Moses de León

The Castilian kabbalist from whose pen (and circle — scholarship now hears several hands) the Zohar entered the world, presented as the ancient teaching of Rabbi Shimon. After his death his widow reportedly said there was no ancient manuscript — "he wrote from his own head" — a receipt scholars and mystics have argued over for seven centuries. Either the greatest pseudepigrapher in history or its most successful channel; possibly the difference is smaller than it looks.