In Search of the Sacred Book studies the artistic incorporation of religious concepts such as prophecy, eternity, and the afterlife in the contemporary Latin American novel. It departs from sociopolitical readings by noting the continued relevance of religion in Latin American life and culture, despite modernity's powerful secularizing influence. Analyzing Jorge Luis Borges's secularized "narrative theology" in his essays and short stories, the book follows the development of the Latin American novel from the early twentieth century until today by examining the attempts of major novelists, from María Luisa Bombal, Alejo Carpentier, and Juan Rulfo, to Julio Cortázar, Gabriel García Márquez, and José Lezama Lima, to "sacralize" the novel by incorporating traits present in the sacred texts of many religions. It concludes with a view of the "desacralization" of the novel by more recent authors, from Elena Poniatowska and Fernando Vallejo to Roberto Bolaño.
A Buddhist monk takes up arms to resist the Chinese invasion of Tibet - then spends the rest of his life trying to atone for the violence by hand printing the best prayer flags in India. A Jain nun tests her powers of detachment as she watches her best friend ritually starve herself to death. Nine people, nine lives; each one taking a different religious path, each one an unforgettable story. William Dalrymple delves deep into the heart of a nation torn between the relentless onslaught of modernity and the ancient traditions that endure to this day. LONGLISTED FOR THE BBC SAMUEL JOHNSON PRIZE
Sacred presents photographs of locations cloaked in mysticism and imbued with a spiritual energy, exploring the meaning of the sacred in a global, multicultural context. Countless cultures have found it in the magnificence of nature and what can be called the divine gestures of the nature landscape. We looked to the majesty of snowcapped mountains, the glow of the full moon, the power of a magical waterfall, the endless sands of the Sahara Desert, the towering height of the tallest trees and the subtle essence of a lotus flower. We created remarkable buildings to the essence of what we felt to be sacred. What is sacred and what do cultures around the world consider sacred? What is sacred to a Muslim, a Tibetan monk, a Native American, a Christian elder, an atheist, a mountaineer, a poet or an artist? Chris Rainier has spent the last forty years in search of the sacred––from the peaks of Tibet to the icebergs of Antarctica, from the vibrant mysticism of India to the mysteries of the Silk Road, from the jungles of New Guinea to the druid stones of Scotland, and from the deserts of the Southwest United States to the rock art of aboriginal Australia and Africa. Rainier’s photographs masterfully capture the wonder and awe inherent to all these sites. Sacred presents photographs from this lifelong journey. The collection offers spiritually driven glimpses of ancient monuments and haunting landscapes from around the world––each echoing with the energy of timeless and sacred power places. RENOWN PHOTOGRAPHER AND AUTHOR: Chris Rainier is a documentary photographer and National Geographic explorer who is highly respected for his documentation of endangered cultures and traditional languages around the globe. AWARD-WINNING PHOTOGRAPHY: Rainier was Ansel Adams last photo assistant and has contributed numerous photographs for the United Nations, UNESCO, Amnesty International, Conservation International, the Smithsonian Institution, CNN, BBC, NPR, National Geographic, TIME magazine, the New York Times, and LIFE magazine. CELEBRATED CONTRIBUTORS: Over twelve internationally recognized contributors discuss what sacred means to them and include British essayist and novelist Pico Iyer; ethnographer, writer, photographer, and filmmaker Wade Davis; and Pulitzer Prize winner and National Geographic Fellow Paul Salopek.
Bestselling author Gary Thomas transforms the way you look at romantic relationships. His unique perspective on dating will prepare you for a satisfying, spiritually enriching marriage. In the revised edition of his hit book The Sacred Search, Gary Thomas helps single people of all ages make wise marital choices by rethinking what basis those choices should be made on. You will be encouraged to think beyond finding your “soul mate” and instead adopt a more biblical search for a “sole mate”—someone who will walk with you on your spiritual journey. Thomas asks, What if we focused on why we should get married more than on who to marry? What if being “in love” isn’t a good enough reason to get married? And most of all, what if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy? The Sacred Search casts a vision for building a relationship around shared spiritual mission—and making marriage with eternity at its heart.
Consider the woven integrated complexity of a living cell after 3.8 billion years of evolution. Is it more awe-inspiring to suppose that a transcendent God fashioned the cell, or to consider that the living organism was created by the evolving biosphere? As the eminent complexity theorist Stuart Kauffman explains in this ambitious and groundbreaking new book, people who do not believe in God have largely lost their sense of the sacred and the deep human legitimacy of our inherited spirituality. For those who believe in a Creator God, no science will ever disprove that belief. In Reinventing the Sacred, Kauffman argues that the science of complexity provides a way to move beyond reductionist science to something new: a unified culture where we see God in the creativity of the universe, biosphere, and humanity. Kauffman explains that the ceaseless natural creativity of the world can be a profound source of meaning, wonder, and further grounding of our place in the universe. His theory carries with it a new ethic for an emerging civilization and a reinterpretation of the divine. He asserts that we are impelled by the imperative of life itself to live with faith and courage-and the fact that we do so is indeed sublime. Reinventing the Sacred will change the way we all think about the evolution of humanity, the universe, faith, and reason.
A captivating history of one of the world's most iconic and mysterious flowers Bewitched by a lotus which flowered from three-thousandyear- old seeds in his English garden, Mark Griffiths set out to track the origins and significance of this sublime plant in this beautifully-illustrated book. The Lotus Quest takes Griffiths from the headquarters of the Linnaean Society in London to a mountain top in northern Japan. As he travels in search of this ancient flower, Griffiths looks at the lotus's significance in ancient Egypt and India, the plant's medicinal uses and the inspiration it has provided to Western artists. As he tracks the plant, its story unveils a stunning vision of Japan's feudal era with visits to shrines, ruins, gardens and wild landscapes as well as meetings with priests and archaeologists, philosophers and anthropologists, gardeners and botanists, poets and artists. He even dines on the lotus in a Tokyo cafe. By the end of Griffiths' journey, when he reaches the hauntingly beautiful Japanese temple of Chuson-ji, readers will finally understand why the lotus has obsessed people throughout the ages.
This fascinating study of parallel movements sheds new light on spiritual art. More importantly, it asks us to look again at that art and its role in divine revelation, to see what riches are there and what lessons may be learned for a reinvigorated sacred art today.
In Sacred Time and the Search for Meaning, author Gary Eberle contemplates how humans' view of time has evolved throughout history, how we came to measure time, and why we feel especially starved for it now. Eberle seeks to rediscover a renewed sense of meaning in life through looking for ways to enter the realm of sacred time or "sabbath time"—where we can reconnect with the slower, deeper rhythms of life that have traditionally been experienced through worship, prayer, and the observance of holy days. Drawing from the work of Western philosophers from Aristotle to Heidegger, and on theorists from Jung to Foucault, he presents both an intellectual history of time and a personal account of his own search for sacred time. Along the way he formulates an insightful analysis of our culture's obsession with speed and efficiency, and he offers guidance for slowing down to savor life outside of schedules and routines, showing the way toward finding fulfillment in this increasingly accelerated world.
