**Commentary and Study Questions** Paragraph 1: - **Know that it is through these names, combined together here in the explanation of these 72 letters** - Here Abulafia refers to the 72 Letter name discussed above. While we are studying the four letter name for now, the same principles apply. - **...that those who practice prophecy [מתנבאים]** - "Those who practice prophecy" is a term which first appears in the context of prophetic bands of biblical hippies who wandered the land "speaking in ecstasy", playing music, and rolling around naked in the desert. See Samuel 1:19:20-24. - Abulafia's use of this term also recalls medieval interpretations of prophecy as a transpersonal meditative state understood in light of Aristotelian and neoplatonic philosophy. - **...will attain eternal life [חיי העולם הבא], and therefore this book is called The Book of Eternal Life. -** Eternal Life [חיי העולם הבא] is a term that resonates with rabbinic and medieval philosophical and Kabbalistic meanings. For Abulafia, like Maimonides, it involves an expanded state of consciousness which involves transcending the ego or personal identity, and it also overlaps a metaphysical reality. - The rabbis would not necessarily approved of Abulafia's idea that the prophecy is still is a thing and that he was one. The rabbis who excommunicated Abulafia were certainly not sympathetic. Paragraph 2 - **It is known in the divine prophetic tradition of the Torah that when an enlightened sage combines the letters, the holy spirit overflows upon hir.** *The combination of letters* is understood as the means of the creation of the world and achieving higher states of consciousness. This tradition may first originate in the Tanakh, but it appears in any case in rabbinic (200-500 CE) and medieval (circa 1000 CE) sources. - **...This is for you a sign when you study the holy letters in truth and faith".** I think the "this" is this sentence is the experience of the holy spirit overflowing on you. When you feel it, it is a sign that you are studying the letters correctly. - **...and combine them, the beginning with the end, and the end with the beginning**: "Combining the end with the beginning" etc. is the patten of combining letters in various orders, back and forth, until all possibilities are covered. - **Thus, you will understand everything in this way, you will role the letters forward and back, repeatedly vocalizing them.** "Repeatedly vocalizing them" refers to Abulafia's meditation technique, according to which you vocalize letters from the divine name for the full length of your exhalation. Paragraph 3 - **One should begin in a relaxed manner...**: Abulafia is describing the process of vocalizing the name. - **And one should also be learned in the secrets of Torah and wisdom so that s/he may recognize what emerges through the rolling of the combinations...** During the vocalization, breathing and movement, images or feelings or symbols appear to the mind's eye. Abulafia teaches that it is important to learn Torah tradition so that one will be able to interpret these appearances. - **...and hir heart will be aroused in the contemplation of the intellectual, divine, prophetic image."** When one focuses hir awareness on images that emerge during the vocalization of the name, this awakens spiritual energies in the practitioner. Abulafia calls the image that appears *intellectual* in light of Jewish philosophy in the middle ages. He calls in *divine* and *prophetic* in light of biblical and rabbinic tradition. Paragraph 4 - **At first, that which emerges from the combinations in secluded meditation [התבודדות] will reignite an experience of fear and trembling, and the hairs of hir head will stand, and hir limbs will be shocked.** - *Fear and trembling* are common in biblical and medieval portrayals of altered states of consciousness. *Secluded meditation [hitbodedut]* is a technical term for transcending our day-to-day state of mind in order to seclude the divine part of the self. The term was coined by medieval thinkers seeking to understand biblical prophecy. It is today an important practice for hassidut Breslov. It is also the term Abulafia uses to describe his own technique. - **Afterwards, if one should merit this, the spirit of the living God will pass over hir, *And the spirit of the LORD shall rest upon hir, The spirit of wisdom and understanding, The spirit of counsel and might, The spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD. (Isaiah 11:2).*** Abulafia identifies the experience of awakened spirit accessed by the meditator as becoming possessed with the spirit of God. His source is the biblical prophecy of Isaiah. - **And s/he will feel as if hir whole body, from head to foot, has been anointed with the anointing oil...** - Abulafia describes his experience during the vocalization of the divine name: She feels awash in a pleasurable life-giving flow which identifies as the anointing oil used to anoint the *mashiach* (the anointed of God). I think I know that feeling of being awash in life-giving energy during meditation. Have you every felt it during meditation or some other time? This is what we referred to as "flow". - **and s/he will be the anointed one [mashiach] of God, and God’s emissary. And s/he will be called "the angel of God", and hir name will be like the name of hir master, which is *Shadai*, the one who is called *Metatron*, the heavenly ministering angel.** Abulafia said you experience the anointing oil and so you are...the anointed one! You are the mashiach. And also may become an angel, or perhaps even God. This is the stuff that got Abulafia excommunicated. What do you think about it?