Modern scholars have favored the idea that the Essenes
were the first systematizers of and the first practitioners in the
Cabbalah, and have interpreted their name[337] to mean those engaged
in secret things, but the mystic tradition itself is earlier than the
foundation of a special mystic sect. It is part of the heritage from
the Jewish prophets and psalmists and the Babylonian interaction with
Hebraism.
Philo had large sympathies with the Essenic development of Judaism, and
he speaks at times as though he had joined one of their communities, and
therein had been initiated into the great mysteries and secret
philosophies of the sages. We have noted that he offers his most
precious wisdom to the worthy few alone, "who in all humility practice
genuine piety, free from all false pretence." They, in turn, are to
discourse on these doctrines only to other members of the brotherhood.
"I bid ye, initiated brethren, who listen with chastened ears, receive
these truly sacred mysteries in your inmost souls, and reveal them not
to one of the uninitiated, but laying them up in your hearts, guard them
as a most excellent treasure in which the noblest of possessions is
stored, the knowledge, namely, of the First Cause and of virtue, and
moreover of what they generate."[338] These mysteries, it is not
unlikely, represent according to some scholars the [Hebrew: sod] of the
Talmudical rabbis, which was elaborately developed in the Zohar and
kindred writings.
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