'Hinduism' is a term often used to summarize the aspirations of the majority of the Indian people. But any simple definition of it is difficult, if not impossible. This is partly owing to the nuances of the Sanskrit language, in which many texts are written, and partly to the too literal interpretation of Hindu imagery and mythology that often veils its real significance. This book, first published in 1977, is an essential reference source that goes some way to clarifying the difficulties of understanding Hinduism.

This book, first published in 1968, is a collection of twenty-five lectures by Swami Prabhavananda, the outstanding scholar and translator of Hindu scriptures. They present a direct and pragmatic approach to spiritual life, and a clear guide to Hinduism.

This book, first published in 1968, comprises five articles on the immortality of the soul. According to Hindu tradition this immortality cannot be proved by the scientific method of reasoning - it is based upon scriptural evidence and on the direct experience of enlightened souls. These articles examine the Hindu tradition and provide reasoned support to the scriptures and experiences.

This book, first published in 1957, was the first in English to provide a full and clear introduction to one of the most significant of Indian gods, and stresses his supreme role in Indian religion and art. The book relates the full Krishna story, explaining his role in Indian religion, and traces the history of Krishna in Indian painting. There are 39 plates of Indian pictures, each accompanied by a commentary by the author, revealing a wealth of subtle and poetic detail.

Groundbreaking interpretations of classical rabbinic texts lead the reader through an exploration of ""attuned learning"" an emerging paradigm of mindfulness that emphasizes alertness to ones own mental, emotional, and physical workings as well as awareness of others within the complexities of learning interactions. The pedagogical is integrated with the ethical in transformative teaching and learning; repair of educational disruptions; the role of the human visage; and the dynamics of argumentative and collaborative learning. Textual analyses reveal how deliberate self-cultivation not only infuses ethics and spirituality into the growth of teachers, learners, and co-learners, but also offers a potential corrective for calculative modalities in contemporary educational thinking. The author speaks to the existential, humanizing art of education, enabling readers to examine, expand, or revisit their beliefs and practices.

In The Second Canonization of the Qur'an, Nasser studies the transmission and reception of the Qur'anic text and its variant readings through the work of Ibn Mujahid (d. 324/936), the founder of the system of the Seven Eponymous Readings of the Qur'an. The overarching project aims to track and study the scrupulous revisions the Qur'an underwent, in its recited, oral form, through the 1,400-year journey towards a final, static, and systematized text. For the very first time, the book offers a complete and detailed documentation of all the variant readings of the Qur'an as recorded by Ibn Mujahid. A comprehensive audio recording accompanies the book, with more than 3,500 audio files of Qur'anic recitations of variant readings.

Rabbi Abraham ibn Ezra's commentary is one of the great biblical exegeses produced by medieval Jewry. His commentary accompanies almost every version of the Rabbinic Bible, and his influence on biblical studies continues to this very day. Ibn Ezra sought to provide the literal meaning of the biblical text. However, he did more than that. His commentary is saturated with insights into Hebrew grammar, medieval philosophy, and astrology. Rabbi Abraham ibn Ezra's Commentary on Books 3-5 of Psalms: Chapters 73-150 completes the publication of the translation and annotation of Ibn Ezra's commentary to Psalms, making it available to both scholars and general readers.

This collection of essays seeks to demonstrate that many biblical authors deliberately used Classical and Hellenistic Greek texts for inspiration when crafting many of the narratives in the Primary History. Through detailed analysis of the text, Gnuse contends that there are numerous examples of clear influence from late classical and Hellenistic literature. Deconstructing the biblical and Greek works in parallel, he argues that there are too many similarities in basic theme, meaning, and detail, for them to be accounted for by coincidence or shared ancient tropes. Using this evidence, he suggests that although much of the text may originate from the Persian period, large parts of its final form likely date from the Hellenistic era. With the help of an original introduction and final chapter, Gnuse pulls his essays together into a coherent collection for the first time. The resultant volume offers a valuable resource for anyone working on the dating of the Hebrew Bible, as well as those working on Hellenism in the ancient Levant more broadly.

This volume is a systematic and comprehensive introduction to one of the most read texts in South Asia, the Bhagavad-gita. The Bhagavad-gita is at its core a religious text, a philosophical treatise and a literary work, which has occupied an authoritative position within Hinduism for the past millennium. This book brings together themes central to the study of the Gita, as it is popularly known - such as the Bhagavad-gita's structure, the history of its exegesis, its acceptance by different traditions within Hinduism and its national and global relevance. It highlights the richness of the Gita's interpretations, examines its great interpretive flexibility and at the same time offers a conceptual structure based on a traditional commentarial tradition. With contributions from major scholars across the world, this book will be indispensable for scholars and researchers of religious studies, especially Hinduism, Indian philosophy, Asian philosophy, Indian history, literature and South Asian studies.

This multidisciplinary collective volume advances the scholarly discussion on the origins of Islam. It simultaneously focuses on three domains: texts, social contexts, and ideological developments relevant for the study of Islam's beginnings -- taking the latter expression in its broadest possible sense. The intersections of these domains need to be examined afresh in order to obtain a clear picture of the concurrent phenomena that collectively enabled both the gradual emergence of a new religious identity and the progressive delimitation of its initially fuzzy boundaries.

The Mahabharata has been explored extensively as a work of mythology, epic poetry, and religious literature, but the text's philosophical dimensions have largely been under-appreciated by Western scholars. This book explores the philosophical implications of the Mahabharata by paying attention to the centrality of dialogue, both as the text's prevailing literary expression and its organising structure. Focusing on five sets of dialogues about controversial moral problems in the central story, this book shows that philosophical deliberation is an integral part of the narrative. Black argues that by paying attention to how characters make arguments and how dialogues unfold, we can better appreciate the Mahabharata's philosophical significance and its potential contribution to debates in comparative philosophy today. This is a fresh perspective on the Mahabharata that will be of great interest to any scholar working in religious studies, Indian/South Asian religions, comparative philosophy, and world literature.

This book focuses on the expressions used to describe Job's body in pain and on the reactions of his friends to explore the moral and social world reflected in the language and the values that their speeches betray. A key contribution of this monograph is to highlight how the perspective of illness as retribution is powerfully refuted in Job's speeches and, in particular, to show how this is achieved through comedy. Comedy in Job is a powerful weapon used to expose and ridicule the idea of retribution. Rejecting the approach of retrospective diagnosis, this monograph carefully analyses the expression of pain in Job focusing specifically on somatic language used in the deity attack metaphors, in the deity surveillance metaphors and in the language connected to the body and social status. These metaphors are analysed in a comparative way using research from medical anthropology and sociology which focuses on illness narratives and expressions of pain. Job's Body and the Dramatised Comedy of Moralising will be of interest to anyone working on the Book of Job, as well as those with an interest in suffering and pain in the Hebrew Bible more broadly.

Comedy is both relative, linked to a time and culture, and universal, found pervasively across time and culture. The Hebrew Bible contains comedy of this relative, yet universal nature. Melissa A. Jackson engages the Hebrew Bible via a comic reading and brings that reading into conversation with feminist-critical interpretation, in resistance to any lingering stereotype that comedy is fundamentally non-serious or that feminist critique is fundamentally unsmiling.
Dividing comic elements into categories of literary devices, psychological/social features, and psychological/social function, Jackson examines the narratives of a number of biblical characters for evidence of these comic elements. The characters include the trickster matriarchs, the women involved in the infancy of Moses, Rahab, Deborah and Jael, Delilah, three of David's wives (Michal, Abigail, Bathsheba), Jezebel, Ruth, and Esther. Nine particularly instructive points of contact between comedy and feminist interpretation emerge: both (1) resist definition, (2) exist amidst a self/other, subject/object dichotomy, (3) emphasise and utilise context, (4) promote creativity, (5) acknowledge the concept of distancing, (6) work towards revelation, (7) are subversive, (8) are concerned with containment and control, and (9) enable survival. The use of comedy as an interpretive lens for the Hebrew Bible is not without difficulties for feminist interpretation. While maintaining an uncomfortable, even painful, awareness of the hold patriarchy retains on the Hebrew Bible, feminist critics can still choose to allow comedy's revelatory, subversive, survivalist nature to do its work revealing, subverting, and surviving.

Does Jesus remain concealed by the very traditions intended to portray him? History and theology define Jesus to be a 1st-century Galilean or the son of God, a man limited by his time and place or exalted as the Messiah and Christ. He has been recognized as a Jewish rabbi or the prophet of a coming apocalypse. The quest for the historical Jesus and theology's Christ of faith may both be essential and undeniable in the history of scholarship. Secular historians and the Christian church have made their claims. Jesus' self-conception, however, has been neglected, his consciousness largely ignored. A new interpretation of the gospels presents Jesus as a unprecedented human being who will "utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world" (Matt. 13:35) and make their meanings significant for the here and now. Jesus' life from the virgin birth to the resurrection can neither be reduced to history's scepticism nor theology's affirmation. Is it possible to re-imagine the life and words of Jesus? He reveals himself to be a "first-born" who makes possible the second act of creation for every individual no less than for the social world.

Samkara (c.700 CE) has been regarded by many as the most authoritative Hindu thinker of all time. A great Indian Vedantin brahmin, Samkara was primarily a commentator on the sacred texts of the Vedas and a teacher in the Advaitin teaching line. This book serves as an introduction to Samkara's thought which takes this as a central theme. The author develops an innovative approach based on Samkara's ways of interpreting sacred texts and creatively examines the profound interrelationship between sacred text, content and method in Samkara's thought. The main focus of the book is on Samkara's teaching method. This method is, for Samkara, based on the Upanishads' own; it is to be employed by Advaitin teachers to draw pupils skilfully towards that realisation which is beyond all words. Consequently, this book will be of interest not only to students and scholars of Indian philosophy, but to all those interested in the relation between language and that which is held to transcend it.

Reading Hebrew Bible Narratives introduces readers to narrative traditions of the Old Testament and to methods of interpreting them. Part of the Essentials of Biblical Studies series, this volume presents readers with an overview of exegesis by mainly focusing on a self-contained narrative to be read alongside the text. Through sustained interaction with the book of Ruth, readers have opportunities to engage a biblical book from multiple perspectives, while taking note of the wider implications of such perspectives for other biblical narratives. Other select texts from Hebrew Bible narratives, related by theme or content to matters in Ruth, are also examined, not only to assist in illustrating this method of approach, but also to offer reinforcement of reading skills and connections among different narrative traditions. Considering literary analysis, words and texts in context, and reception history, this brief introduction gives students an overview of how exegesis illuminates stories in the Bible.

In The Aroma of Righteousness, Deborah Green explores images of perfume and incense in late Roman and early Byzantine Jewish literature. Using literary methods to illuminate the rabbinic literature, Green demonstrates the ways in which the rabbis' reading of biblical texts and their intimate experience with aromatics build and deepen their interpretations. The study uncovers the cultural associations that are evoked by perfume and incense in both the Hebrew Bible and midrashic texts and seeks to understand the cultural, theological, and experiential motivations and impulses that lie behind these interpretations. Green accomplishes this by examining the relationship between the textual traditions of the Hebrew Bible and Midrash, the surviving evidence from the material culture of Palestine in the late Roman and early Byzantine periods, and cultural evidence as described by the rabbis and other Roman authors.

As the world becomes increasingly globalised Islam faces some important choices. Does it seek to "modernise" in line with the cultures in which it is practised, or does it retain its traditions even if they are at odds with the surrounding society? This book utilizes a critical rationalist viewpoint to illuminate many of the hotly contended issues in modern Islam, and to offer a fresh analysis. A variety of issues within Islam are discussed in this book including, Muslims and modernity; Islam, Christianity and Judaism; approaches to the understanding of the Quran; Muslim identity and civil society; doctrinal certainty and violent radicalism. In each case, the author makes use of Karl Popper's theory of critical rationalism to uncover new aspects of these issues and to challenge post-modern, relativist, literalist and justificationist readings of Islam. This is a unique perspective on contemporary Islam and as such will be of significant interest to scholars of Religious Studies, Islamic Studies and the Philosophy of Religion.

Of the several works on the rise and development of the Babi movement, especially those dealing with the life and work of its founder, Sayyid Ali Muhammad Shirazi, few deal directly with the compelling and complex web of mysticism, theology and philosophy found in his earliest compositions. This book examines the Islamic roots of the Babi religion, (and by extension the later Baha'i faith which developed out of it), through the Qur'anic commentaries of the Bab and sheds light on its relationship to the wider religious milieu and its profound debt to esoteric Islam, especially Shi'ism. Todd Lawson places the two earliest writings of the Bab within the diverse contexts necessary to understand them, in order to explain why these writings made sense to and inspired his followers. He delves into the history of the tafsir (Qur'an commentary) genre of Islamic scholarship, situates these early writings in the Akhbari, Sufi and most importantly Shaykhi traditions of Islam. In the process, he identifies both the continuities and discontinuities between these works and earlier works of Shi'i tafsir, helping us appreciate significant elements of the Bab's thought and claims. Filling an important gap in the existing literature on the Babi movement, this book will be of greatest interest to students and scholars of Qur'an commentary, Mysticism, Shi'ism, the modern history of Iran and messianism.

This book sets out how contemporary Iranian scholars have approached the Qur'an during recent decades. It particularly aims to explore the contributions of scholars that have emerged in the post 1979-revolution era, outlining their primary interpretive methods and foundational theories regarding the reading of the Qur'an. Examining issues such as the status of women, democracy, freedom of religion and human rights, this book analyses the theoretical contributions of several Iranian scholars, some of which are new to the English-speaking academy. The hermeneutical approaches of figures such Abdolkarim Soroush, Muhammad Mojtahed Shabestari, Mohsen Kadivar, Hasan Yousefi-Eshkevari, Abolqasem Fanaie and Mostafa Malekian are presented and then analysed to demonstrate how a contextualist approach to the Qu'ran has been formed in response to the influence of Western Orientalism. The effect of this approach to the Qu'ran is then shown to have wide-ranging effects on Iranian society. This study reveals Qu'ranic thought that has been largely overlooked by the West. It will, therefore. Be of great use to academics in Religious, Islamic and Qur'anic studies as well as those studying the culture of Iran and the Middle East more generally.

The Struggle for Jerusalem and the Holy Land Between Judaism and Islam is a new inquiry into the Qur'an and classic Islamic sources on the people of Israel, their Torah, and their links to the Holy Land. In recent generations, the Muslim and Arab world has been suffused with publications on the subject of the people of Israel and their affinity to the Land of Israel. Most of these publications are tendentious, written with a hostile attitude toward Jews and Judaism; indeed, some of them are tainted with anti-Semitism. The Qur'an also deals with the question of the status of Eretz Israel, the Land of Israel. Many of its exegetes, following in the tracks of Islam's holy book, have done so as well-and somewhat surprisingly, perhaps, express an approach asserting that this land is promised exclusively to the people of Israel.

The Gates of Repentance (Sha'arei Teshuvah), by Rabbeinu Yonah of Geronah (d. 1263), is one of the most important books of Jewish literature. Now available in a modern English translation, this volume probes the profound idea of teshuvah, often translated as "repentance" but in reality far more complex and subtle than the simple meaning of "regret for sin" or "contrition." Rabbi Feldman furnishes the reader with an eminently readable translation and provides notes directly on-site when difficulties arise in the text. He gives a general introduction as well as short introductions to each gate, followed by a synopsis of each gate for review and overview. Unique to this work are the scholarly notes Rabbi Feldman provides, which enable the reader to follow themes throughout the work, get a better understanding of other sages' insights, and develop to a higher level the ideas discussed in The Gates of Repentance.

The Latter Prophets-Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Book of the Twelve-comprise a fascinating collection of prophetic oracles, narratives, and vision reports from ancient Israel and Judah. Spanning centuries and showing evidence of compositional growth and editorial elaboration over time, these prophetic books offer an unparalleled view into the cultural norms, theological convictions, and political disputes of Israelite communities caught in the maelstrom of militarized conflicts with the empires of ancient Egypt, Babylonia, and Persia. Instructive for scholar and student alike, The Oxford Handbook of the Prophets features wide-ranging discussion of ancient Near Eastern social and cultic contexts; exploration of focused topics such as the persona of the prophet and the problem of violence in prophetic rhetoric; sophisticated historical and literary analysis of key prophetic texts; issues in reception history, from these texts' earliest reinterpretations at Qumran to Christian appropriations in contemporary homiletics; feminist, materialist, and postcolonial readings engaging the insights of influential contemporary theorists; and more. The diversity of interpretive approaches, clarity of presentation, and breadth of expertise represented here will make this Handbook indispensable for research and teaching on the Latter Prophets.