From the Introduction to Jewish Meditation

People are often surprised to hear the term "Jewish meditation." Otherwise knowledgeable Jews, including many rabbis and scholars, are not aware that such a thing exists. When shown texts that describe Jewish meditation, they respond that it belongs to esoteric or occult corners of Judaism and has little to do with mainstream Judaism.

It is therefore not surprising that many current books on meditation give scant attention to Judaism. Although most writers seem to be aware that mystical elements exist in Judaism, their discussion is usually restricted to the Kabbalah or the Chasidic masters. Most books on meditation emphasize Eastern practices, and in some instances Christian meditation, but Jewish meditation is for all practical purposes ignored.

For students of meditation, this is a serious oversight. Judaism produced one of the more important systems of meditation, and ignoring it is bound to make any study incomplete. Furthermore, since Judaism is an Eastern religion that migrated to the West, its meditative practices may well be those most relevant to Western man. Without a knowledge of Jewish meditative practices, an important link between East and West is lost. This omission is all the more significant in light of considerable evidence that the Jewish mystical masters had dialogue with the Sufi masters and were also aware of the schools of India. . . .

Because so little on Jewish meditation was ever published, many people argued that meditation was to be found only in the backwaters of Judaic literature--in works not even worthy of publication. Actually, many works dealing with Kabbalistic methods of meditation were not published be...