I got part way into Tucker's episode today and the guy mentioned Kabbalah. I had been curious about it, think I saw Charls Carrol mention it but never watched him long.
I figured it was some Jewish heresy like Christian gnosticism but GPT says its accepted in mainstream Orthodox Judaism but is only taught to like 10% of people? Is that right? It just sounds like the typical hidden knowledge type shit, but its very weird to hear that its accepted in mainline rabbinic Judaism. Anyone know about this?
I'm no expert, but based on my research, Kabbalah is a form of western esotericism that arose in Jewish circles in the middle ages. It makes mystical interpretations of the Hebrew Bible and invents additional stories and elements, as the Talmud already did, but Kabbalah takes it further into the realm of magic and heavily focuses on secret knowledge (similar to occultism and gnosticism) and mysticism.
I think since Judaism believes in an oral Torah and oral tradition beyond what is written down, Kabbalah was able to convince many Jews that it was part of that ancient tradition going back at least as far as king Solomon, who is often seen by Kabbalists as something of a sorcerer and discoverer of many aspects of Kabbalism. Renaissance magic was based on Kabbalism, and from what I can tell most forms of western esotericism since then appear to be heavily based on it, such as Theosophy and Freemasonry.
By the way, Tucker is well known for wearing the red Kabbalah bracelet. He's even mentioned as a notable example by Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_string_(Kabbalah)#Modern_trend