The Temple of High Witchcraft: Ceremonies, Spheres and The Witches' Qabalah

Features

• Cover Type: Paperback with 576 pages
• Published by: Llewellyn Publications October 1, 2007
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 0738711659
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-0738711652
• Book Dimensions: 9 x 7.5 x 1.6 inches
• Weighs: 2.4 pounds

From Publishers Weekly
Like his other thorough guides for all things witchcraft, Penczak (The Mystic Foundation) offers fans another comprehensive, easy to use handbook for the aspiring witch, this time for advanced practitioners—what he calls continuing education for followers of his Temple of Witchcraft series. According to Penczak, high witchcraft is quite different from the household magick of the everyday witch. It is known as god magick, involving the use of ritual to align with the divine and seeking divine enlightenment while incarnated in a body. Penczak helpfully likens learning the ceremonies and rituals of high witchcraft to a regular routine of exercise, yet instead of the body, you are build[ing] your psychic and magical 'muscles.' And readers should get ready for a hefty workout. Following several introductory chapters, Penczak provides a highly technical course of 13 lessons designed to provide all the necessary tools and intellectual, academic and ceremonial background information readers need to deepen their connection to the divine and self-initiate into high witchcraft. Audiences looking for witchcraft history will certainly find it here, but this is foremost an engaging textbook designed for home-schooling the advancing witch, and it is encyclopedic in its rituals, charts and even homework assignments. (Oct.)
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Product Description
"This is foremost an engaging textbook designed for home schooling the advancing witch, and it is encyclopedic in its rituals, charts, and even homework assignments." —Publishers Weekly

THE CRAFT MEETS HIGH MAGICK
Take your spiritual evolution to the next level by mastering the essentials of ceremonial magick.  In this much-anticipated fourth volume in Christopher Penczak's award-winning series on witchcraft, he introduces the concepts of the Qabalah and the rituals of high magick, and explores the deeply interwoven relationship between these traditions and the Craft.

The teachings in this book correspond to the element of Air, guiding you into the realm of creative and critical thinking, communication, knowledge, and truth. Four preliminary chapters introduce the basic concepts, history, and skills you will need for your journey. Next, twelve formal lessons, in the witches' traditional year-and-a-day format, provide instruction in the basics of ceremonial magic:

·The Qabalah
·The Tree of Life
·Symbol and sigil magick
·Elemental constructs  
·Qabalistic Cross
·The four worlds and their correspondences
·Middle Pillar
·Pathworking
·The Ritual of the Rosy Cross
·Invoking and banishing rituals
·Fluid condensers
·Barbarous words of power, magickal constructs, and the Goetia

The book's thirteenth lesson culminates in a ritual initiation fusing the traditions of witchcraft and high magick—the creation of your own Reality Map. The cosmology you create will be based on your own spiritual experiences as well as the philosophies and practices of ceremonial magick.


Reader Reviews
This book is the fourth in a series on Witchcraft by Penczak. It follows a very similar layout to previous volumes. The first four chapters introductory reading, then thirteen lessons to be studied in a year and a day. The first lesson is basics, then one lesson for each sepherot (plus Da'ath), then ending with an initiation. The material on the Qabalah follows orthodox Golden Dawn teaching very closely. There us not much material on the 22 connecting paths nor on the Tarot. In fact it is remarkable how little information is conveyed in 500+ pages. Other writers cover much more in less space. But this is not necessarily a bad thing. For pagans unfamiliar with the Qabalah the conversational tone and lucid exposition is very helpful in learning what is, in my opinion, a dry and intellectual subject. All in all, I would say this book will be of interest mainly to those familiar with his three previous volumes. Ceremonial magicians will find it too elementary to be of much use. But for pagans who are curious about the Qabalah and how it could be incorporated it into their craft, it can be very useful.