Acknowledgements
Preface: Shaul Magid
Chapter 1: Prelude: New Skin for Post-Secular Philosophy of Circum/fession
Chapter 2: On Exile As Redemption in (Canadian) Jewish Mysticism
Chapter 3: From Darkness, A Love of All This: Seeking Sacred in Post-Secular Song
Chapter 4: Tangle of Matter & Ghost: Objective Spirit & Non-Dual Reality
Chapter 5: A Question of Pure Consciousness in the Priestly Blessing of Love
Chapter 6: Amen to American Agnosticism
Chapter 7: Nothing as Whole as a Broken Middle Matzah
Chapter 8: Falling with Our Angels, So Human
Chapter 9: “An Appetite for Something Like Religion”: Unbinding the Binding of Isaac, Jesus Christ & Joan of Arc through Zen
Chapter 10: Standing Where There Used to Be a Street: 9/11 Post-Secularism & Sacred Song
Chapter 11: Never Mind this Neuzeit, Here’s Kaddish: Between the Nameless & the Name
Chapter 12: Coda: A Philosophy of Post-Secular Song in Light of Piyyut as a Cultural Lens
Postface: Elliot R. Wolfson
Aubrey L. Glazer, Ph.D. (University of Toronto) is rabbi of Congregation Beth Sholom, San Francisco. His latest books dedicated to exploring Jewish philosophy in different contexts: Mystical Vertigo: Kabbalistic Hebrew Poetry Dancing Cross the Divide (Academic Studies Press, 2013) and A New Physiognomy of Jewish Thinking: Critical Theory After Adorno as Applied to Jewish Thought (Continuum, 2011) recently translated into Hebrew (Resling Press, 2015).
“In the first extended encounter with Leonard Cohen’s complex and
demanding legacy since Cohen’s death Aubrey Glazer profoundly
attunes us to the prophetic, mystical, and Jewish registers of
Cohen’s voice and music that are normally an octave too high for
our ears. This book reflects a rare combination of erudition and
poetic sensitivity needed for the task to guide us along a musical
scale ranging from Isaac on the altar to Jesus on the cross to Joan
of Arc on the stake; from the medieval Jewish philosopher
Maimonides to a Hasidic Rebbe against the backdrop of Quebecois
culture to the Zen master Roshi; and from the Zohar to Yiddish
humour. Cohen’s passing leaves another crack in the world and
Glazer’s study allows the light to come streaming through.”
*—James A. Diamond, Joseph & Wolf Lebovic Chair of Jewish
Studies, University of Waterloo*
“This bold, imaginative book enables us to appreciate Leonard Cohen
as a Jewish mystical humanist, a post-secular troubadour who
wrestles intimately with his own tradition. Cohen emerges as a
prophet who realizes our brokenness and inspires healing.”
*Daniel Matt, translator-editor of the Zohar-Pritzker
edition*
“Weaving an intertextilic elixir of the sacred and the secular of
both religious hermeneutics and contemporary cultural theory,
Glazer’s formidable Tangle of Matter and Ghost is a pioneering
study of how Cohen, as Canadian kabbalist buddhist, saint, mystic
poet, a prophet with priestly lineage, helps us realize that the
Shekhina is indeed dwelling inside and between every letter.
Establishing an alchemic cirqumfrission, it compellingly cuts into
all that is connected and cracked, rigorously detailing how and
where the light gets in.”
*Adeena Karasick, Professor of Global Literature, St. John’s
University, New York, award-winning author of seven books of
poetry, including most recently, Amuse Bouche: Tasty Treats for
the Mouth (Talonbooks, 2009)*
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