The Spiritual Form of Adam Kadmon and the Blessed Trinity

[Metaron]

During the middle ages, there were many converts to the Church from Judaism. One of the biggest reasons was their study of the Kaballah, the Jewiah Mystical Tradition (Note: I am referring to the pre-Lurainic Kaballah; the Lurainic Kaballah seems to be corrupted by foreign ideas.). These Jewish converts wrote a number of books which explored the Kabbalah or Jewish Mystical traditions in the light of Catholic belief. Pope Sixtus IV along with some other Popes approved of this movement and ordered the Kabbalah to be translated into Latin and to be studied by all Divinity students. This is partially discussed on the website Hewbrewcatholic.org.

Now, in the Jewish tradition, their were ten Sephirot, which were the ten attributes of Godhead. The lowest one was Malkhut, which was seen as God’s presence among his people. the other nine were seen as three triads of three, a triad of triads, a Trinity. Many Jews recognized this, and converted.

The Sefirot are seen in Kabbalah as the garments or crowns of the King and as aspects of the Divine Personality which are united ‘like a flame joined to a coal’. The Kabbalah uses the image of a tree or a body to explain the Sefirot. They call this Body the Adam Kadmon and this can be linked to St Paul’s concepts of the Second Adam and the Body of Christ.

In Catholic Kaballah, the Sephirot are called Dignities, and have Latin names. There was also more Christocentric ideas in the Catholic Kaballah than in its Jewish predecessor.

The idea of Adam Kadmon (i.e., Christ as the Second Adam) and of the Sabbath Queen (a striking image of Our Lady Mary) as well of the Triad of Dignities (as the Trinity) are striking, and completely compatible with Christianity, just as Pope Sixtus IV and the other Popes stated.

 

[mschrank]

Never head of this Catholic Kaballah, can you post more resources on it?

 

[Metaron]

Never head of this Catholic Kaballah, can you post more resources on it?

Catholic Kabbalah was expounded in part by Catalan philosopher and mystic, Raymon Lull (1232 - c.1316). Lull thought that, through teaching of the similarities of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, that they would eventually be converted by the Catholic Church.
The Sephirot were called Dignities. Lull mentioned nine Dignities (or Dignitaries): Bonitas (Goodness), Magnitudo (Greatness), Eternitas (Eternity), Potestas (Power), Sapientia (Wisdom), Voluntas (Will), Virtus (Virtue), Veritas (Truth), and Gloria (Glory). These are shown in the follwing diagram.

With a little juggling of the order we have all the Kabbalistic Sefirot bar the lowest one, Malkut (This was considered as separate in Catholic Kaballah, and was called Ecclesia):

Sefirah and corresponding Dignity:

Keter (Crown; Divine Will) = Voluntas
Hokmah (Wisdom) = Sapientia
Binah (Intelligence) = Veritas
Hesed (Mercy, Love) = Bonitas
Gevurah (Strength) = Potestas
Tifaret (Beauty) = Virtus
Netzah (Endurance) = Eternitas
Hod (Majesty) = Gloria
Yesod (Foundation) = Magnitudo

In addition we also find the incorporation of the four elements and the qualities. There is an elaborate system of correspondences, in that the nine Dignities have their correspondences in the celestial sphere, the human level, and the animal, plant, and material creation.

In all this we see the influence, not only of Kabbalah, but also of Aristotlean categories, Augustinian Platonism (nearly all the Lullian Dignities can be found listed as Augustine’s Divine Attributes), and the celestial hierarchies of angels of the Christian Neoplatonist Dionysius, interestingly.

The christological speculations of a number of Jewish converts from the late 13th to the late fifteenth centuries were expounded during the Rennaissance, and more philosophical Christian and Renaissance speculation concerning the Kabbalah developed around the Platonic Acadamy founded by the Medici family in Florence.

The Florentines, headed by the renowned Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-94) believed they had discovered in Kabbalah a lost divine revelation that could give the key to understanding both the teachings of Pythagoras, Plato, and the Orphics, and the mystical aspect of Catholic Christianity. Pico himself had a considerable amount of Catholic and Jewish Kabbalistic literature translated into Latin by the scholarly convert Samuel ben Nissim Abulfaraj.

Among the 900 theses Pico presented for public debate in Rome was the claim that no science can better convince the Jews of the divinity of Jesus Christ than their own Kabbalah. He believed he could prove the dogmas of the Trinity and the Incarnation through Kabbalistic ideas.

 

[Metaron]

Also, I forgot to mention, that, although his Catholic Kaballistic teaching was looked down upon by Pope Gregory XI and Pope Paul IV, the Church has given Ramon Lull beatification (Bl. Ramon Lull), in that his cult was confirmed in 1858 by Pope Pius IX… He has also been called ‘Doctor Illuminatus’.

 

[mschrank]

Could you just post some links so we could do our own research? Thanks.

 

[Metaron]

Could you just post some links so we could do our own research? Thanks.

Well, the only thing I could find on him is a Wikipedia article. All the other information about it I got from Introduction to Christian Cabala and Idiot’s Guide to Kaballah. Let me google…