This work is a collection of intriguing short stories by Temple Thurston. Found in this volume are the following stories: The Rosicrucian; Back to Burmah; The Archbishop; Dance, Little Lady; The Bigamist; Mr. Simmonds' Bit O Business; Virgin; Dementia; The Cherry Tree; Elizabeth; Skeleton in the Cupboard; Grey Quakers.

Rosicrucian Library, Volume No. V. Included in this volume are the secret teachings of Tibet, divided into twelve books entitled: obligations that relate to man considered as an individual; passions; woman; consanguinity, or natural relations; providence, or the accidental differences of men; social duties; religion; man considered in general; man considered in regard to his infirmities and their effects; of the affectations of man, which are hurtful to himself and others; the advantages man may acquire over his fellow creatures; manifestations of karma.

Found in this work are historical sketches of magic and witchcraft in England and Scotland. It was not the author's purpose in this volume to attempt a general history of magic and alchemy, or a scientific inquiry into their psychological aspects. He confined himself to a sketch of their progress in England and to a narrative of the lives of our principal magicians. It is also devoted to a historical review of witchcraft in Great Britain, and an examination into the most remarkable witch trials.

Volume 1: The Brotherhood of the Rosy Cross. Authentic and spurious organizations as considered and dealt with in treatises originally published and issued in monograph form.

Few populations around the world have been as deeply affected by outside cultures as Native Americans. The wide variety of people who lived in America prior to Western migration possessed an equally wide variety of faith practices and beliefs. This book is about how those beliefs began, how they changed due to the influence of outside forces, and how Native Americans today are working to preserve their faiths. Tied deeply to the land and to nature, Native American faiths share some common traits. Native American Faith in America explores these basic beliefs, the ""coming of the long knives,"" and the impact of Western expansion, along with the ways that Native Americans and their faiths were deeply changed by this new civilization on their land. As the years have passed, many Native American ways have come into the general culture, influencing everything from fashion and music to medicine and sports. The dominant American culture continues to affect the social lives of Native Americans, both on reservations and elsewhere, while the sacred sites of some tribes have been the source of great controversy. In the political world, Native Americans have been very active, and most of this political work, from the American Indian Movement to today's reservation casinos, is based in faith and belief. Finally, the book focuses on how Native Americans young and old are working to ensure that their faiths and beliefs do not die out as some of their languages and customs have.

Originally published under the title The Story of Early Chemistry. Tells the story of the development of chemical knowledge and science, from the beginning of time to the end of the 18th century. Contents: practical chemistry of the ancients; earliest chemical manuscripts; theories of the ancients of matter and its changes; early alchemists; chemical knowledge of the Middle Ages; chemistry in the 13th century; chemistry of the 14th and 15th centuries; progressive 16th century; chemical currents in the 16th century; chemistry of the 16th century; the 18th century, rise and fall of the Phlogiston theory; development of pneumatic chemistry in the 18th century; early ideas of chemical affinity; Lavoisier and the chemical revolution.

This translation and commentary on the Ugaritic texts is aimed at general readers as well as students and specialists in biblical, classical and religious studies. The Ugaritic texts have long been recognized as basic background material for Old Testament study. Ugaritic deities, myths, religious terminology, poetic techniques and general vocabulary are widely encountered by the attentive reader of the Hebrew Bible. This edition has a modern translation and commentary based on scrutiny of the original tablets and recent academic discussion. While addressing the needs of accurate translation, it also attempts to take seriously demands for a readable English version.

This book of magic and politics uses quotes from classic books to show the connections between the two throughout history.

First published in 1978, "The Nag Hammadi Library" was widely acclaimed by critics and scholars alike. Containing many of the writings of the Gnostics since the time of Christ, this was the work that launched modern Gnostic studies and exposed a movement whose teachings are in may ways as relevant today as they were sixteen centuries ago. Although some of the texts had appeared in other translations, the 1978 edition was the first and only translation of these ancient and fascinating manuscripts to appear in one volume. This new edition is the result of ten years of additional research, and editorial and critical work. Every translation has been changed or added to; many have been thoroughly revised. Unearthed in 1945 near the town of Nag Hammadi in Upper Egypt, the texts literally begin where the Dead Sea Scrolls end. Their discovery is seen as equally significant, bringing to light a long-hidden well of new information, sources, and insights into early Judaism and the roots of Christianity. Each text is accompanied by a new and expanded introduction. Also included are a revised general introduction and an afterword discussing the modern relevance of Gnosticism, from Voltaire and Blake through Melville and Yeats to Jack Kerouac and science fiction writer Philip K. Dick. The translations and introductions to the Nag Hammadi texts are by members of the Coptic Gnostic Library Project, which includes such scholars as Helmut Koester, George McRae, and Elaine Pagels.

Mrs. Stanton's Bible traces the impact of Elizabeth Cady Stanton's religious dissent on the suffrage movement at the turn of the century and presents the first book-length reading of her radical text, the Woman's Bible. Stanton is best remembered for organizing the Seneca Falls convention at which she first called for women's right to vote. Yet she spent the last two decades of her life working for another cause: women's liberation from religious oppression. Stanton came to believe that political enfranchisement was meaningless without the systematic dismantling of the church's stifling authority over women's lives.

In 1895, she collaboratively authored this biblical exegesis, just as the women's movement was becoming more conservative. Stanton found herself arguing not only against male clergy members but also against devout female suffragists. Kathi Kern demonstrates that the Woman's Bible itself played a fundamental role in the movement's new conservatism because it sparked Stanton's censure and the elimination of her fellow radicals from the National American Woman Suffrage Association. Mrs. Stanton's Bible dramatically portrays this crucial chapter of women's history and facilitates the understanding of one of the movement's most controversial texts.

This comprehensive guide offers complete sample rituals for celebration and worship plus a history of Wicca and the beliefs of the Celtic Druids, the different phases of the god and goddess, and the principles of nature and their sacred symbols. Illustrations.

At an excavation of the Great Aztec Temple in Mexico City, amid carvings of skulls and a dismembered warrior goddess, David Carrasco stood before a container filled with the decorated bones of infants and children. It was the site of a massive human sacrifice, and for Carrasco the center of fiercely provocative questions: If ritual violence against humans was a profound necessity for the Aztecs in their capital city, is it central to the construction of social order and the authority of city states? Is civilization built on violence?
In City of Sacrifice, Carrasco chronicles the fascinating story of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital, investigating Aztec religious practices and demonstrating that religious violence was integral to urbanization; the city itself was a temple to the gods. That Mexico City, the largest city on earth, was built on the ruins of Tenochtitlan, is a point Carrasco poignantly considers in his comparison of urban life from antiquity to modernity.
Majestic in scope, City of Sacrifice illuminates not only the rich history of a major Meso american city but also the inseparability of two passionate human impulses: urbanization and religious engagement. It has much to tell us about many familiar events in our own time, from suicide bombings in Tel Aviv to rape and murder in the Balkans.

Huna is ancient and at the same time magnificently modern.The mystical practice of Kahuna evolved in isolation on the island paradise of Hawaii. The ancient Hawaiians valued words, prayer, their gods, the sacred, the breath, a loving spirit, family ties, the elements of nature, and mana-the vital life force-ideas profound yet elegantly simple. Discovering the concepts of Huna is like finding gemstones in a mountain-a joyous journey!

An explosive first-person account by a young woman who spent fifteen years in a sex cult called the Children of God, which encouraged "sacred prostitution" and taught that "The Lord is our pimp."

Miriam Williams was an idealistic child of the sixties who, at seventeen, accepted an invitation from a "Jesus person" to visit a commune in upstate New York. She would soon be prostituting herself for a perverse cult that used sex to lure sinners to the Lord -- and this is her shocking, searingly honest account of a fifteen-year spiritual odyssey gone haywire.

The Children of God turned its female devotees into Heaven's Harlots, leading strangers to the love of God by enticing them with the pleasures of the flesh. At its height, the cult boasted 19,000 members around the world: In such places as France and Monte Carlo, young women, Miriam among them, mingled with the rich and famous to save their souls, and in this unsparing, unnerving autobiography, she'll identify some of her high-profile "clients." She left this bizarre world in an attempt to protect her son, born through an arranged marriage and kidnapped by his father.

Now, in a clear, compelling, cautionary tale, she shares both her extraordinary existence as a holy whore and the daunting experience of rebuilding a normal life -- an ordeal that led her to found a group dedicated to helping other cult survivors reclaim their souls as well.

In 1886 Walter McClintock went to northwestern Montana as a member of a U.S. Forest Service expedition. He was adopted as a son by Chief Mad Dog, the high priest of the Sun Dance, and spent the next four years living on the Blackfoot Reservation. The Old North Trail, originally published in 1910, is a record of his experiences among the Blackfeet.

Ancient Egyptian Magic is the first authoritative modern work on the occult practices that pervaded all aspects of life in ancient Egypt. Based on fascinating archaeological discoveries, it includes everything from how to write your name in hieroglyphs to the proper way to bury a king, as well as:

• Tools and training of magicians

• Interpreting dreams

• Ancient remedies for headaches, cataracts, and indigestion

• Wrapping a mummy

• Recipes for magic potions and beauty creams

• Explanations of amulets and pyramid power

• A spell to entice a lover

• A fortune-telling calendar

These subjects and many more will appeal to everyone interested in Egyptology, magic, parapsychology, and the occult; or ancient religions and mythology.

When Paul B. Steinmetz worked among the Oglala Lakota in South Dakota, he prayed with the Sacred Pipe, conversed with medicine men, and participated in their religious ceremonies.

Steinmetz describes the history, belief systems and contemporary ceremonies of three religious groups among the Oglala Lakota: traditional Lakota religion, the Native American Church, and the Body of Christ Independent Church, a small Pentecostal group. On the basis of these descriptions, Steinmetz discusses the interdynamics of Pipe, Bible, and Peyote, and offers a model for understanding Oglala religious identity. Steinmetz maintains that a sense of sacramentalism is essential in understanding Native American religions and that the mutual influence between Lakota religion and Christianity has been far more extensive than most scholars have suggested.

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

"On his own terms, Brandon more than fulfills his promise to take the reader on the transatlantic journey of the orisha and to explore the complexities of African memory in the diaspora." American Historical Review

"He adeptly addresses broader issues, such as power relations within Caribbean slavery, multiculturalism, and the forms of religious accommodation to cultural change. In addition, he offers a fresh and cogent assessment of the production and reproduction of African beliefs and practices in new contexts. Brandon s exemplary archival research is supplemented by skillful participant observation." Choice

The Yoruba religious tradition arose in West Africa, but its influence has spread beyond Africa to millions of adherents in the Americas as well. Santeria from Africa to the New World retraces one path taken by this tradition a path from Africa to Cuba and to New York City. George Brandon examines the religion s transatlantic route through Cuban Santeria, Puerto Rican Espiritismo, and Black Nationalism. In following the historical and anthropological evolution of the Yoruba religion, Brandon discusses broader questions of power, multiculturalism, cultural change, and the production and reproduction of African retentions."

This is the extraordinary account of Donner-Grau's experiences with doña Mercedes, an aged healer in a remote Venezuelan town known for its spiritualists, sorcerers, and mediums.

Ever since nature and consciousness were separated in the late Middle Ages, giving rise to a science of matter alone, the spiritual beings who are the universe have felt abandoned and unable to complete their work, for this work depends for its success on human collaboration. At the same time, human beings have also felt abandoned, condemned to a speck of dust in an infinitely decaying universe. In these remarkable lectures, Rudolf Steiner reestablishes the human being as a participant in an evolving, dynamic universe of living spiritual beings: a living universe, whole and divine. And he does so in concrete images, capable of being grasped by human consciousness as if from within. How is this possible? Implicit in Rudolf Steiner's view is the fact that, fundamentally, the universe consists of consciousness. Everything else is illusion. Hence to understand the evolution of the cosmos and humanity in any terms other than consciousness is also illusion. Whenever we have to do with mighty cosmic facts, we have to do with states of consciousness. But states of consciousness never exist apart from the beings who embody them. Therefore, the only true realities are beings in different states of consciousness. In this sense, Rudolf Steiner's spiritual science is a science of states of consciousness and the beings who embody them. Indeed, rightly considered, all science-physics, chemistry, botany, zoology, geology, psychology, astronomy, etc.-is a science of beings. And the sensory perception, the physical trace, is but the outer vestment of the activity of beings in different states of consciousness. To describe these beings, Steiner uses the names made familiar by the wisdom tradition of theWest. He speaks of the evolutionary states of Saturn, Sun, Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan; and the nine "choirs" of angels (Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones; Dominions, Virtues, and Powers; Principalities, Archangels, and Angels); as well as of elemental beings and nature spirits; and the elements of fire, earth, air, and water.

In The Dream Seekers, Lee Irwin demonstrates the central importance of visionary dreams as sources of empowerment and innovation in Plains Indian religion. He examines 350 dreams from 150 years of published and unpublished sources to describe the shared features of cosmology for twenty-three groups of Plains Indians.

Irwin describes the different means of acquiring visions, including stress, illness, social conflict, and mourning and the spontaneous vision experience common among Plains Indian women. He also explores the stages of the structured male vision quest, unsuccessful or abandoned quests, and threshold experiences during a vision. His conclusion is that dreams not only strengthen the group's experience of a shared religious world view but also confer the right to enact new patterns of individual and collective behavior.

"The Dream Seekers offers new and genuine insights into the dream experience of the Plains Indians....(and) offers original comments on the dream experience itself -- the receiving of the dream and the transference of the dream's inherent power". -- American Indian Culture and Research Journal.

"No library -- private, professional, public, or academic, with any interest in Native American culture -- should be without this book". -- Western Historical Quarterly.

"Anyone with a particular interest in American Indian studies, anthropology, sociology, or religion will find this volume invaluable". -- Rapport.

When trappers and fur traders first encountered the Arikara Indians, they saw a settled and well-organized people who could be firm friends or fearsome enemies. Until the late eighteenth century the Arikaras, close relatives of the Pawnees, were one of the largest and most powerful tribes on the northern plains. For centuries Arikaras lived along the middle Missouri River. Today, they reside on the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota.

Though much has been written about the Arikaras, their own accounts of themselves and the world as they see it have been available only in limited scholarly editions. This collection is the first to make Arikara myths, tales, and stories widely accessible. The book presents voices of the Arikara past closely translated into idiomatic English.

The narratives include myths of ancient times, legends of supernatural power bestowed on selected individuals, historical accounts, and anecdotes of mysterious incidents. Also included in the collection are tales, stories the Arikaras consider fiction, that tell of the adventures and foibles of Coyote, Stuwi, and of a host of other characters.

"Myths and Traditions of the Arikara Indians" offers a selection of narratives from Douglas R. Parks's four-volume work, Traditional Narratives of the Arikara Indians. The introduction situates the Arikaras in historical context, describes the recording and translation of the narratives, and discusses the distinctive features of the narratives. For each story, cross references are given to variant forms recorded among other Plains tribes.

The rich religious beliefs and ceremonials of the Pueblo Indians of Arizona and New Mexico were first synthesized and compared by ethnologist Elsie Clews Parsons. Prodigious research and a quarter-century of fieldwork went into her 1939 encyclopedic two-volume work, Pueblo Indian Religion.

The author gives an integrated picture of the complex religious and social life in the pueblos, including Zuni, Acoma, Laguna, Taos, Isleta, Sandia, Jemez, Cochiti, Santa Clara, San Felipe, Santa Domingo, San Juan, and the Hopi villages. In volume I she discusses shelter, social structure, land tenure, customs, and popular beliefs. Parsons also describes spirits, cosmic notions, and a wide range of rituals.

The cohesion of spiritual and material aspects of Pueblo culture is also apparent in volume II, which presents an extensive body of solstice, installation, initiation, war, weather, curing, kachina, and planting and harvesting ceremonies, as well as games, animal dances, and offerings to the dead. A review of Pueblo ceremonies from town to town considers variations and borrowings. Today, a half century after its original publication, Pueblo Indian Religion remains central to studies of Pueblo religious life.