Now that Scarlett Johansson's "Under the Skin" movie has been released in New York and Los Angeles (last Friday), and starting tomorrow will be shown "in select cities," I'll have to make my decision. Do I really want to go see it? As a UFOlogist, I think I ought to. (If only for the imagery … [Read more...]
Madonna’s Kabbalist – Philip Berg and the Kabbalah Centre (Part 2)
(Continuing my blog post from last week.) My first encounter with Philip Berg's Kabbalah Centre wasn't in Los Angeles, to which the organization's headquarters eventually migrated. It was in a subway station in New York City. It was hot there, and noisy; and a pretty young Israeli woman was … [Read more...]
Madonna’s Kabbalist – Philip Berg and the Kabbalah Centre (Part 1)
It's thanks to an email forwarded by my friend Boaz Huss that I heard the news: Philip Berg died this past Monday, September 16. He was 84, or possibly 86, depending on who you want to believe. Who's Philip Berg? you may say. Or, if you know and despise Philip Berg and most of what he stood … [Read more...]
Gershom Scholem – Kabbalah’s Greatest Scholar
I was thinking of calling this post “Gershom Scholem, Jewish Mysticism, and the UFO.” But I don’t want to be accused of false advertising. The UFOlogical relevance of Gershom Scholem, and the domain of learning of which he was undisputed master, will become clear only gradually. I'll need a … [Read more...]
Love Goddess Stories – Esther, Ishtar, and the “Doe of the Dawn” (Postscript)
This is a P.S. to a three-part post, on the mythic background of Esther and the Purim story. You can read the earlier installments by clicking here, here, and here. In 114 or 113 BCE, a Jew named Dositheus showed up in Egypt, carrying with him a Greek document which he called "the Letter of … [Read more...]
