Because his poems were often ecstatic love songs from God to his beloved world, many have called Hafiz the "Tongue of the Invisible."With this stunning collection of 250 of Hafiz's most intimate poems, Daniel Ladinsky has succeeded brilliantly in capturing the essence of one of Islam's greatest poetic and religious voices. Each line of THE GIFT imparts the wonderful qualities of the spiritual teacher: an audacious love that empowers lives, profound knowledge, wild generosity, and a sweet, playful genius unparalleled in world literature.

    We go to synagogue dutifully enough. We rise when we should rise, sit when we should sit. We read and sing along with the cantor and answer 'Amen' in all the right places. We may even rattle through the prayers with ease. We sacrifice vitality for shelf-life, and the neshomeh, the Jewish soul, can taste the difference."--from the IntroductionThis fresh approach to prayer is for all who wish to appreciate the power of prayer's poetry and song, jump into its ceremonies and rituals, and join the age-old conversation that Jews have had with God. Reb Zalman, one of the most important Jewish spiritual teachers in contemporary American Judaism, offers you new ways to pray, new channels for communicating with God and new opportunities to open your heart to God's response.With rare warmth and authenticity, Reb Zalman shows you:How prayer can engage not just spirit, but mind, heart and bodyMeditations that open the door to kavanah, the focus or intention with which we prayHow to understand the underlying "deep structure" of our prayer servicesHow to find and feel at home in a synagogueHow to sing and lead niggunim, the simple, wordless tunes that Jews sing to get closer to Godand more

    A. Milne's Piglet. Piglet? Yes, Piglet. For better than impulsive Tigger... or gloomy Eeyore... or intellectual Owl... or even loveable Pooh... Piglet herein demonstrates a very important principle of Taoism: the Te - a Chinese word meaning Virtue - of the Small.In this wonderful sequel to The Tao of Pooh, Benjamin Hoff explores the Te (Virtue) of the Small - a principle embodied perfectly in Piglet, a Very Small Animal who proved to be so Useful after all.

    Jenö Barcsay, a professor who taught applied anatomy at the Budapest Academy of Fine Arts, offers a detailed portrayal of the body for the fine artist in 142 full-page plates. From the entire skeleton and the joints in and out of motion to all the muscles and even facial characteristics, every body part appears in close-up and from varying perspectives. Accompanying the images are brief discussions of male and female anatomical construction, explaining precisely the articulations and movement of the foot, the arm, the trunk, the spinal column, and the skull. In many cases, two sketches appear side by side: one just lightly traced in, and marked with letters to show how proportions and perspective were figured, and another fully finished drawing. Without the indispensable information contained on these illuminating pages, painters cannot observe with understanding all the attitudes, positions, and movements of which the body is capable—and produce a truly magnificent work of art. Features a new concealed spiral that keeps the book open as you work!

    A preeminent scholar, writer, and teacher, he has had a profound influence on millions of people. To him, mythology was the "song of the universe, the music of the spheres." With Bill Moyers, one of America's most prominent journalists, as his thoughtful and engaging interviewer, The Power Of Myth touches on subjects from modern marriage to virgin births, from Jesus to John Lennon, offering a brilliant combination of intelligence and wit.

    Fear is spreading. Banished diseases have returned. And a militant “anti-vax” movement has surfaced to campaign against immunization. But why?In The Doctor Who Fooled the World, award-winning investigative reporter Brian Deer exposes the truth behind the crisis. With the page-turning tension of a detective story, he unmasks the players and unearths the facts. Where it began. Who was responsible. How they pulled it off. Who paid.At the heart of this dark narrative is the rise of the so-called “father of the anti-vaccine movement”: a British-born doctor, Andrew Wakefield. Banned from medicine, thanks to Deer’s discoveries, he fled to the United States to pursue his ambitions, and now claims to be winning a “war.”In an epic investigation, spread across fifteen years, Deer battles medical secrecy and insider cover-ups, smear campaigns and gagging lawsuits, to uncover rigged research and moneymaking schemes, the heartbreaking plight of families struggling with disability, and the scientific scandal of our time.2021 winner: Independent Publisher Book Award (IPPY), and 2021 Eric Hoffer Book Award

    Five years later, Josef rescues a young girl, Mila, after her parents are killed while running to meet the Rebbe they hoped would save them. Josef helps Mila reach Zalman Stern, a leader in the Satmar community, in whose home Mila is raised as a sister to Zalman’s daughter, Atara. As the two girls mature, Mila’s faith intensifies, while her beloved sister Atara discovers a world of books and learning that she cannot ignore. With the rise of communism in central Europe, the family moves to Paris, to the Marais, where Zalman tries to raise his children apart from the city in which they live.      When the two  girls come of age, Mila marries within the faith, while Atara continues to question fundamentalist doctrine. The different choices the two sisters makes force them apart until a dangerous secret threatens to banish them from the only community they’ve ever known.      A beautifully crafted, emotionally gripping story of what happens when unwavering love, unyielding law, and centuries of tradition collide, I Am Forbidden announces the arrival of an extraordinarily gifted new voice and opens a startling window on a world long closed to most of us, until now.

    Religious and biblical scholar Bart Ehrman makes the provocative case that many of our widely held beliefs concerning the divinity of Jesus, the Trinity, and the divine origins of the Bible itself are the results of both intentional and accidental alterations by scribes.In this compelling and fascinating book, Ehrman shows where and why changes were made in our earliest surviving manuscripts, explaining for the first time how the many variations of our cherished biblical stories came to be, and why only certain versions of the stories qualify for publication in the Bibles we read today. Ehrman frames his account with personal reflections on how his study of the Greek manuscripts made him abandon his once ultra–conservative views of the Bible.

    Designed to provide just such a framework, In the Buddha's Words is an anthology of the Buddha's works that has been specifically compiled by a celebrated scholar and translator. For easy reference, the book is arrayed in ten thematic sections ranging from "The Human Condition" to "Mastering the Mind" to "The Planes of Realization." Each section comes with introductions, notes, and essays to help beginners and experts alike draw greater meaning from the Buddha's words. The book also features a general introduction by the author that fully lays out how and why he has arranged the Buddha's teachings in this volume. This thoughtful compilation is a valuable resource for both teachers and those who want to read the Buddha on their own.

    Seldom has such a small handful of words provided a teaching as rich as has this famous opening line. In a single stroke, the simple sentence cuts through the pervasive tendency students have of getting so close to Zen as to completely miss what it’s all about. An instant teaching on the first page. And that’s just the beginning.In the forty years since its original publication, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind has become one of the great modern Zen classics, much beloved, much reread, and much recommended as the best first book to read on Zen. Suzuki Roshi presents the basics—from the details of posture and breathing in zazen to the perception of nonduality—in a way that is not only remarkably clear, but that also resonates with the joy of insight from the first to the last page. It’s a book to come back to time and time again as an inspiration to practice, and it is now available to a new generation of seekers in this fortieth anniversary edition, with a new afterword by Shunryu Suzuki’s biographer, David Chadwick.

    Irenaeus was his disciple, and tells us that "Polycarp was instructed by the apostles, and was brought into contact with many who had seen Christ" (Adv. Haer., iii. 3; Euseb. Hist. Eccl., iv. 14).

    By sharing her own story, Lydia Kukoff creates a remarkable work about what it means to make this significant choice. Years after her own conversion she continues to question, grow, and learn, and encourages others to do the same.

    As a member of the Skverers, one of the most insular Hasidic sects in the US, he knows little about the outside world—only that it is to be shunned. His marriage at eighteen is arranged and several children soon follow. Deen's first transgression—turning on the radio—is small, but his curiosity leads him to the library, and later the Internet. Soon he begins a feverish inquiry into the tenets of his religious beliefs, until, several years later, his faith unravels entirely. Now a heretic, he fears being discovered and ostracized from the only world he knows. His relationship with his family at stake, he is forced into a life of deception, and begins a long struggle to hold on to those he loves most: his five children. In All Who Go Do Not Return, Deen bravely traces his harrowing loss of faith, while offering an illuminating look at a highly secretive world.

    “For years,” says the Journal of the Buddhist Society, “the newcomer to Buddhism has lacked a simple and reliable introduction to the complexities of the subject. Dr. Rahula’s What the Buddha Taught fills the need as only could be done by one having a firm grasp of the vast material to be sifted. It is a model of what a book should be that is addressed first of all to ‘the educated and intelligent reader.’ Authoritative and clear, logical and sober, this study is as comprehensive as it is masterly.”This edition contains a selection of illustrative texts from the Suttas and the Dhammapada (specially translated by the author), sixteen illustrations, and a bibliography, glossary and index.

    He recounts the perilous journey of the world’s birds to the faraway peaks of Mount Qaf in search of the mysterious Simorgh, their king. Attar’s beguiling anecdotes and humor intermingle the sublime with the mundane, the spiritual with the worldly, while his poem models the soul’s escape from the mind’s rational embrace.Sholeh Wolpé re-creates for modern readers the beauty and timeless wisdom of the original Persian, in contemporary English verse and poetic prose.