The Kabbalah Unveiled (Mathers)
S.L. MacGregor Mathers's 1887 translation of three central Zoharic treatises — the Idra Rabba (Greater Assembly), Idra Zuta (Lesser Assembly), and Siphra Dtzenioutha (Book of Concealment) — via Knorr von Rosenroth's 1684 Latin Kabbala Denudata. The first widely-circulated English access to Zoharic material.
Source context· Egyptian-Hebrew stream · Egypto-Chaldean cultural impulse
- Stream
- Egyptian-Hebrew
- Cultural impulse
- Egypto-Chaldean (3rd post-Atlantean cultural age)
- Composed
- c. 1887 CE
- Written down
- Greco-Latin (4th post-Atlantean cultural age) manuscript epoch
- 1Introduction (Kabbalah, Sephiroth, Tree of Life, Four Worlds) — Introduction — Kabbalah, Sephiroth, Tree of Life, Four Worlds
S. L. MacGregor Mathers's 1887 introductory essay — the foundation-text by which late-Victorian English-language readers received Lurianic Kabbalah. The ten sephiroth arranged on the Tree of Life; the four worlds (Atziluth, Briah, Yetzirah, Assiah); the partzufim; the doctrine of en-sof. The frame for the three Zoharic tractates that follow.
13,161 words - 2The Book of Concealed Mystery (Sifra di-Tzeniutha) — Sifra di-Tzeniutha — The Book of Concealed Mystery
The shortest and most concentrated of the Zoharic tracts — five chapters of dense aphoristic Kabbalah on the concealed mystery of the divine emanations. The text whose exposition occupies the entirety of the two Idrot (Greater and Lesser Assemblies).
22,919 words - 3The Greater Holy Assembly (Idra Rabba) — Idra Rabba — The Greater Holy Assembly
The longer of the two great companion-tracts. Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai and his nine companions gathered in a field to expound the secrets of the Sifra di-Tzeniutha; their detailed expositions of the Long Face (Arikh Anpin) and the Short Face (Zeir Anpin) — the great partzufim. Three of the nine companions die in ecstasy during the assembly.
47,875 words - 4The Lesser Holy Assembly (Idra Zuta) — Idra Zuta — The Lesser Holy Assembly
The closing tract — and the textual closing of the Zohar proper. The Lesser Assembly held at the time of Rabbi Shimon's death; the great master concludes the disclosure of the Sifra di-Tzeniutha and dies as his soul leaves his body with his last word still on his lips. The most exalted single passage in the Zoharic corpus.
31,351 words
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