Al-Ghazali Letter to a Disciple: Ayyuha'l-Walad (New)

How the World Is Made: The Story of Creation According to Sacred Geometry
Michell, John
Inner Traditions / Bear & Company

Galileo described the universe as a large book written in the language of mathematics, which can only be read by those with knowledge of its characters--triangles, circles, and other geometrical figures. The laws of geometry are not human inventions. They are found ready-made in nature and hold a truth that is the same in all times and all places and is older than the world itself.

In How the World Is Made John Michell explains how ancient societies that grasped the timeless principles of sacred geometry were able to create flourishing societies. His more than 300 full-color illustrations reveal the secret code within these geometrical figures and how they express the spiritual meanings in the key numbers of 1 through 12. For example, the number 8 and its octagon are symbols of peace and stability, the holy 7 and its seven-sided figure are connected to the world-soul. He identifies the various regular shapes and shows their constructions; their natural symbolism; their meetings, matings, and ways of breeding; and their functions within the universal order. Some are musical and structural, others relate to life and humanity. In the process of making these discoveries, Michell helps us see the world in a new light. Disparate shapes and their corresponding numbers are woven together, resolving themselves into an all-inclusive world image--that 'pattern in the heavens,' as Socrates called it, 'which anyone can find and establish within themselves.

Price: $35.00

Cantus Circaeus: The Incantations of Circe, together with The Judiciary, being the Art of Memory
Bruno, Giordano
Ouroboros Press

Standard Edition: Small octavo, full black cloth over boards with gilt title and device. In a printed dust jacket. 144 pages. Illustrated with woodcuts.

There can be no doubt as to the importance Giordano Bruno's life and writings had on the western esoteric tradition and the history of scientific thought. With this in mind, Ouroboros Press is pleased to be issuing the first English translation of Giordano Bruno's Cantus Circaeus, rendered from the original Latin by Darius Klein. Originally printed in Paris 1582, the eloquence of Klein's English translation is fitting for the words of the Nolan.

"To one who is about to behold the Daughter of the Sun, she who is learned in magical lore, and who comes forth from the hidden places; you shall go as a free man into the House of Circe, not bound by the fetters of Night."

In the beginning of his Cantus Circaeus, Bruno portrays the doctrine of correspondence as used with the seven planetary invocations, which are themselves tokens of praxis in the Hermetic tradition. The incantatory litanies include the names, attributes, plants, stones, animals and other qualities associated with the astral bodies, and are thus memory palaces of planetary arcana. Through dialogue, Circe and her assistant Moeris, explicate the use of images in the imagination in order to facilitate use of the Art of Memory which constitutes the latter half of the text.

"Bruno's magic memory system thus represents the memory of the Magus, one who both knows the reality beyond the multiplicity of appearances through having conformed his imagination to the archetypal images, and also has powers through this insight. It is the direct descendant of Ficino's Neoplatonic interpretation of the celestial images, but carried to a much more daring extreme." - Francis A. Yates; Giordano and the Hermetic Tradition.

Price: $40.00

The Zohar 5: Pritzker Edition, Volume Five
Matt, Daniel
Stanford University Press

Sefer ha-Zohar (The Book of Radiance) has amazed and overwhelmed readers ever since it emerged mysteriously in medieval Spain toward the end of the thirteenth century. Written in a unique, lyrical Aramaic, this masterpiece of Kabbalah exceeds the dimensions of a normal book; it is virtually a body of literature, comprising over twenty discrete sections. The bulk of the Zohar consists of a running commentary on the Torah, from Genesis through Deuteronomy.

This fifth volume of The Zohar: Pritzker Edition opens in the middle of Exodus immediately following the revelation at Mount Sinai. The first chapter features a famous narrative about two rabbis and an old donkey-driver they encounter on the road. This old man seems like a complete ignoramus and pesters them with nonsensical riddles, but he turns out to be a sage and explains to them one of the most tightly guarded secrets of Kabbalah: the reincarnation of the soul. In the course of his exposition, the old man enthralls his two listeners with a romantic account of Torah as a maiden who reveals herself only to one who pursues her lovingly.

The rest of this volume consists mainly of the Zohar's commentary on the biblical description of the mishkan, the Dwelling (or Tabernacle) in the desert. The mishkan symbolizes Shekhinah, the feminine presence of God who "dwells" on earth. Since the Dwelling was the center of worship, the Zohar explores here the theme of prayer.

The volume concludes with one of the shortest yet most important sections of the Zohar -- Sifra di-Tsni'uta (The Book of Concealment). This enigmatic and poetic composition contains a veiled description of God's body, focusing on the beard. Its few pages convey the central teachings of Kabbalah, including the balance between male and female energies, and how divine breath animates all that exists.

Price: $49.95

The Essential Rene Guenon: Metaphysical Principles, Traditional Doctrines, & the Crisis of Modernity
Herlihy, John (ed)
World Wisdom Books

A prolific writer and author of over 24 books, Rene Guenon was the founder of the Perennialist/Traditionalist school of comparative religious thought. Known for his discourses on the intellectual and spiritual bankruptcy of the modern world, symbolism, tradition, and the inner or spiritual dimension of religion, this book is a compilation of his most important writings. A key component of his thought was the assertion that universal truths manifest themselves in various forms in the world's religions and his writings on Hinduism, Taoism, and Sufism are particularly illuminating in this regard.

Price: $24.95