ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that in order to understand the need for a rational-mystical “hermeneutic balance” one should digress briefly to focus on the pertinent knowledge coming out of research on inter-hemispheric brain activity. It discusses the possibility of a hermeneutic dialogue via interhemispheric balancing and then return to show how the Midrashic system offers a narrative or hermeneutic model that allows people to choose between Cabalic-mystic and rational philosophic interpretations of text and reality. The criteria for setting and resettling polar and opposite dyads according to changing norms and circumstances derive from various cultural hermeneutic coding systems. One can best understand the functionality or dysfunctionality of rational-emotional hermeneutic balancing by studying the possibilities for under standing and altering deviant conduct. Mystic “spark-lifting” rituals are not to replace the Talmudic rationalism but are to be employed simultaneously as hermeneutic codes for understanding and experiencing reality.
