Reddit reviews Sefer Yetzirah: The Book of Creation

I'm not sure about essential to every occult library (and I realize some of these aren't necessarily considered primarily 'occult' texts), but here are a few I've found useful:

• The Golden Dawn - Israel Regardie
  
• Morals and Dogma - Alfred Pike
  
• Modern Magick - Donald Michael Kraig
  
• The Secret Teachings of All Ages - Manly P. Hall
  
• Initiation into Hermetics - Franz Bardon
  
• Sefer Yetzirah - Aryeh Kaplan
  
• The Secret Doctrine - Madame Blavatsky
  
• Liber Null & Psychonaut - Peter J. Carroll
  
• The Book of Thoth - Aleister Crowley
  
• Undoing Yourself with Energized Meditation and Other Devices - Christopher S. Hyatt
  
• Prometheus Rising - Robert Anton Wilson
  
• Enochian Vision Magick - Lon Milo DuQuette
  
• The Chicken Qabalah - Lon Milo DuQuette
  
• Brain Magick - Philip Farber
  
• Info-Psychology - Timothy Leary
  
• Beelzebub's Tales to his Grandson - George Gurdjieff
  
• Initiation, Human and Solar - Alice Bailey
  
• The Red Book - Carl Jung
  
• Principia Discordia - Malaclypse the Younger

take some gold for being in a similar situation as myself at around the same time in life. in return, i hope you will look into purchasing one, a few, or all of these used/new books on amazon (or anywhere) for your contemplations.. you have my sacred word you will not regret it even if you just set them aside for a year or two. The knowledge gained from opening one's mind to these potential patterns of thought is incomparable to anything else I can think of as an addendum to the Holy Bible & other worldly religious books of faith.

1. Sefir Yetzirah (Book of Formation) - Aryeh Kaplan's version (a great explanatory edition)
   
   
2. The Hermetica - Timothy Freke & Peter Gandy compilation
   
   
3. The Gnostic Bible - Edited by Willis Barnstone & Marvin Meyer
   
   
4. Isis Unveiled - vol 1 and vol 2 - Madame Helena Blavatsky
   
   
5. The Magician's Companion: A Practical & Encyclopedic Guide to Magical & Religious Symbolism - Bill Whitcomb
   
   

Raziel is probably most famous for the book he gave to Adam. There are many versions of the story, including one where angels steal the book back from Adam out of jealousy. It supposedly passed through the hands of Enoch, Noah, and Solomon, inspiring the Book of Enoch, teaching Noah how to build the Ark, and granting Solomon great knowledge and power in magic respectively. Source

The origin of this story is pretty interesting: "The myth of the Book of Raziel grows out of a midrash attempting to explain the verse, This is the book of the generations of Adam (Gen. 5:1)." Source, also a good read

Raziel is mentioned in Targum Ecclesiastes 10:20 - "Do not speak evil of the king in thy conscience, nor in the secret of thy heart, nor in the most hidden place in thy house, curse not a wise man; for Raziel calls daily from heaven upon Mount Horeb, and his voice goes through the whole world; and Elijah, the great priest, goes, flying through the air like a winged eagle, and publishes the words which are spoken in secret by all the inhabitants of the earth." The Targumim are pretty old - they date back to the 1st to 7th centuries. This page offers an interesting theory about Raziel's early role in Jewish mysticism - not as the keeper of secrets but rather the revealer.

According to Maimonides (1135-1204) in his Mishneh Torah, Raziel is the chief of the order of Erelim, also the herald of God and preceptor of Adam.

Now, there is a 13th century medieval grimoire known as "Sefer Raziel HaMalakh". The true author is unknown, but it's commonly attributed to Eleazer of Worms or Isaac the Blind, medieval writers of the time. It draws heavily on Sefer Yetzirah and Sefer Ha-Razim, the former being the oldest and probably the most important Qabalistic text.

As for the Sefer Raziel itself, you can read it online here. Steve Savedow's translation is unfortunately not great, the amazon reviews sort of speak for themselves, but it's better than nothing. You may find something interesting there.

tl;dr Raziel is a very old and important angel, considering he derives from Genesis 5:1. If you are trying to connect to angels in a Qabalistic context, I'd highly recommend starting with the books they originated from, like Sefer Raziel and its predecessors. Hope this helps.

One of the oldest and most fundamental books for students of the Kabbalah is the Sepher Yetzirah. This text has literally been used for centuries by Jewish mystics, and it was one of the primary sources for the Kabbalistic elements of modern western occultists (e.g. the Golden Dawn and affiliated individuals like Crowley, Case, Waite, etc.). You can't go wrong with any of the books listed thus far -- Duquette, for example, is a great author -- but they are all second hand accounts of Kabbalistic sources like the Sepher Yetzirah.

One of the best modern versions of the Sepher Yetzirah is by Rabbi Kaplan. His book has received praise by both students of the occult and the Kabbalah. It has everything you are looking for (e.g. the cube of space is discussed in 5:2 on page 203) and more (e.g. gematria, the 231 gates, astrological associations, anatomical associations, planetary rulers and their seals, etc.). On top of that, you should be able to find a free PDF version online with a little Googling, but it's so comprehensive that it's worth having a physical copy.

Sefer Yetzirah is traditionally ascribed to Abraham by those who appreciate it, but they do not normally claim that Abraham wrote it as it now exists. The claim is that the traditions contained within (in perhaps a truncated form) originate with and were taught by Abraham. Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan even suggests that, while the fundamentals come from Abraham, that it cannot be the case that Abraham actually wrote the text down (after all, if it were, it would be part of the Hebrew Bible). Sefer Yetzirah isn't really like the Hebrew Bible. It's not stories, laws, or prophecies. It's more a few pages on mystical grammar.

If you do wish to read it and understand some of it, you ought to learn the Hebrew alphabet and familiarize yourself with the Torah. Then you'll have some foundation when you read Sefer Yetzirah: The Book of Creation by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan.

The Sepher Yetzirah

Agrippa's Three Books on Occult Philosophy

The Pistis Sophia

The Secret Doctrine

The Book of the Law

The Book of Abramelin

I've been reading this commentary on Sepher Yetzirah. It has some very fascinating and comparable interpretations of the Will. In brief, the author views the will as being the highest/deepest aspect of humanity. The book is also full of nifty techniques for getting close to this undifferentiated consciousness.

Edit: Shitty grammar. posted this late last night.

Thank you for getting the joke.

I would not really advise to solely look at Enochian Text for this, you might want to start looking at
A Dictionary of Angels for some good baseline info
and the Sepher Rezial Hemelach

Fifth World Books - 419 E. 2100 South, SLC, UT. Ph.(801)486-6437 Will often know where to point you as well. Rosenblum's World of Judaica on Devon St. In Chicago can direct you as well as get you some very hard to find reference books.

Hope those can give you some more diverse and accurate sources of information.

EDIT: Also of course the Sefer Yetzirah: The Book of Creation and The Magician's Companion

In no particular order, I'd recommend: The Early Kabbalah, The Kabbalistic Mirror of Genesis, Meditation and Kabbalah, Lessons in Tanya, 138 Openings of Wisdom, Anatomy of the Soul, Sefer Yetzirah, and A Tapestry for the Soul.