“The Authorship and Structure of the Zohar”
Pg. 5-8
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It was in the second century C.E., during the Roman occupation of what is now Israel, that the Zohar was revealed by the Creator to Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai and his son Elazar, who had taken refuge from the Romans in a mountain cave. This is a very firm kabbalistic teaching, although the origin of the Zohar is a subject of debate among academics. Many scholars maintain that the Zohar was written by the eleventh-century kabbalist Moses de Leon or by others among his contemporaries. When the Zohar is truly understood, however, it becomes clear that only Rabbi Shimon could have composed the work.

When the historians elect Moses de Leon as the author of the Zohar, they ignore the opinion of such great kabbalists as Moses Cordovero, Shlomo Alkabetz, Joseph Caro, Isaac Luria, Moses Luzzatto, and many others—men for whom the Zohar was a way of life, rather than a field of study, and who were unanimous in their agreement that Rabbi Shimon was the author of the Zohar. The underlying assumptions of these great men were that the man who wrote the Zohar must have been the same level of spirituality as its contents, and that only Rabbi Shimon fit that description.

In the seclusion of the cave, Rabbi Shimon was visited twice a day by the prophet Elijah, who revealed to him the contents of the Zohar. The text comprises a commentary on the Bible and contains several sections. The main section, which bears the general title of Sefer haZohar, is generally connected and related to the weekly portion of the Torah. To this are attached: (1) Idra Rabbah (The Greater Assembly), which was actually written when Rabbi Shimon and his son Elazar emerged from the cave and selected eight disciples; these eight, together with Rabbi Shimon and his son, formed the ”Great Assembly” where, for the first time, the esoteric, internal teachings of the Torah were revealed; (2) Sifra diTzenuta (The Book of the Veiled Mystery) deals with the structure of the creative process; (3) Sitrei Torah (The Secrets of the Torah) treats the power of the divine Names and how they are used to access the immense power of the cosmos; (4) Idra Zuta (The Lesser Assembly) describes those teachings of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai that were not revealed during the Greater Assembly, but only on the day of Rabbi Shimon’s death; (5) Ra’aya Mehemna (The Faithful Shepherd), Moses, deals with those cosmic precepts and doctrines not covered in the discourses between Elijah the Prophet and Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai; (6) Midrash haNe’elam (The Recondite Exposition) contains a vast collection of scriptural exposition concerning the method of numerology, that is, the permutations and combinations of the letters of the Aleph Beth and the Hebrew numerals; (7) Zohar Hadash (The New Zohar) is an independent commentary along the same lines as the Zohar, but it embraces, in addition to the Torah, the Five Megillot (Scrolls): The Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, and Esther; (8) Tikunei Zohar (Emendations of the Zohar) addresses the same general subject matter as the Zohar but also discourses on the teachings that are specifically directed to the Age of Aquarius; (9) Tosefta (Additions) adds some fragmentary supplements to the Zohar in which references to the Sefirot are made.

One should not take this to mean that the secrets of the Zohar were revealed only to Rabbi Shimon. His teacher, Rabbi Akiva, and several others before him were fully versed in all the teachings of the Zohar. In fact, the entire understanding of Kabbalah was presented in its oral form to Israel on Mount Sinai. Many understood the dazzling truths of spirituality, but few could make others see and understand them. For this, the written text of the Zohar, we would have to wait for Rabbi Shimon.

Why was Rabbi Shimon chosen to set down the teachings of the Zohar in preference to his teacher, Rabbi Akiva, or indeed any of the other giants of Kabbalah who preceded him? This problem has been the source of many commentaries and parables; it is often stressed, for instance, that through his fugitive and solitary life, Rabbi Shimon was able to overcome the physical restraints and limitations that normally prevent the attainment of higher levels of spiritual consciousness. He was thus able to transcend the laws governing time and space, thereby acquiring root knowledge of all existence as we experience it on this earthly plane.

The first text of the Zohar was in Aramaic, the vernacular of the region at that time. As with the Sefer Yetzirah, however, the wisdom of the Zohar was out of harmony with the consciousness of its time—nor was this disharmony limited to the realm of the intellect. Kabbalah teaches that the Zohar is an energy source in a very physical sense. Contemporary writers on Kabbalah compare the Zohar to an overwhelmingly powerful source of electrical power: Until the world was ready to make use of electricity, the presence of such a power source would be useless, and perhaps even dangerous. Therefore, the Zohar was hidden away for more than ten centuries; Rabbi Shimon himself predicted that the concealment would last twelve hundred years.