The Works of Flavius Josephus

Josephus’s writings are a major first-century historical source on Judaism, the Jewish-Roman wars, and the social and religious world out of which rabbinic Judaism emerged. Though not a Kabbalistic text in a strict sense, readers interested in Jewish esoteric traditions find in it valuable historical background, descriptions of sects, priestly life, and the Temple context that later mystics and scholars often reference.

Flavius Josephus (c. 37–c. 100 CE) was a Jewish historian whose works are essential sources for Second Temple Judaism, early Christianity, and the broader religious world of antiquity. While not an occult writer, his historical and apologetic texts have long been mined for material relevant to biblical interpretation, angelology, apocalyptic traditions, and the history of Jewish sectarian thought.