his poetry

studies on elliot wolfson’s poetry in light of philosophy

on wings of moonlight: elliot r wolfson’s poetry in the path of rosenzweig and celan

By Barbara galli

on wings of moonlight focuses on the poetic nature of wolfson’s works through an exploration of his poems. barbara galli argues that wolfson’s poems resonate with a kabbalistic worldview that is also reflected in his scholarly work and personal life. on wings of moonlight – a phrase taken from one of the poems – illuminates the poetic and philosophic kinship between wolfson, franz rosenzweig, one of his influences since graduate school, and paul celan. displaying a deep knowledge of the literary, philosophical, jewish, and feminist traditions informing wolfson’s academic work, galli argues that his prose cannot be fully appreciated without consideration of its poetic dimensions.

elliot r wolfson: poetic thinking

By Hava tirosh-samuelson

elliot r. wolfson, a scholar of jewish mysticism and philosophy, uses the textual sources of judaism to examine universal philosophical topics such as the function and processes of the imagination, the paradoxes of temporality, and the mystery of poetic language. working at the intersection of disciplines and refusing to reduce texts to their simple historical contexts, wolfson puts texts spanning diverse temporal, cultural, and religious periods in creative counterpoint. his sensitivity to language reveals its fragility as it simultaneously points to the uncertainty of meaning. the result is a creative reading of both judaism and philosophy that informs and is informed by poetic sensibility and philosophical hermeneutics.

pathwings: philosophic and poetic reflections on the hermeneutics of time and language

BY ELLIOT R. WOLFSON

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.