Ordinary TV detectives normally get a result through hard work - gruelling hours of surveillance and trawling through data bases, tough talk in interview rooms. Or they operate via neat work with their fists or quick work with a Heckler& Koch. And they drive everywhere, usually very fast.

Adam Kadmon is an extraordinary detective, with an extra-sensory modus operandi. He's given up driving - the psychic emanations of an urban gridlock can literally obstruct his vision - but his observation techniques transcend the ordinary limitations of space and time. His data bases are the intra-mundane spaces and the aethyric zones. He seeks clues in the pattern of a Tarot spread or the shape of an ancient sigil. He addresses angels and interrogates demons.

It's hard and dangerous work. Adam can handle himself smartly enough when it comes to physical threats but inevitably his divinations lead him into life-threatening encounters.

And there's a more subtle danger. Existing on multiple reality levels, even for a short time, makes huge demands on him, both physically and psychologically, especially when he's forced to confront - and subdue - the darker aspects of those realities. He's risked burnout, madness, and alienation from those he loves.

Only through the disciplines of an ancient spiritual tradition - the Kabbalah - can he find the equilibrium that he needs to resolve the dangers and dilemmas of his vocation. Moreover, it's through the Kabbalah that he aspires to a deeper understanding of the cosmos and his place in it.

Kabbalah is a mystical system of speculation and magical practice, derived from the secret teachings of Judaism, but developed by non-Jews over the last five hundred years to create a structure - still evolving - that integrates different aspects of the Western esoteric tradition - magic, Tarot, clairvoyance and all the psychic gifts. It provides a framework for ritual, a focus for meditation, a map of inner space and a route - jagged as a lightning-flash - to a divine Source of all consciousness.

Yet it's also a system in which practitioners have to live in the real world and embrace its contradictions, as Adam does. It's rooted in the notion that even the humblest aspects of existence can have a divine significance, and organised around a simple concept that contains a wealth of complexities - The Tree of Life

Each of the ten Spheres or Sephiroth on the Tree reflects a different level of reality, an aspect of the human mind, and a facet of the Creator, carrying with it a whole network of associations and correspondences. The twenty-two Paths that link the Sephiroth correspond with the major cards of the Tarot and signify a change or transformation.

Every episode takes its name from one of the Sephiroth or one of the Paths. The Babalon Working Group have written several sample episodes. Barry Kavanagh's episode can be found at Hellshaw. You can also read an extract from Paul A Green's episode Hod.

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