Elliot Wolfson

philosopher, scholar of religion

Professor of Hebrew and Judaic Studies; Abraham Lieberman Professor of Hebrew and Judaic Studies - New York University.

Research Interests:

Jewish mysticism and philosophy; gender construction and the history of religion; symbolism and myth; philosophical hermeneutics and the phenomenology of religious experience

Bio:

Elliot Wolfson received bachelor and master of Arts degrees from Queens College of the City University of New York, where he pursued the study of philosophy, focusing especially on phenomenology, hermeneutics, and existentialism. he received master of arts and doctor of philosophy degrees from Brandeis University, where he specialized in the study of the Kabbalistic texts and traditions that have remained central to his scholarly work. He is the Abraham Lieberman Professor of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University, where he has taught since 1987.

Select Publications:

A Dream Interpreted Within a Dream: Oneiropoiesis and the Prism of Imagination. Zone Books, 2011.

Alef, Mem, Tau: Kabbalistic Musings on Time, Truth, and Death. University of California Press, 2006.

Language, Eros, Being: Kabbalistic Hermeneutics and Poetic Imagination. Fordham University Press, 2005.

Reading the Veil: Concealment and Secrecy in the History of Religions. New York: Seven Bridges Press. 1999.

Through a Speculum That Shines: Vision and Imagination in Medieval Jewish Mysticism. Princeton University Press. 1994.

Fellowships/Honors:

National Jewish Book Award in Scholarship awarded to Language, Eros, Being (2006); American Academy of Religion Award for Excellence in Historical Studies, awarded to Through a Speculum That Shines (1995); National Jewish Book Award for Excellence in Scholarship, awarded to Through a Speculum That Shines (1995).

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