[Avodah] When do the malachim come

[Arie Folger]

RTK wrote:
> And I've always understood "the kallah" (=the Shabbas queen) to be  either
> a metaphor/personification of the Shabbos for poetic purposes, or the
>  angel in charge of Shabbos, the way the Sar shel Esav, say, is the angel
> in  charge of Esav.

There is a book by Prof. Reuven Kimmelman etitled Lekhah Doidi veQabalat 
Shabbat (Hebrew), where he shows that Lekhah Dodi only makes sense within the 
particulars of Rav Mosheh Cordovero's Kabbalah. It is filled with scriptural 
idiom and paraphrase, but cannot be read according to the simple meaning of 
the quoted verses.

Therefore, it is all the more surprising that it became a mainstay of the 
siddur even in communities that tended to vehemently oppose the inclusion of 
kabbalistic texts in it.

KT
-- 
Arie Folger
http://www.ariefolger.googlepages.com