Emanation

This week, I have been reading Michael Sells’s Mystical Languages of Unsaying. (Thank you Rei and Adam, if you are reading this, for the recommendation!) This is a work of comparative mysticism, which draws parallels between several mystics in different times, places, and traditions. Rather impressively, the books draws parallels between certain linguistic operations in Latin, Arabic, French, and Ancient Greek, demonstrating how writers participating in different mystical traditions use the same tricks of language to achieve a representation of the divine in consciousness. 

I have been learning from this book that so much of the philosophy I understood as being internal to Kabbalah is actually not so; kabbalists demonstrably inherit ways of thinking and figures of representation for the divine that are shared with Islam and Christianity (among other traditions.) In fact, all three of those mystical traditions inherit certain concepts, such as emanation from a shared source, which Sells argues is Plotinus, a Roman-Egyptian philosopher from the third century. Plotinus is the first philosopher of neoplatonism, a school of thought which was very influential during late antiquity and in medieval times, when the Christian, Jewish, and Islamic mystical traditions were founded.

One key aspect of kabbalistic thought borrowed from Plotinus is the doctrine of emanation. In the kabbalistic myth of creation, there was first nothing, the ein-sof, literally meaning “without end.” The divine existed imperceptibly with no created universe. The divine then “retracted” to create a space or thing outside itself–I picture this as an exhale, because when we exhale, we create space by making ourselves smaller—and the world, and then humans, were created in that negative space through an emanation of light. Notice two linguistic features in the last few sentences: inverted commas/quotation marks, and the use of reflexive pronouns like “itself.” These are both linguistic tools, Sells argues, that the mystics used in order to speak about God indirectly, or through apophasis. Apophasis literally means un-saying, or speaking-away. It describes the way that a writer might describe something precisely by saying it has no qualities, like in the sentence “X is beyond names.” When writers describe creation apophatically, they might say something like “the divine creates itself,” which is a paradox. If something created itself, then who is the creator? It remains nameless, or unsaid. And if all of creation is an emanation of that unknowable divine, then, well, that tells us nothing about creation, except that we still don’t know what “it” is. Inherently, this always makes for difficult and obscure sentences; it’s not easy to read or understand mystics in any language. Kabbalistic sources are notoriously difficult reading.

Emanation, the word itself, comes from the Latin words ex manare or “flow out.” It describes an image of the good, the divine, or the creator welling up within source, and then overflowing into creation. This becomes more complicated by the fact that the original act of creation was an overflowing of source, but also, our present reality is source constantly creating itself, constantly overflowing. That presents another paradox: creation, which literally means origin, is also the present and also eternity. Creation is always creating creation. Mystics use confusing sentences like this to make logic puzzles that induce bewilderment intentionally, like a language game designed to describe the inherent paradox, the mystery at the root of all things.

Plotinus himself offered a useful visual representation of emanation. Imagine a glowing mass at the center of a hollow sphere. Light shines out from the center, through every part of the sphere. Then, remove the physical mass at the center of the sphere. The light shines out without source.

I felt inspired, reading about this image in Plotinus, to use it as an anchor in my meditation practice. This is also based on the 17-week meditation course I recently completed at the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. I wrote my ideas out below, as a visual meditation practice you might try out at home. (I’m also inspired to do this by the written visual meditations in Jill Hammer’s book about Sefer Yetzirah.) If you do try this, please write to me and let me know what you experience (or tell me in person at Der Nister.)
 

Meditation
 

Close your eyes. Breathe in and out deeply.

As you inhale, imagine a column of light that extends above your head, reaching up towards the sky. Light travels up the column.

As you exhale, imagine light drawing down from the sky, traveling towards your seat and the ground.

Now, picture an empty glass sphere. There is a light, perhaps from a candle burning, at the center of the sphere. Light shines out and covers every part of the sphere.

Now, remove the candle, or the physical mass making the light. There is only light with no source.

Imagine this vessel overflowing with light like a substance, so that the light pours out of the vessel.

Picture again the column of light that travels up in your body from the sky to the ground underneath you. Picture this light then overflowing, emanating from out of the column.

When you are ready, open your eyes.