This volume offers the first critical edition, with English translation and commentary, of seven astrological treatises by Abraham Ibn Ezra: the Book of Elections (3 versions); the Book of Interrogations (3 versions); and the Book of the Luminaries.
As a result of Abraham Ibn Ezra’s increasing popularity after his death, there were repeated waves of translation of collections of his Hebrew astrological treatises into Latin and into the emerging European vernaculars. A study of these versions affords us a golden opportunity to shed light on a significant missing link in our knowledge of Ibn Ezra’s astrological oeuvre. The present volume offers the first critical edition, accompanied by an English translation, a commentary, and an introductory study, of three Latin texts on the astrological doctrines of elections and interrogations, written by or attributed to Abraham Ibn Ezra: the Liber electionum, the Liber interrogationum, and the Tractatus particulares.
The present volume offers the first critical edition, accompanied with English translation and commentary, of Sefer ha-Moladot, which addresses the doctrine of nativities and the system of continuous horoscopy in nativities, and of Sefer ha-Tequfah, which is devoted exclusively to continuous horoscopy in nativities. The doctrine of nativities makes predictions about the whole of an individual’s subsequent life on the basis of the natal chart, and the system of continuous horoscopy in nativities is concerned with the interval between life and death and makes predictions based mainly on anniversary horoscopes, which are juxtaposed with the natal horoscope. To Abraham Ibn Ezra’s mind, not only are these two doctrines the core of astrology; they also epitomize the praxis of the astrological métier. “Sela...has provided explanatory appendices and very interesting notes about Jewish attitudes toward the sciences and astrology in the middle ages.” Reference & Research Book News, 2013.
Critical edition of the earliest known astrological autobiography The present book reveals the riches of the earliest known astrological autobiography, authored by Henry Bate of Mechelen (1246–after 1310). Exploiting all resources of contemporary astrological science, Bate conducts in his Nativitas a profound self-analysis, revealing the peculiarities of his character and personality at a crucial moment of his life (1280). The result is an extraordinarily detailed and penetrating attempt to decode the fate of one’s own life and its idiosyncrasies. The Astrological Autobiography of a Medieval Philosopher offers the first critical edition of Bate’s Nativitas. An extensive introduction presents Bate’s life and work and sheds new light on the reception and use of Greek, Latin, Arabic, and Hebrew texts among scholars in Paris at the end of the 13th century. The book thus provides a major new resource for scholars working on medieval science, autobiography, and notions of personhood and individuality.
The present volume offers a critical edition of the Hebrew texts, accompanied by English translation and commentary of Reshit Ḥokhmah (Beginning of Wisdom) and Mishpeṭei ha-Mazzalot (Judgments of the Zodiacal Signs) by Abraham Ibn Ezra (ca. 1089–ca. 1161). The first, the summa and by far the longest of his astrological works, the target of the most cross-references from the rest of that corpus and the most influential, enjoyed the widest circulation among Jews in the Middle Ages and after. The second, by contrast, is the most obscure. It is never referred to elsewhere by its author and is the only work for which Ibn Ezra’s authorship must be substantiated. Reshit Ḥokhmah and Mishpeṭei ha-Mazzalot were written in order to explain concepts common to the various branches of astrology that Ibn Ezra addressed elsewhere and to elucidate the worldview that underlies astrology. These two treatises are the richest and most varied with regard to the astrological information they present. Reshit Ḥokhmah and Mishpeṭei ha-Mazzalot also exemplify the close collaboration between astronomy and astrology in medieval science and are the two components of Ibn Ezra’s astrological corpus with the most extensive, comprehensive, and significant astronomical content. "A critical edition with English translation of Reshit Ḥokhmah was published in 1998 by Epstein. Sela has not only aspired to improve it but also supplied a commentary to render the text more comprehensible. Sela’s mission is successfully accomplished for both treatises. This multifarious book is another important contribution to a deeper understanding of the life and work of one of the most important medieval Jewish polymaths." - Ilana Wartenberg, Universität Bern, in: Journal for the History of Astronomy 50.1 (2019)
Language is the most essential medium of scientific activity. Many historians, sociologists and science studies scholars have investigated scientific language for this reason, but only few have examined those cases where language itself has become an object of scientific discussion. Over the centuries scientists have sought to control, refine and engineer language for various epistemological, communicative and nationalistic purposes. This book seeks to explore cases in the history of science in which questions or concerns with language have bubbled to the surface in scientific discourse. This opens a window into the particular ways in which scientists have conceived of and construed language as the central medium of their activity across different cultural contexts and places, and the clashes and tensions that have manifested their many attempts to engineer it to both preserve and enrich its function. The subject of language draws out many topics that have mostly been neglected in the history of science, such as the connection between the emergence of national languages and the development of science within national settings, and allows us to connect together historical episodes from many understudied cultural and linguistic venues such as Eastern European and medieval Hebrew science.
The present volume focuses on Henry Bate, the first scholar to bring Ibn Ezra’s astrological work to the knowledge of Latin readers, and offers critical editions of all six of Henry Bate’s complete translations of Ibn Ezra’s astrological writings.
The present volume offers the first critical edition, accompanied with English translation and commentary, of 'Sefer ha-Moladot', which addresses the doctrine of nativities and the system of continuous horoscopy in nativities, and of 'Sefer ha-Tequfah', which is devoted exclusively to continuous horoscopy in nativities. The doctrine of nativities makes predictions about the whole of an individual's subsequent life on the basis of the natal chart, and the system of continuous horoscopy in nativities is concerned with the interval between life and death and makes predictions based mainly on anniversary horoscopes, which are juxtaposed with the natal horoscope. To Abraham Ibn Ezra's mind, not only are these two doctrines the core of astrology; they also epitomize the praxis of the astrological metier."
Abraham Ibn Ezra was “reborn” in the Latin West in the last decades of the thirteenth century thanks to a plethora of authored and anonymous Latin translations of his astrological writings. The present volume offers the first critical edition, accompanied by an English translation, a commentary, and an introductory study, of Liber nativitatum (Book of Nativities) and Liber Abraham Iudei de nativitatibus (Book on Nativities by Abraham the Jew), two astrological treatises in Latin that were written by Abraham Ibn Ezra or attributed to him, and whose Hebrew source-text or archetype has not survived. The first is undoubtedly an anonymous Latin translation of the second version of Ibn Ezra’s Sefer ha-moladot (Book of Nativities), whose Hebrew source text is otherwise lost. The second is the most mysterious specimen among the Latin works attributed to Ibn Ezra that have no extant Hebrew counterpart. The present volume shows not only that the Liber Abraham Iudei de nativitatibus underwent a significant metamorphosis over time and was transmitted in four significantly different versions, but also that its date of composition is not that previously accepted by modern scholarship. "These volumes represent a major achievement in the history of medieval astrology and it is no wonder that they have already become classics, often referred to by specialists in the field, including by this reviewer." -David Juste, Ptolemaeus Arabus et Latinus, Munich, Journal for the History of Astronomy 51 (I) (2020)
The "Shadow Tree Series" comprises a unique collection of Western Esoteric studies and practices which Jacobus G. Swart, spiritual successor to William G. Gray and co-founder of the Sangreal Sodality, has actuated and taught over a period of forty years. In "The Book of Immediate Magic - Part 1" Jacobus G. Swart perpetuates the fundamental tenets of "Self Creation" in which it is maintained that the "Centre" establishes the "Circumference," and that personal reality is emanated in harmony with personal "Will." Hence this tome comprises an enhancement and expansion of the magical doctrines and techniques of Practical Kabbalah addressed in "The Book of Self Creation," "The Book of Sacred Names," and "The Book of Seals & Amulets." Jacobus Swart claims that working "Immediate Magic" is neither impossible nor difficult when we fully understand that consciousness is just one vast ocean, and that thoughts are the waves we make in it. It is all a matter of coordinating consciousness.