ʾAsya Ḳarṭinah’s Book of Medicines and the Shekhinah’s Lovesickness: Notes on Medicine and Kabbalah in Zoharic Literature

Abstract This article examines the intersection of medicine, as both knowledge and practice, and theology in the context of the Zoharic literature, the acme of medieval Kabbalah. Focusing on the Tiḳuney Zohar , it demonstrates its author’s expertise in state-of-the-art high medieval medical discourse, and its importance within his writing. The article demonstrates how the physician becomes a favored epistemic model in two related narratives: the Zoharic discussion of an ideal physician named ʾAsya Ḳarṭinah, and a Tiḳuney Zohar narrative portraying the exiled Shekhinah as a patient, and discusses possible meanings of a medicine based on the secrets of the Kabbalah.