SEPHER YETZIRAH: THE BOOK OF FORMATION - WILLIAM W. WESTCOTT, 1950s - KABBALAH

Title: SEPHER YETZIRAH: THE BOOK OF FORMATION AND THE THIRTY TWO PATHS OF WISDOM

Author: WILLIAM W. WESTCOTT

Publisher: Occult Research Press

City: New York
Year: 1950s (First Edition of this imprint; ND provided)
Binding Style: Softcover
Pagination: 43
Illustrated: No

Book Details + Condition: First Edition Thus. Softcover booklet, Small octavo. Stapled in printed card covers. A reprint of the revised edition of Westcott's translation of the Kabbalistic treatise "Sepher Yetzirah". It was first published in 1887 and later reissued as the tenth volume of the "Collectanea Hermetica" series, edited by W. Wynn Westcott (1848 – 1925). The present edition was published by Occult Research Press, an early imprint of what would become Samuel Weiser Publishing. Wrappers lightly faded at spine, a little creasing to bottom corner, and overall a clean, tight very good copy. The Sepher Yetzirah is one of the most famous of the ancient Qabalistic texts. It was first put into writing around 200 AD. Westcott's Translation of the Sepher Yetzirah was a primary source for the rituals and Knowledge Lectures of the Golden Dawn. The Sepher Yetzirah is a formulation of the Creation through the Tree of the Sephiroth and twenty two Hebrew Hieroglyphs. Please see below for more information on Westcott.

William Wynn Westcott

William Wynn Westcott (1848-1925) was an English Rosicrucian and Theosophist best known as a founder of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, which was an offshoot of Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia. Dr. William Wynn Westcott, S.L. MacGregor Mathers, and William Robert Woodman formed the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn in 1881. The three men particularly wanted to expand their studies in Kabbalah, occultism, alchemy, and ceremonial magic. Westcott decoded old documents, Golden Dawn Cipher Manuscripts, which laid out five masonic initiations. MacGregor Mathers rewrote the rituals, and ultimately they decided upon ten levels of initiation corresponding to the ten sephiroth of the Kabbalah.

"They taught Qabalah, Alchemy, Astrology, Geomantic and Tarot Divination, Tattwa Vision and the Pentagram Ritual. Much of the background material for these teachings came from Dr. Westcott; his occult and metaphysical library was unrivaled in his day."