When you think of a witch, what do you picture? Pointy black hat, maybe a broomstick. But witches in various guises have been with us for millennia. In Waking the Witch, Pam Grossman explores the cultural and historical impact of the world’s most magical icon. From the idea of the femme fatale in league with the devil in early modern Europe and Salem, to the bewitching pop culture archetypes in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, and Harry Potter; from the spooky ladies in fairy tales and horror films to the rise of feminist covens and contemporary witchcraft, witches reflect the power and potential of women. In this fascinating read that is part cultural analysis, part memoir, Pam opens up about her own journey on the path to witchcraft, and how her personal embrace of the witch helped her find strength, self-empowerment, and a deeper purpose. A comprehensive meditation on one of the most mysterious and captivating figures of all time, Waking the Witch celebrates witches past, present, and future, and reveals the critical role they have played—and will continue to play—in shaping the world as we know it.

    In Battling the Gods, Tim Whitmarsh journeys into the ancient Mediterranean, a world almost unimaginably different from our own, to recover the stories and voices of those who first refused the divinities.Homer’s epic poems of human striving, journeying, and passion were ancient Greece’s only “sacred texts,” but no ancient Greek thought twice about questioning or mocking his stories of the gods. Priests were functionaries rather than sources of moral or cosmological wisdom. The absence of centralized religious authority made for an extraordinary variety of perspectives on sacred matters, from the devotional to the atheos, or “godless.” Whitmarsh explores this kaleidoscopic range of ideas about the gods, focusing on the colorful individuals who challenged their existence. Among these were some of the greatest ancient poets and philosophers and writers, as well as the less well known: Diagoras of Melos, perhaps the first self-professed atheist; Democritus, the first materialist; Socrates, executed for rejecting the gods of the Athenian state; Epicurus and his followers, who thought gods could not intervene in human affairs; the brilliantly mischievous satirist Lucian of Samosata.Before the revolutions of late antiquity, which saw the scriptural religions of Christianity and Islam enforced by imperial might, there were few constraints on belief. Everything changed, however, in the millennium between the appearance of the Homeric poems and Christianity’s establishment as Rome’s state religion in the fourth century AD. As successive Greco-Roman empires grew in size and complexity, and power was increasingly concentrated in central capitals, states sought to impose collective religious adherence, first to cults devoted to individual rulers, and ultimately to monotheism. In this new world, there was no room for outright disbelief: the label “atheist” was used now to demonize anyone who merely disagreed with the orthodoxy—and so it would remain for centuries.As the twenty-first century shapes up into a time of mass information, but also, paradoxically, of collective amnesia concerning the tangled histories of religions, Whitmarsh provides a bracing antidote to our assumptions about the roots of freethinking. By shining a light on atheism’s first thousand years, Battling the Gods offers a timely reminder that nonbelief has a wealth of tradition of its own, and, indeed, its own heroes. From the Hardcover edition.

    Yeats took a particular interest in the tales' mythic and magical roots. The Celtic Twilight ventures into the eerie and puckish world of fairies, ghosts, and spirits. "This handful of dreams," as the author referred to it, first appeared in 1893, and its title refers to the pre-dawn hours, when the Druids performed their rituals. It consists of stories recounted to the poet by his friends, neighbors, and acquaintances. Yeats' faithful transcription of their narratives includes his own visionary experiences, appended to the storytellers' words as a form of commentary.

    Their supposed author, a mythical figure named Hermes Trismegistus, was thought to be a contemporary of Moses. The Hermetic philosophy was regarded as an ancient theology, parallel to the revealed wisdom of the Bible, supporting Biblical revelation and culminating in the Platonic philosophical tradition. This new translation is the only English version based on reliable texts, and Professor Copenhaver's introduction and notes make this accessible and up-to-date edition an indispensable resource to scholars.

    From their conversation emerges a series of subtle reflections on gender roles, sex in society and the sublimation of basic human instincts. The discussion culminates in a radical challenge to conventional views by Plato's mentor, Socrates, who advocates transcendence through spiritual love. The Symposium is a deft interweaving of different viewpoints and ideas about the nature of love--as a response to beauty, a cosmic force, a motive for social action and as a means of ethical education.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

    Nowhere is his glorious poetic and pictorial legacy more evident than in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, which many consider his most inspired and original work.The Marriage of Heaven and Hell is both a humorous satire on religion and morality and a work that concisely expresses Blake's essential wisdom and philosophy, much of it revealed in the 70 aphorisms of his "Proverbs of Hell." This beautiful edition, reproduced from a rare facsimile, invites readers to enjoy the rich character of Blake's own hand-printed text along with his deeply stirring illustrations, reproduced on 27 full-color plates. A typeset transcription of the text is included.

    G. Lockhart, who worked for a publishing firm. The book proved popular and Scott was paid six hundred pounds, which he desperately needed (despite his success as a novelist, Scott was almost ruined when the Ballantyne publishing firm, where he was a partner, went bankrupt in 1826).Letters was written when educated society believed itself in enlightened times due to advances in modern science. The book, however, revealed that all social classes still held beliefs in ghosts, witches, warlocks, fairies, elves, diabolism, the occult, and even werewolves. Sourcing from prior sixteenth- and seventeenth-century treatises on demonology along with contemporary accounts from England, Europe, and North America (Cotton Mather's Magnalia Christi, for one), Scott's discourses on the psychological, religious, physical, and preternatural explanations for these beliefs are essential reading for acolytes of the dark and macabre; the letters dealing with witch hunts, trials (Letters Eight and Nine), and torture are morbidly compelling.Scott was neither fully pro-rational modernity nor totally anti-superstitious past, as his skepticism of one of the "new" sciences (skullology, as he calls it) is made clear in a private letter to a friend. Thus, Letters is both a personal and intellectual examination of conflicting belief systems, when popular science began to challenge superstition in earnest.

    It is a letter written to a Muslim cleric, a violent opponent of the Bahá'ís who, along with his father (called by Bahá'u'lláh "the wolf"), also a Muslim cleric, had put to death a number of Bahá'ís. In this work Bahá'u'lláh quotes extensively from his own previously revealed scriptures. This makes a large portion of the work a summary of excerpts on critical concepts expressed in previous works in a condensed form.-"Baha'u'llah (November 12, 1817 - May 29, 1892), born Mirza Husayn-'Ali Nuri, was the founder of the Baha'i Faith.He claimed to fulfill the Babi prophecy of "He whom God shall make manifest", but in a broader sense he also claimed to be the "supreme Manifestation of God", referring to the fulfillment of the eschatological expectations of a prophetic cycle beginning with Adam, and including Abrahamic religions, as well as Zoroastrianism, the Indian religions, and others. Baha'is see Baha'u'llah as the initiator of a new religion, as Jesus or Muhammad - but also the initiator of a new cycle, like that attributed to Adam.Baha'u'llah authored many religious works, most notably the Kitab-i-Aqdas and the Kitab-i-lqan. He died in Bahji, Palestine, present-day Israel, and is buried there.

    Following a format similar to that of The Oxford Illustrated History of Britain, this brings together the work of 30 authorities & organizes their contributions into three main sections. The 1st covers Greece from the 8th to the 4th centuries, a period unparalleled in history for its brilliance in literature, philosophy & the visual arts. The 2nd deals with the Hellenization of the Middle East by the monarchies established in the areas conquered by Alexander the Great, the growth of Rome & the impact of the two cultures on one another. The 3rd covers the foundation of the Roman Empire by Augustus & its consolidation in the 1st two centuries AD. A concluding essay discusses certain aspects of the later Empire & its influence on Western civilization, notably thru the adoption of Christianity. Within each section, chapters dealing with political & social history alternate with ones on literature, philosophy & the arts. Maps & chronological charts--not to mention over 250 illustrations, 16 in color--enrich the basic text, along with bibliographies & an index. John Boardman is Lincoln Professor of Classical Archeology at the University of Oxford. Jasper Griffin & Oswyn Murray are Fellows of Balliol College, Oxford.

    Come on a journey through the Wheel of the Year, joining in the celebration of the Gods, Goddesses and festivals that have been a part of mankind since the Dawn of Time.Although aimed at beginning Solitary Practitioners, the original Heartsongs would add depth to the workings of even the most seasoned Pagan.

    This concise guide offers a modern interpretation of the doctrine, distilling its teachings with seven compelling principles that can be applied to self-development in daily life.

    The Theogony contains a systematic genealogy of the gods from the beginning of the world and an account of their violent struggles before the present order was established. The Works and Days, a compendium of moral and practical advice for a life of honest husbandry, throws a unique and fascinating light on archaic Greek society, ethics, and superstition. Hesiod's poetry is the oldest source for the myths of Prometheus, Pandora, and the Golden Age.Unlike Homer, Hesiod tells us about himself and his family (he lived in central Greece in the late eighth century BC). This new translation by a leading expert combines accuracy with readability.

    Illustrated with visual artifacts of the period. With the long-awaited publication of this book, we have for the first time in any modern literary form one of the most vital and important of ancient myths: that of Inanna, the world's first goddess of recorded history and the beloved deity of the ancient Sumerians.The stories and hymns of Inanna (known to the Semites as Ishtar) are inscribed on clay tablets which date back to 2,000 B.C. Over the past forty years, these cuneiform tablets have gradually been restored and deciphered by a small group of international scholars. In this groundbreaking book, Samuel Noah Kramer, the preeminent living expert on Sumer, and Diane Wolkstein, a gifted storyteller and folklorist, have retranslated, ordered, and combined the fragmented pieces of the Cycle of Inanna into a unified whole that presents for the first time an authentic portrait of the goddess from her adolescence to her completed womanhood and godship. We see Inanna in all her aspects: as girl, lover, wife, seeker, decision maker, ruler; we witness the Queen of Heaven and Earth as the voluptuous center and source of all fertile power and the unequaled goddess of love.Illustrated throughout with cylinder seals and other artifacts of the period, the beautifully rendered images guide the reader through Inanna's realm on a journey parallel to the one evoked by the text. And the carefully wrought commentaries providing an historical overview, textual interpretations, and aannotations on the art at once explicate and amplify the power, wonder, and mystery embedded in these ancient tales.Inanna--the world's first love story, two thousand years older than the Bible--is tender, erotic, frightening, and compassionate. It is a compelling myth that is timely in its rediscovery."A great masterpiece of universal literature."--Mircea Eliade

    What is certain is that this 1899 classic has become a foundational document of modern Wicca and neopaganism. Leland claimed his "witch informant," a fortune-teller named Maddalena, supplied him with the secret writings that he translated and combined with his research on Italian pagan tradition to create a gospel of pagan belief and practice. Here, in the story of the goddess Aradia, who came to Earth to champion oppressed peasants in their fight against their feudal overlords and the Catholic Church, are the chants, prayers, spells, and rituals that have become the centerpieces of contemporary pagan faiths. American journalist and folklorist CHARLES GODFREY LELAND (1824-1903) was editor of Continental Monthly during the Civil War and coined the term emancipation as an alternative to abolition, but he is best remembered for his books on ethnography, folklore, and language, including The Gypsies (1882), The Hundred Riddles of the Fairy Bellaria (1892), and Unpublished Legends of Virgil (1899).

    To those who learn to unpack its sometimes cryptic sayings, the Gospel of Thomas offers a naked and dazzlingly subversive representation of Jesus’ defining and most radical discovery: that the living Kingdom of God burns in us and surrounds us at all moments."―from the Foreword by Andrew HarveyThis ancient text can become a companion for your own spiritual journey. In 1945, twelve ancient books were found inside a sealed jar at the base of an Egyptian cliff. One of those texts was the Gospel of Thomas, one of the most important religious archaeological discoveries of the twentieth century. While illuminating the origins of Christianity, it raises the question whether the New Testament’s version of Jesus’ teachings is entirely accurate and complete.Written at the same time as the canonical Gospels, the Gospel of Thomas portrays Jesus as a wisdom-loving sage. The aphoristic sayings emphasize the value of the present, teaching that the Kingdom of God is here and now, rather than a future promise or future threat. It presents a new way of looking at the challenging and intriguing figure of Jesus, and reminds us that the Divine can be found right here on earth.Now you can experience the Gospel of Thomas with understanding even if you have no previous knowledge of early Christian history or thought. This SkyLight Illuminations edition offers insightful yet unobtrusive commentary that explains references and philosophical terms, shares the inspiring interpretations of famous spiritual teachers, and gives you deeper understanding of Thomas’s innovative message: that self-knowledge and contemplation of the nature of this world are the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven.