In the dawn of the new African Millennium, the Rastafari movement has achieved unheralded growth and visibility since its inception more than eighty years ago. Moving beyond a pure spiritual movement, its aesthetic component has influenced cultures of the Caribbean, the United States, and others across the globe. Locating the Rastafari movement at a literal and figurative crossroad, Barnett sets out to consider the possible paths the movement will chart. Rastafari in the New Millennium covers a wide range of perspectives, focusing not only on the movement's nuanced and complex religious ideology but also on its political philosophy, cosmology, and unique epistemology. Barry Chevannes's essay addresses the concerns of death and repatriation, highlighting the transformative challenges these issues pose to Rastafari. Essays by Ian Boxill, Edward Te Kohu Douglas, Erin MacLeod, and Janet L. DeCosmo, among others, offer rich accounts of the globalisation of Rastafari from New Zealand to Ethiopia, from Brazil to Zimbabwe. Drawing on new research and global developments, the contributors, many of whom are leading scholars in the field, reinvigorate the critical dialogue on the current state and future direction of the Rastafari movement.

Ce texte est un des ecrits fondamentaux de l'Hindouism

Kurukshetra-a city where history blends the legend...a city of myths, great battles, and even greater empires...a city that lent canvas to the epic Mahabharata and bore the song celestial, the Bhagavad Gita...a city that eulogises the glory of the primordial river, Saraswati... ...a city no spiritual seeker would pass up on. Tracing the inviolable sanctity of this timeless city, Kurukshetra: Timeless Sanctity explores Kurukshetra as a metaphor, a leitmotif of Indian spirituality and mysticism, and as a confluence of profound streams of faiths as divergent yet concurrent as Buddhism, Sufism and Hinduism, while recounting its story through the lives of warriors and kings, prophets and poets, saints, savants and freedom fighters who have shaped its history.

Living out of silence, out of a fully functioning, lovingly attentive mind, is requisite for depth or profundity in living or relating. A fully attentive, truly silent or meditative mind sees that there is real dualism of time and the timeless. An examination of a wide variety of writers shows that these understandings are seldom there in contemporary writings, just as they were not there in writings that have come down to us from the past.

Vedic Sanskrit literature contains a wealth of material concerning the mythology and religious practices of India between 1500 and 500 B.C.E. a crucial period in the formation of traditional Indian culture. Stephanie W. Jamison here addresses the conditions that have limited our understanding of Vedic myth and ritual, such as the profusion and obscurity of the texts and the tendency on the part of scholars to approach mythology and ritual independently. Tracing two key myths through a variety of texts, Jamison provides insight into the relationship between early Indic myth and ritual as well as offering a new methodology for their study.

After a brief survey of Vedic literature and religion, Jamison examines the recurrences of the myths "Indra fed the Yatis to the hyenas" and "Svarbhanu pierced the sun with darkness." Focusing on their verbal form and ritual setting, she essays a general interpretation of the myths and their ritual purpose. Her book sheds new light on some central figures in Vedic mythology and on the evolution of Vedic mythological narrative, and it points to parallels in other cultures as well. Indologists and other scholars and students of South Asian culture, Indo-Eurepeanists, folklorists, historians of religion, classicists, and comparatists will welcome this rich and suggestive introduction to the Vedic tradition."

With its complex nature and many forms and practices, Hinduism is one of the world's most elusive religions for outsiders to understand. In Essential Hinduism, expert Steven Rosen aims to make the facets of this faith clear. Essential Hinduism explores this rich tradition through its history, literature, arts, and people. This straightforward overview focuses primarily on monotheistic Vaishnavism, the most common form of Hinduism. Beginning with chapters about the foundations of Hinduism, Steven Rosen clearly lays out the religion's otherwise complicated history. Providing Hindu terms alongside English translations, he illuminates the basics of the faith for readers unacquainted with its varieties and tenets and examines commonly held misconceptions. Chapters about practices, including festivals, teachings, chanting, eating habits, and more, bring Hinduism to life in vivid detail.

The Baha'i Faith in America sets out to accomplish two main goals. The first is to introduce to the American reading public a religion whose name may be commonly mentioned or heard, yet in terms of its unique history, world-view, beliefs, and laws, is virtually unknown. Such categories provide the essential material for Part I. The second objective, which is the uniting thread of Part II, is to trace the historical development of the American Baha'i community from its earliest beginnings at the end of the nineteenth century up until the present day. The chapters in this section not only peruse the major events and introduce the leading personalities associated with American Baha'i history, they also trace significant themes, motifs, and issues that have characterized the community over the decades. Examples include early Baha'i connections with both American millenialism and metaphysical esotericism, to more recent associations with the Civil Rights Movement and the 1960s youth counterculture. In addition, the book's final chapters take a close look at some of the more controversial issues that have characterized American Baha'i community life over the past few decades. Here issues ranging in content from disagreements over differing styles of propogation to the freedom of expression allowed to Baha'i scholars are examined. In the process, the work reveals a dynamic and highly idealistic faith that is attempting to offer a model of religious community that is compatible with the continuing process of globalization.

Chondogyo is a unique and indigenous religion of Korea founded in 1860 by Choe Je-u, better known as Suun, his pen name. Chondogyo means "the Religion of Heavenly Way." Originally called Donghak, meaning "Eastern leaning," the religious movement is regarded as one of the most important in Korean history, with a particular impact on modern Korean society and politics. Its scripture has played a foundational and essential role in the belief system of Chondogyo, containing Suun's ideas about God, man, and the world, as well as his own religious experience. This translation represents the only complete translation of Donggyeong Daejeon with notes in English. The study of Chondogyo has been limited in the West due to its lack of circulation in Western languages. With this translation, a main part of the Chondogyo literature is available to the worldwide community of scholars and students engaged in the study of this important Korean religion. This work, therefore, makes a significant contribution to the scholarship of world religions.

Popular Christianity in India explores Indian Christianity as crafted and expressed through lived experience, providing an important balance to currently available, typically theological, studies. Drawing from many disciplines, this volume unearths the multifaceted terrain of festivals, rituals, saints, miracle workers, missionaries, and visionaries in Christian India, providing a wonderful glimpse of its richness and complexities. The contributors reveal the ways in which local Christian traditions deftly challenge assumed divisions and power imbalances between East and West, Hindu and Christian, foreign and indigenous, and elite and local expressions. Whether forging complicated religious, caste, and national identities, employing religious hybridity to promote well-being, or asserting autonomy within oppressive social and religious structures, local Christianity provides a crucial means for its participants to manage their earthly needs and desires.

The Devi Gita, literally the "Song of the Goddess, " is an Eastern spiritual classic that appeared around the fifteenth century C.E.C. Mackenzie Brown provides a reader-friendly English translation of this sacred text taken from his well-regarded previous book The Devi Gita: The Song of the Goddess, A Translation, Annotation, and Commentary. Here the translation is presented uninterrupted without the scholarly annotations of the original version and in its entirety for the pleasure of all readers who wish to encounter this treasure from the world's sacred literature.

Often neglected, the Devi Gita deserves to be better known for its presentations of one of the great Hindu visions of the divine conceived in feminine terms. The work depicts the universe as created, pervaded, and protected by a supremely powerful, all-knowing, and wholly compassionate divine female. It also describes the various spiritual paths leading to realization of unity with the Goddess. The author of the Devi Gita intended for the work to supplant the famous teachings of Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita (the "Song of the Lord") from a goddess-inspired perspective.

The massacre of 120 emigrant men, women, and children at Mountain Meadows on September 11, 1857, by Mormons and Mormon-incited Indians shocked the nation. It was not until the spring of 1859 that federal authorities began to conduct inquiries into the massacre. Bvt. Major James H. Carleton, 1st Dragoons, was instructed to investigate the even while en route to Salt Lake City. Carleton's account of May 1859 from the bone-strewn ground is full, accurate, and understandably emotional.

You can go to a mirror to find our how your body is doing, but how can you get a picture of your soul? A Well-Tended Soul holds a mirror up to your life for a refreshing, unabashedly feminine look at spiritual formation. Valerie Bell shows how to start building a life of incredible richness as you become more internally focused, forming your soul to God's own heart. A well-tended soul is a woman's beautifier. Soul-care weeds out what is malignant and false and builds in what is lovely, worthy, and redemptive. With refreshing candor, empathy, and earthiness, Bell uses her own experiences to help you - Live a deeper, more genuinely connected life - Pursue your truest dreams - Shape the world around you with an authentic spirituality - Discover the power of thankfulness to uproot envy and loss - Build confidence, joy, and beauty into your life - Transcend the fears and losses of aging . . . and much more.

With close to one million members, the Church of the Nazarites ( "ibandla lamaNazaretha") is one of the most popular indigenous religious communities in South Africa. Founded in 1910 by Isaiah Shembe, it offers South Africans2;particularly disadvantaged black women and girls2;a way to remake and reconnect to ancient sacred traditions disrupted by colonialism and apartheid. Ethnomusicologist Carol Muller explores the everyday lives of Nazarite women through their religious songs and dances, dream narratives, and fertility rituals, which come to life both musically and visually on CD-ROM.
Against the backdrop of South Africa's turbulent history, Muller shows how Shembe's ideas of female ritual purity developed as a response to a regime and culture that pushed all things associated with women, cultural expression, and Africanness to the margins.
Carol Muller breaks new ground in the study of this changing region and along the way includes fascinating details of her own poignant journey, as a young, white South African woman, to the "other" side of a divided society.

Aum Shinrikyo and Japanese Youth offers insights into Japanese spirituality by analyzing the motivations of those who joined the Aum Shinrikyo religious sect. This group attracted worldwide attention after its poison gas attack on the Tokyo subways in March, 1995. Daniel A. Metraux explores the reasons that thousands of Japanese people, many of them youths, joined the sect. He questions why they joined it, what they expected of their membership, and why they stayed involved or left. Metraux finds that most of the members got involved for religious and social reasons and did not partake in the terrorist and criminal activities of the leaders of Aum Shinrikyo. In addition, the author examines how the Aum situation reflects a growing sense of alienation from the traditional Japanese religion and culture among some of the young and middle-aged Japanese people, providing important information about the present status of the Japanese people.

Zen Among the Magnolias explores the integration of some of the practices of Zen and of Christianity. Benjamin Lee Wren discusses the possibilities as people from different backgrounds seek a deeper meaning for their lives, without destroying their heritage, through experiences such as zazen, tai chi, ikebana, folk dancing, and the celebration of the liturgy. He focuses on living in the present rather than in the past or the future. Wren explains a merging of asceticism and aesthetics which leads to a philosophy and theology that appreciates less as more, asymmetry, simplicity, tranquillity, and the beauty of aging. He shows how through parallels between the Four Noble Truths and Eight Fold Path of the Buddha and the Eight Beatitudes of Jesus, people become more sensitive to the problems of social justice. The result of an understanding of Zen through the nonverbal and nonimage form of pure contemplation called zazen, Wren demonstrates, is an experience of depth and breadth into the root of one's own being. This practice does not discount a Christian background; instead, it leads to a deeper understanding of all aspects of life.

This book provides a translation, with introduction, commentary, and annotation, of the medieval Hindu Sanskrit text the Devi Gita (Song of the Goddess). It is an important but not well-known text from the rich Sakta (Goddess) tradition of India. The Devi Gita was composed about the fifteenth century C.E., in partial imitation of the famous Bhagavad Gita (Song of the Lord), composed some fifteen centuries earlier.

Around the sixth century C.E., following the rise of several male deities to prominence, a new theistic movement began in which the supreme being was envisioned as female, known as the Great Goddess (Maha-Devi). Appearing first as a violent and blood-loving deity, this Goddess gradually evolved into a more benign figure, a compassionate World-Mother and bestower of salvific wisdom. It is in this beneficent mode that the Goddess appears in the Devi Gita.

This work makes available an up-to-date translation of the Devi Gita, along with a historical and theological analysis of the text. The book is divided into sections of verses, and each section is followed by a comment explaining key terms, concepts, ritual procedures, and mythic themes. The comments also offer comparisons with related schools of thought, indicate parallel texts and textual sources of verses in the Devi Gita, and briefly elucidate the historical and religious background, supplementing the remarks of the introduction.

Written by a noted philosopher and former president of India, this remarkable book describes the leading ideas of Indian philosophy and religion, and traces their influence upon Western thought from classical times, through the Renaissance and the Enlightenment, to the present day. The author also argues that Christianity, which arose out of an Eastern background but flourished in the Graeco-Roman culture, will eventually find its re-birth in a renewed alliance with its Eastern origins.

Ganapati is the Hindu Lord of Beginnings, the Keeper of the Threshold, the Remover of Obstacles, Master of the Mind, Son of Siva, Elephant-headed, plump, and lovable. This book offers a wide range of information about Ganapati gathered from such diverse sources as hymns, poems, myths, shrines, practices, and theologies.

With impetus provided by the accumulated historical and textual evidence supporting reincarnation, this book first examines Gospel evidence that Jesus actually taught reincarnation and karma rather than resurrection. Deardorff's compelling analysis bolsters other studies indicating that the concept of resurrection displaced reincarnation in earliest Christianity due to its pre-belief by certain Pharisee converts, and specifies how the Gospels came to reflect this belief. Jesus in India reexamines the evidence that the "lost years" of Jesus' youth were spent in the India. Deardorff's analysis brings out the plausibility of Jesus having gained knowledge about reincarnation and related spiritual matters under certain yogis in India. With the empty tomb on Easter morning not to be explained by resurrection, the book reviews six resuscitation hypotheses and presents a seventh one that withstands previous objections. This well documented research constitutes an important addition to the existing literature on comparative religions and a thought provoking contribution to the on-going debate on the historicity of a wide range of New Testament passages.

Dr. Yong Choon Kim is a distinguished scholar and educator. He wrote this book to fill the need for a concise introduction to the philosophical and religious ideas of the East. The work is analytical, comparative, and critical presentation in three parts: Indian Thougt, Chinese Thought, abd the Thoughts of Korea and Japan. It can serve for such courses as Oriental Philosophy, Eastern Religions, World Religions, Comparative Religion, and Comparative Thought. It may also be used in other introductory courses in Religion, Philosophy, and Asian Culture. The book should be very useful to the general reader interested in Oriental Thought and culture.

Interviews with 30 converts from the 1930s and 1940s are a component of Barry Chevanne's book, a look into the origins and practices of Rastafarianism. From the direct accounts of these early members, he is able to reconstruct pivotal episodes in Rastafarian history to offer a look into a subgroup of Jamaican society whose beliefs took root in the social unrest of the 1930s. The little that most people know about Rastafarianism has come through the Jamaican music, Reggae, which resonates with the contemporary social and political struggle of the poverty-stricken cities of Trenchtown and Kingston. Bob Marley and the Wailers, for instance, with their politically charged lyrics about the ghetto, became emissaries for the Jamaican poor. Here Chevannes traces Rastafarianism back to 1930's prophet Marcus Garvey and his mass coalition against racial oppression and support of a free Africa. Before Garvey, few Jamaicans, the overwhelming majority of whom had been brought to the island from Africa and enslaved by Europeans, held positive attitudes about Africa. The rise of black nationalism, however, provided the movement with its impetus to organise a system of beliefs. Likewise, Chevannes explores the movement's roots in the Jamaican peasantry, which underwent distinct phases of development between 1834 and 1961 as freed slaves became peasants. The peasants established themselves in the recesses of the island and many eventually moved to cities, where the economic and social hardship already inherent in Jamaican society, was even more desolate. Between 1943 and 1960, detrimental social changes transformed Jamaica's rapidly expanding cities. Kingston's population grew by 86 percent, and crime and disease were rampant. It was under this severe social decay that Rastafari became a hospice for the uprooted and derelict masses. As a spiritual philosophy, Rastafarianism is linked to societies of runaway slaves or maroons and derives from both the African Myal religion and the Revivalist Zion churches. Like the revival movement, Rastafarianism embraces the 400-year-old doctrine of repatriation. Rastas believe that they and all Africans who have migrated are but exiles in ""Babylon"" and are destined to be delivered out of captivity by a return to Zion or Africa - the land of their ancestors and the seat of Jah Rastafari himself, Haile Selassie I, the former emperor of Ethiopia. ""Rastafari"" is a work with an historical and ethnographic approach that seeks to correct several misconceptions in existing literature - the true origin of dreadlocks, for instance. It should be of interest to religion scholars, historians, scholars of Black studies, and a general audience interested in the movement and how Rastafarians settled in other countries.

Winner of the 2022 Association for the Study of Japanese Mountain Religion Book Prize Defining Shugendo brings together leading international experts on Japanese mountain asceticism to discuss what has been an essential component of Japanese religions for more than a thousand years. Contributors explore how mountains have been abodes of deities, a resting place for the dead, sources of natural bounty and calamities, places of religious activities, and a vast repository of symbols. The book shows that many peoples have chosen them as sites for ascetic practices, claiming the potential to attain supernatural powers there. This book discusses the history of scholarship on Shugendo, the development process of mountain worship, and the religious and philosophical features of devotion at specific sacred mountains. Moreover, it reveals the rich material and visual culture associated with Shugendo, from statues and steles, to talismans and written oaths.