TheIdra (Jewish Babylonian Aramaic:אִדְרָא,romanized: iḏrā,lit. 'threshing floor'[1]), is aKabbalistic work included in printings of theZohar, and was probably written and appended to the main body of theZohar at a later date. Contemporary scholars believe theIdra dates to the third generation of Zoharic literature, which also produced the two anonymous orcollective works of theTikunei haZohar andRa'aya Mehemna "Faithful Shephard" as well as other Zoharic material. The main body of theZohar dates to the second generation of Zoharic material.
There are two texts in Zoharic literature called theIdra. The first is theIdra Rabba "greater Idra", and the second is theIdra Zuta "lesser Idra." These two texts are intimately connected.
Idra Rabba (אדרא רבא,Zohar 3:127b-145a):Shimon bar Yohai convenes with nine other scholars, and they gather in the sacred threshing field, where they thresh out secrets.[2] Each scholar expounds various configurations of thepartsufim (emanations of theGodhead), and three of them die in ecstasy while doing so. In one discussion, the subject of the woman with the furnishings gifted to her by the Creator, and of the man with the furnishings gifted to him by the same Creator, is brought up. It speaks about the physical union of male and female and how the two are analogous toYHWH, who createdAdam (humanity, both male and female) with their associated traits of "mercy" (raḥamim), a trait that is found with the male, and "judgment" (din), a trait that is found with the female.
Idra Zuta (אדרא זוטא,Zohar 3:287b-296d): Years later, at Shimon bar Yohai's deathbed, the seven still-living scholars come to his deathbed, along with the wholeheavenly host. He alone explains the configurations of the partsufim, so this work is more unified. Shimon bar Yohai wavers between this world and the next. He directed his students to celebrate his death that day as aYom Hillula (wedding),[3] as it wouldmessianically unite the immanent and transcendentohr "divine lights" of Creation. TheIdra Zuta is considered the deepest teachings of the Zohar.[4]
In the standard printed edition of theZohar, theIdra Rabba is printed in the section relating to theparasha ofNaso, and theIdra Zuta is printed inHaazinu.
16th centuryLurianic Kabbalah systemised the Zoharic partzufim in its recasting of the whole Kabbalistic scheme. On one occasion, as recorded byHayyim ben Joseph Vital,Isaac Luria convened his students in the traditional location of the Idra Rabba Assembly nearMeron, placing each one in the designated location of their formerincarnations as the students of bar Yohai. In so doing, he identified himself with bar Yohai.[5]
^Vital ShG, Haqdamah 38, pp. 132-133. "I once traveled with my master, may his memory be blessed, to the place where Rabbi Shimon bar Yohai's disciples assembled when they held the Idra Rabba [described in portion]Naso [in the Zohar]. There on the eastern side of the road, there is a cave (lit. "great rock") in which there are two large openings. In the opening on the northern end was the place where Rabbi Shimon bar Yohai, peace be upon him, sat on the occasion of the Idra."
