Definition of cabala

What does the word cabala mean?

• part of speech: noun

  A Hebrew word, denoting the general body of tradition interpreting the canonical books in their figurative as well as their direct sense, the Masorah, or unwritten tradition, setting forth its literal meaning. (Pharisees; Sadducees; Talmud.) As dealing with the secondary meanings of Scripture, the Cabala became associated with magic, and the Christian Cabalists made a profession of divining by combinations of scriptural characters. See Sortes.