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Visions of wondrous things By Shahar Arzy Tags: mystical experiences Few subjects are as fascinating as mysticism. Believers find in it signs that support their faith; celebrities use it to seek meaning in their lives; historians trace the background of its protagonists; writers weave plots around it; and philosophers break it down into schools of thought. These interests - as it frequently happens - might conceal from the eye of the beholder the most important elements of this realm, at least those considered as such by the mystics themselves. Therefore, those who seek to delve into mysticism would do well to study the first-person perspectives offered in reports by mystics throughout the generations. Take, for example, the founder of Hasidism, Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer, known as the Baal Shem Tov (The Besht, 1699-1760). In a letter, he reports the following experience: "On Rosh Hashanah of the year 5507 (1746), I performed an incantation for the ascent of the soul, known to you. And in that vision I saw wondrous things ... and it is impossible to describe and to tell what I saw and learned in that ascent hither, even in private ... so I ascended degree after degree, until I entered the palace of the Messiah ... I asked the Messiah: When do you come? And he answered: You will know [the time] which is when your doctrine will be revealed in public and it will be disclosed to the world and 'your fountains will well outside,' what I have taught you and you apprehended, and also they will be able to perform the unifications and the ascents of the soul as you do" ("Sefer migdal 'Oz," Mondshine, 1980, p. 124). The "ascent of the soul" and mystical unification are of highest importance here: The coming of the Messiah depends on induction by practices that he himself taught the Besht, "for it is a joy to those above when I practice unification below." The technical aspect of these practices does not diminish their value; on the contrary, as the Besht understands: "and I was astonished at this, and it was for me greatly agonizing, due to the elapse of so much time until this could possibly happen. However, from what I learned when I was there [which is] easy to learn and explain, then my mind was calmed and I thought that it is possible for my contemporaries to attain these degrees and aspect by theses [practices], as I do, namely to be able to accomplish the ascents of souls, and they will be able to study and to become like me" (Sefer migdal 'Oz). Advertisement Where did the Besht obtain these techniques and what was their meaning? It is possible that while he was in the Carpathian Mountains, he came into contact with shamanistic traditions from the East, which he taught. However, practicing the attainment of a spiritual experience was a central element of Jewish mysticism centuries before the time of the Besht. The ascent of the soul was also reported by the main disciple of Rabbi Isaac Luria (the Ari, 1534-1572): Rabbi Chaim Vital (1543-1620). He also practiced "unifications," which were passed on to him by his master, while practicing secluded meditation, fasting and sleep deprivation, as Vital writes in "Sefer hahezionot" ("The Book of Visions," Faierstein, 1999, p. 116): "Once I fainted deeply for an hour, and a huge number of old men and many women came to watch me and the house was completely full with them, and they all were worried for me. Afterward the swoon passed and I opened my eyes and said: 'Know that just now my soul ascended to the Seat of Glory and they sent my soul back to this world to preach before you and lead you in the way of penitence and charity.'" Elsewhere (in "Shaarei kedusha" - "The Gates of Holiness," Safrin, 1988, p. 114-5), Vital describes the technique needed to reach this experience of the "ascent of the soul": "[One should] remove his thoughts from all matters of this world, as if his soul had departed from him, like a person from whom the soul departed and who feels nothing ... And he should imagine that his soul has departed and ascended, and he should envision the upper worlds, as though he stands in them ... and he should concentrate in his thought ... And if he feels nothing, he is apparently not yet worthy and ready, and therefore he must further fortify himself in worship and holiness, and return to seclusion by means of the way mentioned until he will merit that the spirit rest upon him." These descriptions reveal a repeated action undertaken by the mystic after suitable preparation, leading to the spiritual experience. Such action is typical of a more ancient school, that of "prophetic kabbala," founded by Rabbi Abraham Abulafia (1240-1291). Abulafia developed a complex technique consisting of combinations of letters whose purpose was to raise an autoscopic image (that is, the experience of seeing a double of oneself outside one's body) of the mystic himself coming to reveal the future (hence, the term prophetic kabbala): "Direct your face to the name mentioned and think as if a man is standing before you and sit as though a man is standing before you and waiting for you to speak with him; and he is ready to answer you concerning whatever you may ask him, and you say 'speak' and he answers ... and begin then to pronounce [the name] and recite first 'the head of the head' [i.e., the first combination of letters], drawing out the breath and at great ease; and afterward go back as if the one standing opposite you is answering you; and you yourself answer, changing your voice ... imagine as if one is standing before you answering you and answer yourself in your own voice" ("Sefer haheshek," the Book of Desire). Although this description explicitly shows that the induced experience is an autoscopic image of the mystic himself, Abulafia emphasizes that its origin is in the divine, as "if you are pure and whole in all you have instructed him, I have no doubt the glory will be revealed and seen before you in a way that you can recognize ... that it comes from him and not from you." This was also clarified by Rabbi Yitzhak of Acre, an important mystic living at the end of the 13th century, who also belonged to the prophetic Kabbalah school: "This supernal spirit of holiness suddenly comes ... only the heavenly voice speaking within it, teaching him [the mystic] sciences which had never been heard or had never been seen ... [All this will happen] after he has stripped off every corporeal thing, because of the great immersion of his soul in the divine spiritual world. This 'container' will see his own form, literally standing before him and speaking with him as a man speaks to his friend; and his own [physical form] will be forgotten as if his body doesn't exist in the world" ("Sefer otzar haim"). These examples clearly demonstrate that major trends in Jewish mysticism were based on repeatedly practicing techniques that led to experiences which challenged the habitual perception of the mystic's own body and self, such as seeing his "double" or disengaging from his body during "ascent of the soul." The above mentioned techniques are not at all simple to perform, and require years of practice which do not always bear fruit. Why, therefore, did these prominent kabbalists invest so much time and effort in these practices? The kabbala saw in the "human soul" a "divine spark," "part of the divine above." Therefore, to understand God, the mystic could study the "divine spark" within by introspectively studying himself. Mystics and philosophers throughout the generations utilized ecstatic states to understand the "self" as well as the relationship between body and mind. Literally, the term "ex-stasis" means "standing outside" the body. Accordingly, ecstatic states include autoscopy (seeing one's body from outside); "ascent of the soul" (an out-of-body experience, mostly accompanied by paranormal encounters with celestial beings); "Maggid" or a "dybbuk" (possession of one's body by an external "personality"); and "uni-mystica" (the experience of mystical union with the divine). The "ascent of the soul" is therefore a state in which the "self" separates from the body and allows the mystic to look within each of these components in turn, attempting to understand their individual functions. The autoscopic experiences as described by Abulafia's circle also refers to another autoscopic body: Between that body and his own physical body, the mystic can "move" his sense of "self" and thus peruse even more closely the boundaries of the body, the "soul" and the "self." A study of reports of patients suffering from lesions in the junction of the brain's temporal and parietal lobes (temporoparietal junction), as well as of people whose brains are electrically stimulated during surgical procedures, reveal experiences that challenge the ordinary perception of the body and the self, experiences that are similar to the reports of various mystics, research that were described. Increased activity in the temporoparietal junction was also found in experiments involving healthy subjects who practiced tasks similar to those cited by the abovementioned mystics. This brain mechanism was found to play a central role in the integration of various kinds of input from the body, as well as in higher cognitive functions involving the body and the self. Such experiments may also explain the differences between various kabbalistic techniques and the experiences they evoke. In an experiment described in a recent edition of the Journal of Neuroscience, subjects were presented with schematic human figures in different positions. In one task, they were asked to imagine that the schematic figure was their own reflection in a mirror, and in another task, they were asked to imagine themselves in the position of the human figure - and from these points of view, to perform different judgment about the presented figure. Notably, in the first task, subjects saw themselves from their habitual point of view, embodied within their physical body, similar to descriptions of Abulafia's technique ("as if seeing himself in a mirror"). In the other task, subjects came "out" of their bodies (disembodiment), and looked at themselves and the world from that perspective - as did those who followed the teachings of the Lurianic kabbala and early Hasidism ("and he will imagine himself as if his soul has gone out and ascended"). Activation of the brain Electrical neuroimaging revealed that different brain activities correlate to these tasks. While in the first task (embodied self-location), activation was found in the left extrastriate body area (EBA) of the brain, the second task (disembodied self-location) was associated with activity in the right temporoparietal junction. These findings are compatible with the role of these brain mechanisms: extrastriate body area is involved with visualization and imagination of bodies and of body parts, and therefore it is active in an experience that is mainly visual, like autoscopy; the temporoparietal junction is involved in multisensory coding and higher processing of the human body and self, and thus involved in the sense of disembodiment. The special function of the right hemisphere, which allows people to imagine their body in numerous and sundry variations, including from outside of it, can also be seen here. The left hemisphere is more involved with the common visual basis of the phenomenon, as well as Abulafia's technique of letter combinations, since the mechanism involved in reading is located nearby. Moreover, application of electrical neuroimaging on these two tasks while in supine or sitting positions revealed that body position influences the sense of embodiment. This is in keeping with the fact that neurological patients describe out-of-body experiences as occurring while they are reclining, while autoscopy occurs mostly in a sitting position. It also conforms to the fact that Abulafia's techniques as performed mainly in a sitting position, while those of the Lurianic kabbala and Hasidism were done in a supine position. From phenomenological analysis of the detailed descriptions of kabbalists, and comparisons of them with neurological reports and the exacting experiments described above, it can therefore be concluded that the difference between the various experiences described by the major figures of kabbala and Hasidism stemmed mainly from various brain activities spurred by the detailed techniques they utilized. Into these neuro-cognitive structures they poured their beliefs - beliefs that stemmed from their varied spiritual world, in which a very important part was ecstatic states and their achievement. Ecstatic phenomena have attracted human imagination for thousands of years, and traces of them can be found in folklore, mythology and spiritual experiences in many cultures, as well as in the finest literary works and modern art. These phenomena have served and continue to serve as milestones in the philosophy of mind and the study of consciousness. Thus, for example, the contemporary philosopher Thomas Metzinger argued that the concept of "soul" may have its origins in accurate, first-person descriptions of ecstatic states. These preliminary attempts to build up a philosophy of mind had a subsequent impact on the development of modern philosophy. The mystics referred to the ecstatic states as a separation of their "self" not only from the body, but also from more basic levels. Ecstatic kabbalists thus used such phenomena as a model that presents different levels of self. Regarding the impact of these mystics on Christian mysticism, Muslim astro-magical traditions and various aspects of Jewish thought, it may be assumed the techniques and methods developed by Abulafia and the prophetic kabbala circle, the Ari and the mystics of Safed, and the luminaries of Hasidism, can be considered a pioneering investigation of the human self and mind. Shahar Arzy is a neurologist and neuroscientist at the Hadassah Hebrew University Hospital and the Swiss Institute of Technology. The author wishes to thank Tirtsah Arzy and Prof. Moshe Idel for their comments. Bookmark to del.icio.us   Fragile cease-fire Olmert: Gaza cease-fire is fragile, may be short lived. Unbalanced stance Italy FM: EU stance on Israel in past swayed by intolerance.

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