Kabbalah

"In brief, the Tree of Life is a compendium of science, psychology, philosophy, and theology." (Dion Fortune: The Mystical Qabalah)

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". Samuel Weiser, Inc. (1984). ISBN: 0-87728-596-9.

"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." (Eliphas Levi: The Doctrine and Ritual of High Magic)

• 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.