# Kabbalah

Kabbalah or Qabalah (Hebrew: קַבָּלָה) is an esoteric method, discipline and school of thought in Jewish mysticism. It forms the foundation of mystical religious interpretations within Judaism.

## Quotes

* The curious symbol-system known to us as the Tree of Life is an attempt to reduce to diagrammatic form every force and factor in the manifested universe and the soul of man; to correlate them one to another and reveal them spread out as on a map so that the relative positions of each unit can be seen and the relations between them traced. In brief, the Tree of Life is a compendium of science, psychology, philosophy, and theology.
** Dion Fortune: The Mystical Qabalah, ch. 3: "The Method of the Qabalah", p. 13. Samuel Weiser, Inc. (1984). ISBN 0-87728-596-9.
* In the literature, there is considerable discussion regarding the term Kabbalah (קַבָּלָה‎). Most authorities state that it comes from the root Kabal (קבל‎) , meaning "to receive." Abulafia takes this a step further, maintaining that a mystic is called a Kabbalist because he has received (Kibel, קִבֵּל‎) the tradition from either the prophets or those who received from them.
** Aryeh Kaplan: Meditation and Kabbalah, ch. 3, "Rabbi Abraham Abulafia", p. 76. Weiser Books (1982). ISBN 0-87728-616-7.
* We are seized with admiration when we penetrate the sanctuary of the Cabala, by the sight of a doctrine so logical, so simple, and at the same time so absolute. The necessary union of ideas and of signs; the consecration of the most fundamental realities with primitive characters, the trinity of words, of letters and of numbers; a philosophy as simple as the alphabet, profound and infinite as the Verb; theorems more complete and illuminating than those of Pythagoras; a theology which we summarize by counting on our fingers; an infinity that could be held in the hollow of a child's hand; ten numbers and twenty-two letters, a triangle, a square, and a circle: those are the whole of the elements of the Cabala.
** Eliphas Levi: The Doctrine and Ritual of High Magic, "Introduction to the Doctrine of High Magic", p. 21. TarcherPerigee (2017). ISBN 0-14-311103-5.
* The word "Qabalah" is derived from a Hebrew root קבל (QBL) meaning "to receive". The legend is that this philosophy is a knowledge of things first taught by the Demiurgos to a select company of spiritual intelligences of a lofty rank who, after the Fall, communicated its divine injunctions to Mankind—who, in reality, were themselves in incarnation. It is also denominated the Chokmah Nistorah, "The Secret Wisdom", so-called because it has been orally transmitted from Adept to Pupil in the Secret Sanctuaries of Initiation.
** Israel Regardie: A Garden of Pomegranates (Second Edition), ch. 1, "Historical Survey", p. 17. Llewellyn Publications (1987). ISBN 0-87542-690-5.
* The process which the Kabbalists described as the emanation of divine energy and divine light was also characterized as the unfolding of the divine language. … They speak of attributes and of spheres of light; but in the same context they speak also of divine names and the letters of which they are composed. … The elements of the divine language appear as the letters of the Holy Scriptures. Letters and names are not only conventional means of communication. They are far more. Each one of them represents a concentration of energy and expresses a wealth of meaning which cannot be translated, or not fully at least, into human language.
** Gershom Scholem: On the Kabbalah and Its Symbolism, ch. 2, "The Meaning of the Torah in Jewish Mysticism", pp. 35–36. Translated by Ralph Manheim. Schocken Books (1969). ISBN 0-8052-0235-8.

## See also

* Tree of life (Kabbalah)