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| A fragment from the Cairo Geniza in the hand of Maimonides' only son, Avraham ben haRambam |
Introduction
This article—based extensively on the research by Professor Ronald Kiener—examines the contested origins of Jewish mysticism, including the neglected question of the role Islamic mysticism may have played. This Islamic influence seems to have been previously missed by the doyenne of Jewish mysticism, Gershom Scholem, who “based largely on manuscripts from Italy and Germany…hardly professes to say much of Judaism in Islamdom” (Hodgson 1974: 2:202, n.1). Scholem’s use of texts predominantly from Europe accounts for his Eurocentric approach to the history of Jewish mysticism. Scholem was not alone because sixty years ago most scholars indeed “looked to Europe in order to provide narrative explanations for the history and development of Jewish mysticism” (Kiener 2011:147). However, scholarship has changed since then, and Moshe Idel, one of the foremost contemporary scholars on Jewish mysticism, starkly declares:
“Muslim culture is the primary source of influence upon Jewish mysticism” (Idel 1991:33).
