Kabbalah and Criticism 
by 

Harold Bloom

 

A Post-Modernist Tradition

Ever since Pico della Mirandola brought Kabbalah to the attention of Christian society in the late 15th century, the mystical Jewish discipline has found its way into a European literature. Jorge Luis Borges and H. P. Lovecraft use Kabbalah extensively in their short stories. Franz Kafka's later works indicate an increasing interest in Kabbalistic interpretation. Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum is structured around the Sefirot, the Kabbalah's terms for the attributes of God. Thomas Pynchon in Gravity's Rainbow, and Malcolm Lowry in Under the Volcano use Kabbalah as a central trope. So to some degree, Kabbalah has become naturalised into modern fiction.

Harold Bloom's little book is both a useful introduction to the history and symbology of Kabbalah, as well as an application of Kabbalah in poetic criticism. He respects its religious origin but also its unique character, "Kabbalah differs from Christian and Eastern mysticism in being a mode of intellectual speculation rather than a way of union with God." For Bloom, Kabbalah is a theory of rhetoric and a theory of writing, "writing before writing, speech before speech."

Bloom recognises that Kabbalah's primary subject is language itself, and quotes the authority of Gershom Scholem, the leading Kabbalistic scholar of the 20th century: "The God who manifests himself is the God who expresses himself, which means that the Sefirot [the ten mystical names of God] are primarily language, attributes of God... they are like poems." Religion itself is "spilled poetry," thus establishing a priority for Kabbalah as a critical not just a mystical method.

The Sefirot are peculiar poetic forms. They are self-referential; they comment poetically on themselves: "As early as the thirteenth century, Kabbalists spoke of the Sefirot reflecting themselves within themselves, so that each 'contained' all the others." As such, the Kabbalah, therefore, is not incidentally but essentially a method of poetic criticism.

Bloom is explicit about the literary method involved: "Kabbalah if viewed as rhetoric centres upon two series of tropes: first, irony, metonymy, metaphor, and then - synecdoche, hyperbole, metaiepsis." This corresponds to the sequence which Kabbalah describes as Zimzum, Shevirat, Tikkun - roughly Destruction, Re-assignment, and Reconciliation. Call it productive mis-reading to align it with Bloom's general theory of literary criticism.

This poetic process of mis-reading anticipates what has become known in 20th century philosophy as deconstruction, the phenomenological analysis of a text in order to identify its central presumptions and intentions. It also anticipates the epistemological method of the 19th century philosopher C.S. Peirce, whom Bloom discusses at some length. This epistemology he connects with the "wandering" or experimentation with meaning that is inherent in Kabbalah. "Meaning wanders to protect itself", primarily from premature or prejudicial closure of textual interpretation.

Kabbalah emerged from a philosophical conflict within Judaism between Gnosticism and Neo-Platonism. A similar conflict has also been perennial in Christian history. But in Christianity resolution has largely been imposed by the power of an ecclesiastical hierarchy. The result has been increased conflict and ethical compromise. Judaism's solution is not only more pacific, it is also more productive, encouraging the incorporation of religious tradition within the core of literary civilisation. Quite an accomplishment. It seems almost...well, post-modern.