Mirror of His Beauty: Feminine Images of God from the Bible to the Early Kabbalah (Jews, Christians, and Muslims from the Ancient to the Modern World) Paperback – October 17, 2004

I have been looking for a book with information on the feminine in the Bible, especially the Old Testament or otherwise known as the Hebrew Bible. This has come the closest of delivering the answers to my questions of any book I have purchased so far.

I can't say that I disliked this book. It provides a compendium and a tabulation of a wealth of material regarding the history of the Divine Feminine in the Christian and Jewish traditions, starting with the wisdom literature in the bible and going through the later Middle Ages. Along the way it reviews the thoughts of Philo and the Kabbalah in this area, and provides some data on the phenomenon of Mariology in Western Medieval Christianity.On the whole, though, I found the book to be long on data and short on insight. One gets the feeling that Professor Schafer fears to offend his Jewish and Christian readers by pursuing the possibility that they actually may have had an effect on each other's religious thought.Also, despite the subtitle of this book, there is virtually nothing about the Islamic contribution to this phenomenon, an omission that I suspect may be crucial. The figure of the Divine Feminine is very important in much Islamic mystical literature from the Middle Ages, and not least of all in Spain, where it would have had considerable influence certainly on Jewish circles, and very likely on Christian ones as well.In short, if you're looking for a thumbnail sketch of the Feminine Images of God in pre-modern western thought, this book is fine, but you will not walk away with any in-depth understanding of the subject.

Peter Schaefer is a fine scholar of the history of spiritual concepts in the Judeo-Christian tradition. This book is an important and innovative contribution which draws on previous work of Gershom Scholem and Raphael Patai ("The Hebrew Goddess"). Whereas Scholem suggested the influence of Albigensian thought on the re-appearance in 12th century Judaism of attention to feminine aspects of God's nature, he was never able to pinpoint this. Schaefer instead discusses the possible influence of reverence for Virgin Mary in "official" Christianity of the period. This throws an entirely new light on the book "Bahir" as well as later Kabbalistic developments. The text was originally written in German but completely redone in English, and it reads smoothly for the most part. The subject matter is fascinating and inspiring. Recommended for all readers interested in mystical theology, particularly in Judaism.

Revelation 1:14-15(14) his head and his hairs were white like (WOOL) as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire;(15) And his (FEET) like unto fine (BRASS) as if they (BURNED) in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many watersIt's not hard to find out (JESUS CHRIST) true image and his (TRUE WORD) the world knows in the time of (MOSES) and (JESUS) they both had to hide them selves among the sons of (HAM) who were the ( TRUE BLOODLINE BLACK EGYPTIANS) not these Turkish ARABS you see today do your research find the (TRUTH) that's laced all through the BIBLE that many OTHER nations don't teach about, the pages that's not looked upon in the BIBLE.......When JESUS RETURN the WORLD will be SHOCKED on who AND what IMAGE he was when he was here and will be the SAME when he RETURN