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Where Men and Gods Fear to Tread lays out the intertwined nature of all major world religions and even shows the religion from which they are all descended (the Urreligion). It also incorporates discussion of every major world's religions basic practices, philosophies, and shortcomings. This is an audiobook of Book 3....

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Where Men and Gods Fear to Tread lays out the intertwined nature of all major world religions and even shows the religion from which they are all descended (the Urreligion). It also incorporates discussion of every major world's religions basic practices, philosophies, and shortcomings. This is an audiobook of Book 2....

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The Westminster Larger Catechism, along with the Westminster Shorter Catechism, is a central catechism of Calvinists in the English tradition throughout the world. The Westminster Shorter Catechism was to be easier to read and concise for beginners and the Larger Catechism was to be more exact and comprehensive. The Catechism was completed by the Westminster Assembly in 1647. It was then adopted by the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1648 and (with modifications relating to the civil magistrate) by the Presbyterian Synod of New York and Philadelphia in 1788....

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Religion

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Martin Luther strove to give a verse by verse exegesis of the Epistle to the Galatians in the work. The original work, written in Latin in around 1516, was much longer. This translation by Theodore Graebner strove to produce a copy of the work in a format and with wording much more applicable to the general English-speaking American public. (Summary by Timothy Perkins)...

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Religion

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Contra Gentes is the first of a two volume work published by Athanasius of Alexandria prior to the outbreak of the Arian controversy (ca. 319). It focuses especially on pagan beliefs and worship concluding with a defense of the Christian view of God and creation -- especially creation by the eternal Word. In this way, the ground is prepared for the second volume of his work, now published separately under the title De Incarnatione Verbi. (Summary by Jonathan Lange)...

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Ancient Texts

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Charles Foster Kent was one of the premier scholars in Jewish Studies at the turn of the century. He was particularly well-known for his comparisons of early Christianity to its Jewish roots. He also wrote several distinguished histories of Israel, the Jewish people, Torah studies, and the development of oral Torah. (Summary by Kirsten Ferreri)...

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History, Religion

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De Imitatione Christi (De navolging van Christus) is een middeleeuws boek dat handelt over hoe je een goed christen wordt. Het werd in de vijftiende eeuw geschreven door de Nederlandse augustijn Thomas a Kempis. Dit werk was na de Bijbel het meest verspreide boek van de late Middeleeuwen en wordt ook nu nog door veel christenen gelezen. (bron: Wikipedia, kattekliek)...

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Religion

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Hosea was the son of Beeri and a prophet in Israel in the 8th century BCE. He is one of the Twelve Prophets of the Jewish Hebrew Bible, also known as the Minor Prophets of the Christian Old Testament. We know practically nothing about the life or social status of Hosea. According to the Book of Hosea, he married the prostitute Gomer, the daughter of Diblatayim, at God's command. He lived in the Northern Kingdom in the period 740–725 BCE. In Hosea 5:8 ff., there is a reference to the wars which led to the capture of the kingdom by the Assyrians (ca. 734–732 BCE). It is not certain if he has also experienced the destruction of Samaria, which is foreseen in Hosea 14:1. Hosea's family life reflected the adulterous relationship which Israel had built with polytheistic gods. His children's names made them like walking prophecies of the fall of the ruling dynasty and the severed covenant with God — much like the prophet Isaiah a generation later. Hosea is often seen as a prophet of doom, but underneath his message of destruction is a promise of restoration. (From Wikipedia)...

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Religion

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All mythology and/or Hawthorne lovers unite! Here is a delightful collection of charming stories from Greek Mythology. This collection features some very popular characters like our beloved Jason, Ulysses, King Pluto and Theseus (and of course, our favorite, Mr. Minotaur, too). Written in Hawthorne's interesting and beautiful style, these stories will be a great delight to read AND listen to. (Summary by Neeru Iyer)...

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Myths/Legends, Children

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Rome having been stormed and sacked by the Goths under Alaric their king, the worshippers of false gods, or pagans, as we commonly call them, made an attempt to attribute this calamity to the Christian religion, and began to blaspheme the true God with even more than their wonted bitterness and acerbity. It was this which kindled my zeal for the house of God, and prompted me to undertake the defence of the city of God against the charges and misrepresentations of its assailants. This work was in my hands for several years, owing to the interruptions occasioned by many other affairs which had a prior claim on my attention, and which I could not defer. However, this great undertaking was at last completed in twenty-two books. Of these, the first five refute those who fancy that the polytheistic worship is necessary in order to secure worldly prosperity, and that all these overwhelming calamities have befallen us in consequence of its prohibition. In the following five books I address myself to those who admit that such calamities have at all times attended, and will at all times attend, the human race, and that they constantly recur i...

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Literature, Philosophy, Religion

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The Ball and the Cross is G. K. Chesterton's third novel. In the introduction Martin Gardner notes that it is a mixture of fantasy, farce and theology. Gardner continues: Evan MacIan is a tall, dark-haired, blue-eyed Scottish Highlander and a devout Roman Catholic.... James Turnbull is a short, red-haired, gray-eyed Scottish Lowlander and a devout but naive atheist.... The two meet when MacIan smashes the window of the street office where Turnbull publishes an atheist journal. This act of rage occurs when MacIan sees posted on the shop's window a sheet that blasphemes the Virgin Mary, presumably implying she was an adulteress who gave birth to an illegitimate Jesus. When MacIan challenges Turnbull to a duel to the death, Turnbull is overjoyed. For twenty years no one had paid the slightest attention to his Bible bashing. Now at last someone is taking him seriously! Most of the rest of the story is a series of comic events in which the two enemies wander about seeking a spot for their duel. MacIan and Turnbull become friends as they protect each other from interference from the modern world, which has trivialized their views over lif...

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Fiction, Fantasy, Religion

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Deuteronomy is the fifth book of the Hebrew Bible, and of the Jewish Torah/Pentateuch. The Hebrew title, [spoken] words, is taken from the opening phrase, These are the words...; the English title is from the Greek and Latin, both meaning second law, a mistranslation of the Hebrew phrase mishneh ha-torah ha-zoth, a copy of this law, in Deuteronomy 17:18. The book consists of three sermons or speeches delivered to the Israelites by Moses on the plains of Moab, shortly before they enter the Promised Land. The first sermon recapitulates the forty years of wilderness wanderings which have led to this moment, and ends with an exhortation to observe the law (or teachings); the second reminds the Israelites of the need for exclusive allegiance to one God and observance of the laws he has given them, on which their possession of the land depends; and the third offers the comfort that even should Israel prove unfaithful and so lose the land, with repentance all can be restored. One of its most significant verses is Deuteronomy 6:4, the Shema, which has become the definitive statement of Jewish identity: Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the ...

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Religion, History

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volunteers bring you 13 recordings of Pillow and Stone by Abram S. Isaacs. This was the Weekly Poetry project for April 24, 2011. Abram S. Isaacs (1851-1920) was an American rabbi, author, and professor. Isaacs received his education at the New York University, from which he was graduated in 1871. He became a Rabbi at Barnett Memorial Temple at Paterson, New Jersey. For thirty-five years he occupied a chair at the New York University, first as Professor of Hebrew, then of Germanic languages, and later of Semitics. (summary from Wikipedia)...

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Instruction, Philosophy, Religion, Poetry

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The improved theory and practice of religion and of medicine are mainly due to the people's improved views of the Supreme Being. (from The People's Idea of God )...

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Religion

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The Gospel of Luke is the most literary of the four gospels which recount the life and work of Jesus Christ. Although anonymous, the book is generally attributed to Luke, a physician and a missionary companion of the Apostle Paul. His account contains events which are unique in the four gospels including the visits of Gabriel to Mary and Zacharias, the visit of the shepherds to the birth of Jesus, and the story of the young Jesus at the temple. This gospel contains the most references to women and is favorable to the Gentiles for whom it was written. Perhaps the most well-known of all New Testament passages is the second chapter of Luke which tells of the birth of Christ. (Summary by Susan Denny)...

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Religion

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The Curtezan unmasked or, the Whoredomes of Jezebel Painted to the Life: With Antidotes against them, or Heavenly Julips to cool Men in the Fever of Lust is a fire-and-brimstone polemic by A Spiritual Physician to persuade young men not to succumb to harlotry and its accompanying perils. (Introduction by Denny Sayers)...

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Religion, Satire

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The Book of Job (American Standard Version) is presented in forty-two chapters and is one of the Old Testament Wisdom Books. The narrative chronicles the trials of Job as he is brought low from a comfortable and exalted position in his community to face loss of his fortune, children and health. Joined by three friends who initially commiserate and sympathize with him, there ensues a lengthy argument about the fate of the wicked and the just and much questioning about the character of God and the justice He metes out to his creations. A quite lively and poetic discussion ensues among these wise elders and their suppositions and conclusions are eventually contested by a youth who enters the discussion toward the end. God has the final word in this narrative and Job is left to abjectly acknowledge that his complaints and knowledge mean little in the face of that which is so far beyond his ability to comprehend. Debate regarding the meaning, purpose and author of this book is still hotly contested among biblical scholars. It is far beyond the scope of this summary to offer any conclusions regarding this work. The reader offers the words...

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Religion

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Devotions upon Emergent Occasions is a 1624 prose work by the English writer John Donne. It is a series of reflections that were written as Donne recovered from a serious illness, believed to be either typhus or relapsing fever. (Donne does not clearly identify the disease in his text.) The work consists of twenty-three parts describing each stage of the sickness. Each part is further divided into a Meditation, an Expostulation, and a Prayer. The seventeenth meditation is perhaps the best-known part of the work. It contains the following passage: No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee....

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Religion, Literature

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Strauss was an early pioneer in the ongoing 'Quest of the Historical Jesus' movement, and his Life of Jesus is one of the few landmarks in the field. The first edition of Strauss' book was published in Germany in 1835, when he was only 27 years old. He focused his attention on battling two theological fronts which were current at the time - the biblical Literalists who believed the miracles in the Gospels were to be taken as literal history, and the Rationalists, who believed that the Gospel miracles were true but could be explained by natural and rational causes. Strauss rejected both camps and, in a historical analysis of the Gospels that was scrupulous and exhaustive, concluded that our knowledge of the Historical Jesus is hopelessly buried under layers of legend and myth.The price that Strauss paid for publication was high – his book scandalized Europe, and cost him his job as Chair of Theology at the University of Zurich, and ultimately his career. Dozens of books, mostly from Germany, were written in rebuttal. The school of Rationalism died in the 19th century, due in no small part to Strauss' criticism. The school of Literali...

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Philosophy, Religion

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The book starts with a young heroine telling her story of coping with a debilitating illness that includes depression and thoughts of suicide. Her doctor is unable to help her and sends her off on a holiday where she meets a mystical character by the name of Raffaello Cellini, an Italian artist. Cellini offers her a strange potion which immediately puts her into a tranquil slumber, in which she experiences divine visions. This is the beginning of her journey to health, both spiritual and physical. ....

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Fantasy, Literature, Religion

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A very wise physician has said that “every illness has two parts—what it is, and what the patient thinks about it.” What the patient thinks about it is often more important and more troublesome than the real disease. What the patient thinks of life, what life means to him is also of great importance and may be the bar that shuts out all real health and happiness. The following pages are devoted to certain ideals of life which I would like to give to my patients, the long-time patients who have especially fallen to my lot. (Summary by Herbert J Hall - from the Preface)...

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Advice, Religion, Psychology

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El Castillo Interior or Las Moradas (trans.:The Interior Castle or The Mansions) was written by Saint Teresa of Ávila in 1577. After being ordered to write her autobiographical La Vida de la Santa Madre Teresa de Jesús (The Life of S. Teresa of Jesus), Teresa was hesitant to begin writing again on her views of the perfection found in internal prayer. In the hands of the Inquisition at that time, her Life was commonly believed to be the weight in the scale of whether to call her experiences heretical or not. Her humility and claims that, “I am not meant for writing; I have neither the health nor the wits for it,” almost prevented Teresa from composing The Interior Castle. However, according to a letter written by Fray Diego, one of Teresa’s former confessors, Teresa was finally convinced to write her book after a she received a vision from God. Diego wrote that God revealed to Teresa, ...a most beautiful crystal globe, made in the shape of a castle, and containing seven mansions, in the seventh and innermost of which was the King of Glory, in the greatest splendour, illumining and beautifying them all. The nearer one got to the centr...

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Religion

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John Donne was an English Jacobean preacher, sometime lawyer, later in life a Member of Parliament and Royal Chaplain. Marrying for love against the wishes of his influential father-in-law; Donne's career was cast into shadow: forcing him to support his wife, Anne, as best he might under a specter of unforgiving penury. Despite such hardships - perhaps because of them - Donne's writings demonstrate a mastery of poetry layered with metaphysical meaning and mystery: which continues to delight and challenge modern-day readers. Donne's divine poems - the focus of this collection - present profound theological insights using absorbing allegories and beautiful imagery. At the end of Donne's life - as his health deteriorated under illnesses of increasing severity - his poetry served him as: distraction, consolation, and even public confession. With them, Donne cheerfully but soberly faces the limits of his own mortality: and contemplates the mysteries that lie beyond the grave. (Introduction by Godsend)...

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Poetry, Religion

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“THE BOOK THAT DORIAN GRAY LOVED AND THAT INSPIRED OSCAR WILDE”. Such is the enticing epigraph of one early translation of Huysmans’ cult novel of 1884, which is also routinely called the Bible of Decadence. Accurate descriptions, both, of this bizarre masterpiece which has reverberated ever since through high and popular culture.“Against Nature” (or in this version “Against The Grain”) explores to the furthest limit the life of the world-rejecting aesthete living a reclusive existence devoted entirely to artificial paradises of his own devising. This is no solemn tract, however: the book’s anti-hero Duc Jean Floressas Des Esseintes spectacularly fails to achieve his life’s work, as all his attempts to create worlds of perverse experience through synaesthesia and interior decoration prove ludicrously unsatisfying and injurious to health. An innocent tortoise also falls casualty to his theories, in the wonderful fifth chapter.This is probably a novel best savoured one chapter at a time, and not only because John Howard’s clunky translation makes indigestible listening. Those who can skip whole chunks without guilt would do well to av...

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Fiction

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Religio Medici (The Religion of a Doctor) sets out Sir Thomas Browne's spiritual testament as well as being an early psychological self-portrait. In its day, the book was a European best-seller. It was published in 1643 by the newly-qualified physician, and its unorthodox views placed it swiftly upon the Papal Index Librorum Prohibitorum in 1645. Although predominantly concerned with Christian faith, the Religio also meanders into digressions upon alchemy, hermetic philosophy, astrology, and physiognomy. Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial, or a Discourse of the Sepulchral Urns lately found in Norfolk, was published in 1658. Its nominal subject was the discovery of a Roman urn burial in Norfolk. The discovery of these remains prompts Browne to deliver, first, a careful description of the antiquities found, and then a careful survey of most of the burial and funerary customs, ancient and current, of which his era was aware. The most famous part of the work, though, is the fifth chapter, where Browne quite explicitly turns to discuss man's struggles with mortality, and the uncertainty of his fate and fame in this world and the next, to produce a...

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Essay/Short nonfiction, Philosophy, Religion

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A collection of fifteen short nonfiction works in the public domain. The essays, speeches and reports included in this collection were independently selected by the readers, and the topics encompass humor, history, politics, science medicine, nature, finance, cooking, film and religion. (summary by J. M. Smallheer)...

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Essay/Short nonfiction

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A collection of sixteen short nonfiction works in the public domain. The essays, speeches and reports included in this collection were independently selected by the readers, and the topics encompass history, politics, medicine, nature and religion. (summary by J. M. Smallheer)...

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Essay/Short nonfiction

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The title page gives this book the subtitle, “True stories of the intrepid bravery and stirring adventures of missionaries with uncivilized man, wild beasts, and the forces of nature in all parts of the world.” The thrilling accounts in this collection include stories of Jacob Chamberlain’s medical ministry in India, the dangers faced by Alexander Mackay in Uganda, James Chalmers’ work among the headhunters of New Guinea, John Paton’s mission to the South Sea cannibals, and the Hawaiian queen Kapiolani’s challenge to the gods of the volcano. “Romantic” in the sense that these brave missionaries faced the unknown, but never “romanticized” – all sacrificed home and luxury, and many suffered the loss of family, fortune, and even their lives. (Summary by D. Leeson)...

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Biography, History, Religion, Travel