The Kybalion

by Three Initiates

Overview

Who wrote this mysterious guide to esoteric psychology and wordly success? History has kept us guessing. Discover for yourself an occult classic that has introgued and enlightened seekers for generations.

Here are the teachings of the legendary sage Hermes Trismegistus, reinterpreted for the modern person. Said to be an ancient Egyptian man-god who fathered astrology. alchemy, and other magical arts, the mythical figure of Hermes has fascinated readers of occult literature for centuries. Magicians and gnostics in late antiquity identified Hermes Trismegistus as the author of many esoteric teachings, building the mysteru of his lineage.

Since 1908, The Kybalion—written by the hand of "Three Initiates"—has itself generated debate and controversy. Who is behind it? Do its ideas really arise from the secrets of a faraway era? And, most important, do they work for the contemporary seeker?

In this concise, engaging guide, the Three Initiates assemble Hermetic doctrine into seven compelling principles, and provide practical methods for applying these ideas for self-development in everyday life.

Fully redesigned and reset for ease of reading, this is the definitive text of an esoteric classic.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781585426430
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	05/15/2008
Series:	Tarcher Cornerstone Editions Series
Pages:	160
Sales rank:	8,394
Product dimensions:	5.16(w) x 7.00(h) x 0.42(d)
Age Range:	18 - 13 Years

About the Author

The Kybalion was anonymously printed in 1908 by "The Three Initiates". It is believed by many that The Kybalion was authored by William Walker Atkinson, either alone or with others. Atkinson was known to use many pseudonyms, and to self-publish his works. He was also the owner of the "Yogi Publication Society of Chicago", the original publisher of The Kybalion. Also suggestive is the fact that, among his earliest published pseudonymous and anonymous works may have been a series entitled The Arcane Teachings, which bears many superficial similarities to The Kybalion - The Kybalion explores seven "Hermetic Principles" while The Arcane Teachings examines seven "Arcane Laws", The Kybalion claims to be an elucidation of an ancient, unpublished Hermetic text of the same name, while The Arcane Teachings claims to reveal the wisdom of an ancient, unpublished scroll of occult aphorisms, and both books describe three "Great Planes" of reality which are further subdivided into seven lesser planes. Both books also describe three of the lesser planes as "astral black keys" analogous to the black keys on a piano, and inhabited by elemental spirits. And, both books describe the process of "Mental Alchemy" in great detail, and in nearly complete agreement with each other. There are other similarities, and The Arcane Teachings might have been Atkinson's "first draft" of material which later became The Kybalion. A common theory is that Atkinson co-wrote the book with Paul Foster Case and Michael Whitty. This theory is often held by members of Builders of the Adytum, the Mystery School later founded by Case, though the group doesn't publicly make this claim itself. In fact, this story appears to have originated with the Fraternity of Hidden Light. Other names speculatively mentioned as co-authors of The Kybalion include Harriet Case (Paul Foster Case's wife at the time), Ann Davies (who succeeded Paul Foster Case as head of the B.O.T.A.), Mabel Collins (a prominent Theosophical writer), Claude Bragdon (an architect, Theosophist, and writer on "mystic geometry"), and Claude Alexander (a well-known stage magician, mentalist, proponent of crystal gazing, and New Thought author). However, given Atkinson's prolific output under almost a dozen pseudonyms, it is debatable whether he would have needed or sought a co-author for the book.