Idra Rabba & Idra Zuta, The Greater and Lesser Assembly

The two Idrot ("Assemblies") are the dramatic and doctrinal summit of the Zohar. In both, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai gathers the companions and discloses the configuration of the partzufim, the "countenances" of the Godhead, anatomized limb by limb, from the skull and the dew through the eyes, the nose, the ears, and the beard, to the union of male and female and the building of Adam. The Idra Rabba (the Greater Assembly, from parashat Naso) is the fuller exposition; the Idra Zuta (the Lesser Assembly, from parashat Ha'azinu) is its condensation, delivered as Rabbi Shimon departs the world, and closes with his death.

This is the first complete public-domain English of both Assemblies, printed together. It is translated from the ground up out of the bare Aramaic, and it consults exactly one commentary, named: the Perush ha-Sulam of Rabbi Yehudah Ashlag (1945). The bare text is rendered on its own terms; the Lurianic reading sits beside it in a set-off Notes apparatus, marked as Ashlag's and never merged into the translation. Published in The Substrate Archive series by Threshold Press.

Contents

  1. Idra Rabba I, The Assembly (the Opening)
  2. Idra Rabba II, Atika Kaddisha / Arikh Anpin: the anatomy
  3. Idra Rabba III, The Beard of Arikh Anpin: the thirteen tikkunim
  4. Idra Rabba IV, Atika in Detail; the Transition to Ze'ir Anpin
  5. Idra Rabba V, Ze'ir Anpin: the anatomy and the beard
  6. Idra Rabba VI, Recapitulation: the Configuration of Adam
  7. Idra Rabba VII, The Deaths of the Companions; the Close
  8. Idra Zuta I, The Opening Frame
  9. Idra Zuta II, Atika Kaddisha / Arikh Anpin: the anatomy
  10. Idra Zuta III, The Transition to Ze'ir Anpin
  11. Idra Zuta IV, Ze'ir Anpin: the anatomy and the beard
  12. Idra Zuta V, The Union and the Holy of Holies
  13. Idra Zuta VI, The Death-Scene; the Close

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