Religions East

In a 2010 terrorist plot, Al-Qaeda hid a bomb in a FedEx shipment addressed to Reynald de Chatillon, a knight who had died centuries ago in the Crusades. A reviled figure in Islamic history, often portrayed as the very epitome of brutality, Reynald remains as controversial - and as vividly present in the minds of many in the Middle East - as the story of the Crusades themselves.

Whatever else the United States intended when it invaded Iraq in the spring of 2003, it was not to hand the country over to a 32-year-old militant cleric who fought against the U.S. presence from the start and was described by former Iraqi administrator L. Paul Bremer III as a "Bolshevik Islamist".

The Muslim Brotherhood, or Ikhwan, has engaged in terrorism, assassinations, and anti-Western, anti-Semitic rhetoric and violence for almost a century - yet few Americans realize how powerful they really are. While we focus on al Qaeda, Hamas, and Hezbollah, it's actually the Muslim Brotherhood, the world's oldest, most influential, and most anti-American Islamist group, that has become the preeminent voice and power in the Muslim world.

Shahan Mufti’s family history, which he can trace back 1,400 years to the inner circle of the prophet Muhammad, offers an enlightened perspective on the mystifying history of Pakistan. Mufti uses the stories of his ancestors, many of whom served as judges and jurists in Muslim sharia courts of South Asia for many centuries, to reveal the deepest roots - real and imagined - of Islamic civilization in Pakistan.

Pensadores de Oriente es una colección de anécdotas y “parábolas en acción” que ilustran el acercamiento lúcido y eminentemente práctico de los maestros derviches orientales. Este material, el cual es una destilación de las enseñanzas de más cien sabios provenientes de tres continentes, hace hincapié en lo experiencial por sobre lo teórico; y es justamente tal característica particular del estudio Sufi la que provee su impacto y vitalidad única. El énfasis de Pensadores de Oriente contrasta fuertemente con el concepto que Occidente tiene de Oriente.

This book describes the inevitable evolution of Christian dogma towards greater inclusivity. The pathway of this future evolution leads to an understanding that the individual soul’s relationship to God is the goal of the spiritual life. The beauty, harmony, and sacredness of individual spiritual traditions need not be sacrificed but may someday be understood in a deeper and more personally meaningful light.

There are many reasons why it might seem unwise to walk, mostly alone, through the Middle East. That, in part, is exactly why Leon McCarron did it. From Jerusalem, McCarron followed a series of wild hiking trails that trace ancient trading and pilgrimage routes and traverse some of the most contested landscapes in the world. In the West Bank, he met families struggling to lead normal lives amidst political turmoil and had a surreal encounter with the world's oldest and smallest religious sect.

Inside Syria and Iraq, and even along the refugee trail, they’re a religious minority persecuted for their Christian faith. Outside the Middle East, they’re suspect because of their nationality. A small remnant of Christians is on the run from the Islamic State. If they are wiped out, or scattered to the corners of the earth, the language that Jesus spoke may be lost forever - along with the witness of a church that has modeled Jesus’ way of nonviolence and enemy-love for two millennia.

The continuing crisis in Syria has raised a question mark over the common perception of Middle Eastern affairs as an offshoot of global power politics. To Western intellectuals, foreign-policy experts, and politicians, "empire" and "imperialism" are categories that apply exclusively to the European powers and more recently to the United States of America. Lacking an internal dynamic of its own, the view of such people is that Middle Eastern history is the product of its unhappy interaction with the West.

Before September 11, 2001, one terrorist group had killed more Americans than any other: Hezbollah, the “Party of God.” Today it remains potentially more dangerous than even al Qaeda. Yet little has been known about its inner workings, past successes, and future plans–until now.

I have sought to indicate what scope there is for such research work, and I have devoted a special chapter to Sir Laurence Gomme’s luminous analysis of the water cults prevailing in Britain and its isles with a view to indicating the methods of research adopted by him. If we follow the same lines in tracing the ancestry of the Indian customs and beliefs, we may hope to throw some fresh light on the cultural history of the ancestors, or at all events the immediate predecessors, of the people among whom we now find them prevailing.

We live in the age of religious pluralism where all religions are considered the same and different paths lead to the same spiritual destination. It is important for Christians to learn how to affirm Jesus Christ as the only way to God - while also paying due respect to people of other faiths and worldviews. In The Unknown God: A Journey with Jesus from East to West, Mathew P. John explores the redemptive revelations lurking in the darkness outside the boundaries of Christian tradition.

In 1989, Francis Fukuyama famously announced the "end of history." The Berlin Wall had fallen; liberal democracy had won out. But what of illiberal democracy - the idea that popular majorities, working through the democratic process, might reject gender equality, religious freedoms, and other norms that Western democracies take for granted? Nowhere have such considerations become more relevant than in the Middle East, where the uprisings of 2011 swept the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist groups to power.

On a cold, cloudy day in early February 1985, Shelley Wachsmann, then resident nautical archaeologist for the Israel Department of Antiquities and Museums, drove to Kibbutz Ginosar, an agricultural settlement near the shores of the Sea of Galilee. Two brothers, avid amateur archaeologists, had found a boat buried in the lake, its outlines revealed by receding lake waters. The boat was "possibly ancient," according to the handwritten note placed on Wachsmann's desk a day or two before.

This book is written by two of the leading terrorist experts in the world. Hacking ISIS will explain in graphic detail how ISIS produces religious cultism, recruits vulnerable young people of all religions and nationalities and disseminates their brutal social media to the world. More, the book will map out the cyberspace-level tactics on how ISIS spreads its terrifying content, how it distributes tens of thousands of pieces of propaganda daily and is winning the battle in cyberspace and how to stop it in its tracks.

Terrorism expert Erick Stakelbeck pulls back the curtain on ISIS, the violent terrorist organization spreading death and hate in the Middle East. The rise of ISIS took the White House by complete surprise: President Obama called the group "JV" then was forced to reassess when ISIS began executing innocent American journalists. Now radicalized Americans and Europeans are joining ISIS' ranks.

Throughout life, we all experience events and practices that bow us low. When you understand that you can turn millstones into milestones, you are able to channel these events into opportunities for spiritual growth and magnificent manifestations. Through many epiphanies, perhaps thousands of them, you can enrich your life and enhance your well-being. As an interfaith minister, a family counselor, and parapsychologist, the author offers you another pathway for enriching your life, experiencing the positive forces at work throughout the physical, mental, and spiritual lives.

Dr. Glenville Ashby’s Finding Mother: Lessons in Spirituality - East and West is a refreshing work that delves into topical issues surrounding spirituality. Reincarnation, fire ceremonies, death meditation, sex, and spiritual healing are just few of the intriguing subjects discussed. Moreover, Dr. Ashby explores the goddess concept in Eastern and Western religious traditions and offers a series of exercises toward self-awareness.

Canon Andrew White has experienced some of the most intense persecution and spiritual resistance imaginable. And yet, in the middle of the most turbulent war zones he has learned the secret to creating a "Glory Zone". During Saddam Hussein's regime and the invasion of ISIS, Canon Andrew White served as Vicar of St. George's Church in Baghdad. Despite incredible persecution, the church experienced amazing revival.

Number-one best-selling author and radio host Glenn Beck exposes the real truth behind the roots of Islamic extremism in Muslim teaching in this sharply insightful audiobook that debunks commonly held assumptions about Islam and the dream of a renewed caliphate.