Zoroastrian Rituals in Context

Zoroastrian Rituals in Context
Author: Michael Stausberg
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 766
Release: 2018-08-14
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9047412508

Rituals play a prominent role in Zoroastrianism, one of the oldest religious traditions of mankind. In this book, scholars from a broad range of disciplines make the first ever collective effort to discuss Zoroastrian rituals in different historical contexts and geographical settings.

Ernst Herzfeld and the Development of Near Eastern Studies 1900-1950

Ernst Herzfeld and the Development of Near Eastern Studies 1900-1950
Author: Ann Gunter
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 654
Release: 2005-02-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 9047406583

As archaeologist, philologist, and historian, German scholar Ernst Herzfeld (1879–1948) significantly shaped the study of the prehistoric to Islamic Near East. His life and work are reassessed and situated within decisive developments in research and politics in the 20th century, providing new insights into the historiography of the Near East.

The Rise of the West

The Rise of the West
Author: William H. McNeill
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 866
Release: 2009-07-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 0226561615

The Rise of the West, winner of the National Book Award for history in 1964, is famous for its ambitious scope and intellectual rigor. In it, McNeill challenges the Spengler-Toynbee view that a number of separate civilizations pursued essentially independent careers, and argues instead that human cultures interacted at every stage of their history. The author suggests that from the Neolithic beginnings of grain agriculture to the present major social changes in all parts of the world were triggered by new or newly important foreign stimuli, and he presents a persuasive narrative of world history to support this claim. In a retrospective essay titled "The Rise of the West after Twenty-five Years," McNeill shows how his book was shaped by the time and place in which it was written (1954-63). He discusses how historiography subsequently developed and suggests how his portrait of the world's past in The Rise of the West should be revised to reflect these changes. "This is not only the most learned and the most intelligent, it is also the most stimulating and fascinating book that has ever set out to recount and explain the whole history of mankind. . . . To read it is a great experience. It leaves echoes to reverberate, and seeds to germinate in the mind."—H. R. Trevor-Roper, New York Times Book Review

Birth of the Persian Empire

Birth of the Persian Empire
Author: Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 157
Release: 2010-01-08
Genre: History
ISBN: 0857733079

Of the great ancient civilizations, that of Persia is the least known and the most enigmatic. This book explores the formation of the first Persian Empire under the Achaemenid Persians. It brings together a multi-disciplinary view of ancient Iran in the first millennium BC and concentrates on the art, archaeology, history and religion of a geographical area far beyond the present borders of modern Iran in the period beginning just before the formation of the Persian empire in the middle of the 6th century up to its collapse following conquest by Alexander the Great in the late 4th century BC. Eminent scholars here give a critical approach to some of the traditional interpretations and discuss topics which help the reader towards a better understanding of the formation of the Persian empire. This is the first volume in the "Idea of Iran" series which will be a four-volume collection encompassing the history of that country.

The Ocean of the Soul

The Ocean of the Soul
Author: Ritter
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 859
Release: 2021-12-28
Genre: Reference
ISBN: 9004245073

The Ocean of the Soul is one of the great works of the German Orientalist Hellmut Ritter (1892-1971). It presents a comprehensive analysis of the writings of the mystical Persian poet Farīd al-Dīn ‘Aṭṭār who is thought to have died at an advanced age in April 1221 when the Mongols destroyed his home city of Nīshāpūr in the north-east of Iran. The book, which resulted from decades of investigation of literary and historical sources, was first published in 1955 and has since remained unsurpassed not only as the definitive study of ‘Aṭṭār's world of ideas but as an indispensable guide to understanding pre-modern Islamic literature in general. Quoting at length from ‘Aṭṭār and other Islamic sources, Ritter sketches an extraordinarily vivid portrait of the Islamic attitude toward life, characteristic developments in pious and ascetic circles, and, in conclusion, various dominant mystical currents of thought and feeling. Special attention is given to a wide range of views on love, love in all its manifestations, including homosexuality and the commonplace sūfī adoration of good-looking youths. Ritter's approach is throughout based onprecise philological interpretation of primary sources, several of which he has himself made available in critical editions.

The Rainbow

The Rainbow
Author: Claas Jouco Bleeker
Publisher: Brill Archive
Total Pages: 328
Release: 1975
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9789004042223

The Spiritual Technology of Ancient Egypt

The Spiritual Technology of Ancient Egypt
Author: Edward F. Malkowski
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 574
Release: 2007-10-03
Genre: History
ISBN: 1594777764

How ancient Egyptians understood quantum theory • Investigates the history of how modern religion and the Age of Science were inspired by the sacred science of the ancients • Examines how quantum theory explains that the cosmos arises from consciousness • Reveals the unanimity between Schwaller de Lubicz’s “sacred science” and the science of a cosmos governed by quantum mechanics Since the dawn of the Age of Science humankind has been engaged in a methodical quest to understand the cosmos. With the development of quantum mechanics, the notion that everything is solid matter is being replaced with the idea that information or “thought” may be the true source of physical reality. Such scientific inquiry has led to a growing interest in the brain’s unique and mysterious ability to create perception, possibly through quantum interactions. Consciousness is now being considered as much a fundamental part of reality as the three dimensions we are so familiar with. Although this direction in scientific thought is seen as a new approach, the secret wisdom of the ancients presented just such a view thousands of years ago. Building on René A. Schwaller de Lubicz’s systematic study of Luxor’s Temple of Amun-Mut-Khonsu during the 1940s and ’50s, Edward Malkowski shows that the ancient Egyptians' worldview was not based on superstition or the invention of myth but was the result of direct observation using critical faculties attuned to the quantum manifestation of the universe. This understanding of reality as a product of human consciousness provided the inspiration for the sacred science of the ancients--precisely the philosophy modern science is embracing today. In the philosophical tradition of Schwaller de Lubicz, The Spiritual Technology of Ancient Egypt investigates the technical and religious legacy of ancient Egypt to reveal its congruence with today’s “New Science.”