Eastern Religion

At a time when a lasting peace between the Palestinians and the Israelis seems unattainable, understanding the roots of their conflict is an essential step in restoring hope to the region. In The Iron Cage, Rashid Khalidi provides a lucid context for the realities on the ground today, a context that has been, until now, notably lacking in our discourse.

As more and more people in the West pursue yoga in its various forms, whether at traditional centers, in the high-powered atmosphere of sports clubs, or on their own, they begin to realize that far from being just another exercise routine, yoga is a discipline of the body and the mind. The 365 meditations included in this book offer a way to integrate the mindfulness that yoga teaches into everyday life.

The Commanding Self, in Sufic terminology, is that mixture of the primitive and conditioned responses, common to everyone, which inhibits and distorts human progress and understanding. This audiobook was described by Shah as the key to understanding his entire corpus of work. While complete in itself as an anthology of hitherto unpublished work, it serves to illustrate and amplify Idries Shah’s preceding books on the Sufi Way.

The Sufis, mystics of Islam, have been educators of the heart for some fourteen centuries. Their teachings and methods are designed to help us awaken and purify the heart, to learn to listen to our deepest knowing. In The Knowing Heart, Kabir Helminski presents the Sufi way as a practical spirituality suitable for all cultures and times—and offers insights that are especially valuable for our life in today's world. In cultivating a knowing heart, we learn to experience a new sense of self, transform our relationships, and enhance our creative capacities.

It is said that the practice of dream yoga deepens our awareness during all our experience: the dreams of the night; the dream-like experience of the day; and the bardo experiences after death. Indeed, the practice of dream yoga is a powerful tool of awakening, used for hundreds of years by the great masters of the Tibetan traditions. Unlike in the Western psychological approach to dreams, the ultimate goal of Tibetan dream yoga is the recognition of the nature of mind or enlightenment itself.

In 2001, Toni Bernhard got sick and, to her and her partner’s bewilderment, stayed that way. As they faced the confusion, frustration, and despair of a life with sudden limitations - a life that was vastly different from the one they’d thought they’d have together - Toni had to learn how to be sick. In spite of her many physical and energetic restrictions (and sometimes, because of them), Toni learned how to live a life of equanimity, compassion, and joy.

To many in the West, Orthodoxy remains shrouded in mystery, an exotic and foreign religion that survived in the East following the Great Schism of 1054 that split the Christian world into two camps - Catholic and Orthodox. However, as the second largest Christian denomination, Orthodox Christianity is anything but foreign to the nearly 300 million worshipers who practice it. For them, Orthodoxy is a living, breathing reality; a way of being Christian ultimately rooted in the person of Jesus and the experience of the early church.

Twenty-seven years ago, Matthieu Ricard gave up a promising career as a scientist to study Tibetan Buddhism—not as a detached observer but by immersing himself in its practice under the guidance of its greatest living masters. Years later, this project was born, and Ricard met with his father, Jean-Francois Revel—a French philosopher who became world famous for his challenges to both Communism and Christianity. At an inn, these two profoundly thoughtful men explored questions that have occupied humankind throughout its history.

The Urban Monk, a New York Times best seller, reveals the secrets to finding an open heart, sharp mind, and grounded sense of well-being, even in the most demanding circumstances. Shojai's no-nonsense life mastery program brings together clear tools and exercises that can elevate your existence.

Early Google engineer and personal growth pioneer Chade-Meng Tan first designed Search Inside Yourself as a popular course at Google, intended to transform the work and lives of the best and brightest behind one of the most innovative, successful, and profitable businesses in the world... and now it can do the same for you. Meng has distilled emotional intelligence into a set of practical and proven tools and skills that anyone can learn and develop.

Working from existing translations, Thomas Merton composed a series of his own versions of the classic sayings of Chuang Tzu, the most spiritual of Chinese philosophers. Chuang Tzu, who wrote in the fourth and third centuries BC, is the chief authentic historical spokesperson for Taoism and its founder, Lao Tzu (a legendary character known largely through Chuang Tzu’s writings).

Asian spiritual practices, from yoga and tai chi to qigong and mindfulness meditations, permeate our culture. But these practices are often casually used in the West, and sometimes little understood. As informative as it is inviting, A Lamp unto Yourself introduces “spiritual explorers” of all experience levels to embodied Eastern spiritual practices.

Father Thomas Hopko draws on the wisdom of the Orthodox Christian Church and the Holy Scriptures to help us understand same-sex attraction, with both compassion and clarity. Combining theological and pastoral insights, this small gem will aid pastors, those who experience same-sex desires, and anyone seeking a deeper understanding of the nature of our identity and our sexuality. This book is in reality a primer on how to overcome the passions through the traditional Christian ascetic struggle, which, of course, applies to everyone.

Current Western society would lead us to believe that acquiring financial wealth would be the answer to all of our problems. Or would it? In this thought-provoking program, author and Eastern philosopher Laurence Boldt takes you on a journey to uncover what your belief system is and just how much your life is being dictated by a misdirected desire to gain peace of mind through acquiring material wealth.

Many men have written about Tibet and its secret lore, but few have actually penetrated it to learn its ancient wisdom. Among those few was Madame Alexandra David-Neel, a French orientalist. A practicing Buddhist...she actually lived in Tibet for more than 14 years. Magic and Mystery in Tibet tells the story of her experiences in Tibet, among lamas and magicians. It is neither a travel book nor an autobiography but a study of psychic discovery, a description of the occult and mystical theories and psychic training practices of Tibet.

Historian Nigel Cliff delivers a sweeping, radical reinterpretation of Vasco da Gama's pioneering voyages, revealing their significance as a decisive turning point in the struggle between Christianity and Islam. Perfect for fans of Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage, Galileo's Daughter, and Atlantic, this first-ever complete account of da Gama's voyages includes new information from the recently discovered diaries of his sailors and an extraordinary series of letters between da Gama and the Zamorin, a king of modern-day Kerala, India.

One of the most significant and popular books in the history of human thought, and China’s earliest philosophical classic, The Dao De Jing has served for millennia as a brilliant guide to living healthily and happily, to treating the Earth with respect, and to understanding our place in the cosmos. Renowned translator J. H. Huang has spent over two decades researching the Dao, resulting in the most accurate translation to date based on the oldest known transcripts of the text.

In many ways, we seem to be living in wintry times at present in the Western world. In this new book, Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury and a noted scholar of Eastern Christianity, introduces us to some aspects and personalities of the Orthodox Christian world, from the desert contemplatives of the fourth century to philosophers, novelists and activists of the modern era, that suggest where we might look for fresh light and warmth.

Inside each of us are seven major energy centers that hold the key to our happiness, sense of ease, and well-being. Research on chakras dates back thousands of years across numerous spiritual traditions. Acupuncture, yoga, reiki, crystals, essential oils, and meditation are among the many methods used to awaken and balance chakras.

With practical teachings and detailed instructions, Ken Wilber introduces Integral Mindfulness, a new way of practicing the widely popular meditation. Integral Mindfulness applies many of the leading-edge insights of Ken Wilber's Integral Theory - the first system to combine Eastern teachings on the five stages of awakening with the eight major Western models of human development, thus portraying the complete path of human evolution.