Menachem Filc

student of medieval philosophy and kabbalah

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@ariel_haivri I think it's useful to remember that Sefer Hazohar emerged as a novel work. There were different schools of kabbalah who's kabbalah doesn't have the traditions in the zohar. We can argue wether the tradition precedes the literary work, but even kabbalist at first were skeptical 1

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@kilovh In another version, probably the original, its not the Etz chaim, but one of the works of the ספרי היכלות.

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@Searcherseek @NhavsMaimonides @shnayor Oddly enough the Lubavitcher Rebbe said this exactly thing in one of his talks. I haven't seen any chabadnik handing out Moreh yet לצערי הגדול

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@arinohem Thankfully we have pdfs

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@AdlerYonatan People do you תפיל as singular. Not super common, but definitely heard it used

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@_KaylaGlover Thanks for all the great great work

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@cyphr0 @Waubb Thats amazing 🤩, thanks for all your work man

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@NhavsMaimonides @Searcherseek Yeah the classic examples are very telling. The rabbinic myth of the unborn child learning the Torah before birth parallels the platonic notion of knowledge and learning as recollection. The Torah that precedes the creation of the world clearly relates to the world of forms....

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@NhavsMaimonides @Searcherseek ..have a long history in earlier kabbalistic sources./6

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@NhavsMaimonides @Searcherseek on the systems these sections present, through reading them together, he's still very much loyal to the general themes of the Idra's new notion of Partzuf and the emergency of the Din/Rachamim though the emergence of the Partzufim. Basically most of Luria's most novel ideas../5

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@Searcherseek This is from מאמרי אדמו"ר הזקן - תורה ומועדים א on page 331. This is the clearest Ive seen him say this, evaluating the Avodah of the Nefesh Habahamis over the Divine Soul. The theme appears elsewhere, but not nearly as explicit and as intense... /4

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@Searcherseek משא"כ דחילו ורחימו טבעיי' אף שהוא רק בבחי' בהמה מצד טבעה מ"מ הם בבחי' עצמיות הנפש ומעורר למעלה ג"כ בבחי' עצמיות א"ס ...וכמו"כ ע"פ העבודה דייקא ע"י בחי' טבעיות המדות מבחי' נפש הבהמיות יוכל לעלות ולעורר מבחי' עצמיות אא"ס בחי' פנימית הכתר יותר למעלה מבחי' דחילו ורחימו שכליים /3

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@NhavsMaimonides I hear so much of him now back in those sources. Carlos Fraenkel has a great piece on this topic, and very relevant to some of the issues of matter i was talking about
https://t.co/3QGdu3yCpB

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@NhavsMaimonides Curious how you see the relationship between Spinoza and Maimonides. You touched on this above a little bit....but reading Spinoza I feel he's the realization of the whole medieval jewish philosophical tradition. Especially rambam, Ralbag, and crescas. / 1

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@NhavsMaimonides So at least in the case of Lurianic kabbalah there are diverse trends, often within the same sources. the diversity of teachings here sourced from Luria seemingly reflect Luria's own concern over continuity between Matter and the divine. Vital's material is especially cautious /6

[Menachem Filc @MenachemL]

@NhavsMaimonides the same sources stress explicitly that the material cannot ultimately "descend" from the spiritual, and that the physical remains ex nihilo. /5