CABBALA, or KABBALAH, according to the Hebrew style, has a very distinct signification from that in which we understand it in our language. The word is an abstract, and means reception, a doctrine received by oral transmission. The rabbis who are called cabbalists study principally the combination of particular words, letters, and numbers, by which means they pretend to discover what is to come, and to see clearly into the sense of many difficult passages of Scripture. There are no sure principles of this knowledge, which in fact depends upon some particular traditions of the ancients; for which reason it is termed cabbala. The cabbalists have abundance of names which they call sacred, and not only make use of in invoking spirits, but imagine that they derive great light from them. They tell us that the secrets of the cabbala were discovered to Moses on Mount Sinai; and that these have been delivered down to them from father to son without interruption, and without any use of letters; for to write them down is what they are by no means permitted to do. This is likewise termed the oral law, as passing from father to son, in order to distinguish it from the written law. There is another cabbala, called artificial, which consists in searching for abstruse and mysterious significations of a word in Scripture, from which are borrowed certain explanations, by combining the letters which compose it. This cabbala is divided into three species, viz., the Gematria, the Notaricon, and the Temurah. The first, or Gematria, consists in taking the letters of a Hebrew word for ciphers or arithmetical numbers, and explaining every word by the arithmetical value of the letters of which it is composed; the second, called Notaricon, consists in taking every particular letter of a word for an entire diction; and the third, called Temurah, or change, consists in making different transpositions or changes of letters, placing one for the other, or one before the other. Among the Christians, likewise, a certain sort of magic is, by mistake, called cabbala, and consists in using improperly certain passages of Scripture for magical operations, or in forming magical characters or figures with stars and talismans. Some visionaries among the Jews believe that our Saviour wrought his miracles by virtue of the ridiculous mysteries of the cabbala.
Wolfsus has given an extended account of the cabbala, and of the numerous manuscripts and printed Jewish works in which its principles are contained, as well as abundant references to Christian authors who have treated of it. (Biblioth. Hebr. ii. 1191, sq.) See also Beer, Geschichte der Lehren aller Secten der Juden, und der Cabbala, Brünn, 1822, 2 vols. 8vo.