Introduction. Mentalities of ancient Judaism -- Memory, Torah, and magic -- The Sar-Torah texts. The texts -- Sar-Torah narratives : translation and analysis -- Sar-Torah rituals and related texts -- Ritual and revelation. Ritual and Purity -- Tradition and authority -- Conclusions. Scholastic magic
Summary
In exploring the social background of early Jewish mysticism, Scholastic Magic tells the story of how imagination and magic were made to serve memory and scholasticism. In the visionary literature that circulated between the fifth and ninth centuries, there are strange tales of ancient rabbis conjuring the angel known as Sar-Torah, the "Prince of the Torah." This angel endowed the rabbis themselves with spectacular memory and skill in learning, and then taught them the formulas for giving others these gifts. This literature, according to Michael Swartz, gives us rare glimpse
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 231-247) and indexes