Om "mystik", Hekhalot-litteraturen, og dens syn på forholdet mellem Gud og Metatron

The question of the right labelling of the traditions in the pseudephigraphical Hekhalot literature has often been asked among researchers in Judaism. In this article I have tried to show that ‘mysticism’ is an adequate term of these traditions. My main concern is, however, to point to an interesting problem concerning two central figures in the Merkavah mysticism, i.e. God and Metatron, the “head” of angels. Saul Lieberman has shown that the name Metatron is probably derivated from two Greek words, which brings us to the supposition that there exists an extraordinary close relation between the two characters. This supposition is confirmed, when we look at some sections of the manuscripts. Metatron is often called “Little JHVH” or “Little Lord”, and in the macroform Merkavah Rabba the climax is reached by the sentence “JHVH the God of Israel, and this is Metatron”