Cabala

The Cabala (1): Introduction

Cabala (sometimes spelt Kabbalah or Qabbala), meaning ‘the received wisdom’, is basically comprised of the secret teachings of the prophet Moses, who was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians (Acts 7: 22), with additions from other prophets and masters down the ages, both before and since Moses. It is said to have been taught first by God to a school of angels before the fall of man. After the fall God sent the archangel Raziel to teach it to Adam and Eve, so that mankind might find redemption. Successive great souls were further instructed, with new revelations from other archangels at the start of new epochs of human evolution. It is designed to lead people to enlightenment through the progressive discovery (or uncovering) of the truth, and employs many cryptic methods such as numerological cipher and word substitution as well as allegory and symbolism, prayer and meditation—and, above all, acts of charity.

Since the mind is illumined by and reflects the wisdom of the heart, as the moon reflects the light of the sun, so the knowledge which the mind acquires in this way is the cabala or received wisdom. Mind (or intelligence), receptivity and reflection are all associated with what is known cabalistically as the ‘left-hand side’ of the ‘Tree of Life’. The left-hand side is known as the dark side, associated with night and the moon, and hence with all things mysterious or secret.

In the broader sense, cabala constitutes that which we know, or may know, of the divine wisdom. The nature of wisdom is light, and so when we receive this wisdom into our hearts and minds, both ensouling it in our understanding and embodying it in our actions, we become illumined by it. That which carries this wisdom to us, and that in us which allows us to receive this wisdom, is love. For this reason another name for a cabalist is philosopher, a ‘lover of wisdom’. The fully realised state of this love is the highly illumined state, which is ecstatic.

The name Cabala has a Hebraic origin. The wisdom received, gathered, tested and passed on as a wisdom tradition or knowledge (science) is not unique to the Hebrews, but historically a certain special presentation of the wisdom tradition which originated in both Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia simultaneously, was passed on via the prophet Moses (with his own additions) to the ‘elect’ of the Tribes of Israel. This was carefully preserved and added to over the centuries, and was an essential feature of the teachings of Jesus Christ, although taught in depth only to his pupil-disciples and not to the general public, as per normal in cabalistic tradition. Also incorporated at that time by Jesus was the cabala of the Greeks, passed on via the Orphic Mystery schools, whose origins were, as for the Israelites and later Jews, linked with the Ancient Egyptians as well as with the Celtic Druids and Indo-Aryans.

For a few centuries major aspects of this Cabala appeared to be all but lost to the Christian Church, but this did not prevent the Jews from developing it further, bringing it to a high point in Spain before their tragic expulsion in 1492. The positive side to this is that the Jewish Cabala was spread wider afield, in particular to Italy where Pico della Mirandola re-interpreted it in a Christian way, thereby establishing Renaissance Christian Cabala. This he did within the Medici circle in Florence that had been founded by Marsilio Ficino, the ‘Second Plato’. The result was that four streams of wisdom tradition that had separated from their initial unity were brought together again—the Neoplatonic (Orphic), Hermetic, Christian and Cabalistic.

During the Renaissance this Neoplatonic-Hermetic-Christian Cabala was passed on orally in esoteric schools and societies throughout Europe, but also with written works and illustrations increasingly being published. The Renaissance came to its head in Elizabethan England at the time of Francis Bacon, and he, as a great master of the Cabala, used it to design and launch his Great Instauration as well as to teach others. More than this, he set out to cleanse the human mind of erroneous thoughts and superstitions, and to build anew, in a safer and more compassionate way, the world of thought and action. Like all the great masters of the Cabala he was a great ethical teacher and a practitioner of what he taught, having tried and tested it first. He promoted (and his method still promotes) the discovery and realisation of truth in all the manifest (and therefore knowable) worlds—spiritual, celestial and natural—so as to discover the nature of God, man and nature. He was concerned not only with mankind’s physical welfare, but also with humanity’s moral and psychological progress and spiritual nature. He knew the supreme cabalistic secret, that God is love, and that this truth is revealed in the actions of love, which is charity. His doctrine and method embraces all this. He referred to himself as the herald of the new age, and was likened to Elias (Elijah), the great prophet and master of the Cabala who represented for Israel not only the type of the eternal Master of masters but also the type of prophetic activity that precedes and prepares humanity for the ‘coming of the Lord’.

The consciousness or sphere of Cabala, which is knowledge of the divine, is reached via four methods of interpretation. Cabalistically they are represented by the initials of the four words used to describe the four methods, which initials form the Hebrew word PRDS, meaning ‘Paradise’. The first method is Peshat, the ‘simple’ or literal interpretation of the scriptures. The second is Remez, ‘allusion’ to the hidden meanings. The third is Derash, the ‘homiletic exposition’ of doctrinal truths. The fourth and final method is that of Sod, the ‘mystery’, which is ‘revelation’ or initiation into the divine wisdom. No method can be missed out, and when one has successively completed them all then one is in Paradise!

The fourth method consists essentially of the spiritual interpretation and application of the first chapter of Genesis (i.e. the Maaseh Bereshith or ‘Work of the Beginning’, which Bacon refers to as the Six Days’ Work), and of the first chapter of Ezekiel’s prophecies, concerning the vision of the divine throne as a celestial chariot (i.e. the Maaseh Merkabah or ‘Work of the Chariot’). The former is incorporated into Bacon’s design of the Great Instauration, and the latter into the building of his temple (i.e. chariot) of knowledge or light, which reaches from earth to heaven.

The Francis Bacon Research Trust