Καθώς εργάζομαι σταδιακά στο επόμενο βιβλίο μου, Necronomicon Compendium, ασχολούμαι όλο και περισσότερο με τις καμπαλιστικές αντιστοιχίες των Μεγάλων Παλαιών. Έτσι, η αναζήτηση μου με οδήγησε σ’ αυτό το ενδιαφέρον κατά τα άλλα, άρθρο, το οποίο και αναδημοσιεύω από το εν λόγω ιστότοπο το οποίο προσπαθεί να σκιαγραφήσει την σχέση των Κλιφώθ με τις οντότητες του mythos, τουλάχιστον έτσι όπως παρουσιάζονται στο βιβλίο του Σίμωνα!



Part 1
The term Qliphoth, kliffoth, or klippot, is derived from the Hebrew term qelippot, meaning “peels”, “shells” or matter. The qliphoth in Kabbalah are thought of as the opposites to the sephiroth (singular sephirah). The ten sephiroth are thought to be ten divine “enumerations” or “emanations” of God into the universe. It is thought that the qliphoth are the ten (or eleven) manifestations of darkness, into which God’s divine light cannot reach. The qliphoth are the personifications of an “anti-God” condition A Hasidic view states that in the process of creation, ten sephiroth were created, each encapsuled by a qliphah. The ten sephiroth are thought to be ten divine “enumerations” or “emanations” of God into the universe. The first set of ten qliphoth proved too weak to hold the emanating force, and the lower seven of them broke. They were replaced, but the broken former set, animated by a residue of the creative power of God, remained and conflicts with those aspects of the world corresponding to the lower seven sephiroth.
Throughout my research on the Qliphoth, I began to discover that it is always said to pre-date the Judaic-Christian Kabbalistc system. This made me curious about looking further into the origins of the Kabbalah.

The Kabbalah by Alexander S. Holub, Ph.D he states on page 1 the following:
“The first mention of the Tree of Life in the Scriptures is in Genesis 3:22 (Masoretic Text). The date of the writing of this text by the Jahwist Priests was sometime around 750-700 BCE. That gives plenty of time to incorporate and include the Tree of Life idea into the religious system and its writings. If you will look at the Semitic tribes, they all had this concept playing quite prominently in their religious beliefs. The Sumerians were the first to depict a Sacred Tree: a Tree of Life. Babylon took it from the Sumerians when they overthrew their empire. Assyria then took it from the Babylonians when they conquered the Babylonian empire.”

The above quote indicates that the Tree of Life Sumerian in origin. I quickly began to realize that it is quite possible that the Judaic-Christian Kabbalah may have demonized the original Tree of Life in an effort to make their culture seem superior. According to two authoritative sources, H.P. Blavatsky and the Jewish Encyclepedia, the Jews also acquired from the Chaldeans their doctrines of Eastern mysticism. These were later developed into a written compendium of esoteric literature known as the Jewish Qabbalah or Kabalah, and in the Middle Ages as the Latin Cabala.

“Kabalah (Heb.) The hidden wisdom of the Hebrew Rabbis of the middle ages derived from the older secret doctrines concerning divine things and cosmogony, which were combined into a theology after the time of the captivity of the Jews in Babylon. All the works that fall under the esoteric category are termed Kabalistic.” (Blavatsky, Theosophical Glossary, p. 16 8)

“The Pythagorean idea of the creative powers of numbers and letters, upon which the ‘Sefer Yetzirah’ is founded, and which was known in tannaitic times…is here proved to be an old cabalistic conception. In fact, the belief in the magic power of the letters of the Tetragrammaton and other names of the Deity…seems to have originated in Chaldea (see Lenormant, ‘Chaldean Magic,’ pp. 29, 43). Whatever, then, the theurgic Cabala was …, the very fact that Abraham, and not a Talmudical hero like Akiba, is introduced in the ‘Sefer Yetzirah,’ at the close, as possessor of the Wisdom of the Alphabet, indicates an old tradition, if not the antiquity of the book itself…

“The whole dualistic system of good and of evil powers, which goes back to Zoroastrianism and ultimately to old Chaldea, can be traced through Gnosticism; having influenced the cosmology of the ancient Cabala before it reached the medieval one…

“The gradual condensation of a primal substance into visible matter, a fundamental doctrine of the Cabala, … is the ancient Semitic conception of the ‘primal ocean,’ known to the Babylonians as ‘Apsu’ (compare Jastrow, ‘Religion of Babylonia’), and called by the Gnostics βύθος = (Anz, ‘Die Frage nach dem Ursprung des Gnostizismus,’ p. 98).”

The above passages seems to indicate that the Kabala is not of Judaic origin, but it is a derives from Babylonian and Chaldean Sources. This would mean then that the Qliphoth, which predates the Judaic Kabbalistic system, was the original Kabbalistic Rite. In an article hoseted by an online Jewish Magazine, entitled MileChai.com, which can be found at this link.
It states the following:
“In the medieval era, old ideas from Babylon gained new strength. The Qliphoth, or Kelippot(קליפות the primeval “husks” of impurity), was blamed for all the evil in the world. Qliphoth are the evil twin of the Sephiroth. The tree of Qliphoth is usually called the kabbalistic Tree of Death, and sometimes the Qliphoth are called the Deathangels, or Angels of Death. The Qliphoth are found in the old Babylonian incantations, a fact used as evidence in favor of the antiquity of most of the cabalistic material.”

The above passage informs us that the Kabbalah does indeed derive from Ancient Mesopotamian sources and was demonized since the “foreign deities” could not fit into the Jewish pantheon. Another interesting perspective that we must also consider is that the term Qliphoth, meaning shell, was not an term to describe something “evil” in its inception. It is also interesting to note a “shell” was symbolic of a pregnant woman. Birth in Babylonia and in the Bible: Its Mediterranean Setting by Marten Stol, on page 52 it states:
“The combination sign for “shell” is identical: a body with water in it. The Sumerian word is iskilla; Akkadian isqillatu. The Babylonians saw this shell as a symbol of the pregnant woman…The greeks and Romans had similar associations; the cowrie shell was named “Cyprian” after the goddess Venus of Cyprus,… Clearly this shell reminded ancient man of the womb.”
The above passage informs us that the “shell” was also a symbol of a pregnant woman. The Babylonians, in their popular religion, supremely worshipped a Goddess Mother and a Son, who was represented in pictures and images as an infant or child in his mother’s arms. From Babylon, this worship of the Mother and the Child spread to the ends of the earth. In Egypt, the Mother and the Child were worshipped under the names Isis and Osiris [called most frequently Horus]…in Pagan Rome, as Fortuna and Jupiter…the boy; in Greece, as Ceres the Great Mother, with the babe at her breast…and even in Thibet [Tibet], China, and Japan, the Jesuit missionaries were astonished to find the counterpart of Madonna and her child as devoutly worshipped as in Papal Rome itself. Therefore the Qliphoth, may have been viewed as an “evil” tree in comparison to the Judaic Kabbalistc correspondences, on because it was of honored foreign deities. It is also interesting to note that the kabbalistic tree, which consists of ten Sephiroth, the ten “emanations” of God, consists of three pillars. The left side of the tree, the female side, is considered to be more destructive than the right side. Maybe the female side of the Tree was demonized in Judaic-Christian Correspondences because it reminded Christian and Jewish scholars of the ancient matriarchic rites of Babylon.

Now that we have a brief overview of the Qliphoth, we can now compare the Tree of death (Transformation) with the workings in the Simon Necronomicon, but first we must mention that there are very few people in the occult community that have publicly come forth with a understandable thesis as to how the Qliphothic Tree works. Among these are Kenneth Grand and some of the material available by an occult organization known as Dragon Rouge. Dragon Rouge has even gone as far as to base their Grade System on the Qliphothic correspondences. Here are a few things that appear of their website concerning the Qliphoth.

“The Qliphoth is the principles of the shadow and the antitheses that are hidden behind everything. The side of light in the Qabalah represents mathematical/ geometrical principles through which God created the world. The Qliphoth corresponds to fractals and principles of chaos. The Qliphoth are the dividing and destructive forces. The Qliphotic Qabalah uses the forces of destruction to free the adept from the limitations of creation. Through these forces we can learn to create. In the Qabalah, Lucifer and the fallen angels are those who first used the Qliphotic forces to free themselves from God. The principles of light are keeping the angels and the rest of creation in their firm, predetermined circles. The dark forces break these circles and make a free will and an individual existence outside God possible. The most common occultism usually warns against these forces. Under the surface of the bright occultism the dark tradition has sometimes appeared, often as a warning or as unspoken insinuations. There are three main levels of knowledge, in which the first one is our mundane knowledge and the information that the mundane science presents. Under this level we can find the light esoteric knowledge that has been transmitted through the classical occult societies. Under this level we can find the dark esoteric knowledge.

1. Esoteric knowledge: Mundane science.
2. Light esoteric knowledge: The bright tradition
3. Dark esoteric knowledge: The dark tradition.

The dark initiation is extremely rare, since it leads out into chaos and few people are able to wander this path. The light Esoterism leads to a melting together with the divine, while the dark Esoterism leads beyond the divine. The word “draconian” can also be translated as”harsh” and this is too a very fitting description of the Draconian Path. It is a harsh path but it also leads into worlds of singular beauty and power. The bright Esoterism leads to a unity with Jahve or Marduk and the ideas that they created the world from. The dark Esoterism leads out to Tehom or Tiamat who existed long before the light gods and who exists in infinity outside the light of divinity. For the initiated adept on the Draconian Path this darkness is a light, so much stronger than the light of the gods of light, that their light is experienced merely like darkness.”

Now let us compare the Qliphothic Grade System that is used by Dragon Rouge with some of the working in the Simon Necronomicon to see how they compare. The whole foundation of the Walking in the Simon Necronomicon is found on page 6:
“I have seen the Unknown Lands, that no map has ever charted. I have lived in the deserts and the wastelands, and spoken with demons and the souls of slaughtered men, and of women who have dies in childbirth, victims of the she-fiend LAMMASHTA”

The above passage mentions the Mad Arab’s Journey starting with, or witnessing the work of LAMMASHTA. LAMMASHTA is a derivative of Lamashtu, who later became known as Lilith. Lamashtu can also be described as the Black Earth (NINHURSAG). This is a subject that we covered in a prior discussion. Please checkout here.
Next the Mad Arab continues on page 6:
“I have traveled beneath the Seas, in search of the Palace of Our Master, and found the stone of monuments of vanquished civilisations, and deciphered the writings of some of these; while still others remain mysteries to any man who lives. And these civilisations were destroyed because of the knowledge contained in this book.”

The ‘vanquished civilisations’ that the Mad Arab stumbled upon, were indeed the seven gates that after the Gate of Adar lead to the Sphere of Enki, or the Palace of our Master. Notice the Chart that is an excerpt from the SUPLEMENTARY MATERIAL TO 777

Now let us look at the Mad Arab’s following words on page 6:
“I have traveled among the stars, and trembled before the Gods. I have, at last, found the formulae by which I passed the Gate ARZIR, and passed into the forbidden realms of the foul IGIGI”

According the SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL TO 777, the realms of the IGIGI would be the Sphere of ENKI. Now that we have a brief overview of the GateWalking Path, let us look at the Qliphothic Grade System of Dragon Rouge:

The tree of Knowledge (The Qliphoth)

Here is an outline of the Qliphotic Initiatory path:
1. Lilith 1.0°. The gate to the unknown. (LAMMASHTA/NINHURSAG/LILITH)
———
2. Gamaliel 2.0°. (NANNA GATE)The dark dreams. Astral magic. Witchcraft. The mysteries of the dark moon. The dark Goddess.
3. Samael 3.0°. (NEBO GATE)The philosophy of the left hand path. The wisdom of insanity. Yezidi magic. The dark side of the Chakras.
4. A’arab Zaraq 4.0°.(ISHTAR GATE) Luciferian magic. The dark side of Venus. Eroto-mysticism and the path of the warrior.
5. Thagirion. 5.0°. (SHAMMASH GATE) The illumination of the nightside. The black sun. The union of the god and the beast.
6. Golachab 6.0°. (NERGAL GATE) Ragnarök. The activation of Surt/Sorath. The magnetism of lust and suffering.
7. Gha’agsheblah 7.0°. (MARDUK GATE) The higher levels of eroto mysticism. Preparations for the abyss.
8. Satariel 8.0°. (ADAR GATE) The opening of the eye os Lucifer/Shiva/Odin. The Drakon principle.
9. Ghagiel 9.0°. (SPHERE OF ENKI/ZODIAC/IGIGI)The lightening of the Luciferian star.
10. Thaumiel 10.0°. (SPHERE OF ENLIL/ Sphere of the Primum Mobile) The accomplishment of the promise given by the serpent. Divinity.
———
11 Thaumiel 11.0°.(SPHERE OF ANU/TIAMAT) The black hole. The step into the new creation. Universe B.
For more information on the Dragon Rouge: www.dragonrouge.net
We can see that the Qliphothic Initiatory System of Dragon Rouge lines up perfectly with the Initiatory System of GateWalking that is found in the Simon Necronomicon. This means that the Rites in the Simon Necronomicon are without a doubt Qliphothic in nature. We will continue to explore this subject in our second esay on the Qliphothic Tree of Transformaion.
The method of the NECRONOMICON concerns deep, primeval forces that seem to pre-exist the normal archetypal images of the tarot trumps and the Golden Dawn telesmatic figures. These are forces that developed outside the Judeo-Christian mainstream, and were worshipped and summoned long before the creation of the Qabala as we know it today. Hence, the ineffectiveness of the Golden Dawn banishing procedures against them. They are not necessarily demonic or qliphotic in the sense that these terms are commonly understood in the West, they just simply represent power sources largely untapped and thus far ignored by twentieth-century, mainstream consciousness.”

“Know that the Seven Spheres must be entered in their times and in their seasons, one at a time, and never the one before the other. Know that the Four beasts of the Spaces claim the blood of the initiate, each in their own time and season. Know that TIAMAT seeks ever to rise to the stars, and when the Upper is united to the Lower, then a new Age will come of Earth, and the Serpent shall be made whole, and the Waters will be as One, when on high the heavens had not been named”

Part 2
This is our second discussion about the BANDAR sign. Previously, we were able to discover, by comparing several passages within the Simon Necronomicon, that the Watcher is KUTULU. The next question that arises would be; who is KUTULU? It would seem as if this question is already answered in the Simon Necronomicon, on page 188 where it states: “…,the Ancient Worm, TIAMAT, the ABYSS, also called KUTULU, the Corpse-God,” It would seem as if this reference would indicate that TIAMAT was KUTULU, or a male aspect of TIAMAT. Would this be ABSU? Simon himself states, in the Introduction the following words: “although both names are mentioned independently of each other, indicating that somehow KUTULU is the male counterpart of TIAMAT, similar to ABSU.” This passage indicates that KUTULU is not ABSU, but one that is similar to him. Let us look a little further.
In our last discussion about the BANDAR we spoke a little bit about the god NERGAL, as he is the lord of the Underworld. Let us look a little further into the history of NERGAL, as he might be a candidate for the title of KUTULU. Wikipedia offers us this description of NERGAL:

“The name Nergal (or Nirgal, Nirgali) refers to a deity in Babylonia with the main seat of his cult at Cuthah represented by the mound of Tell-Ibrahim. Nergal is mentioned in the Hebrew bible as the deity of the city of Cuth (Cuthah): “And the men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, and the men of Cuth made Nergal” (2 Kings, 17:30). He is the son of Enlil and Ninlil……,Nergal was also the deity who presides over the netherworld, and who stands at the head of the special pantheon assigned to the government of the dead (supposed to be gathered in a large subterranean cave known as Aralu or Irkalla). In this capacity he has associated with him a goddess Allatu or Ereshkigal, though at one time Allatu may have functioned as the sole mistress of Aralu, ruling in her own person. In some texts the god Ninazu is the son of Nergal by Allatu/Ereshkigal.
Ordinarily Nergal pairs with his consort Laz. Standard iconography pictured Nergal as a lion, and boundary-stone monuments symbolise him with a mace surmounted by the head of a lion.
Nergal’s fiery aspect appears in names or epithets such as Lugalgira, Sharrapu (”the burner,” perhaps a mere epithet), Erra, Gibil (though this name more properly belongs to Nusku), and Sibitti. Certain confusion exists in cuneiform literature between Ninurta and Nergal. Nergal has epithets such as the “raging king,” the “furious one,” and the like. A play upon his name — separated into three elements as Ne-uru-gal (lord of the great dwelling) — expresses his position at the head of the nether-world pantheon.
In the late Babylonian astral-theological system Nergal is related to the planet Mars. As a fiery god of destruction and war, Nergal doubtless seemed an appropriate choice for the red planet, and he was equated by the Greeks either to the combative demigod Heracles (Latin Hercules) or to the war-god Ares (Latin Mars) — hence the current name of the planet. In Babylonian ecclesiastical art the great lion-headed colossi serving as guardians to the temples and palaces seem to symbolize Nergal, just as the bull-headed colossi probably typify Ninurta.
Nergal’s chief temple at Cuthah bore the name Meslam, from which the god receives the designation of Meslamtaeda or Meslamtaea, “the one that rises up from Meslam”. The name Meslamtaeda/Meslamtaea indeed is found as early as the list of gods from Fara while the name Nergal only begins to appear in the Akkadian period. Amongst the Hurrians and later Hittites her was known as Aplu, a name derived from the Akkadian Aplu Enlil, meaning “the son of Enlil”. As God of the plague, he was invoked during the “plague years” during the reign of Suppiluliuma, when this disease spread from Egypt.
The cult of Nergal does not appear to have spread as widely as that of Ninurta, but in the late Babylonian and early Persian period, syncretism seems to have fused the two divinities, which were invoked together as if they were identical. Hymns and votive and other inscriptions of Babylonian and Assyrian rulers frequently invoke him, but we do not learn of many temples to him outside of Cuthah. Sennacherib speaks of one at Tarbisu to the north of Nineveh, but significantly, although Nebuchadnezzar II (606 BC - 586 BC), the great temple-builder of the neo-Babylonian monarchy, alludes to his operations at Meslam in Cuthah, he makes no mention of a sanctuary to Nergal in Babylon. Local associations with his original seat — Kutha — and the conception formed of him as a god of the dead acted in making him feared rather than actively worshipped. Nergal was also called Ni-Marad in Akkadian. Like Lugal Marad in Sumerian, the name means “king of Marad,” a city, whose name means “Rebellion” in Akkadian, as yet unidentified. The name Ni-Marad, in Akkadian means “Lord of Marad”. The chief deity of this place, therefore, seems to have been Nergal, of whom, therefore, Lugal-Marad or Ni-Marad is another name. Thus, some scholars have drawn the connection of Ni-Marad being yet another deified name for Nimrod, the rebel king of Babylon and Assyria mentioned in Genesis 10: 8-11.
[Nergal in demonology
Being a deity of the desert, and a god of fire, the negative aspects of the sun, and the underworld, and also being a god of one of the religions who rivalled Christianity and Judaism, Nergal was sometimes called a demon and even being identified with Satan. According to Collin de Plancy and Johann Weyer, Nergal was said to be the chief of Hell’s “secret police”, and said to be “an honorary spy in the service of Beelzebub.”

From the above definition, given to us through Wikipedia, we can see that NERGAL is definitely the ruler of the Underworld. This is very interesting since Simon defines KUTULU as ‘man of the Underworld.’ We also find out something else in our review of the definition of NERGAL, that indeed the GateWalking Process in the Simon Necronomicon is that of the Qlippothic Tree.
The Simon Necronomicon gives us this description of NERGAL in the gate of NERGAL:

“He has the head of a man on the body of a lion, and bears a sword and a flail…., He was thought to be an agent of the Ancient Ones, for he dwelt in CUTHA, for some time.”

Later in the Urilla text we are given the description of the Seal of KUTULU, we read:
“And the Third comes from the South, and is called LAMAS, and is of the Shape of a Lion, but with a human head, and governs those things of the Flame and Burning Wind”

The above passage describes certain elements of the seal of KUTULU, as equivalent to that found in the description of NERGAL during the GateWalking Process. This would mean that the GateWalkers of the Simon Necronomicon are indeed working with the Qlippothic Tree.
The energies of the Qlippothic Tree, as encountered in the GateWalking Process, are also seen in the words of the Mad Arab himself. On page 6 of the Simon Necronomicon it states:

“I have trod all the Zones of the Gods, and also the place of the Azonei, and have descended unto the fowl places of Death and Eternal Thirst, which may be reached through the Gate of GANZIR, which was built in UR, in the days before Babylon was.”

The Mad Arab’s description of GANZIR was to be later echoed in the words of the MAGAN text, giving us solid evidence that the workings in the Simon Necronomicon are those of the Qlippothic Tree. Notice his opening words in the MAGAN text:

“The verses here following come from the secret text of some of the priests of a cult which is all that is left of the Old Path that existed before Babylon was built, and it was originally in their tongue, but I have put it into the Golden speech of my country so you may understand it. I came upon this text in my early wanderings in the region of the Seven Fabled Cities of UR, which are no more..,”

It is clear that since these ‘cities’ no longer exist, the Mad Arab could only access them by going into the Underworld, or though the Gate of GANZIR. This would be the Tree of Death or the Qlippothic Tree. This is also the reason why he states in the Magan text the following words:

“, it tells of the .., horrors and ugliness that the Priest will encounter in his Rites are herein described, and their reasons, and their natures, and Essences…, I copied these words down in my tongue and kept them faithfully these many years, and my own copy will go with me to the place where I will go when my Spirit is torn from my body.”

The Mad Arab gives us his description of his walk upon the Qlippothic Tree before his departure:

“But now, after One Thousand-and-One moons of the journey, the Maskim nip at my heads, the Rabishu pull at my hair. Lammashta opens her dread jaws AZAG-THOTH gloats blindly at his throne, KUTULU raises his head and stares up through the Veils of sunken Varloomi, up through the Abyss..,”

This is very similar to the account given to us in the Magan Text:
“AZAG-THOTH screamed upon the throne.
CUTHULU lurched forth from his sleep…;
The Eye of the Throne took flight.”

The forces that the Mad Arab describes in the latter part of his first Testimony are the same forces that Ishtar encountered when she went into the Underworld. This would indicate that the workings of the Necronomicon are those of the Qlippothic Tree. This would even give reason for the Maqlu text’s purpose, since one was traveling through the Underworld, they would have to constantly defend themselves against the evil forces. It is interesting to note that Shammash often protected Dumuzi in his efforts to escape from the Underworld. The Simon Necronomicon on page 77 states: “The arms should be in the attitude of a Priest of SHAMMASH,” This indicates that in a similar way as Dumuzi, while he was in the Underworld, the worker of the Necronomicon Rites can also seek refuge in SHAMMASH. There are many references in the Simon Necronomicon that indicate the workings contained therein are those of the Qlippothic Tree. One of the most solid references to indicate this is found in the Invocation of the NERGAL Gate. Keeping in mind that NERGAL is the ruler of the Underworld, notice what is mentioned in his INVOCATION as found on page 58:

“Gate of the Lord of the ARRA and the AGGA, Open!”

NERGAL is described in his INVOCATION as being the Lord of the ARRA and the AGGA. Since NERGAL is ruler of the Underworld, his Lordship over the ARRA and AGGA would also make these elements of the Underworld. This would fit the description of a reference cited in our first discussion about the BANDAR.

“The whole underworld was said to be ruled over by Nergal, god of wisdom, and was divided into seven spheres or regions, each under the guardianship of a watcher stationed at a massive portal. The deceased is represented as a traveler who must surrender a portion of his vestments (his sheaths of consciousness) to each one of the seven guardians in turn.”

The above discussion gives us solid evidence that the workings of the Simon Necronomicon are those of the Qlippothic Tree. We will see later in our discussion why this is somewhat vital in defining the identity of KUTULU. Let us now consider, why anyone would want to work with the alleged Tree of Death?
It should first be noted that the Kabbalah as we know it today is not of Judaic origin. According to two authoritative sources, H.P. Blavatsky and the Jewish Encyclopedia, the Jews also acquired from the Chaldeans their doctrines of Eastern mysticism. These were later developed into a written compendium of esoteric literature known as the Jewish Qabbalah or Kabalah, and in the Middle Ages as the Latin Cabala.

“Kabalah (Heb.) The hidden wisdom of the Hebrew Rabbis of the middle ages derived from the older secret doctrines concerning divine things and cosmogony, which were combined into a theology after the time of the captivity of the Jews in Babylon. All the works that fall under the esoteric category are termed Kabalistic.” (Blavatsky, Theosophical Glossary, p. 168)”

Since the Kabbalah is not of Judaic origin, the Jewish scholars demonized what their predecessors taught them since they could not integrate foreign deities into the Jewish tradition. What is called the Tree of Life today is actually a perversion of a more ancient tradition. Edgar James Banks informs us of this very same thing in his 1903 work entitled The Biblical World:

“The story says that the Cutheans, together with the other captives, thus forced to live in a foreign, refused to adopt the religion of Yahweh, the Lord of the land and as a punishment…, lions were sent to destroy them.”

The above passage shows us the hostility that flourished at times between the Jews and some of the surrounding nations. It shows us that the Jews, like any other people demonized the religion and customs of their oppressors, mainly Babylon and Egypt. This means that the traditional view of the Qlippothic Tree is just that, a tradition, or perspective.
Another thing to consider is that the Qlippothic Tree is considered to be older than the Tree of Life, as known from the Judaic perspective. Notice some definitions given to the Qlippothic Tree by Wikipedia:

“A Hasidic view states that in the process of creation, ten sephiroth were created, each encapsuled by a qliphah. The ten sephiroth are thought to be ten divine “enumerations” or “emanations” of God into the universe. The first set of ten qliphoth proved too weak to hold the emanating force, and the lower seven of them broke. They were replaced, but the broken former set, animated by a residue of the creative power of God, remained and conflicts with those aspects of the world corresponding to the lower seven sephiroth.”

The above passage shows us that the Qlippothic Tree preceded the so-called Tree of Life in the Judaic Tradition. I find it amazing that anything of value preceding the Judeo-Christian era, is often times considered demonic, or pre-historic.
Since the so-called Qlippothic Tree is found to be of a more ancient origin than the Judaic Tree of Life, it is probable that the tradition held in the Qlippothic Tree was one of benefit and value to people that used this system in Pre-Judaic times. The purpose of the Qlippothic Tree can be found in the following passage from the Dragon Rouge website, located here.

“he Qliphoth is the principles of the shadow and the antitheses that are hidden behind everything. The side of light in the Qabalah represents mathematical/ geometrical principles through which God created the world. The Qliphoth corresponds to fractals and principles of chaos. The Qliphoth are the dividing and destructive forces. The Qliphotic Qabalah uses the forces of destruction to free the adept from the limitations of creation. Through these forces we can learn to create. In the Qabalah, Lucifer and the fallen angels are those who first used the Qliphotic forces to free themselves from God. The principles of light are keeping the angels and the rest of creation in their firm, predetermined circles. The dark forces break these circles and make a free will and an individual existence outside God possible.”

The above passage clearly shows a great benefit in working with the Qlippothic Tree. It is also interesting to note that in the above passage, the result from working with the Qlippothic Tree is what broke the angels away from their fixed position. We can also see that the Qlippothic Tree was labeled demonic by the later Jewish and Christian sectors since it did not fit into their religious scheme. This is also confirmed by Richard Laurence, who translation of the Book of Enoch first appeared in 1821 states:

“Yet Josephus, notwithstanding his constant efforts in the direction of Israel’s unmerited glorification, and though he does attribute that science (of Wisdom) to the Jewish Enoch- writes history.” He shows those pillars as still existing during his own time. He tells us that they were built by Seth; and so they may have been, only neither by the Patriarch of that name, the fabled son of Adam, nor by the Egyptian god of Wisdom –Teth, Set, Thoth, Tat, Sat (the later Sat-an), or Hermes, who are all one- but by the “sons of the Serpent-god,” or “Sons of the Dragon,” the name under which the Hierophants of Egypt and Babylon were known before the Deluge, as were their forefathers, the Atlanteans.”

The above passage indicates clearly all that we have stated, and it also shows us that certain ancient teachings were indeed co-opted into Judaic-Christian traditions with a different understanding. The effects of the Pre-Judaic-Christian era were not one of chaos, but one that exerted more power. The Qlippothic Tree, also referred to as the Tree of Death is not a negative force, but one that is more potent. In esoteric schools of thought ‘death ‘is often times defined as transformation. Richard Laurence comments on this as well:

“This kind of easy death, or euthanasia, has an esoteric meaning. It symbolizes the death of any adept who has reached the power and degree, as also the purification, which enable him to die only in the physical body and still live and lead a life in his astral body.”

These adepts are able to live on eternally. The Mad Arab states on page five of the Simon Necronomicon:

“I have seen One Thousand and One moons, and surely this is enough for the span of a man’s life, though it is said the Prophets lived much longer.”

From the Mad Arab’s statement ‘surely this is enough for the span a man’s life,’ indicates that his astral body was fully mature and ready to live on as a conscious entity, and he could disregard his physical body whenever he chose. The Prophets that he speaks of as ‘living longer’ was indeed a reference to Enoch, who lived 365 years and was the seventh in line from Adam. This number 365 is symbolic of the solar year. Evidently the rites of Enoch were those of a solar current which came after the Draconian rites of the ancient Sumerians. The gods of Ancient Sumeria were said to be children of the Dragon. Enoch represented a class of priests who were keepers of the secret wisdom, also attributed to Hermes and Thoth. The scribe that taught the Mad Arab was indeed Nebo. We find the following quote of great support to our discussion, which can be found at this website.

Mesopotamian Magic
The Qabalah owes its origin to prior Assyrian origins. The usual attributions to the Etz Chaim are:
In which Ishtar is Venus, Marduk is Jupiter, Nergal is Mars, Nabu is Mercury, Ninurtu is Saturn, Shamash the Sun and Sin the Moon. However, this is confusing, because there are only 28 paths on the Assyrian tree, not 32. Moreover, the Assyrian syllabary has 30 signs, not 22 letters as in the Hebrew alphabet. The 8-rayed star, symbol of divinity, may be taken as the eight atus missing from the conventional Tarot. Moreover, Ninurtu, “Saturn” is missing from the above diagram and the Gods (corresponding to the planets) are placed differently. The Babylonian system, being much older than the Hebrew version, must be taken as more correct, but the details have not been completely worked out. It’s clear that they used a 60-based numerological system and that they practiced an early form of gematria.
Notice in the Assyrian Tree of Life that each branch has 7 leaves (”for the healing of nations”) which are repetitions of the 7 large leaves near the top. These leaves represent the planets. Therefore the historical attributions of the sephiroth must not be quite correct. They may be zodiacal representations.”