This class is in a way a “second part” of the other one, “Beginnings of Jewish Mysticism”, yet, both also stand in their own rights, respectively. The earliest mystical texts in Jewish tradition are undoubtedly the so-called “Hekhalot literature”, otherwise known as literature of the descenders to the Merkhabah. This literature is by no means homogenous or without problems of redaction, manuscript tradition etc. We will read texts of the Hekhalot literature in combination with critical scholarship concerning the texts. Main interest will lay in the problems of scholarship and scholarly evaluation.