Kabbalah Recreata:
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/pome.v9i2.132Keywords:
Western esotericism, Kabbalah, Pagan studies, ceremonial magic, Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, Aleister CrowleyAbstract
In the early twentieth century, certain elements of the Kabbalah were transformed by being given new interpretations and uses in the context of what I term the “programmatic syncretism” of modern, fin de siècle occultism. In so doing I will focus specifically on one text by Aleister Crowley, which I consider the full-blown example of the phenomenon in question. The text demonstrates how the occultists' Kabbalah functions first and foremost as a classificatory tool and a mnemonic system, mainly for practical use in magical rituals. That use is part of a reinterpretation of the Kabbalah in the modern occult revival, mainly from Eliphas Levi through the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, culminating in the works of Aleister Crowley. It is my intention that this focus will not only shed light on a process of reinterpretation peculiar to fin de siècle occultism, but also on the processes characteristic of religious innovation in the modern age in general.References
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Coudert, Alison P. The Impact of Kabbalah in the 17th Century. Leiden: Brill, 1999.
???. ‘Seventeenth-Century Natural Philosophy and Esotericism at the Court of Sulzbach’. In Ésotérisme, gnoses et imaginaire symbolique: Mélanges offerts à Antoine Faivre, edited by Richard Caron et al., 27-46. Leuven: Peeters, 2001.
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???.’Liber O vel Manus et Segattiæ’. In Magick. Liber ABA, 613-26.
???. Magick. Liber ABA. Book Four. Parts I–IV. York Beach: Samuel Weiser, 1997.
???. ‘Notes for an Astral Atlas’. In Magick. Liber ABA, 499-512.
???. ‘One Star in Sight. A Glimpse of the Structure and System of the Great White Brotherhood A?A?’. In Magick. Liber ABA, 486-498.
???. ‘What is Qabalah?’. In 777 Revised vel Prolegomena Symbolica ad Systemam Sceptico-Mysticæ Viæ Expliciandæ, Fundamentum Hieroglyphicum Sanctissimorum Scientiæ Summæ. London: Neptune, 1955.
Fine, Lawrence. Physician of the Soul, Healer of the Cosmos: Isaac Luria and his Kabbalistic Fellowship. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003.
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???. Modernity and Self Identity. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1991.
Gilbert, Robert A. The Golden Dawn: Twilight of the Magicians. Wellingborough: The Aquarian Press, 1983.
???. The Golden Dawn Companion: A Guide to the History, Structure, and Workings of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. York Beach: Weiser Books, 1986.
???. Golden Dawn Scrapbook:The Rise and Fall of a Magical Order. York Beach: Weiser Books, 1998.
Godwin, Joscelyn. The Theosophical Enlightenment. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994.
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???. ‘Teachings of the Kabbalists: The Ten Sefirot’. In A Guide to the Zohar. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004.
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???. Transcendental Magic: Its Doctrine and Ritual. York Beach: Weiser Books, 2001.
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Mathers, S.L. MacGregor, trans. The Kabbalah Unveiled. Containing the Following Books of the Zohar. 1. The Book of Conceiled Mystery. 2. The Greater Holy Assembly. 3. The Lesser Holy Assembly. London, 1887.
McIntosh, Christopher. Eliphas Levi and the French Occult Revival. New York: Samuel Weiser, 1974.
Pasi, Marco. ‘The Neverendingly Told Story: Recent Biographies of Aleister Crowley’. Aries 3.2 (2003): 224-45. doi:10.1163/157005903767876928
Regardie, Israel, ed. The Original Account of the Teachings, Rites and Ceremonies of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. St. Paul: Llewellyn Publications, 1989.
Salecker, Kurt. Christian Knorr von Rosenroth (1636–1689). Leipzig: Meyer & Müller, 1931.
Scholem, Gershom. ‘Isaac Luria and his School’. In Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism. New York: Schocken, 1961.
???. Kabbalah. New York: Meridian, 1974.
Sutin, Lawrence. Do What thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley. New York: St Martin’s Press, 2000.
Vitale, Alfred. ‘“The Method of Science, The Aim of Religion”. A Systematic Model for the Academic Study of Modern Western Occultism’. http://www.aseweb .org/Papers/vitale.htm (accessed 27 November 2006).
Wasserstrom, Steven M. Religion after Religion: Gershom Scholem, Mircea Eliade, and Henry Corbin at Eranos. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999.
???. ‘Sefer Yesira and Early Islam: A Reappraisal’. Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy 3 (1993): 1-30.
Webb, James. The Flight from Reason. Volume 1 of The Age of the Irrational. London: Macdonald, 1971.
Westcott, William Wynn, trans. Aesch mezareph or Purifying Fire: A Chymico-Kabalistic Treatise Collected from the Kabala denudata of Knorr von Rosenroth. London, New York, 1894.
???, trans. Sepher Yetzirah: The Book of Formation. London: J.M. Watkins, 1911.
Bauman, Zygmunt. Liquid Modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2000. Booth, Martin. A Magick Life: The Life of Aleister Crowley. London: Coronet Books, 2000.
Coudert, Alison P. The Impact of Kabbalah in the 17th Century. Leiden: Brill, 1999.
???. ‘Seventeenth-Century Natural Philosophy and Esotericism at the Court of Sulzbach’. In Ésotérisme, gnoses et imaginaire symbolique: Mélanges offerts à Antoine Faivre, edited by Richard Caron et al., 27-46. Leuven: Peeters, 2001.
Crowley, Aleister. Liber 777 and Other Qabalistic Writings of Aleister Crowley, edited by Israel Regardie. York Beach: Samuel Weiser, 1977.
???.’Liber O vel Manus et Segattiæ’. In Magick. Liber ABA, 613-26.
???. Magick. Liber ABA. Book Four. Parts I–IV. York Beach: Samuel Weiser, 1997.
???. ‘Notes for an Astral Atlas’. In Magick. Liber ABA, 499-512.
???. ‘One Star in Sight. A Glimpse of the Structure and System of the Great White Brotherhood A?A?’. In Magick. Liber ABA, 486-498.
???. ‘What is Qabalah?’. In 777 Revised vel Prolegomena Symbolica ad Systemam Sceptico-Mysticæ Viæ Expliciandæ, Fundamentum Hieroglyphicum Sanctissimorum Scientiæ Summæ. London: Neptune, 1955.
Fine, Lawrence. Physician of the Soul, Healer of the Cosmos: Isaac Luria and his Kabbalistic Fellowship. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003.
Fraser, Robert. ‘Note on the Text’ to The Golden Bough: A New Abridgement, James George Frazer, xl-xliii. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994.
Giddens, Anthony. The Consequences of Modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1990.
???. Modernity and Self Identity. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1991.
Gilbert, Robert A. The Golden Dawn: Twilight of the Magicians. Wellingborough: The Aquarian Press, 1983.
???. The Golden Dawn Companion: A Guide to the History, Structure, and Workings of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. York Beach: Weiser Books, 1986.
???. Golden Dawn Scrapbook:The Rise and Fall of a Magical Order. York Beach: Weiser Books, 1998.
Godwin, Joscelyn. The Theosophical Enlightenment. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994.
Green, Arthur. ‘Introduction’ to The Zohar: Pritzker Edition, edited by Daniel C. Matt, I, xxxi-lxxxi. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004.
???. ‘Teachings of the Kabbalists: The Ten Sefirot’. In A Guide to the Zohar. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004.
Greer, Mary K. Women of the Golden Dawn. Rochester: Park Street Press, 1994.
Habermas, Jürgen. ‘Modernity—An Incomplete Project’. In Postmodernism: A Reader, edited by Thomas Docherty, 98-109. New York: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1993.
Hammer, Olav. Claiming Knowledge: Strategies of Epistemology from Theosophy to the New Age. Leiden: Brill, 2004.
Hanegraaff, Wouter. ‘The New Age Movement and the Esoteric Tradition’. In Gnosticism and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times, edited by Roelof van Den Broek and Wouter Hanegraaff, 359-82. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998.
Howe, Ellic. The Magicians of the Golden Dawn: A Documentary History of a Magical Order 1887–1923. York Beach: Samuel Weiser, 1978.
Huss, Boaz. ‘Ask no Question, Gershom Scholem and the Study of Contemporary Jewish Mysticism’. Modern Judaism 25 (2005): 141-58. doi:10.1093/mj/kji010
???. ‘“Authorized Guardians”: The Polemics of Academic Scholars of Jewish Mysticism against Kabbalah Practicioners’. In Western Esotericism and Polemics, edited by Olav Hammer and Kocku von Stuckrad. Leiden: Brill, forthcoming.
Kaczynski, Richard. Perdurabo: The Life of Aleister Crowley. Tempe, AZ: New Falcon Publications, 2002.
Kilcher, Andreas B. ‘Verhüllung und Enthüllung des Geheimnisses. Die Kabbalah Denudata im Okkultismus der Moderne’. Morgen-Glantz 16 (2006): 343-83.
Kippenberg, Hans. Discovering Religious History in the Modern Age. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002.
Klein, Eliahu. Kabbalah of Creation: The Mysticism of Isaac Luria, Founder of Modern Kabbalah. Berkeley: North Atlantic Books, 2005.
Knorr von Rosenroth, Christian. Kabbala denudata seu doctrina hebraeorum transendentalis et metaphysica atque theological. Sulzbach: Zunner, Johann David II, 1677–1684.
Kupperman, J.S. ed. ‘The Cipher Manuscript’. http://www.hermetic.com/gdlibrary/ cipher/index.html (accessed 11 November 2006).
Levi, Eliphas. Le livre des splendeurs. Paris: Chamuel, 1894.
???. Transcendental Magic: Its Doctrine and Ritual. York Beach: Weiser Books, 2001.
Lyotard, Jean-François. The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1979.
Mathers, S.L. MacGregor, trans. The Kabbalah Unveiled. Containing the Following Books of the Zohar. 1. The Book of Conceiled Mystery. 2. The Greater Holy Assembly. 3. The Lesser Holy Assembly. London, 1887.
McIntosh, Christopher. Eliphas Levi and the French Occult Revival. New York: Samuel Weiser, 1974.
Pasi, Marco. ‘The Neverendingly Told Story: Recent Biographies of Aleister Crowley’. Aries 3.2 (2003): 224-45. doi:10.1163/157005903767876928
Regardie, Israel, ed. The Original Account of the Teachings, Rites and Ceremonies of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. St. Paul: Llewellyn Publications, 1989.
Salecker, Kurt. Christian Knorr von Rosenroth (1636–1689). Leipzig: Meyer & Müller, 1931.
Scholem, Gershom. ‘Isaac Luria and his School’. In Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism. New York: Schocken, 1961.
???. Kabbalah. New York: Meridian, 1974.
Sutin, Lawrence. Do What thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley. New York: St Martin’s Press, 2000.
Vitale, Alfred. ‘“The Method of Science, The Aim of Religion”. A Systematic Model for the Academic Study of Modern Western Occultism’. http://www.aseweb .org/Papers/vitale.htm (accessed 27 November 2006).
Wasserstrom, Steven M. Religion after Religion: Gershom Scholem, Mircea Eliade, and Henry Corbin at Eranos. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999.
???. ‘Sefer Yesira and Early Islam: A Reappraisal’. Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy 3 (1993): 1-30.
Webb, James. The Flight from Reason. Volume 1 of The Age of the Irrational. London: Macdonald, 1971.
Westcott, William Wynn, trans. Aesch mezareph or Purifying Fire: A Chymico-Kabalistic Treatise Collected from the Kabala denudata of Knorr von Rosenroth. London, New York, 1894.
???, trans. Sepher Yetzirah: The Book of Formation. London: J.M. Watkins, 1911.
Published
2007-12-17
Issue
Section
Articles
How to Cite
Asprem, E. (2007). Kabbalah Recreata:. Pomegranate, 9(2), 132-153. https://doi.org/10.1558/pome.v9i2.132
