Time, eternity and mystical experience in kabbalah

In this article, I focus on the nexus between mystical cleaving, unio mystica, and the experience of time in several Kabbalistic sources. First, I examine the philosophical mysticism of the thirteenth-century Jewish mystic Abraham Abulafia, in which union with God happens above and beyond time. The second mystical system I will turn to is that of classic theosophical kabbalah as represented in the Zohar, in which sacred time is the focus of mystical cleaving and union with the divine. In my view, this distinction marks a substantial difference in the religious experience that each mystical path has to offer.