His explanation derives from a profound understanding of Sufism, and extends to many aspects which are usually neglected. His illuminating answer to 'What is Sufism?' gives a taste of the very subject matter itself. What do Sufis believe? What do they aim at? What do they do? Unlike other writers on the subject, Martin Lings treats all the three questions with equal justice. He is thus able to give a wealth of answers to the main question 'What is Sufism?', each answer being from a different angle but all going to the root of the matter. A reviewer wrote 'Should the book appear in paperback, I would use it for undergraduate and graduate courses on Islamic civilization', and in fact What is Sufism? has become a set book in colleges and universities on both sides of the Atlantic. It is now accepted as the authoritative statement on the subject of Sufism and it has been translated into French, German, Italian and Spanish. It has also been published in Sarajevo in Bosnian, and is available in Braille.

    Rendered into English in the late 1800s, it speaks of demons, their composition, their mannerisms, and relates numerous tales of copulation with the same. Perhaps one of the strangest works of Demonology, this work claims that it is possible for demons to father literal offspring with humans through the use of a corpse as a vehicle, and although it is a technically Catholic work, Sinistrari even makes the claim that incubi are, in some ways, perhaps superior even to man.

    This history of 20th-century magic presents a detailed analysis of a pre-Christian occult tradition which survived persecution and reappeared in recent times.

    This guide to the history and modern celebrations of Ostara shows you how to perform rituals and work magic to renew your power and passion for living and growing. Rituals Recipes Lore Spells Divination Crafts Correspondences Invocations Prayers MeditationsLlewellyn's Sabbat Essentials explore the old and new ways of celebrating the seasonal rites that are the cornerstones of the witch's year.

    Phil Zuckerman, a Pitzer College sociologist, makes this case as fluidly and pleasurably as anybody in his book, Living the Secular Life."A Best Book of 2014, Publishers Weekly Over the last twenty-five years, “no religion” has become the fastest-growing religion in the United States. Around the world, hundreds of millions of people have turned away from the traditional faiths of the past and embraced a moral yet nonreligious—or secular—life, generating societies vastly less religious than at any other time in human history. Revealing the inspiring beliefs that empower secular culture—alongside real stories of nonreligious men and women based on extensive in-depth interviews from across the country—Living the Secular Life will be indispensable for millions of secular Americans. Drawing on innovative sociological research, Living the Secular Life illuminates this demographic shift with the moral convictions that govern secular individuals, offering crucial information for the religious and nonreligious alike. Living the Secular Life reveals that, despite opinions to the contrary, nonreligious Americans possess a unique moral code that allows them to effectively navigate the complexities of modern life. Spiritual self-reliance, clear-eyed pragmatism, and an abiding faith in the Golden Rule to adjudicate moral decisions: these common principlesare shared across secular society. Living the Secular Life demonstrates these principles in action and points to their usage throughout daily life. Phil Zuckerman is a sociology professor at Pitzer College, where he studied the lives of the nonreligious for years before founding a Department of Secular Studies, the first academic program in the nation dedicated to exclusively studying secular culture and the sociological consequences of America’s fastest-growing “faith.” Zuckerman discovered that despite the entrenched negative beliefs about nonreligious people, American secular culture is grounded in deep morality and proactive citizenship—indeed, some of the very best that the country has to offer.Living the Secular Life journeys through some of the most essential components of human existence—child rearing and morality, death and ritual, community and beauty—and offers secular readers inspiration for leading their own lives. Zuckerman shares eye-opening research that reveals the enduring moral strength of children raised without religion, as well as the hardships experienced by secular mothers in the rural South where church attendance defines the public space. Despite the real sorrows of mortality, Zuckerman conveys the deep psychological health of secular individuals in their attitudes toward illness, death, and dying. Tracking the efforts of nonreligious groups to construct their own communities, Zuckerman shows how Americans are building institutions and cultivating relationships without religious influence. Most of all, Living the Secular Life infuses the sociological data and groundbreaking research with the moral convictions that govern secular individuals, and demonstrates how readers can integrate these beliefs into their own lives. A manifesto for a booming social movement—and a revelatory survey of this overlooked community—Living the Secular Life offers essential and long-awaited information for anyone building a life based on his or her own principles. New York Times Book Review (Susan Jacoby) “[A] humane and sensible guide to and for the many kinds of Americans leading secular lives in what remains one of the most religious nations in the developed world."

    Graced with opening words by His Holiness The Dalai Lama, the Penguin Deluxe Edition of The Tibetan Book of the Dead is "immaculately rendered in an English both graceful and precise." Translated with the close support of leading contemporary masters and hailed as “a tremendous accomplishment,” this book faithfully presents the insights and intentions of the original work. It includes one of the most detailed and compelling descriptions of the after-death state in world literature, practices that can transform our experience of daily life, guidance on helping those who are dying, and an inspirational perspective on coping with bereavement.

    Already over 100,000 people are using it.Author Donald Michael Kraig wrote this after teaching the information in classes for ten years. It is refined, tested, and easy to understand. It is filled with exercises, techniques, and rituals to help you. It is presented in a series of eleven lessons. Follow the lessons, practice the rituals and techniques, and by the end of your work you will be a magician. What does it cover? Rituals, healing, initiation, talismans, astral travel, creative visualization, psychic self-defense, evocation of spirits, the Kabalah, physical exercise, and magical tools such as wands.Want more? You'll also learn the secrets of true meditation, how to use the Tarot, how to remember your dreams, how to do the rituals of Western Magick, including rituals of the Pentagram, Hexagram, Middle Pillar, Rose Cross, and Watchtower. You'll learn how to manipulate magical energy, secrets of relaxation, Wicca, pathworking, Tantra, and sex magick.Once you have finished working your way through this book you will be an accomplished magician. You will be able to perform real magick. Then this book will become the most valuable reference tool in your collection of books.What if you want to know even more about a subject? No problem. Each chapter has a bibliography so you can go even deeper into any topic. There is an annotated bibliography at the end with even more resources.In the new, second edition the contents pages contain more information so it is even easier to find what you need, but there is also an entirely new appendix with answers to many of the most frequently asked questions that Kraig has received over the years. This book is a must!

    He shows how the Gospel portraits of Jesus, historically seen, make sense. Borg takes into account all the recent developments in historical Jesus scholarship, as well as new theories on who Jesus was and how the Gospels reflect that.The original version of this book was published well before popular fascination with the historical Jesus. Now this new version takes advantage of all the research that has gone on since the 80s. The revisions establish it as Borg's big but popular book on Jesus.

    The real identity of the person who chose to write under the pseudonym of Dionysius the Areopagite is unknown. Even the exact dates of his writings have never been determined. Moreover the texts themselves, though relatively short, are at points seemingly impenetrable and have mystified readers over the centuries. Yet the influence of this shadowy figure on broad range of mystical writers from the early middle ages on is readily discernible. His formulation of a method of negative theology that stresses the impotence of humans' attempt to penetrate the "cloud of unknowing" is famous as is his meditation on the divine names.Despite his influence, relatively few attempts have been made to translate the entire corpus of his written into English. Here in one volume are collected all of the Pseudo-Dionysius' works. Each has been translated from the Migne edition, with reference to the forthcoming Göttingen critical edition of A.M. Ritter, G. Heil, and B. Suchla.To present these works to the English-speaking public, an outstanding team of six research scholars has been assembled. The lucid translation of Colm Luibheid has been augmented by Paul Rorem's notes and textual collaboration. The reader is presented a rich and varied examination of the main themes of Dionysian spirituality by René Roques, an incisive discussion of the original questions of the authenticity and alleged heresies in the Dionysian corpus by Jaroslav Pelikan, a comprehensive tracing Dionysius' influence on medieval authors by Jean Leclercq, and a survey by Karlfried Froehlich of the reception given the corpus by Humanists and sixteenth-century Reformers.

    It has exerted a living influence in China for 3000 years and interest in it has spread in the West. Set down in the dawn of history as a book of oracles, the Book of Changes deepened in meaning when ethical values were attached to the oracular pronouncements; it became a book of wisdom, eventually one of the Five Classics of Confucianism, and provided the common source for both Confucianist and Taoist philosophy. Wilhelm's rendering of the I Ching into German, published in 1924, presented it for the 1st time in a form intelligible to the general reader. Wilhelm, who translated many other ancient Chinese works and who wrote several books on Chinese philosophy and civilization, long resided in China. His close association with its cultural leaders gave him a unique understanding of the text of the I Ching. In the English translation, every effort has been made to preserve Wilhelm's pioneering insight into the spirit of the original.This 3rd edition, completely reset, contains a new forward by Hellmut Wilhelm, one of the most eminent American scholars of Chinese culture. He discusses his father's textual methods and summarizes recent studies of the I Ching both in the West and in present-day China. The new edition contains minor textual corrections, bibliographical revisions and an index.

    We are, however, the pleroma itself, for we are a part of the eternal and infinite. But we have no share thereof, as we are from the pleroma infinitely removed; not spiritually or temporally, but essentially, since we are distinguished from the pleroma in our essence as creatura, which is confined within time and space. Yet because we are parts of the pleroma, the pleroma is also in us. Even in the smallest point is the pleroma endless, eternal, and entire, since small and great are qualities which are contained in it. It is that nothingness which is everywhere whole and continuous. Only figuratively, therefore, do I speak of created being as a part of the pleroma. Because, actually, the pleroma is nowhere divided, since it is nothingness. We are also the whole pleroma, because, figuratively, the pleroma is the smallest point (assumed only, not existing) in us and the boundless firmament about us. But wherefore, then, do we speak of the pleroma at all, since it is thus everything and nothing? I speak of it to make a beginning somewhere, and also to free you from the delusion that somewhere, either without or within, there standeth something fixed, or in some way established, from the beginning. Every so-called fixed and certain thing is only relative. That alone is fixed and certain which is subject to change. What is changeable, however, is creatura. Therefore is it the one thing which is[...]".

    They were wizards, storytellers, teachers and spiritual leaders. They were attuned to the Earth and the Sun. And they were very powerful.Druid Magick presents everything you need to know to become a Druid and even start your own Druid "Grove" (the name of a Druid group). Learn about the Druid's tools--the sickle, wand, cord, and more--and how to make and use them. Discover all of the beliefs the Druids hold, including the emphasis on honor and ethics.And, of course, you'll learn the secrets of the magic of the Druids.Protection spells How to use magic to find missing items Learn to visit other "worlds" (levels of reality) Shapeshifting And more! Druidry is far more than historic Celtic leadership. It is a living, growing, spiritual tradition that can bring you more self-assurance and self-development than you've before ever had.Winner of the 2001 Coalition of Visionary Resources (COVR) Award for best Magic Book

    Comparing the key events of the Old Testament with the latest findings in physics, biochemistry, and paleontology, a physicist and theologian shows that science and the Bible can be reconciled to resolve the age-old debates about God.

    The author offers guidelines for expanding one's psychic consciousness and achieving success and happiness by following the teachings of the mystic masters.

    Wattles, and many others Following in the footsteps of a little-known group of esoteric seekers from the late-nineteenth century who called themselves “the Miracle Club,” Mitch Horowitz shows that the spiritual “wish fulfillment” practices known as the Law of Attraction, Positive Thinking, “the Secret,” and the Science of Getting Rich actually work. Weaving these ideas together into a concise, clear formula, with real-life examples of success, he reveals how your thoughts can impact reality and make things happen. In this “manual for miracles,” Horowitz explains how we each possess a creative agency to determine and reshape our lives. He shows how thinking in a directed, highly focused, and emotively charged manner expands our capacity to perceive and transform events and allows us to surpass ordinary boundaries of time and physical space. Building on Neville Goddard’s view that the human imagination is God the Creator and Ralph Waldo Emerson’s techniques for attaining personal power, he explores the highest uses of mind-power metaphysics and explains what works and what doesn’t, illuminating why and how events bend to our thoughts. He encourages readers to experiment and find themselves “at the helm of infinite possibilities.” Laying out a specific path to manifest your deepest desires, from wealth and love to happiness and security, Horowitz provides focused exercises and concrete tools for change and looks at ways to get more out of prayer, affirmation, and visualization. He also provides the first serious reconsideration of New Thought philosophy since the death of William James in 1910. He includes crucial insights and effective methods from the movement’s leaders such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Napoleon Hill, Neville Goddard, William James, Andrew Jackson Davis, Wallace D. Wattles, and many others. Defining a miracle as “circumstances or events that surpass all conventional or natural expectation,” the author invites you to join him in pursuing miracles and achieve power over your own life.