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A Garden of Pomegranates: Skrying on the Tree of Life
Long considered the best single introduction to the Qabalah for magicians, the third edition of Israel Regardie's A Garden of Pomegranates is now better than ever, thanks to the extensive annotations and new material by Chic Cicero and Sandra Tabatha Cicero. Their work has made A Garden of Pomegranates easier to understand, more complete, and up to date. It now includes over 300 pages of never-before-published information from two Senior Adepts of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. The Qabalah is the ancient system of Hebrew mysticism that is the foundation of Western magical and esoteric studies. Its primary symbol is the Tree of Life, a diagram that can aid in the study of the nature of the Universe, the essence of God, and the human mind, spirit, and soul. A Garden of Pomegranates is the clearest introductory guide on this subject. When Israel Regardie wrote A Garden of Pomegranates in 1932, he designed it to be a simple yet comprehensive guidebook outlining the complex system of the Qabalah and providing a key to its symbolism. Since then, it has achieved the status of a classic among texts on the Qabalah. The full annotations, critical commentary, and explanatory notes now make this book the ultimate single resource on the subject. The new material, including pathworkings, exercises, daily affirmations, rituals, meditations, and more, not only complement the original, full text included in this edition, but also make A Garden of Pomegranates indispensable for modern magicians.
552 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1932
178 people are currently reading
1350 people want to read
About the author
Israel Regardie
151 books305 followersIsrael Regardie (born Francis Israel Regudy) was considered by many to be the last living Adept of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. At an early age, Regardie worked as Aleister Crowley's personal secretary. In addition to his extensive writings, Regardie practiced as a chiropractor and as a neo-Reichian therapist. He taught psychiatry at the Los Angeles College of Chiropractic and contributed articles to many psychology magazines.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 35 reviews
March 27, 2012
At the time it was written, I imagine that this was a fairly useful read. As the years have passed and the subject of Kabbalah and the Western mysteries have come once again into the fore, I would not recommend this book for a new reader to the subject. Regardie gives a simple enough introduction to the subject throughout, but there are much better compilations currently on shelves, from our time and from his.
If you are looking into Regardie's works because of an affiliation to the Golden Dawn, or because you've heard his name in Esoteric Circles, I would rather refer you to his other writings which I find much more illuminating and original. Particularly: Tree of Life; Roll away the Stone; Eye in the Triangle as well as his many compilations of Aliester Crowley's writings and of course his master work: The Golden Dawn, which isn't original by any stretch but is intensely unique in what it can offer the seeker.
As for a more illuminating work on the kabbalah, I would recommend Dion Fortune's "Mystical Qabbalah" as well as Lon Duquette's "Chicken Qabbalah," which have helped many friends of mine get their feet wet into this inviting, but difficult subject.
If you're into a bit of a heavier read, then I cannot recommend highly enough Gershom Scholem's two introductions to the subject, "Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism" as well as his "Kabbalah;" both of which are translated in a highly accessible manner, and though they are written primarily as historical research into the subject, through the course of their pages they give a far more complete view of the kabbalistic system than any of the authors coming out of the esoteric channels.
If you are looking into Regardie's works because of an affiliation to the Golden Dawn, or because you've heard his name in Esoteric Circles, I would rather refer you to his other writings which I find much more illuminating and original. Particularly: Tree of Life; Roll away the Stone; Eye in the Triangle as well as his many compilations of Aliester Crowley's writings and of course his master work: The Golden Dawn, which isn't original by any stretch but is intensely unique in what it can offer the seeker.
As for a more illuminating work on the kabbalah, I would recommend Dion Fortune's "Mystical Qabbalah" as well as Lon Duquette's "Chicken Qabbalah," which have helped many friends of mine get their feet wet into this inviting, but difficult subject.
If you're into a bit of a heavier read, then I cannot recommend highly enough Gershom Scholem's two introductions to the subject, "Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism" as well as his "Kabbalah;" both of which are translated in a highly accessible manner, and though they are written primarily as historical research into the subject, through the course of their pages they give a far more complete view of the kabbalistic system than any of the authors coming out of the esoteric channels.
July 14, 2008
The only way I was able to memorize the sepiroth and get a hand-hold onto Kabbalah was by reading the original versionof this book. (the one written by Israel Regardie) I later bought this version, which CONTAINS the orgiginal and then has a few hundred pages of various discussion afterward. All the 'extras' are garbage, for the most part. Yet still, this is the only book which contains I.R's Garden and as I said, it was the only book (after having read over 50 on the subject) which allowed me to understand and retain information pertaining to each sephirah on the tree.
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May 7, 2020In an early edition of this book Regardie argues strongly against trying to fit the figures of Christianity into a correspondence with the Tree of Life. One could quite easily imagine what those correspondences might look like (with the holy trinity mapping onto Kether, Chokhmah and Binah, for example, and perhaps Mary, Joseph and the newborn Christ mirrored below, etc.), and if I remember right he even offers some provisional correspondences like this, but he maintains that it would be inappropriate. Later, this section is removed, and such correspondences are disucssed without any cautions. What was the source of this brief hesitation?
Western esoterism, in the Renaissance, was stimulated by a fascination with Jews. Jews were brutally oppressed in Renaissance Europe in several ways and for several reasons, but one curious affinity existed between antisemitism and the paranoia around withcraft. Many jewish men were burned at the stake during witch-trials and Agrippa, infamous for providing legal defense to women accused of witchcraft, also provided legal defense to Jews (so that Jean Catilinet described him as a 'judaizing heretic'). Antisemitic myths about jewish secrecy and conspiracy, their barbarous cultural practices and black magic, could be thought of as the blueprint for the self-image of the occult mystery schools, even as they insisted on the benevolence of their work. Grimoires were given an exciting impression by attaching the names of Jewish authors to them, and occultists, following Christian mystics, began to retrieve Jewish mysticism as a source of spiritual knowledge. Their engagement was, however, based on very little besides rumour and speculation. The system of 'Cabalah' they developed had only the merest reflection of the Kabbalah. Agrippa's only source for his writing on the Kabbalah in the influential Three Books on Occult Philosophy was the work of a Cabalist friend of his and it seems that this was the principle source for the 19th century Hermeticist's development of the Hermetic Qabalah.
In the early 20th century antisemitism had once again reached the degree it had in the Renaissance, with prestigious public figures from Henry Ford to Ezra Pound espousing antisemitic conspiracies in the press and on the radio in the States and, one year after this books publication, the Nazis taking power in Europe. It seems that this tendency was reflected in the occult milieu. Crowley, Regardie's employer, would include antisemitic barbs in his work, knowing Regardie would remove them, presumably out of childish cruelty. The Golden Dawn's line on the origins of the Kabbalah were that it was originated in an ancient Indo-European period and that Jews learned it from the Hellenes. It's in this extroardinarily hostile context that Regardie, inaugurating his project of making occult teaching accessible to the public, publishes a book on Qabalah.
The source of the anxiety around Christianizing the kabbalah should be obvious. Regardie believes in the hermetic project, but is both intellectually honest and, uh, jewish, and he has to do some work to reconcile them. This looks for him something like finding a path from the Kabbalah to the Qabalah without passing through the Cabalah. In the first non-prefacery chapter he writes that the Qabalah is a "Jewish mystical teaching concerning the initiated interpretation of the Hebrew scriptures." It is a spiritual philosophy which has influenced "the intellectual development of so shrewd and clear-thinking a people as the Jews"(!) but also "renowned theological and philosophical thinkers" of the past few hundred years, giving us a list which includes John Baptista von Helmont, Dr. Henry More and Baruch Spinoza (who was jewish! Cheating!). The book is named after another book by Rabbi Moses Cordovero, a 16th century kabbalist, and throughout he makes extensive reference to the Sepher Zohar and Sepher Yetzirah, the most eminent traditional sources of Kabbalistic teaching.
What Regardie was doing with Garden of Pomegranates was not just providing an accessible paperback introduction to the hermetic Qabalah; he was self-consciously reframing the Qabalah around its traditional Jewish sources. You can see the fingerprints of this approach on most modern esoteric writing on the Qabalah, most prominently in Lon Milo Duquette's writing. I think too little attention is paid to Regardie as a mover and shaker in the occult milieu. His publication of the secretive Golden Dawn's inner texts was tremendously controversial at the time and set most of the old occult milieu against him, and he had a profound impact on the nature of Thelema, in both its practice and organization, through his role as a teacher and communicator. But the mark of his pen is often difficult to detect since he confined himself to writing accessible introductions and brief handbooks. When paying close attention, however, it becomes strikingly clear that Regardie rarely merely summarized, but quietly created, synthesized and reshuffled until he arrived at a new kind of thought. In this way he rearrives, entirely through a commitment to accessibility, at the position of the cryptic esoteric writers of the old age, who's true lessons are deeply concealed beneath the surface.
Anyway, how are we to regard Qabalah, now that it has had its deep misunderstandings effaced and is brought into connection with the real Kabbalah? I think one finds them, in fact, somewhat in tension. The Qabalah belongs to the same intellectual tradition that would produce logical truth tables and Lacan's mathemes, and its sole operation is to transform the Kabbalah into a semiotic system of laterally arranged tuples, ie. the numbers 0-32 each corresponding to an indefinitely extensible series of equivalent definitions. So 5 is Geburah, but its also Mars, nettles, swords, the colour red, etc. Liber 777 delivers the most blunt expression of this calculus (in the form of a spreadsheet). This is the case because every discrete material and spiritual object is the expression of the resonance of the same few Platonic superstrings in the firmament. QED. This is why Regardie eventually realizes that he must acquiesce to the inclusion of the Christian nativity into the table of correspondences: the Qabalah is a suffocating totality which nothing escapes.
While the system is rude, jesus christ it works. Anyone who has worked with this stuff for a few years will be able to testify, you really see the world differntly. Profoundly so. Every sight, smell and sound, every idea, every thought, every sensation is captured by Qabalah's transcendental Reason, furiously related back to Greek myth and Alchemical symbolism, and narrativized in the appropriate way. The Qabalah intervenes between thought and perception in the manner of the eye, capturing, distorting and rendering all experience according to a single principle of comprehensibility. Occultists belong to a different culture, with its own incommensurable world-view, and simply experience the world differently, not because of any spiritual initiation or revelatory experience, but because of its mesmerizing pedagogy.
I have mixed feelings about it now. One of the most profound insights introduced by Thelema is that its highest rank, the Ipsissimus, can be achieved by anyone, along any path. Christian monks, Hindu yogis and Sufi mystics are all taken to have attained to it, as are stormy German philosophers, contemplative ancient Chinese wanderers and neurotic American aerospace engineers. There is no one path to enlightenment, but an enlightenment which constantly elaborates every path. The task is only to go all the way. Thelema's gambit is not that it can produce a unique form of enlightenment but that it can smooth out the process by means of a sufficinetly balanced education. Its means to do this is through the theosophical idea of a universal 'key to the mysteries', an all-embracing syncretism which can discover the true teaching which lurks beneath every particular expression of widom. The pleasure this engenders is that, as my friend Maxwell said, "the components of a spell or ritual become ontologically equivalent", so that the world and its systems are indefinitely reconfigurable, each element of a thing can be modified without changing its meaning. Everything in the world becomes plastic and flexible. Qabalah engenders play and effaces identity.
But the danger here is that the differences between differnet systems of thought are written off as secondary or inconsequential, drag on the universal wisdom. The whole world, and all history, naturally begins to look a lot like 19th century Enlightenment thought! Hermeticism succumbs to the "appropriative" impulse of modernity, as Nick Land put it, which wants to both "learn and legislate for all time", and therefore needs an alterity to stimulate its development. But if it follows the Other too far it'll dissolve itself (and its Other) and so therefore has to stop short, only approaching the Other through what it can pre-inscribe with its own codes. The Other stimulates Enlightenment thought's reproduction of itself as the Same. That's why it so often succumbs to ludicrous stereotypes: the conniving Jew and their sorcery, the wise and eccentric Hindu guru, etc. Its Other's alterity is accentuated aesthetically but intellectually discarded. The Other is then, as Kierkegaard would object, no longer really an Other at all, but is reduced to whatever is the Same in the Other. The hermeticist's inhibited syncretism makes him somewhat like Odysseus who, so that he might hear the Siren's song without dying, blocks up his men's ears and ties himself to the mast. As Geoge Yancy writes, "He wanted to be affected by them without risking fundamental transformation through a radical act of exposure. Indeed, he undermined the very possibility of genuine exposure by stipulating the conditions of the encounter, conditions that allowed some semblance of exposure without the important feature of letting go, both literally and figuratively."
But what is the right step to take? Is it to step back, into the Same's indefinitely self-replicating stupidity, like René Guenon? Or is it to 'let go', to follow the Siren's song all the way, to an erotic union with difference, an uninhibited libidinal syncretism in which I fully dissolve? I think this is the way to conceive of a 'Left Hand Path' today.
Western esoterism, in the Renaissance, was stimulated by a fascination with Jews. Jews were brutally oppressed in Renaissance Europe in several ways and for several reasons, but one curious affinity existed between antisemitism and the paranoia around withcraft. Many jewish men were burned at the stake during witch-trials and Agrippa, infamous for providing legal defense to women accused of witchcraft, also provided legal defense to Jews (so that Jean Catilinet described him as a 'judaizing heretic'). Antisemitic myths about jewish secrecy and conspiracy, their barbarous cultural practices and black magic, could be thought of as the blueprint for the self-image of the occult mystery schools, even as they insisted on the benevolence of their work. Grimoires were given an exciting impression by attaching the names of Jewish authors to them, and occultists, following Christian mystics, began to retrieve Jewish mysticism as a source of spiritual knowledge. Their engagement was, however, based on very little besides rumour and speculation. The system of 'Cabalah' they developed had only the merest reflection of the Kabbalah. Agrippa's only source for his writing on the Kabbalah in the influential Three Books on Occult Philosophy was the work of a Cabalist friend of his and it seems that this was the principle source for the 19th century Hermeticist's development of the Hermetic Qabalah.
In the early 20th century antisemitism had once again reached the degree it had in the Renaissance, with prestigious public figures from Henry Ford to Ezra Pound espousing antisemitic conspiracies in the press and on the radio in the States and, one year after this books publication, the Nazis taking power in Europe. It seems that this tendency was reflected in the occult milieu. Crowley, Regardie's employer, would include antisemitic barbs in his work, knowing Regardie would remove them, presumably out of childish cruelty. The Golden Dawn's line on the origins of the Kabbalah were that it was originated in an ancient Indo-European period and that Jews learned it from the Hellenes. It's in this extroardinarily hostile context that Regardie, inaugurating his project of making occult teaching accessible to the public, publishes a book on Qabalah.
The source of the anxiety around Christianizing the kabbalah should be obvious. Regardie believes in the hermetic project, but is both intellectually honest and, uh, jewish, and he has to do some work to reconcile them. This looks for him something like finding a path from the Kabbalah to the Qabalah without passing through the Cabalah. In the first non-prefacery chapter he writes that the Qabalah is a "Jewish mystical teaching concerning the initiated interpretation of the Hebrew scriptures." It is a spiritual philosophy which has influenced "the intellectual development of so shrewd and clear-thinking a people as the Jews"(!) but also "renowned theological and philosophical thinkers" of the past few hundred years, giving us a list which includes John Baptista von Helmont, Dr. Henry More and Baruch Spinoza (who was jewish! Cheating!). The book is named after another book by Rabbi Moses Cordovero, a 16th century kabbalist, and throughout he makes extensive reference to the Sepher Zohar and Sepher Yetzirah, the most eminent traditional sources of Kabbalistic teaching.
What Regardie was doing with Garden of Pomegranates was not just providing an accessible paperback introduction to the hermetic Qabalah; he was self-consciously reframing the Qabalah around its traditional Jewish sources. You can see the fingerprints of this approach on most modern esoteric writing on the Qabalah, most prominently in Lon Milo Duquette's writing. I think too little attention is paid to Regardie as a mover and shaker in the occult milieu. His publication of the secretive Golden Dawn's inner texts was tremendously controversial at the time and set most of the old occult milieu against him, and he had a profound impact on the nature of Thelema, in both its practice and organization, through his role as a teacher and communicator. But the mark of his pen is often difficult to detect since he confined himself to writing accessible introductions and brief handbooks. When paying close attention, however, it becomes strikingly clear that Regardie rarely merely summarized, but quietly created, synthesized and reshuffled until he arrived at a new kind of thought. In this way he rearrives, entirely through a commitment to accessibility, at the position of the cryptic esoteric writers of the old age, who's true lessons are deeply concealed beneath the surface.
Anyway, how are we to regard Qabalah, now that it has had its deep misunderstandings effaced and is brought into connection with the real Kabbalah? I think one finds them, in fact, somewhat in tension. The Qabalah belongs to the same intellectual tradition that would produce logical truth tables and Lacan's mathemes, and its sole operation is to transform the Kabbalah into a semiotic system of laterally arranged tuples, ie. the numbers 0-32 each corresponding to an indefinitely extensible series of equivalent definitions. So 5 is Geburah, but its also Mars, nettles, swords, the colour red, etc. Liber 777 delivers the most blunt expression of this calculus (in the form of a spreadsheet). This is the case because every discrete material and spiritual object is the expression of the resonance of the same few Platonic superstrings in the firmament. QED. This is why Regardie eventually realizes that he must acquiesce to the inclusion of the Christian nativity into the table of correspondences: the Qabalah is a suffocating totality which nothing escapes.
While the system is rude, jesus christ it works. Anyone who has worked with this stuff for a few years will be able to testify, you really see the world differntly. Profoundly so. Every sight, smell and sound, every idea, every thought, every sensation is captured by Qabalah's transcendental Reason, furiously related back to Greek myth and Alchemical symbolism, and narrativized in the appropriate way. The Qabalah intervenes between thought and perception in the manner of the eye, capturing, distorting and rendering all experience according to a single principle of comprehensibility. Occultists belong to a different culture, with its own incommensurable world-view, and simply experience the world differently, not because of any spiritual initiation or revelatory experience, but because of its mesmerizing pedagogy.
I have mixed feelings about it now. One of the most profound insights introduced by Thelema is that its highest rank, the Ipsissimus, can be achieved by anyone, along any path. Christian monks, Hindu yogis and Sufi mystics are all taken to have attained to it, as are stormy German philosophers, contemplative ancient Chinese wanderers and neurotic American aerospace engineers. There is no one path to enlightenment, but an enlightenment which constantly elaborates every path. The task is only to go all the way. Thelema's gambit is not that it can produce a unique form of enlightenment but that it can smooth out the process by means of a sufficinetly balanced education. Its means to do this is through the theosophical idea of a universal 'key to the mysteries', an all-embracing syncretism which can discover the true teaching which lurks beneath every particular expression of widom. The pleasure this engenders is that, as my friend Maxwell said, "the components of a spell or ritual become ontologically equivalent", so that the world and its systems are indefinitely reconfigurable, each element of a thing can be modified without changing its meaning. Everything in the world becomes plastic and flexible. Qabalah engenders play and effaces identity.
But the danger here is that the differences between differnet systems of thought are written off as secondary or inconsequential, drag on the universal wisdom. The whole world, and all history, naturally begins to look a lot like 19th century Enlightenment thought! Hermeticism succumbs to the "appropriative" impulse of modernity, as Nick Land put it, which wants to both "learn and legislate for all time", and therefore needs an alterity to stimulate its development. But if it follows the Other too far it'll dissolve itself (and its Other) and so therefore has to stop short, only approaching the Other through what it can pre-inscribe with its own codes. The Other stimulates Enlightenment thought's reproduction of itself as the Same. That's why it so often succumbs to ludicrous stereotypes: the conniving Jew and their sorcery, the wise and eccentric Hindu guru, etc. Its Other's alterity is accentuated aesthetically but intellectually discarded. The Other is then, as Kierkegaard would object, no longer really an Other at all, but is reduced to whatever is the Same in the Other. The hermeticist's inhibited syncretism makes him somewhat like Odysseus who, so that he might hear the Siren's song without dying, blocks up his men's ears and ties himself to the mast. As Geoge Yancy writes, "He wanted to be affected by them without risking fundamental transformation through a radical act of exposure. Indeed, he undermined the very possibility of genuine exposure by stipulating the conditions of the encounter, conditions that allowed some semblance of exposure without the important feature of letting go, both literally and figuratively."
But what is the right step to take? Is it to step back, into the Same's indefinitely self-replicating stupidity, like René Guenon? Or is it to 'let go', to follow the Siren's song all the way, to an erotic union with difference, an uninhibited libidinal syncretism in which I fully dissolve? I think this is the way to conceive of a 'Left Hand Path' today.
February 21, 2013
READ THIS FIRST! The Cicero annotations look pretty good, though I've not read them fully. This was Regardie's simplest work, and is for the rank beginner who wants to know the basics of the Qabalistic field of mysticism.
February 23, 2017
I think there is too big a jump in this book. Things seem to be put forward intellectually that are hard to grasp for a newbie such as myself. I'd imagine there is a better intro book out there.
September 1, 2013
The first part by Regardie is a good introduction to Qabalism. The pathworkings in the second part by the Ciceros was really the best part for me though.
December 7, 2025
Much less a straightforward 'introduction' to Kabbalah in the vein of, for example, some of Scholem's stuff on the topic than a re-introduction, or indeed, recontextualisation of this ancient system in a post-Eliphas Levi, post-Freud scientific-spiritual landscape, a more pointedly ideological text in that its eventual 'point' reveals itself to be an argument not for Kabbalah's place within modernity, but that it has one at all - contextualised in a cross-hatching of cross-references and interrelations comparing elements to comparatives from Lacan, yoga, tarot, etc. (In some ways I can see the aim, and indeed this aim is stated clearly by Regardie, that these cross-references might help one with a background in such things grasp, for instance, the ten sephirot, in others they pointlessly complicate and obscure what is otherwise a fairly instructive, clear-cut introduction pointedly aimed towards 'neophytes'). Interesting reading, maybe outdated in its usefulness as an introductory text, but certainly informative for those with an interest in the topic and especially its relationship to other schools of magic and mysticism, especially those belonging to more modern schools of esotericism.
August 22, 2025
I agree with others - I'm not sure how this would have landed if I knew nothing about the subject. But because I've studied the subject before (mainly for tarot), this was an excellent foundational summary of the key information, beautifully written, with some fascinating ideas to contemplate.
I did not read the second half, written by the Ciceros. It feels too much like codified ritual. I prefer to take the basic information and meditate on it for myself, like Regardie urges us to do. My rating is only for the original book written by him, contained in this volume.
I did not read the second half, written by the Ciceros. It feels too much like codified ritual. I prefer to take the basic information and meditate on it for myself, like Regardie urges us to do. My rating is only for the original book written by him, contained in this volume.
April 4, 2012
I really liked this book. This is my first Regardie book to read and I fear that I chose one that was too elementary, given my many years of study. Regardless, however, I do see how the author has a gift for explaining difficult concepts in a clear and concise manner. I really do see the value in this book and shall recommend it to others.
One aspect that I do plan to take full advantage of are the many guided meditations for each of the paths and sephiroth. This is a great book.
One aspect that I do plan to take full advantage of are the many guided meditations for each of the paths and sephiroth. This is a great book.
November 23, 2007
Great concise, classic book by Israel Reagardie.
September 19, 2008
This one is going to take me a while to read -- have been trying for a year
Read
January 26, 2009 Excellent introduction to the hebrew practical occult qabalah. Perfect as a first dive into Qablistic study in an occult context.
Currently reading
January 25, 2011So far, it's fascinating, but I've only started to read it.
January 27, 2011
Good to study.
August 6, 2011
Another incredible and short work of this excellent author. Concisious, with some and concret cabalistic correspondences and with his beautifull way to express them.
April 30, 2017
Good introduction to Qabalah with reference to many philosophers, astrology, tarot, religions and it's Gods.
Still difficult to understand given the complexity of the topic.
Still difficult to understand given the complexity of the topic.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 7, 2019
Excellent book linking psychology and Qabalah (through the Middle Pillar ritual).
September 23, 2023
I'll divide this review into sections for Regardie and sections for the Cicero additions. Given that the majority of this book is the Cicero additions (pages 171-482) the review mostly hinges on what those additions introduce.
+ Regardie
The sections by Regardie are written as mile wide and inch deep. It covers the basics of typical path working and associated practices. I would recommend it for anyone who is interested in the topic, but has yet to dive in. This gives you an idea, but you are mostly left to your own devices to discover how to venture forth into the topics.
Unfortunately, I am unsure how well the delivery is for a beginner. It is clearly made for a beginner, but I'll leave it up to the discretion of beginners to decide how well the material is introduced. What I can tell you is the basics are absolutely here and consists of your general exercises you can find in any other curriculum on the subject.
+ Cicero Addition
The real reason I would recommend this book is the inclusion of the visualized path working on the tree. It is a lengthy section detailing "one person's abbreviated experience in Rising on the Planes". However, unless I've misunderstood the section notes here, it also seems to include elements of other people's experiences, rituals, and other sources of inspiration interspersed. Probably to fill in and include relevant details. This serves to help.
This section alone is worth using the book as a reference when path working or other associated exercises. I keep a multitude of books from different people's experiences and knowledge on path working to reference when doing my own work and research. Each one has their own key strengths and weaknesses and will often reveal different approaches. Due to this the value they contain far exceed dry descriptions. I think this one (in comparison to others like Crowley, Knight, Meral, etc.) is quiet mythical and there is a lot off interaction with an assortment of myths and deities. Compare that to the highly astrological descriptions as provided by Soror Meral. This gives a great handle into possibilities that are not present in many authors as we see direct interaction with the myths. Due to this it also reads like a novel which no doubt is incredibly helpful for a number of students and workers.
I have attached a picture of one of these sections so you can see it includes a brief description of either the Sephiroth or the Path, lightly detailed common associations, and then includes the guided meditation into it. The guided meditation showing the basics of the ritual entry and experience that follows.
Finally, I'd like to also leave a note for those who have newer associations ("Tzaddi is not the star"). The worker used old associations, but I think you'll find the newer associations would be even more relevant to the experience given. This should be interesting to ponder and might lead one to new insights.
+ Regardie
The sections by Regardie are written as mile wide and inch deep. It covers the basics of typical path working and associated practices. I would recommend it for anyone who is interested in the topic, but has yet to dive in. This gives you an idea, but you are mostly left to your own devices to discover how to venture forth into the topics.
Unfortunately, I am unsure how well the delivery is for a beginner. It is clearly made for a beginner, but I'll leave it up to the discretion of beginners to decide how well the material is introduced. What I can tell you is the basics are absolutely here and consists of your general exercises you can find in any other curriculum on the subject.
+ Cicero Addition
The real reason I would recommend this book is the inclusion of the visualized path working on the tree. It is a lengthy section detailing "one person's abbreviated experience in Rising on the Planes". However, unless I've misunderstood the section notes here, it also seems to include elements of other people's experiences, rituals, and other sources of inspiration interspersed. Probably to fill in and include relevant details. This serves to help.
This section alone is worth using the book as a reference when path working or other associated exercises. I keep a multitude of books from different people's experiences and knowledge on path working to reference when doing my own work and research. Each one has their own key strengths and weaknesses and will often reveal different approaches. Due to this the value they contain far exceed dry descriptions. I think this one (in comparison to others like Crowley, Knight, Meral, etc.) is quiet mythical and there is a lot off interaction with an assortment of myths and deities. Compare that to the highly astrological descriptions as provided by Soror Meral. This gives a great handle into possibilities that are not present in many authors as we see direct interaction with the myths. Due to this it also reads like a novel which no doubt is incredibly helpful for a number of students and workers.
I have attached a picture of one of these sections so you can see it includes a brief description of either the Sephiroth or the Path, lightly detailed common associations, and then includes the guided meditation into it. The guided meditation showing the basics of the ritual entry and experience that follows.
Finally, I'd like to also leave a note for those who have newer associations ("Tzaddi is not the star"). The worker used old associations, but I think you'll find the newer associations would be even more relevant to the experience given. This should be interesting to ponder and might lead one to new insights.
May 10, 2022
Add this to an ever growing list of books to re-read and practically memorize. I most definitely have a greater understanding of the Sephora and the paths, but by no means have them memorized which Israel strongly suggested doing. I have a concise, quick reference for scents, stones, colors, Gods, Goddesses for each and every path which will come in handy ceremonially speaking. Matter of fact the first thing I am going to do after writing this is seeing how the Trump cards look in their paths. I can tell you one thing I am noticing already studying these things from a neophyte perspective my dreams are becoming vivid and complex. For instance last noc I was hiding out with a group of humans during an Ai robot apocalypse. We eventually infiltrated and befriended the highest ranks which were cyborg replacements of people like Mark Zuckerberg and Barrack Obama. We had an intricate scheme to take them down and they trusted that we were on their side and agreed to help them find and eliminate remaining pockets of humans. It ended with us dancing in one of their weird Luciferian rituals while two of our members snuck off to fill their oil cans (which they drank like coffee) with a toxic material that would make them melt from the inside. I was woken up from the exciting conclusion by my wife’s bitch, ineptly named Hermes, whom I prefer to call Trudeau.
February 25, 2025
4.5
This is my first reading of an Israel Regardie book and I really enjoyed his perspective on Qabalah. His writing is accessible, and this book makes a great companion to Fortune’s “Mystical Qabalah”. This is a little more tangible than Fortune’s Qabalah, and it explores more concepts such as; the four world, Adam Kadmon, the 22 paths, the actual process of digesting the information. Fortune’s work contains more depth on each of the 10 spheres than this book.
I did not connect with the supplemental chapters on the meditations and visualizations that my edition included. The most I got out of it was an example of how western occult/ceremonial techniques can be extrapolated for individual use. This practical application is what I found missing in Fortune’s book.
This is my first reading of an Israel Regardie book and I really enjoyed his perspective on Qabalah. His writing is accessible, and this book makes a great companion to Fortune’s “Mystical Qabalah”. This is a little more tangible than Fortune’s Qabalah, and it explores more concepts such as; the four world, Adam Kadmon, the 22 paths, the actual process of digesting the information. Fortune’s work contains more depth on each of the 10 spheres than this book.
I did not connect with the supplemental chapters on the meditations and visualizations that my edition included. The most I got out of it was an example of how western occult/ceremonial techniques can be extrapolated for individual use. This practical application is what I found missing in Fortune’s book.
May 2, 2020
Clear and concise. When you are new to the subject and wanting to imerse yourself in ritual magic/quabbalah/golden-dawn-stuff, then this should provide a good starting point. I found the last chapter to be the best and would place it at the very beginning of the book. In a certain sense its the only one you need to read. Obviously, being a classic and such it comes with the marks of its time, above all correspondences and a quite lofty, "mystical" variety of magic with its heart at the right place but an fervent idealism in both the trivial and the philosophical sense which jeopardizes the aforementioned heart, or soul, of the matter.
May 5, 2020
As someone born into Roman Catholicism, a former atheist and fervent student of Hinduism... and dedicated nerd for world myth and philosophy, I was intimidated by the idea of learning about Qabala.
Mr. Redgardie's book made it surprisingly approachable! He doesn't talk over your head, and does not talk down to the reader. Rather, he lays his understanding of Qabala basics in a relatable, but still challenging (in a good way!) manner.
A great "in" for an individual with some metaphysical knowledgebase to pull from who wants an introduction to this fascinating system.
Mr. Redgardie's book made it surprisingly approachable! He doesn't talk over your head, and does not talk down to the reader. Rather, he lays his understanding of Qabala basics in a relatable, but still challenging (in a good way!) manner.
A great "in" for an individual with some metaphysical knowledgebase to pull from who wants an introduction to this fascinating system.
March 12, 2021
Completed reading Regardie's portion of this book, which is only the first portion. The remainder of the book seems very interesting as well and outlines a comprehensive list of practices based on Regardie's work at the beginning of this tome, as well as his exercises in The Middle Pillar, and adds some of the Ciceros' variations and own teachings. The later portion of the book is more experiential and I may add to my review after experimenting with some of the techniques outlined therein.
June 21, 2023
Supernatural, Mystical, or Magical beliefs? this one's for you. "A Garden of Pomegranates" is a gem in the realm of occult literature. Israel Regardie's expertise and passion shine through as he presents the intricacies of the Qabalah in a digestible and engaging manner. Whether you are a novice seeking an introduction to the Qabalah or a seasoned practitioner looking to deepen your understanding, this book offers a valuable resource that will leave you enriched and inspired.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 12, 2022
It isn't the best introduction of qabalah, it is too short for that, if you are looking for the best start on qabalah, go definitely for the mystical qabalah. The guided meditations on tree of life are definitely worth it tho.
February 12, 2024
I wanted more but I am sure it is forthcoming. It would be nice if the writer had a more intimate friendship with a Jewish scholar because it felt like some cultural knowledge that would come from a Jewish understanding of the Hebrew language was missing/ oddly interpreted
August 25, 2020
His first book and one of the original “textbooks” on Hermetic Qabalah. I read this 30 years ago for the first time and still find it worthy of study.
March 24, 2024
Israel rozpływa się nad zaletami kabały może nieco nadmiernie, ale w przystępny sposób wykłada swoją jej wizję czytelnikom
February 23, 2025
Alester Crowleys Secretary providing a fluffed introduction to some the key concepts within Kabal. #Gemeteria
I’d advice a simple conversation the GPT than reading this
I’d advice a simple conversation the GPT than reading this
August 20, 2020
This review and rating applies to the edition specified only.
Purchasers should take note that, of the 480 text pages, fewer than 140 - the Garden proper - are by Israel Regardie, whose name is featured most prominently on the cover. The rest of the volume is additional material by two of his former students, the Ciceros.
Regardie's historical survey is interesting. He's honest enough to note that he's unsure how far back the Qabalistic tradition goes. 2nd Century? 12th or maybe 13th Century (around the time Dante was creating the Divine Comedy)? The Qabalistic Tree of Life is not exactly similar to the Dantean Universe but there are enough parallels for me to wonder. Which one influenced the creation of the other? Has anyone ever looked into this?
A little of the Ciceros' material is helpful. The 'guided visualisations' that make up around half of the volume are, however, where they fail completely - and earn the book the low rating it gets from this usually generous reviewer; they are simply not good enough writers to succeed in the extraordinarily difficult task they set themselves. An example: anyone attempting to write something based on the Myth of King Arthur must, these days, be primarily concerned with not reminding their reader of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. When the Ciceros make the attempt, I'm afraid we're transported straight to Castle Anthrax.
No: if this is the edition you have, read the Regardie material, then put it down and turn instead, for examples of how this should be done, to Promethea or to Snakes and Ladders, both by Alan Moore, or to The Divine Comedy itself.
Purchasers should take note that, of the 480 text pages, fewer than 140 - the Garden proper - are by Israel Regardie, whose name is featured most prominently on the cover. The rest of the volume is additional material by two of his former students, the Ciceros.
Regardie's historical survey is interesting. He's honest enough to note that he's unsure how far back the Qabalistic tradition goes. 2nd Century? 12th or maybe 13th Century (around the time Dante was creating the Divine Comedy)? The Qabalistic Tree of Life is not exactly similar to the Dantean Universe but there are enough parallels for me to wonder. Which one influenced the creation of the other? Has anyone ever looked into this?
A little of the Ciceros' material is helpful. The 'guided visualisations' that make up around half of the volume are, however, where they fail completely - and earn the book the low rating it gets from this usually generous reviewer; they are simply not good enough writers to succeed in the extraordinarily difficult task they set themselves. An example: anyone attempting to write something based on the Myth of King Arthur must, these days, be primarily concerned with not reminding their reader of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. When the Ciceros make the attempt, I'm afraid we're transported straight to Castle Anthrax.
No: if this is the edition you have, read the Regardie material, then put it down and turn instead, for examples of how this should be done, to Promethea or to Snakes and Ladders, both by Alan Moore, or to The Divine Comedy itself.
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