The Holy Kabbalah

by Arthur Edward Waite

This comprehensive and well-documented guide to the arcane Jewish tradition of mysticism was written by one of Britain's foremost writers on occult subjects. Enthusiastic in tone and grounded in scholarship, it presents and comments upon the mystic tradition's fundamental ideas. Author A. E. Waite's extensive and lucid history embraces the literature of the Kabbalah (including the Sepher Yezirah and Zohar and their central ideas), its foremost interpreters, its impact on Christian scholars, and its reputation as "the secret tradition." Waite's thought-provoking analysis includes a rejection of proposals by earlier occultists that many esoteric practices — alchemy, astrology, and Freemasonry, for instance — are founded on or are integral to Kabbalah. Introduction by Kenneth Rexroth.

Genres: Occult, Religion, Philosophy, Mysticism, Magic, Judaism, Nonfiction

672 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1929

About the author

Arthur Edward Waite was a scholarly mystic who wrote extensively on occult and esoteric matters, and was the co-creator of the Rider-Waite Tarot deck. As his biographer, R.A. Gilbert described him, "Waite's name has survived because he was the first to attempt a systematic study of the history of western occultism viewed as a spiritual tradition rather than as aspects of proto-science or as the pathology of religion."

Reviews

[JA · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another brilliant title by AE Waite. What we have here is an expose on Kabbalah, mainly the Zohar, stripped of all the metaphysical hocus-pocus and political posturing present in most Qabalah, both Hermetic and Hebrew. Interestingly, he applies almost an alchemical approach to the Kabbalah, removing the unnecessary and allowing the reader to gently extract the gold.

[Meredith · Rating 3 out of 5]

I use this more as a reference book. A.E. Waite uses turgid prose, so it's as much as I can do to get through the research.

[Hamze · Rating 1 out of 5]

Horrible book, it is mess, it was really exhausting and boring. I wanted to learn more a out the subject but the way this book is put together and scripted is not that good at all

[Jean-claude Klein · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good for Christian Kabbalah.