PATHWINGS

These essays and poems by a leading scholar of Jewish mysticism explore the connections between sexuality, divinity, and textuality, working with topics such as the gender of the Godhead, Apocalypse in the Kabbalah, the suffering of God, the hermeneutics of visionary experience, and other controversial features of Jewish thought. The poems and essays reverberate with and shed light on one another, creating a resonance that reinforces the depth and originality of Wolfson's thought."Wolfson has discerned that the poetic mode is more than a stylistic accessory to his Kabbalistic texts, for the poetic way opens modes of logic inaccessible to traditional philosophizing. Rather than maintaining strict dichotomy between philosophy and poetry, Wolfson offers a fruitful convergence. Here, as always, this brilliant thinker and master of paradox steeps his readers? minds in the glistening depths of Jewish mystical waters."-Barbara E. Galli, McGill University

Elliot R. Wolfson Elliot R. Wolfson is the Abraham Lieberman Professor of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University.His main area of scholarly research is the history of Jewish mysticism but he has brought to bear on that field training in philosophy, literary criticism, feminist theory, postmodern hermeneutics, and the phenomenology of religion.His publications have won prestigious awards awards such as the American Academy of Religion's Award for Excellence in the Study of Religion in the Category of Historical Studies in 1995 and the National Jewish Book Award for Excellence in Scholarship in 1995 and 2006. He has also published two volumes of poetry: Pathwings: Poetic-Philosophic Reflections on the Hermeneutics of Time and Language (Station Hill Press, 2004), and Footdreams and Treetales: 92 Poems (Fordham University Press, 2007)Additionally, Wolfson has been the recipient of several academic honors and awards: he served as the Regenstein Visiting Professor in Jewish Studies in th