What it is
Kabbalah, "that which is received", is the main tradition of Jewish mysticism. It emerged in Provence and Spain in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, drawing on much older sources. It teaches that the hidden God, the Ein Sof or Infinite, is revealed through ten emanations called the sefirot, whose inner life is reflected in the Torah, in the commandments, and in the human soul.
From the late fifteenth century Christian scholars adapted Kabbalah to their own theology, and in the nineteenth century the occult revival adapted it again. The three streams share diagrams and vocabulary and differ in almost everything else. A common convention, which we follow in the shelf list, spells them Kabbalah for the Jewish tradition, Cabala for the Christian, and Qabalah for the Hermetic.
Where to begin
Read Gershom Scholem's Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism before any primary text. Then read the Sefer Yetzirah, which is a few pages long, and a good selection from the Zohar.
Before the Kabbalah
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The Hekhalot literature Hebrew and Aramaic. Late antiquity to the early Middle Ages. E 3
The "palaces" texts describe the ascent of the visionary through seven heavenly halls to the divine throne-chariot, the merkavah, with the names and seals needed to pass the angelic gatekeepers.
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Sefer Yetzirah The Book of Formation. Hebrew. Date disputed, probably between the second and sixth centuries CE. D 3
God creates the world through thirty-two paths of wisdom: ten sefirot and the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Short enough to read in an hour and dense enough to occupy a lifetime. The first English translation appeared in 1877.
The classical Kabbalah
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Sefer ha-Bahir The Book of Brightness. Hebrew. Appeared in Provence in the later twelfth century. D 3
A short, fragmentary, deliberately enigmatic collection of sayings, and the first work to present the sefirot as divine powers arranged as a cosmic tree.
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The writings of Abraham Abulafia Hebrew. Later thirteenth century. D 3
The "prophetic" Kabbalah: methods of meditation on the letters of the divine names, with breathing and movements of the head, aimed at ecstatic experience.
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Gates of Light (Sha'are Orah) Joseph Gikatilla. Hebrew. About 1290. D 3
A systematic guide to the ten sefirot through the divine names associated with each, working upward from the lowest. Its Latin translation of 1516 was the chief source of Christian knowledge of the sefirot.
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The Zohar The Book of Splendor. Aramaic. Castile, about 1280 to 1300. D 3
The central text of Kabbalah: a vast mystical commentary on the Torah, framed as the conversations of the second-century sage Shimon bar Yochai and his companions as they wander Galilee. Scholars attribute its composition chiefly to Moses de Leon and his circle. It was first printed at Mantua and Cremona in 1558 to 1560.
Safed
After the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492, the town of Safed in Galilee became the center of Kabbalistic study.
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Pardes Rimonim The Orchard of Pomegranates. Moses Cordovero. Hebrew. Completed 1548. D 3
A great summary and systematization of the Kabbalah of the Zohar.
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Etz Hayyim The Tree of Life. Hayyim Vital, recording the teaching of Isaac Luria (1534 to 1572). Hebrew. D 3
Sets out Luria's teaching: the divine contraction that made room for the world, the breaking of the vessels, and the human task of repair. Lurianic Kabbalah dominated Jewish mysticism from then on, and in the eighteenth century the Hasidic movement turned its ideas into a popular piety. Hasidic teaching and tales are shelved at the East Gate.
Christian Cabala
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Nine Hundred Theses Giovanni Pico della Mirandola. Latin. 1486. D 3
Includes the first Christian theses drawn from Kabbalah, among them the notorious claim that no science gives greater certainty of the divinity of Christ than magic and Cabala.
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On the Art of the Kabbalah (De arte cabalistica) Johannes Reuchlin. Latin. 1517. D 3
A dialogue among a Jew, a Muslim, and a Pythagorean, and the first full exposition of Kabbalah by a Christian scholar of Hebrew.
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Kabbala Denudata Christian Knorr von Rosenroth. Latin. 1677 to 1684. D 3
"The Kabbalah Unveiled": Latin translations of parts of the Zohar and of Lurianic treatises. Until the twentieth century it was the main gateway to Kabbalah for readers without Hebrew. S. L. MacGregor Mathers put three of its Zoharic texts into English in 1887.
Hermetic Qabalah
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The Mystical Qabalah Dion Fortune. 1935. D 3
The standard exposition of the Tree of Life as it is used in the Western magical tradition: a filing system for symbols, gods, planets, and tarot cards. Lucid, and far removed from its Jewish sources.
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777 Aleister Crowley. 1909. D 3
Tables of correspondences arranged on the thirty-two paths of the Tree. A reference tool, not a book to read through.
Landmark studies
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La Kabbale Adolphe Franck. French. 1843. D 3
The first modern scholarly study of the subject.
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Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism Gershom Scholem. 1941. T 3
The founding work of the modern academic study of Kabbalah. See Reference and Bibliography.
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On the Kabbalah and Its Symbolism Gershom Scholem. German, 1960. English, 1965. D 3
Essays on the Torah, myth, ritual, and the golem. The most approachable of Scholem's books.
Things to watch for
- Which stream? A book on "the Kabbalah" may describe a Jewish religious tradition, a Christian theology, or a system of magical correspondences. The spelling on the cover is a clue and not a guarantee.
- The age of the Zohar. The Zohar presents itself as a work of the second century. Scholarly opinion dates it to the late thirteenth.
- Selections. For most of the twentieth century English readers had only parts of the Zohar. Check how much of the text a translation contains.
- The Tree. The familiar diagram of ten circles and twenty-two paths has several historical forms. The version used in occult books follows a seventeenth-century Christian source.
- Context. Traditional Kabbalah assumes a reader steeped in the Hebrew Bible, the Talmud, and Jewish observance. A translation cannot supply that, and a good introduction will say so.
On the shelves
Kabbalah in all three streams is shelved at the North Gate in class D 3. Earlier Jewish mystical literature and Hasidic texts are at the East Gate in class E 3. Related guides: Mystical Classics and Grimoires and Ceremonial Magic.