The Sôd Hypothesis: Phenomenological, Semiotic, Cognitive, and Noetic-Literary Recovery of the Pentateuch's Embedded Inner-Core Mystical Initiation Tradition of Ancient Israelite Cultic Religion
“Kohav's book is a highly original and widely erudite derivation of a  numinous-mystical core, based on inferred early initiation and esoteric  practices, as the experiential and esoteric source of the early Judaism  of the Pentateuch. [Applying] his extensive knowledge of   critical-interpretive methodologies, Kohav…demonstrate[s] the  plausibility of this numinous-mystical core in early Judaism, where it  has been generally assumed to be absent.”-Harry T. Hunt, Brock University, author of ‘On the Nature of Consciousness’ (Yale, 1995) and ‘Lives in Spirit’ (SUNY, 2003)“Th[e] central question to be solved by the ‘Sôd hypothesis’ is of great  intellectual interest....[Kohav] demonstrate[s] the validity of his  hypothesis in an objective way....[H]e explains WHY the ‘literal’  interpretation of the problematic key passages fails, and HOW…this  shifts the reader’s interpretation strategy from a literal context to  the search for another less literal one, given that we search for  meaning when reading.”-Anna St. Leger Lucas [Whiteside], McMaster University, co-editor of ‘On Referring in Literature’ (Indiana University, 1987)“I am unaware of scholars who actually deal with the question of  esoteric knowledge and secret interpretations of biblical texts during  Iron Age II, ca. 920-586 BCE….Biblicists of my ken assume that even  though not everybody knew everything, knowledge was open.…Kohav is aware  that scholars are unaware that a problem exists, that something  interesting exists in the [Pentateuchal] text that has not yet been  queried.…Everything…has been filtered and fined through his  sophisticated approach. Kohav reads, synthesizes, and develops  complicated arguments logically to a conclusion, drawing together data  and ideas from disparate sources and disciplines….In the end, Kohav owns  all of his arguments.”-Ziony Zevit, American Jewish University, author of ‘The Religions of Ancient Israel’ (Continuum, 2001)