Dating from around 300BC, Tao Te Ching is the first great classic of the Chinese school of philosophy called Taoism. Within its pages is summed up a complete view of the cosmos and how human beings should respond to it. A profound mystical insight into the nature of things forms the basis for a humane morality and vision of political utopia.

The story of novelist and poet Deborah Larsen's youngwomanhood, The Tulip and the Pope is both an exquisitelycrafted spiritual memoir and a beautifully nuanced view of life inthe convent.In midsummer of 1960, nineteen-year-old Deborah sharesa cab to a convent. She and the teenage girls with her, passionateto become nuns, heedless of all they are leaving behind, smoketheir last cigarettes before entering their new lives. In the sameartful prose that distinguished her novel The White ,Larsen's memoir lets us into the hushed life of the convent. Shecaptures the exquisite peace she found there, as well as theextreme constriction of the rules and her gradual awareness of allthat she is missing. Eventually the physical world—the lush tulipshe remembers seeing as a girl, the snow she tunneled in, and eventhe mystery of sex—begins to seem to her an alternative theater fora deep understanding and love of God.

Early one morning, for no earthly reason, Sara Miles, raisedan atheist, wandered into a church, received communion, and foundherself transformed–embracing a faith she’d once scorned. A lesbianleft-wing journalist who’d covered revolutions around the world,Miles didn’t discover a religion that was about angels or goodbehavior or piety; her faith centered on real hunger, real food,and real bodies. Before long, she turned the bread she ate atcommunion into tons of groceries, piled on the church’s altar to begiven away. Within a few years, she and the people she served hadstarted nearly a dozen food pantries in the poorest parts of theircity. Take This Bread is rich with real-lifeDickensian characters–church ladies, millionaires, schizophrenics,bishops, and thieves–all blown into Miles’s life by the relentlessforce of her newfound calling. Here, in this achingly beautiful,passionate book, is the living communion of Christ. “The most amazing book.” –Anne Lamott “Engaging, funny, and

Rabbi Steinberg identifies seven strands that weave togetherto make up Judaism: God, morality, rite and custom, law, sacredliterature, institutions, and the people. A classic work directedto both the Jewish and the non-Jewish reader.

In a narrative that is at once thoughtful and passionate,hopeful but without illusions, award-winning historian ZacharyKarabell reveals the history of peaceful coexistence among Muslims,Christians, and Jews over the course of fourteen centuries untilthe present-day. The harsh reality of religious conflict is daily news, and therising tensions between the West and Islam show no signs ofabating. However, the relationship between Muslims, Christians, andJews has not always been marked with animosity; there is also adeep and nuanced history of peace. From the court of caliphs in ancient Baghdad, where scholarsengaged in spirited debate, to present-day Dubai, where members ofeach faith work side by side, Karabell traces the forgotten legacyof tolerance and cooperation these three monotheistic religionshave enjoyed—a legacy that will be vital in any attempt to findcommon ground and reestablish peace.

The Little Book of Changes is a fresh interpretation of the I Ching, one of the oldest books in the world-recognized by both Confucians and Taoists as a fundamental work. Author Peter Crisp's perceptive and poetic rendition reimagines the ancient philosophical text as a friendly, accessible, and modern companion.

The author of Writing Down the Bones recounts herjourney awakening from the profound sleep of a suburban childhood,describing her fifteen years as a student of Zen Buddhism, herwriting, and resistance to change. Reprint.

According to the Buddha, the path of kindness is the path ofhappiness. Now Sylvia Boorstein, nationally bestselling author ofIt’s Easier Than You Think, has taken the 2500-year-old practice ofdeveloping the qualities of a compassionate heart—the core of theBuddha’s own practice—and made it accessible to all. Pay Attentionfor Goodness’ Sake is the first book ever to guide Western readerson the path of the Buddha’s Ten Paramitas, the Perfections of theHeart. Boorstein combines traditional Buddhist teachings andparables with stories from her own life, as well as easy-to-followmeditations, to show how the practice of Mindfulness—payingattention in everyday life—can lead to these perfections that allof us strive for, including Generosity, Morality, Wisdom, Energy,Patience, Determination, and Equanimity. When we take on this practice, Boorstein notes, “our visionbecomes transformed. We see, with increasing clarity, the confusionin our own minds and the suffering in our own hearts. . .

There is no woman with a worse reputation than Jezebel, theancient queen who corrupted a nation and met one of the mostgruesome fates in the Bible. Her name alone speaks of sexualdecadence and promiscuity. But what if this version of her story,handed down to us through the ages, is merely the one her enemieswanted us to believe? What if Jezebel, far from being a connivingharlot, was, in fact, framed? In this remarkable new biography, Lesley Hazleton shows exactly howthe proud and courageous queen of Israel was vilified and made intothe very embodiment of wanton wickedness by her political andreligious enemies. Jezebel brings readers back to the sourceof the biblical story, a rich and dramatic saga featuring evilschemes and underhanded plots, war and treason, false gods andfalser humans, and all with the fate of entire nations at stake. Atits center are just one woman and one man—the sophisticated QueenJezebel and the stark prophet Elijah. Their epic and ultimatelytragic confrontation pits tolerance again

In this book DanielJonah Goldhagen cuts through the historical and moral fog to layout the full extent of the Catholic Church's involvement in theHolocaust, transforming a narrow discussion fixated on Pope PiusXII into the long-overdue investigation of the Church throughoutEurope. He shows that the Church's and the Pope's complicity in thepersecution of the Jews was much deeper than has been understood.The Church's leaders were fully aware of the persecutions and theydid not speak out and urge resistance. Instead, they supported manyaspects of the persecution. Some clergy even took part in the massmurder. But Goldhagen goes further and develops a new, precise wayfor assessing the Church and its clergy's culpability. He thenshows that the Church has, even according to its own doctrine, anunacknowledged duty of repair. He explores this duty, analyzes theChurch's tactics of evasion, and delineates all that the Churchmust do to repair the harm it inflicted on Jews and to healitself.

To this day, I don't even know what my mother's real nameis. Helen Fremont was raised as a Roman Catholic. It wasn't until shewas an adult, practicing law in Boston, that she discovered herparents were Jewish--Holocaust survivors living invented lives. Noteven their names were their own. In this powerful memoir, HelenFremont delves into the secrets that held her family in a bond ofsilence for more than four decades, recounting with heartbreakingclarity a remarkable tale of survival, as vivid as fiction but withthe resonance of truth. Driven to uncover their roots, Fremont and her sister piecedtogether an astonishing story: of Siberian Gulags and Italianroyalty, of concentration camps and buried lives. After LongSilence is about the devastating price of hiding the truth; aboutfamilies; about the steps we take, foolish or wise, to protectourselves and our loved ones. No one who reads this book can beunmoved, or fail to understand the seductive, damaging power ofsecrets.

This classic book grew out of the fascination that Germanjournalist, Werner Keller, developed when he began to learn thatthe work of archaeologists and historians corroborated Biblicalaccounts which he had hitherto dismissed as mere "pious tales.

Twenty years after he and his family were deported from Sighetto Auschwitz, Elie Wiesel returned to his town in search of thewatch—a bar mitzvah gift—he had buried in his backyard before theyleft.

Churched details an American boy’s experiencesgrowing up in a culture where men weren’t allowed to let their hairgrow to touch their ears (“an abomination!”), women wouldn’t havebeen caught dead in a pair of pants (unless swimming), and thepastor couldn’t preach a sermon without a healthy dose of hellfireand brimstone. In 1978, when Matthew Paul Turner was five, his familybecame sold-out members of an independent Baptist church, joiningwithout any firsthand knowledge of Christian fundamentalism, onlyhis parents’ sincere desire to follow God. In Churched , withwit and careful observation, he reveals the tenderness and gracethat managed to seep through the cracks and a young man who, amidstthe chaotic mess of religion, falls in love with Jesus.