"Rethinking the Beginning of the Kabbalah is a groundbreaking book that not only reshapes our understanding of the beginnings of the Kabbalah but also challenges scholars to rethink the foundations of the field itself. It will be indispensable reading for anyone interested in medieval Jewish intellectual history and the future directions of Kabbalah scholarship."—Boaz Huss, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev "Grounded in meticulous philological analysis and careful historical contextualization, this book shows that philosophical controversy and debates over providence formed the matrix within which esoteric concerns took shape. Tzahi Weiss offers not a revision of the standard narrative, but a fundamentally new point of departure for the study of medieval Jewish thought."—Gerold Necker, Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg