Asian Religions

This landmark collection is the definitive introduction to the Buddha's teachings - in his own words. The American scholar-monk Bhikkhu Bodhi, whose voluminous translations have won widespread acclaim, here presents selected discourses of the Buddha from the Pali Canon, the earliest record of what the Buddha taught. Divided into 10 thematic chapters, In the Buddha's Words reveals the full scope of the Buddha's discourses, from family life and marriage to renunciation and the path of insight.

In Why I Am a Hindu, one of India’s finest public intellectuals gives us a profound book about one of the world’s oldest and greatest religions. Starting with a close examination of his own belief in Hinduism, he ranges far and wide in his study of the faith.

Lost Enlightenment recounts how, between the years 800 and 1200, Central Asia led the world in trade and economic development, the size and sophistication of its cities, the refinement of its arts, and, above all, in the advancement of knowledge in many fields. Central Asians achieved signal breakthroughs in astronomy, mathematics, geology, medicine, chemistry, music, social science, philosophy, and theology, among other subjects.

Author David Shi explores the history and practice of shamanism. What is it? Where is it from? How does one become a shaman? Shi guides listeners through unfamiliar territory—the landscape of North Asia—and through what are largely hidden and unfamiliar traditions. Spirit Voices takes and in-depth look at three main cultural shamanic traditions: Turkic, Mongolic, and Tungus.

Have you ever looked up at a wide, silent sky and felt like something was watching—not judging, not speaking, just present? For the ancient nomads of Central Asia, that feeling had a name: Tengri. Tengrism: A Beginner’s Guide is your invitation into one of the oldest and least understood spiritual traditions on Earth. Before there were temples, before scripture, before borders—there was the steppe, the sky, and a way of life rooted in balance, reverence, and unspoken connection. This book doesn’t just explain Tengrism. It brings it to life with the clarity of a storyteller and the ...

In just over a hundred years - from the death of Muhammad in 632 to the beginning of the Abbasid Caliphate in 750 - the followers of the Prophet swept across the whole of the Middle East, North Africa, and Spain. Their armies threatened states as far flung as the Franks in Western Europe and the Tang Empire in China. The conquered territory was larger than the Roman Empire at its greatest expansion, and it was claimed for the Arabs in roughly half the time.

At the beginning of his career, Joseph Campbell developed a lasting fascination with the cultures of the Far East, and explorations of Buddhist and Hindu philosophy later became recurring motifs in his vast body of work. However, Campbell had to wait until middle age to visit the lands that inspired him so deeply. In 1954, he took a sabbatical from his teaching position and embarked on a year-long voyage through India, Thailand, Cambodia, Burma, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and finally Japan.

This book offers a complete translation of the Majjhima Nikāya, or Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha, one of the major collections of texts in the Pāli Canon, the authorised scriptures of Theravada Buddhism. This collection - among the oldest records of the historical Buddha's original teachings - consists of 152 suttas or discourses of middle length, distinguished as such from the longer and shorter suttas of the other collections.

The Shaolin Monastery charts for the first time in any language the history of the Shaolin Temple and the evolution of its world-renowned martial arts. In this meticulously researched and eminently readable study Meir Shahar considers the economic political and religious factors that led Shaolin monks to disregard the Buddhist prohibition against violence and instead create fighting techniques that by the 21st century have spread throughout the world.

This book details the history, rituals, and beliefs of the major traditional religions of China: universal animism, polydemonism, specters, ancestral worship, Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. He thought that one spiritual essence could be detected beneath a great variety of religious, philosophical, and even political expressions in China, and his lifework was the discovery and exposition of that essence.

This book is a result of the author's many years of personal reflections on the relationship between Islam and the wisdoms of China. These wisdoms are the wisdoms of Buddhism, Confucianism and Taoism, and together, they form the San Chiao, or 'Three Teachings' of the Chinese worldview. Through his Chinese legacy, the author tries to make connections with the Islamic worldview and finds they are inter-related in many ways. He discovers that Chinese wisdoms and practices are, to a large extent, Islamic. A Chinese who enters Islam, therefore, need not abandon his Chinese roots as he takes on ...

Nine out of ten Japanese claim some affiliation with Shinto, but in the West the religion remains the least studied of the major Asian spiritual traditions. It is so interlaced with Japanese cultural values and practices that scholarly studies usually focus on only one of its dimensions: Shinto as a "nature religion", an "imperial state religion", a "primal religion", or a "folk amalgam of practices and beliefs". Thomas Kasulis' fresh approach to Shinto explains with clarity and economy how these different aspects interrelate.

From “perhaps the foremost interpreter of Eastern disciplines for the contemporary West—and an author who ‘had the rare gift of ‘writing beautifully the unwritable’” (Los Angeles Times)—a guide that draws on Chinese Taoism to reexamine humanity’s place in the natural world and...

A celebrated social psychologist offers a radical new perspective on cultural differences that reveals why some countries, cultures, and individuals take rules more seriously and how following the rules influences the way we think and act. In Rule Makers, Rule Breakers, Michele Gelfand, “an...

Afghanistan traces the historic struggles and the changing nature of political authority in this volatile region of the world, from the Mughal Empire in the 16th century to the Taliban resurgence today. Thomas Barfield introduces listeners to the bewildering diversity of tribal and ethnic groups in Afghanistan, explaining what unites them as Afghans despite the regional, cultural, and political differences that divide them.

The original mindfulness book, in a landmark new translation by the award-winning translator of the I Ching and The Art of War The most translated book in the world after the Bible, the Tao Te Ching, or “Book of the Tao,” is a guide to cultivating a life of peace, serenity, and compassion...

Listening to this story nurtures a strong positive feeling of protection and well-being within the Heart chakra, stimulates the energy of the sternum bone that produces the antibodies that fight infection, and is of particular benefit to mankind today, as the world struggles to cope with the many physical and psychological challenges and the increasing pressures of modern life. This is a Devi Mahatmyam for our time.

Set in the nineteenth century, World Odyssey (The World Duology, #1) follows the fortunes of three young travelers as each embarks on an epic journey. Their dramatic adventures span sixteen years and see them engage with Native American Indians, Barbary Coast pirates, Aborigines, Maoris and Pacific Islanders as they travel around the world - from America to Africa, from England to the Canary Islands, to Australia, New Zealand and Samoa. Ambitious American adventurer Nathan Johnson's journey begins when he runs away to sea to escape a violent father. After surviving a shipwreck and ...

Confucius is perhaps the most important philosopher in history. Today his teachings shape the daily lives of more than 1.6 billion people. Throughout East Asia, Confucius' influence can be seen in everything from business practices and family relationships to educational standards and government policies. Even as Western ideas from Christianity to Communism have bombarded the region, Confucius' doctrine has endured as the foundation of East Asian culture.

This volume offers a complete translation of the Saṃyutta Nikāya, The Connected Discourses of the Buddha, the third of the four great collections in the Sutta Pitaka of the Pāli Canon. The Saṃyutta Nikāya consists of 56 chapters, each governed by a unifying theme that binds together the Buddha's suttas or discourses.