Starting with the biographical story of a 92 year old Chaldean woman from northern Iraq and a biography of a Kurdish Jewish woman now living in Israel, Adelman writes about the history of Christians and Jews in the Middle East. Their languages, dialects of the 3000 year old Aramaic language, are under threat, and their homelands continuously threatened by war.

Why are Jews so attracted to India, to Hinduism, and to Buddhism in the United States as well as Israel? They travel there by the thousands, attracted by the exoticism of course, but, Adelman believes, also drawn by an atavistic connection, dating back to the great Persian empires that extended from the land of Israel to the Indian subcontinent, linking the religions, myths, legends, literature, customs, even languages over the centuries. Influenced by her own profoundly mystical experiences, Adelman provides the history, explains the religions, shows the common origins, and gives astonishing examples of parallel symbolism.