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To: alt.magick.tyagi,alt.magick,alt.magick.order,alt.occult,talk.religion.newage
From: tyagi@houseofkaos.abyss.com (nagasiva)
Subject: Various: Mathers, 'Translations', and Occult Sources
Date: 20 Dec 1997 16:25:58 -0800

Bill Heidrick  wrote:

>I hadn't heard about the Mathers edition of Knorr von Rosenroth being 
>cribbed from this Ginsburg text, though. Please tell me more. My 
>impression was Mathers was quite capable of doing his own sloppy Latin 
>translations.

Mathers' _Kabbalah Unveiled_ directly translates nothing from Rosenroth's
approximately 15 times larger _Kabbalah Denudata_.  The introduction in
Mathers' book was cribbed from Ginsburg (there's a slight mention of
Ginsburg's work in it).  The translations that compose the body of that
work are apparently either taken from French (Levi) or English works extant
in those days.  Mathers' "translations" are less clear than those
selections given in Issac Myer's book, but are otherwise similar.

93 93/93
Bill

=========================================================

Bill Heidrick :

93,

 Jeffrey Smith  wrote:

>You've left me a bit confused.   What earlier French and English sources 
>(outside of Levi) do you mean? And who was Isaac Myer, and what exactly 
>did he publish?

Check out:

Eliphas Levi's _The Book of Splendours_, Aquarian Press, Wellingborough,
Northamptonshire, 1973, ISBN 0 85030 104 1 -- also has an appendix by Papus

Isaac Myer, _Qabbalah_, Samuel Weiser Inc, New York, 1970, SBN 87728-008-8
(reprint of the Philadelphia 1888 edition, texts in appendix)/

Roy A. Rosenberg, _The Anatomy of God_, Ktav Publishing House, New York,
1973, ISBN 0-87068-220-2

>The only extensive translation of the Zohar or any parts 
>I know of  prior to Mather's version of Rosenroth

Always remember that the texts in the Mather's KU are a tiny fragment of
what is in the Zohar and in Rosenroth -- not extensive by any meaning of
the term other than word count.

93 93/93
Bill

=============================================================

"David R. Jones" :

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.

Hi pretentious Patty:

I thought we had heard the last of your laughable drivel about things you
have now demonstrated, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that you know less
than nothing about.  But since you have reappeared contrary to your word
(which considering your lack of response on thelema93-l apparently means
nothing to you, how typical of the seriously deluded, ever considered
getting some psychiatric help maybe.)  But since there are members of this
list who may not be aware of your level of dishonesty, ignorance and self
delusion I must again bring forth evidence to refute another lie you have
subjected this list to.

>To point out just a few works, the Goetia
> for exemple was entirely written by Mathers and was lent to Crowley .  

Mathers in fact copied the text of the Goetia verbatim from the English
version shelf marked Sloane MS. 2731 including the errors of spelling and
punctuation and then claimed he had translated it from another text which
doesn't even contain the same paragraph structure.  You apparently live in
England, go to the BM and see for yourself.  He then convinced Crowley to
finance the publication, but didn't want his own name associated with a
Grimoire of Black Magick so he insisted his name not be on the publication.
 This contract is also extant and notarized in the Yorke collection of the
Warburg at the Univ. of London.  If you are intending to write a book you
should really take a look at some primary source material instead of
propagating the false here say at who knows how many persons removed from
the event.  Or are you getting all this from astral communication with the
Secret Chiefs, the spirit of Mathers or the Akashic record?  You certainly
aren't getting it from anything approaching a reliable source.  Have you
even ever examined the MS. in the British Museum, if you ever did you might
realize how much Mathers simply copied what he claimed to have written.

>The
> same applies with the Book Equinox and so on so forth... I could list
here
> a endless array of works but again I do not have time for you nor is it
the
> purport of this list.

Mathers wrote the Blue Equinox, now this is truly laughable.  Do you have
his original MS copy?

[...]

======================================================

Bill Heidrick :

93,

Tim Maroney  wrote:

>I guess my question was how it was known that Mathers had plagiarized 
>from Ginsburg,

Mathers cites the Ginsburg work in the body of the Mathers' introduction
(establishes possiblity).  About 50% of the Mathers' introduction to
_Kabbalah Unveiled_ is Ginsburg word-for-word.  The rest is slightly
paraphrased with word-for-word inclusions and re-arranged.  Direct
comparison is necessary to bring these things out.

>or what translation methods he used.

If you mean the Zohar/Rosenroth alleged translations, the main evidence is
the poor quality of the material, suggestive of derived translation from a
secondary source, and the selection of works frequently anthologized in
translation from the Zohar in the 19th century (relative to the more easily
translated texts that make up the bulk of the Zohar but are of a
disputational religious character).

===========================================================

Bill Heidrick :

93,

 Jeffrey Smith  wrote:

>But compared to what was available before in English, Mather's KU is 
>massive.

No.  On the small side of medium.  The 19th century saw many works on the
subject, most larger than this but with less careful focus on historic
content (E.g., Levi and Meyers included a lot of syncretic material from
India and other traditions).

>The only complete English version I am aware of is the Soncino 
>edition,

Not complete.  The Soncino is most of but not all of the Zohar.

>and even that is confessedly incomplete, since it leaves out not 
>only the material covered by Mathers, but also most of the other 
>secondary levels of the Zoharic corpus--Midrash haNeelam, Ray Mehmena, 
>Tikkune Zohar, Sitre Torah, Mathnitin, Zohar to Shir-haShirim, etc.  

Right.  Some Aramaic and Hebrew included texts were too difficult to
translate properly.  Too many footnotes and essays of explanation are
needed for those works, in contrast to the portions translated in the Soncino.

>(consult Scholem's catalogue of the parts of the Zohar in _Major Trends 
>in Jewish Mysticism_).  In fact, Mather's version is still the only 
>version I know of in English of the "Assemblies" and "Book of 
>Concealment."--whatever its flaws.

See my earlier post for alternatives, as quoted in your present post..

>Although, interestingly, Scholem did 
>not deign to even mention Rosenroth or Mathers in MTIJM's bibliography, 
>although Myer, Adolph Franck, and Waite did make it there.

Check the index in Sholem's _Kabbalah_ (ISBN 0-9128-0352-8).  Extensive
discussion there.  However, Sholem blows it in details (e.g., he thinks
Rosenroth is two volumes, but there were three).

=====================================================

EOF
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