Kabbalah = Witchcraft!

Kabbalah is Witchcraft!

Kabbalah = Witchcraft!

Kabbalah (Hebrew: קַבָּלָה) is the mystical aspect of Judaism. It refers to a set of cryptic teachings meant to define the inner meaning of both the Old Testament Bible and the Talmud, and to explain the significance of Jewish religious practices. Kabbalah literally means "receiving", and is sometimes transliterated as “Cabala“, “Kabbala“, “Kabala“, “Kabalah“, “Qabalah“, or other renderings. It is called “receiving” because the studying of the works without a teacher is considered useless. It is important to note that in all religious Jewish mysticism the catchphrase "those who know don't tell, and those who tell don't know" is one of its foundations.

The Zohar is generally considered the foremost Kabbalistic text. According to the Zohar, Torah (Moses’ books of the Bible) study is divided into four levels:

• Peshat, the simple meaning of the text;
• Remez, literally "hint[s]" - biblical allusion and allegory;
• Derash, i.e. midrash, Rabbinic scriptural exegesis; and
• Sod, which is the kabbalah, the secret inner meaning of the Torah. Kabbalah is considered, by its followers, as a necessary part of the study of the Torah - the study of Torah being an inherent duty of all Jews. Though many, if not most, elements of kabbalah were created by King Solomon, this final level of Torah study was created by Rabbi Akiba ben Joseph. Under him, the casual title of “Rabbi” (“master/teacher”) was to become an office whose holders could sentence people to death. Indeed, not only were the priests and prophets to be replaced by the Rabbis, but the supremacy of the Torah as well. Akiba would make the requirement that a true Rabbi must be able to reverse the meaning of a scripture and use it to justify any action. He invented the lie of a secret “oral Torah“(supposedly handed down from Moses) to supplement the written one. Kabbalah teaches doctrines that are accepted by some Jews as the true meaning of Judaism while most other Jews have rejected these doctrines as heretical to Judaism.

The origins of the term “kabbalah” are unknown and believed to belong to either Solomon ibn Gabirol (1021 - 1058) or to the 13th century A. D. Spanish kabbalist Bahya ben Asher. While other terms have been used in many religious documents from the 2nd century A. D. up to the present day, the term “kabbalah” has become the main indicative of Jewish esoteric knowledge and practices. Main kabbalistic literature which served as the basis for most of the development of kabbalistic thought divides between early works such as Bahir and Heichalot (1st Century A. D. ?) and later works dated to the 13th century A. D., of which the main book is the Zohar representing the main source for the meditative kabbalah ("Kabbalah Iyunit").

To fully understand kabbalah and to be able to practice kabbalistic magic the first requirement is to recognize the astral framework within which the kabbalist operates. The basic tenet of kabbalah is that there is but one God. There is no pantheon of gods and goddesses - there is just one God. Any apparent evidence to the contrary is because we are not able to clearly see the intrinsic harmony exhibited in all of creation (Gaea, goddess of the Earth, has no real existence. She is only a manifestation of the nurturing aspects of the One God).

God existed before the physical universe was created. He had no need to create the universe. Creation was an act of giving on the part of God. Within the created universe humanity has a special place and a special purpose. According to kabbalah mankind is the only species that has free will. The result of humanity's uniqueness is that it has responsibilities that other creatures - both physical and spiritual - do not have.

There are realms that are not ordinarily perceptible to mankind. These are the spiritual realms. These realms are inhabited by beings commonly known as angels, archangels, demons, and other spirits. There is a close, but usually unrecognized relationship, between these spirits and man. To the kabbalist, from a physical standpoint God is unknowable. God is so different from the physical reality that surrounds us that any direct contact would destroy us. But God wants us to experience Him. The reason God created the physical universe and mankind was so that we would have the opportunity to draw closer to Him. God's influence constantly flows in and around us, but for the most part we ignore it. The influence is there - we just have to look for it.

The kabbalist believes that the way God provides His influence is through the sephiroth of the “Tree of Life”. The sephiroth act as attenuators between the reality of God and that of our physical existence. If the sephiroth did not exist then physical universe would not exist - it would be absorbed into God and thus be an intrinsic part of God [though kabbalists say they cannot conceive of God as being composed of "parts" (like the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit?)]. The sephiroth provide us with a tree stretching down from the infinity of God to the finite restriction of the physical universe. If we face away from the illusory attractions of our physical world we will see this Tree, this pathway, stretching away from us into infinity.

According to kabbalah, God created the sephiroth for two reasons:

• to protect us from the overwhelming power of His glory; and
• to provide us with a way of returning to Him (the ultimate goal of mankind's existence. Each of the sephiroth have specific functions in this two-fold process. They act in similar ways to the roundabouts, one-way streets and traffic lights used in road traffic control. Each of the sephiroth has a specific name that is also descriptive of its function.

Though the basic traditional structure remains the same, diagrammatical representations of the sephiroth are as varied as the many mystic/occult movements that have adopted it! The highest sephiroth is "nearest" to God. The lowest is "nearest" to the physical and the most "distant" from God. In the spiritual realm they are considering, "nearness" actually equates with similarity and "distance" with dissimilarity. The progression up the Tree, along the path of the sephiroth, is one of becoming more like God. Today, almost every Western mystical/occult belief system incorporates some form of the “Tree of Life”!

God created mankind in His image. We were formed to be similar to God. This similarity extended to us, like God, being invested with free-will. God is omnipotent and thus has ultimate freedom of will and expression. At the lower level of our physical existence we have the freedom to choose whether we attach ourselves to the physical world or realize our spiritual inheritance. The story of Adam and Eve's fall and expulsion from the garden of Eden describes the process by which mankind chose the physical realm. But the path is still there - the sephiroth still exist. We can still choose to pursue the spiritual path by using the tools we have been given. We can also choose to imitate the fallen angels!

Unfortunately, the kabbalists ignore the very laws they claim to study. The Torah forbids the use of sorcery or witchcraft. The use of magic is condemned throughout the Old Testament. Kabbalistic practices have been adopted by Western magick because they work. Spirits are summoned and dismissed using the holy names of God! Ancient practices of marginal value are now replaced with those of kabbalah.

Magic angers God because it uses the immutable laws He established to do Satan’s will. We use it to glorify ourselves when we use it for good. We use it to empower ourselves when we use it for evil. God is left out of the equation! Being righteous and just, God refuses to break His own laws. He must feel like the honest District Attorney who must watch the guilty go free because of a loophole they discovered in the law. But judgment day comes for every soul. Having left the physical realm, we must all answer for our transgressions during this life. If we have violated God’s law by intruding upon the spiritual realm in matters beyond our maturity, we shall be punished like the adolescent child who willfully broke open the gun cabinet and used a gun to rob a convenience store - only a lot more severely!

Very few kabbalists deny that kabbalah is magical in nature. It is here that this author warns all who use it to beware. Its enormous power is indeed a great temptation to all those intelligent enough to comprehend it and fortunate enough to have an able teacher. But it is only one more of the many temptations that are set before us in our life-times to test us. Compared to basking in the shekinah glory of God we experience because of the blood spilled by Yah Shua HaMashiach (Jesus Christ) through the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit); and the power that shall be granted to those of us who successfully resist this life’s temptations, kabbalah is indeed child’s-play. It is far wiser to resist kabbalah’s temptation now than to suffer the consequences later.