John Friend is a nom de plume. Behind it is an esotericist, occultist, scholar, and translator who has spent years immersed in the Arabic manuscript tradition — reading what most academics catalog but never open, and translating what has never before appeared in any Western language. His work sits at the crossroads of Islamic esotericism, Solomonic magic, and the living tradition of ʿilm al-ḥurūf (the science of letters). He translates not as an outsider looking in, but as a student of the tradition itself.
The Series
Arabic Islamicate Occult Manuscripts in Translation
A seven-volume series presenting the first complete English translations of major Arabic grimoires and esoteric texts — works that have circulated in manuscript form for centuries but were never rendered into any Western language until now.
The series spans Solomonic conjuration, planetary magic, talismanic science, jinn taxonomy, the science of letters and magic squares, and the operational ritual tradition preserved in the great compilations of al-Būnī and his successors.
Available on Amazon.
For inquiries: hello@johnfriendpublishing.com