Winner, 2020 Aldo and Jeanne Scaglione Prize for Comparative Literary Studies, Modern Language Association The novel, the literary adage has it, reflects a world abandoned by God. Yet the possibilities of novelistic form and literary exegesis exceed the secularizing tendencies of contemporary literary criticism. Showing how the Qur'an itself invites and enacts critical reading, Hoda El Shakry's Qur'anic model of narratology enriches our understanding of literary sensibilities and practices in the Maghreb across Arabophone and Francophone traditions. The Literary Qur'an mobilizes the Qur'an's formal, narrative, and rhetorical qualities, alongside embodied and hermeneutical forms of Qur'anic pedagogy, to theorize modern Maghrebi literature. Challenging the canonization of secular modes of reading that occlude religious epistemes, practices, and intertexts, it attends to literature as a site where the process of entextualization obscures ethical imperatives. Engaging with the Arab-Islamic tradition of adab-a concept demarcating the genre of belles lettres, as well as social and moral comportment-El Shakry demonstrates how the critical pursuit of knowledge is inseparable from the spiritual cultivation of the self. Foregrounding form and praxis alike, The Literary Qur'an stages a series of pairings that invite paratactic readings across texts, languages, and literary canons. The book places twentieth-century novels by canonical Francophone writers (Abdelwahab Meddeb, Assia Djebar, Driss Chraibi) into conversation with lesser-known Arabophone ones (Mahmud al-Mas'adi, al-Tahir Wattar, Muhammad Barrada). Theorizing the Qur'an as a literary object, process, and model, this interdisciplinary study blends literary and theological methodologies, conceptual vocabularies, and reading practices.

Written more than 25 centuries ago, the Diamond Sutra is the first text to record the Buddha's own teachings, and it remains one of the most popular.One day, after the Buddha finishes his daily walk to collect alms, a senior monk steps forth to ask how he can best help humanity. Buddha responds, and thus begins a dialogue regarding the nature of perception. Renowned spiritual teacher Osho offers his unique interpretation of the Buddha's words, writing in an easy, humorous, and conversational style that makes even the most complex ideas understandable.

"The Quran in Plain English: A Simple Translation for Children and Young People".

Imagine a world where the Hadith (authentic sayings) of Prophet Muhammad is on major news headlines and media outlets. Since the onset of the twenty first century, the rise of Islamophobia pushed Muslim minorities in the western hemisphere towards the fields of activism and civic engagement. This book is a steppingstone towards bringing that vision into reality by inspiring, informing and guiding a new generation of volunteers, community workers, and activists who quote Muhammad's words in their meetings, marketing material, and chants. A world like ours is in dire need to hear the timeless principles of the man who was divinely sent as a mercy to all of mankind.

In this book, Molly Zahn investigates how early Jewish scribes rewrote their authoritative traditions in the course of transmitting them, from minor edits in the course of copying to whole new compositions based on prior works. Scholars have detected evidence for rewriting in a wide variety of textual contexts, but Zahn's is the first book to map manuscripts and translations of biblical books, so-called 'parabiblical' compositions, and the sectarian literature from Qumran in relation to one another. She introduces a new, adaptable set of terms for talking about rewriting, using the idea of genre as a tool to compare and contrast different cases. Although rewriting has generally been understood as a vehicle for biblical interpretation, Zahn moves beyond that framework to demonstrate that rewriting was a pervasive textual strategy in the Second Temple period. Her book contributes to a powerful new model of early Jewish textuality, illuminating the rich and diverse culture out of which both rabbinic Judaism and early Christianity eventually emerged.

An unlikely cast of characters reinterprets the first five books of the Bible, as divided into the 54 Torah portions that are traditionally read over the course of the year. Writers include: Damon Lindelof, creator of the television series Lost (on Abraham's binding of Issac); essayist Sloane Crosley on the Ten Plagues; novelist Aimee Bender on the Tower of Babel; and Joshua Foer on Esau's brotherly spat with Jacob. Other contributors include actor/director Josh Radnor (How I Met Your Mother); Go the F**k to Sleep's Adam Mansbach; Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright David Auburn; Sam Lipsyte; Rebecca Odes; Susan Dominus; A.J. Jacobs; and more.

The Ramayana is, quite simply, the greatest of Indian epics - and one of the world's supreme masterpieces of storytelling 'Almost every individual living in India,' writes R. K. Narayan in the Introduction to this new interpretation, 'is aware of the story of The Ramayana. Everyone of whatever age, outlook, education or station in life knows the essential part of the epic and adores the main figures in it - Rama and Sita. Every child is told the story at bedtime . . . The Ramayana pervades our cultural life.' Although the Sanskrit original was composed by Valmiki, probably around the fourth century BC, poets have produced countless variant versions in different languages. Here, drawing his inspiration from the work of an eleventh-century Tamil poet called Kamban, Narayan has used the talents of a master novelist to recreate the excitement and joy he has found in the original. It can be enjoyed and appreciated, he suggests, for its psychological insight, its spiritual depth and its practical wisdom - or just as a thrilling tale of abduction, battle and courtship played out in a universe thronged with heroes, deities and demons.

This book approaches the Dhamma, the Buddha's teaching, from a Buddhistic perspective, viewing various individual teachings presented in hundreds of early discourses of Pali canon, comprehending them under a single systemic thought of a single individual called the Buddha. It explicates the structure of this thought, going through various contextual teachings and teaching categories of the discourses, treating them as necessary parts of a liberating thought that constitutes the right view of one who embraces the Buddha's teaching as his or her sole philosophy of life. It interprets the diverse individual dhammas as being in congruence with each other; and as contributory to forming the whole of the Buddha's teaching, the Dhamma. By exploring some selected topics such as ignorance, configurations, not-self, and nibbana in thirteen chapters, the book enables readers to understand the whole (the Dhamma) in relation to the parts (the dhammas), and the parts in relation to the whole, while realizing the importance of studying every single dhamma category or topic not for its own sake but for understand the entirety of the teaching. This way of viewing and explaining the teachings of the discourses enables readers to clearly comprehend the teaching of the Buddha in early Buddhism.

Environmental issues are an ever-increasing focus of public discourse and have proved concerning to religious groups as well as society more widely. Among biblical scholars, criticism of the Judeo-Christian tradition for its part in the worsening crisis has led to a small but growing field of study on ecology and the Bible. This volume in the Oxford Handbook series makes a significant contribution to this burgeoning interest in ecological hermeneutics, incorporating the best of international scholarship on ecology and the Bible. The Handbook comprises 30 individual essays on a wide range of relevant topics by established and emerging scholars. Arranged in four sections, the volume begins with a historical overview before tackling some key methodological issues. The second, substantial, section comprises thirteen essays offering detailed exegesis from an ecological perspective of selected biblical books. This is followed by a section exploring broader thematic topics such as the Imago Dei and stewardship. Finally, the volume concludes with a number of essays on contemporary perspectives and applications, including political and ethical considerations. The editors Hilary Marlow and Mark Harris have drawn on their experience in Hebrew Bible and New Testament respectively to bring together a diverse and engaging collection of essays on a subject of immense relevance. Its accessible style, comprehensive scope, and range of material means that the volume is a valuable resource, not only to students and scholars of the Bible but also to religious leaders and practitioners.

While continuing with reading practice and writing exercises, Aleph Isn't Enough provides additional exercises on which to build solid translation skills. As students solidify their reading ability, they will also enhance their vocabulary, increase their familiarity with roots, and develop their translation skills. With chapters focused on the Hebrew of the Sh'ma, the Amidah, the Torah service, and the Haggadah, this book builds an understanding of the cornerstones of Hebrew grammar. Alternative translations of basic prayers from a wide selection of different prayer books are provided as well.
- Large, clear Hebrew characters simplify reading
- Multileveled format following Aleph Isn't Tough
- Includes supplementary enrichment material designed to increase the student's knowledge of Jewish practice, history, and texts

Few doctrines in Islam have engendered as much contention and disagreement as those surrounding the imamate, the office of supreme leader of the Muslim community after the death of the Prophet. In the medieval period while the caliphate still existed, rivalry among the claimants to that most lofty position was particularly intense. The early 5th/11th-century Ismaili da'i Hamid al-Din al-Kirmani worked for most of his life in the eastern lands of the Islamic world, principally within the hostile domain of the Abbasid caliphs and the Buyid amirs.At a critical point he was summoned by the da'wa to Egypt where he taught and wrote for several years before returning once again to Iran and Iraq. About 405/1015, just prior to his move from Iraq to Cairo, he composed a treatise he called Lights to Illuminate the Proof of the Imamate (al-Masabih fi ithbat al-imama) in the bold hope of convincing Fakhr al-Mulk, the Shi'i wazir of the Buyids in Baghdad, to abandon the Abbasids and support the Fatimid caliph al-Hakim. For that purpose he produced a long, interconnected series of philosophically sophisticated proofs, all leading logically to the absolute necessity of the imamate. This work is thus unique both in the precision of its doctrine and in the historical circumstance surrounding its composition. The text appears here in a modern critical edition of the Arabic original with a complete translation, introduction and notes.

In World of Wonders, Alf Hiltebeitel addresses the Mahabharata and its supplement, the Harivamsa, as a single literary composition. Looking at the work through the critical lens of the Indian aesthetic theory of rasa, "juice, essence, or taste," he argues that the dominant rasa of these two texts is adbhutarasa, the "mood of wonder." While the Mahabharata signposts whole units of the text as "wondrous" in its table of contents, the Harivamsa foregrounds a stepped-up term for wonder (ascarya) that drives home the point that Vishnu and Krishna are one. Two scholars of the 9th and 10th centuries, Anandavardhana and Abhinavagupta, identified the Mahabharata's dominant rasa as santarasa, the "mood of peace." This has traditionally been received as the only serious contestant for a rasic interpretation of the epic. Hiltebeitel disputes both the positive claim that the santarasa interpretation is correct and the negative claim that adbhutarasa is a frivolous rasa that cannot sustain a major work. The heart of his argument is that the Mahabharata and Harivamsa both deploy the terms for "wonder" and "surprise" (vismaya) in significant numbers that extend into every facet of these heterogeneous texts, showing how adbhutarasa is at work in the rich and contrasting textual strategies which are integral to the structure of the two texts.

This book is the first of two volumes that aim to produce something not previously attempted: a synthetic history of Muslim responses to the Bible, stretching from the rise of Islam to the present day. It combines scholarship with a genuine narrative, so as to tell the story of Muslim engagement with the Bible. Covering Sunni, Imami Shi'i and Isma'ili perspectives, this study will offer a scholarly overview of three areas of Muslim response, namely ideas of corruption, use of the Biblical text, and abrogation of the text. For each period of history, the important figures and dominant trends, along with exceptions, are identified. The interplay between using and criticising the Bible is explored, as well as how the respective emphasis on these two approaches rises and falls in different periods and locations. The study critically engages with existing scholarship, scrutinizing received views on the subject, and shedding light on an important area of interfaith concern.

This new Koren Shabbat Humash, Magerman Edition combines the illuminating translation, introduction and commentary on the Shabbat Siddur by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks with the traditional Koren Humash.

The Bhagavad Gita is one of the most revered texts of all time, but it's often impenetrable to the 21st-century seeker. In "Gita Wisdom," Joshua Greene retells this timeless text in a completely new way, revealing that it is, in essence, a heart-to-heart talk between two friends about the meaning of life. As Krishna and his friend Arjuna reminisce on a battlefield known as Kurukshetra, readers learn that the two played together as children, were close as young men, and became family when Arjuna married Krishna's sister. In later life the men shared extraordinary adventures, including a journey to places outside the known universe. Like all great literature, the Gita explores the human condition: who we are, where we came from, and why we're here. With a helpful glossary that lists names, terms, and places, this accessible, enlightening retelling is the perfect introduction to the Gita's venerable wisdom.

What did ancient Jews believe about demons and angels? This question has long been puzzling, not least because the Hebrew Bible says relatively little about such transmundane powers. In the centuries after the conquests of Alexander the Great, however, we find an explosion of explicit and systematic interest in, and detailed discussions of, demons and angels. In this book, Annette Yoshiko Reed considers the third century BCE as a critical moment for the beginnings of Jewish angelology and demonology. Drawing on early 'pseudepigrapha' and Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls, she reconstructs the scribal settings in which transmundane powers became a topic of concerted Jewish interest. Reed also situates this development in relation to shifting ideas about scribes and writing across the Hellenistic Near East. Her book opens a window onto a forgotten era of Jewish literary creativity that nevertheless deeply shaped the discussion of angels and demons in Judaism and Christianity.