of Ramak's works are still in form of manuscripts, whereas his existing writings suggest many other compositions which he either intended to write or had actually written - but were lost. Disciples Around 1550, the Ramak founded a Kabbalah academy in Safed (then in Ottoman Syria), which he led for twenty or so years, until his death. According to Jewish legend, it was reported that the prophet Elijah revealed himself to him. Among his disciples were many of the luminaries of Safed, including Rabbi Eliyahu de Vidas, author of Reshit Chochmah ("Beginning of Wisdom"), and Rabbi Chaim Vital, who later became the official recorder and disseminator of the teachings of Rabbi Isaac Luria. Ramak was survived by a wife whose name remains unknown (it is known that she was Solomon Alkabetz' sister) and by a son named Gedaliah (1562–1625). Gedaliah was the impetus behind the publication of some of Ramak's books in Venice, Italy c. 1584–7. Gedaliah was buried in Jerusalem, where he had spent most of his adult life after returning from Venice. Succession of Kabbalistic interpretation after the Ramak According to tradition, Isaac Luria (known by the acronym "Ari" or "Arizal") arrived in Safed on the exact day of the funeral of Moshe Cordovero in 1570. When he joined in the funeral procession, he realised that only he saw a pillar of fire following the Ramak's presence. The Zohar describes this spiritual revelation as a sign to the individual who sees it, that he is meant to inherit the succession of leadership from the departed person. However, as Luria had been instructed to find his chosen disciple in Safed, Haim Vital, to reveal his new teachings to, he avoided accepting Kabbalistic leadership until six months later, when Rabbi Haim Vital approached him. The Ari only lived for two years after this, until 1572, but in those few months he revolutionised the conceptual system of Kabbalah, with his new doctrines and philosophical system. The two schools of Cordoveran and Lurianic Kabbalah give two alternative accounts and synthesis of the complete theology of Kabbalah until then, based on their interpretation of the Zohar. After the public dissemination of the Zohar in Medieval times, various attempts were made to give a complete intellectual system of theology to its different schools and interpretations. Influenced by the earlier rational success of Jewish philosophy, especially the work of Maimonides, in producing a systematic intellectual