Pardes (legend)
Pardes is the subject of a Jewish aggadah about four rabbis of the Mishnaic period who entered the pardes, only one of them succeeded in leaving the pardes unharmed.
The basic story goes as follows:
Sources differ concerning which sage died and which became demented; the Tosefta and the Babylonian Talmud say ben Azzai died and ben Zoma became demented, but the Jerusalem Talmud, Shir HaShirim Rabbah, and the hekhalot literature record the reverse.
Etymology
The Hebrew word פַּרְדֵּס is of Persian origin and appears several times in the Bible. The same Old Persian root is the source of the word paradise via Latin paradisus and Greek παράδεισος, which were used for פרדס's Biblical Hebrew equivalent גן, Garden, in early Bible translations.Samson Levey proposed the Greek paradosis suggests the four were examining the claims and early documents of Christianity and that the Tosefta account preserves the scholarly undertaking most accurately.
Versions
The story is found in several places, with minor variations: the Tosefta, the Babylonian Talmud, and the Jerusalem Talmud. The earliest context, found in the Tosefta, is the restriction on transmitting mystical teaching concerning the divine Chariot except privately to particularly qualified disciples.The sugya in the Babylonian Talmud, at Hagigah 14b, is the best-known:
Versions of the story also appear in the esoteric Hekhalot literature.
Exposition
Rashi says that ben Azzai died from looking at the Divine Presence. Ben Zoma's harm was in losing his sanity. Acher's "cutting down the plantings" in the orchard refers to becoming a heretic from the experience. Acher means "the other one", and is the Talmudic term for the tanna Elisha ben Abuyah. Akiva, in contrast to the other three, became the leading Rabbinic figure of the era.Rashi explains that the four rabbis ascended to Heaven by utilizing the Divine Name, which might be understood as achieving a spiritual elevation through Jewish meditation practices.
The Tosafot, medieval commentaries on the Talmud, say that the four sages "did not go up literally, but it appeared to them as if they went up." On the other hand, Rabbi Louis Ginzberg wrote that the journey to paradise "is to be taken literally and not allegorically".
According to another interpretation, PaRDeS is an acronym for the four traditional methods of exegesis in Judaism. In this sense, they were the four to understand the whole Torah.
Interpretation in Kabbalah
Another version of the legend is also found in the mystical literature, which adds to the story:Moses ben Jacob Cordovero explains the Zoharic passage in his Pardes Rimonim, whose title itself refers to the Pardes mystical ascent. The meaning of the ascent is understood through Rabbi Akiva's warning. The danger concerns misinterpreting anthropomorphism in Kabbalah, introducing corporeal notions in the Divine. Emanations in Kabbalah bridge between the Ein Sof Divine Unity and the plurality of Creation. The fundamental mystical error involves separating between divine transcendence and immanence, as if they were a duality. Rather, all Kabbalistic emanations have no being of their own, but are nullified and dependent on their source of vitality in the One God. Nonetheless, Kabbalah maintains that God is revealed through the life of His emanations, Man interacting with Divinity in a mutual Flow of "Direct Light" from Above to Below and "Returning Light" from Below to Above. The Sefirot, including Wisdom, Compassion and Kingship comprise the dynamic life in God's Persona. In the highest of the Four Worlds, the complete nullification and Unity of the sefirot and Creation is revealed within its Divine source. Apparent separation only pertains, in successive degrees, to the lower Three Worlds and our Physical Realm. Introducing false separation causes the exile of the Shekhinah within Creation from God. From Cordovero's explanation: