, he felt constrained to harmonize their different and at times even opposing conceptions.
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