The study of Kabbalah permeated every aspect of Jewish life. This included Judaism’s most precious gift -- the Torah -- which, for the kabbalists, became the object of an original mystical way of meditation. The kabbalists did not deny the historicity of the biblical narrative but were more interested in probing the Bible’s inner nature. This exploration focused most specifically on the Five Books of Moses. Commentaries were also written on the Five Scrolls, the Book of Psalms, and the Prophets, but they were secondary considerations. The Zohar’s commentary on the Pentateuch was supplemented with commentaries on Ruth and the Song of Songs.

The main thrust of kabbalistic commentary on the Torah lay in the mystical principle that explicated the connection between creation and revelation. The divine emanation was described in terms of symbols drawn from the doctrine of Sefirot ("emanations") and of symbols drawn from the sphere of language and composed of letters and names. In the case of the latter, the process of creation can be symbolized as the word of God which, being biblically articulated as divine speech, reveals the supreme laws that determine the hierarchy of creation. God reveals Himself in the Torah as Himself rather than as a medium of communication in the limited human sense. Understanding the message of Torah in this small, finite human way bars one from grasping the true nature of Torah. In order to obtain the inner meaning of Torah the kabbalist adheres to three principles: the complete mystical name of God; the perception of Torah as a living organism; the infinite significance of divine speech.

This is religiously significant and instructive for us moderns. The kabbalistic attitude to the Bible was a natural corollary of the overall kabbalistic belief in the symbolic character of all earthly phenomena. Indeed, there was nothing, asserted the kabbalists, that possessed only an external aspect; every aspect of Torah could be examined for hidden meanings and inner realities. Thus all the words of this divine revelation could offer to the enlightened reader secrets of divine thought and creation.

This type of thinking was enhanced by the evolution of normative rabbinic thought which, through its talmudic and midrashic commentaries, changed a highly literal and legalistic narrative into a work to be read on many levels, and through all dimensions. This was the challenge of the rabbis and the kabbalists. The rest is our responsibility. How deeply do we probe the internal teachings of Torah? The kabbalists provide both the methodology and the inspiration.