Sefer Yetzirah ( Sēp̄er Yəṣīrā, Book of Formation, or Book of Creation) is a work of Jewish mysticism. Early commentaries, such as the Kuzari, treated it as a treatise on mathematical and linguistic theory, as opposed to one about Kabbalah. The word Yetzirah is more literally translated as "Formation", the word B'riah being used for "Creation". The book is traditionally ascribed to the patriarch Abraham, although others attribute its writing to Rabbi Akiva or Adam. Modern scholars have not reached consensus on the question of its origins. According to Saadia Gaon, the objective of the book's author was to convey in writing how the things of our universe came into existence. Conversely, Judah Halevi asserts that the main objective of the book, with its various examples, is to give humans the means to understand the unity and omnipotence of God, which appear multiform on the one hand, and yet, are uniform.
The famous opening words of the book are as follows:
Origin A cryptic story in the Babylonian Talmud states,
According to modern historians, the origin of the text is unknown, and hotly debated. Some scholars believe it might have an early medieval origin, while others cite earlier traditions appearing in the book. Most contemporary scholars date the text's authorship to the Talmudic period. Footnote 9 and associated text.
According to the Jewish Encyclopedia, the essential elements of the book are characteristic of the 3rd or 4th century; for a work of this nature, composed in the Geonic period, could have been cast only in the form of Jewish gnosis, which remained stationary after the 4th century, if indeed it had not already become extinct. The historical origin of the Sefer Yetzirah was placed by Richard August Reitzenstein in the 2nd century BCE. According to Christopher P. Benton, the Hebrew grammatical form places its origin closer to the period of the Mishnah, around the 2nd century CE.
The division of the letters into the three classes of vowels, mutes, and sonants also appears in Hellenic texts.
The date and origin of the book cannot be definitely determined as long as there is no critical text of it. The editio princeps (Mantua, 1562) contains two recensions, which were used in the main by the commentators of the book as early as the middle of the 10th century. The shorter version (Mantua I.) was annotated by Dunash ibn Tamim or by Jacob ben Nissim, while Saadia Gaon and Shabbethai Donnolo wrote commentaries on the longer recension (Mantua II.). The shorter version was also used by most of the later commentators, such as Judah ben Barzillai and Nachmanides, and it was, therefore, published in the ordinary editions. The longer recension, on the other hand, was little known, the form given in the editio princeps of the Sefer Yetzirah being probably a copy of the text found in Donnolo's commentary. In addition to these two principal recensions of the text, both versions contain a number of variant readings that have not yet been examined critically.
As regards the relation of the two recensions, it may be said that the longer form contains entire paragraphs which are not found in the shorter, while the divergent arrangement of the material often modifies the meaning essentially. Although the longer recension doubtless contains additions and interpolations which did not form part of the original text, it has many valuable readings which seem older and better than the corresponding passages in the shorter version, so that a critical edition of the text must consider both recensions.
Legendary origin Mystics assert that the biblical patriarch Abraham used the same method to create the calf prepared for the three angels who foretold Sarah's pregnancy in the biblical account at Genesis 18:7. All the miraculous creations attributed to other rabbis of the Talmudic era are ascribed by rabbinic commentators to the use of the same book.
Sefer Yetzirahs appendix (6:15) declares that Abraham was the recipient of the divine revelation of mystic lore; so that the rabbis of the classical rabbinic eraSee Hai Gaon in the responsum cited in "Kerem Ḥemed", viii, 57. and philosophers such as Shabbethai Donnolo and Judah HaLevi never doubted that Abraham was the author of the book.
In Pardes Rimonim, Moses ben Jacob Cordovero (Ramak) mentions a minority opinion that Rabbi Akiva authored it, and takes it to mean that Abraham wrote it and Akiva redacted it to its current form. Jewish Lore attributes the Kabbalah to Adam, and holds that "[f]rom Adam it passed over to Noah, and then to Abraham, the friend of God."
In a manuscript in the British Museum, the Sefer Yetzirah is called the Hilkhot Yetzirah and declared to be esoteric lore not accessible to anyone but the truly pious.See Margoliouth, "Catalogue of the Hebrew and Samaritan Manuscripts of the British Museum," part II., p. 190; compare ib. p. 255, where it is mentioned as being used by Nachmanides for Kabbalistic purposes.
Manuscripts
The Sefer Yetzirah exists in many manuscripts, generally falling in categories known as:
The Short Version, The Long Version, The Saadia Version, and The Gra Version
The long version contains entire paragraphs which are not found in the short version, while the divergent arrangement of the material often modifies the meaning essentially. The short version comprises about 1,300 words and was annotated by Dunash ibn Tamim, and it formed the basis of the first printed Hebrew edition, published in Mantua in the year 1562, and most main versions printed thereafter. The long version is 2,500 words and is present with a commentary by Shabbethai Donnolo. It is frequently printed with this commentary as an appendix to editions of the short Version. In the 13th century, Abraham Abulafia noted the existence of both of these versions.
The Mantua 1562 edition was printed with the short version surrounded by commentaries attributed to Abraham ben David (outside of the page), Nachmanides (bottom of the page) and Moses Botarel (inside of the page; the printer notes that Botarel followed the first two rabbis and also collected all other commentaries that preceded him). An appendix following this contains a pair of commentaries printed side by side, one attributed to Eleazar of Worms) on the outside of the pages and the other to Saadia Gaon on the inside of the pages. At the end of the volume is found the long version.
In the middle of the 16th century, the leader of the school of Safed kabbalists, Moses Cordovero, established a working text based on ten separate manuscripts. His student and successor Isaac Luria further redacted this to harmonize it with the Zohar, and then in the 18th century, the Vilna Gaon, known as "the Gra", further redacted it. This text is called the Gra or ARI-Gra version.
In the 10th century, Saadia Gaon wrote his commentary based on a manuscript which was a reorganized copy of the Longer Version, now called the "Saadia Version". This was translated into French by Lambert and thence into English by Scott Thompson. This version and commentary was more philosophical in nature rather than mystical and had virtually no impact on subsequent kabbalists.
Influence The Sefer Yetzirah is devoted to speculations concerning God's creation of the world. The ascription of its authorship to the biblical patriarch Abraham shows the high esteem that it enjoyed for centuries. It may even be said that this work had a greater influence on the development of the Jewish mind than almost any other book after the completion of the Talmud.
The Sefer Yetzirah is exceedingly difficult to understand on account of its obscure style. The difficulty is rendered still greater by the lack of a critical edition, the present text being much interpolated and altered. Hence there is a wide divergence of opinion regarding the age, origin, contents, and value of the book.
Jewish study The history of the study of the Sefer Yetzirah is one of the most interesting in the records of Jewish literature. With the exception of the Bible, scarcely any other book has been the subject of so much annotation.
An intimate relation exists between the Sefer Yetzirah and the later mystics; and although there is a marked difference between the later Kabbalah and the Sefer Yetzirah (for instance, the sefirot of the Kabbalists do not correspond to those of the Sefer Yetzirah), the system laid down in the latter is the first visible link in the development of Kabbalistic ideas. Instead of the immediate creation ex nihilo, both works postulate a series of emanations of mediums between God and the universe; and both consider God as the first cause only, and not as the immediate efficient cause of the world.
A book of the same name was circulated among the Ashkenazi Hasidim between the 11th and 13th centuries, for whom it became a source of Practical Kabbalah. This book seems to be a mystic work on the six days of creation, and corresponded in part to the small midrash, Seder Rabbah deBereshit.
In Thelema Charles Stansfeld Jones, in his book called The Anatomy of The Body of God has written interpretations of this book from the viewpoint of Thelema, a new religious movement founded by Aleister Crowley early in the 20th century.
Teachings
Structure The Sefer Yetzirah describes how the universe was created by the "God of Israel" (a list of all of God's Hebrew names appears in the first sentence of the book) through "32 wondrous ways of wisdom": Ten Numbers (sefirot, the origin for the sefirot of later Kabbalah) The Twenty-Two Letters of the Hebrew alphabet— Three mother letters (Aleph, Mem, Shin) Seven doubles (Bet, Gimel, Dalet, Kaph, Pe, Resh, Taw) Twelve simples or elementals (He, Waw, Zayin, Heth, Teth, Yodh, Lamedh, Nun, Samekh, Ayin, Tsade, Qoph) The book describes the method for using the ten sefirot and the 22 Hebrew letters to gain Divine Insight/Secret using Abraham's tongue. God's covenant with Abraham is described as being twofold.
The phonetic system The philological is discussed first, since it is necessary for an elucidation of the philosophical speculations of the work. The twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet are classified both with reference to the position of the vocal organs in producing the sounds, and with regard to sonant intensity. In contrast to the Jewish grammarians, who assumed a special mode of articulation for each of the five groups of sounds, the Sefer Yetzirah says that no sound can be produced without the tongue, to which the other organs of speech merely lend assistance. Hence the formation of the letters is described as follows: With the tip of the tongue and the throat Between the lips and the tip of the tongue In the middle of the tongue By the tip of the tongue By the tongue, which lies flat and stretched, and by the teeth (ii. 3)
The letters are distinguished, moreover, by the intensity of the sound necessary to produce them, and are accordingly divided into: Mutes, which are unaccompanied by sound, such as Mem Sibilants, such as Shin, which is therefore called the "hissing shin" Aspirates, such as Aleph, which holds a position between the mutes and sibilants, and is designated as the "airy Aleph, which holds the balance in the middle" (iv. 1; in some eds. ii. 1) Besides these three letters, which are called "mothers," a distinction is also drawn between the seven "double" letters, which have two different sounds according to inflection, and the twelve "simple" letters, the remaining characters of the alphabet which represent only one sound each.
Themes Both the macrocosm (the universe) and the microcosm (human) are viewed in this system as products of the combination and permutation of these mystic characters, and such a use of the letters by the Jews for the formation of the Holy Name for thaumaturgical purposes is attested by magic papyri that quote an "Angelic Book of Moses", which was full of allusions to biblical names.