Is the »Wise Soul« Divine? Conceptions of the Soul in the Writings of R. Bahya ben Asher

R. Bahya ben Asher (13th-14th centuries) was an Iberian exegete and kabbalist whose compositions abound with highly disparate sources. This study undertakes to canvass the various outlooks of the human soul that are distilled in his oeuvre. Many of Bahya's hermeneutical interpretations emerged from a lively exchange with those of Nahmanides. However, the current study shows that he may have sought to withdraw from various aspects of Nahmanides' theory of the soul and instead leaned towards competing trends that prevailed at the time. Among the topics examined here are the soul's standing vis-à-vis the rational world of the angels, the prospects of its post mortem perpetuation, its relation to the Godhead, and how the soul returns to its upper source.