I've been recently reflecting on the truly inspiring news story where Madonna claimed that she is an "Ambassador for Judaism." You probably know somewhat of Madonna's self-congratulatory ascent from:
this...
"When is he going to ask me to take this oversized Hanes v-neck off?"
to this ...
"Practicing Kabbalah likes makes me feel so esoteric..."
Madonna is perhaps the most prominent celebrity as of late to convert to the sexy-mystic religion of Kabbalah. Britney Spears would easily qualify as the least inspiring. But there are tons of other celebrities that have in recent years taken an interest in Kabbalah like Demi Moore, Rosanne, Barr, Jeff Goldblum, Ashton Kutcher, Guy Ritchie, David and Victoria Beckham, and Elizabeth Taylor.
What none of these celebrities are likely aware of are the distinct, if only underlying, ties between the ancient Kabbalah and the founder of the LDS Church - Joseph Smith.
According to Harold Bloom, a Sterling Professor of the Humanities at Yale University, Joseph Smith inculcated in his restorative religious movement crucial elements of Kabbalah that normative Judaism had come to faze out.
"Smith's imaginative recapture of crucial elements, elements evaded by
normative Judaism and by the Church after it. The God of Joseph Smith
is a daring revival of the God of some of the Kabbalists and Gnostics,
prophetic sages who, like Smith himself, asserted that they had returned
to the true religion. . . . Either there was a more direct Kabbalistic influence
upon Smith than we know, or, far more likely, his genius reinvented
Kabbalah in the effort necessary to restore archaic Judaism."
(Bloom, The American Religion, pg. 95)
If the Restoration that founded LDS Church required the restoration of all things, wouldn't it only be natural that we see elements of archaic Judaism via Kabbalah in LDS doctrine? Moreover, don't you think that if Madonna were to really investigate the esoteric underbelly of the real LDS Gospel paradigm she would be pleasantly surprised?
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