Sefer ha-Hayyim · ספר החיים

A commentary on Sefer ha-Hayyim, which says it has comprised for its reader most of the book's secrets according to its author's intention — one intention in all his books, the knowledge of the Name, which cannot be reached without the ways of the permutation of the letters. The book is called Sefer Hayyim, it says, on account of "hai hai", and its secret is the unique Name; it is sam hayyim, an elixir of life. It opens on the book's first verse — "Raziel said: the spirit of the Lord of hosts stirred my spirit" — and on the initial letters of the verses in which the author told his name, his father's name and his lineage: "I am Abraham son of Samuel Abulafia"; tells of the four beginning students who joined Raziel at Pinon, that is Capua; sets out the two writings and their solution; and skips on to the other names and to the secrets of the vowel points. It stops without dwelling further on the names, which the author intends to explain, with the twelve-letter Name, at the end of Hotam ha-Haftarah, and announces that he will begin Sefer ha-Yashar.