Collection: Spirituality & Religion

While I was beseeching Our Lord today...I began to think of the soul as if it were a castle made of a single diamond or of very clear crystal, in which there are many rooms, just as in Heaven there are many mansions. -- St. Teresa of Avila
A masterpiece of spiritual literature, this sixteenth-century work was inspired by a mystical vision that came upon the revered St. Teresa of Avila, one of the most gifted and beloved religious figures in history. St. Teresa's vision was of a luminous crystal castle composed of seven chambers, or "mansions," each representing a different stage in the development of the soul.
In her most important and widely read book, St. Teresa describes how, upon entering the castle through prayer and meditation, the human spirit experiences humility, detachment, suffering, and, ultimately, self-knowledge, as it roams from room to room. As the soul progresses further toward the center of the castle, it comes closer to achieving ineffable and perfect peace, and, finally, a divine communion with God.
A set of rare and beautiful teachings for people of all faiths desirous of divine guidance, this meticulous modern translation by E. Allison Peers breathes contemporary life into a religious classic.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama offers powerful, profound advice on how to live a peaceful and fulfilling life amidst all the conflicts of the modern world.

In this distillation of his life and teachings, the Dalai Lama paints a compelling portrait of his early life, reflecting on the personal and political struggles that have helped to shape his understanding of our world.

Offering his wisdom and experience to interpret the timeless teachings of the Buddha, The Dalai Lama's Little Book of Inner Peace is fresh and relevant to our troubled times. He explains in a simple and accessible way how each of us can influence those around us by living with integrity. And he holds out hope that, through personal transformation, we can all contribute to a better world.

Replaces ISBN 9781571746092

C. G. Jung had a lifelong interest in the paranormal that culminated in his influential theory of synchronicity. Combining extracts taken from the Collected Works; letters; the autobiographical Memories, Dreams, Reflections; and transcripts of seminars, Jung on Synchronicity and the Paranormal sets out clearly his seminal contribution to our understanding of this controversial area.

In his introduction, Roderick Main discusses Jung's encounters with and observations of the paranormal, the influences that contributed to his theory of synchronicity, and the central ideas of the theory itself. The selections include Jung's writings on mediumistic trance phenomena, spirits and hauntings, anomalous events in the development and practice of analytical psychology, and the divinatory techniques of astrology and the I Ching. The book also features Jung's most lucid account of his theory in the form of his short essay "On Synchronicity," and a number of Jung's less-known writings on parapsychology, his astrological experiment, and the relationship between mind and body.

Jung on Synchronicity and the Paranormal addresses subjects that were fundamental to Jung's personal and professional development. Probing deeply into the theory of synchronicity, Roderick Main clarifies issues that have long been a source of confusion to Jung's readers.

What mind can conceive, man can achieve.

Our decisions impact every area of our lives. Making better decisions means living a better life. But how can we develop the habit of making great decisions?

Every noteworthy achievement the world has ever seen was born with a single thought; and every great man who ever lived has been a man of decision. Raymond Charles Barker's The Power of Decision reveals this principle of success and illustrates the process of choice that all of us must take-and that all of us are capable, this very second, of taking-to change our lives and make our dreams come true.

Indecisive people are failure prone, and Dr. Barker examines this basic truth while exploring the decision-making process in the individual, and the role of the subconscious mind in either abetting or thwarting each of our conscious decisions. He provides specific steps to shift the balance of decision-making power in your favor, and he brings to light the constant, ever-present power of will to change a situation- and yourself-for the better.

Picking up The Power of Decision is the moment; and reading it is the decision that will change your life forever.

"The tendency nowadays to wander in wilderness is delightful to see. Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life."

The words could have been written yesterday, in any part of the world where people feel trapped by the excesses of modern life. John Muir's stature as a visionary leader was already on the rise on New Year's Day, 1898, when the above passage first appeared in print. Muir was president of the Sierra Club, which he had cofounded in San Francisco six years earlier. Harvard University and the University of Wisconsin had recently awarded him honorary degrees. Influential editors were encouraging him to share his ideas with a wider audience. Muir's reverence for nature and uncompromising integrity would ultimately play a vital role in awakening the American public to the need to rein in rampant industrial development before it was too late.

Scots born John Muir was happiest heading off into the wild with a loaf of bread, a bag of tea, a journal and sketchbook, and a head full of dreams. He was a modern-day Merlin, a real-world Gandalf who showed how much one determined, hard-working individual with a song in their heart can accomplish.

John Muir: A Miscellany is a gathering together of a rich and hugely entertaining collection of Muir's writings. His writing is as relevant now - possibly even more relevant - than when it was first published over 100 years ago.

The book you now hold in your hands is a training book for a real Taoist School somewhat unknown in the West and misunderstood in Asia.

In the West, scholars tend to focus on either philosophical Taoism or its manifestation in a distant historical past. In actuality Taoism has moved with the times and has a new vocabulary of which they have no inkling. Yet, all Taoism is rooted in over 5000 years of history. One may read an academic text on Tang Dynasty rituals and terminology and think that is how modern Taoists work, which mostly, just isn't the case. Taoism in Asia has developed and evolved.

This is particularly true in folk Taoism which is as far removed from Taoist orthodoxy as much as say Gnosticism is from the Catholic Church.

After my studies with teachers in China and Malaysia. and having returned to the United Kingdom, I looked for books on the subject in English. I found not many at all. Academic works were highly impractical and focused on the past or the Daoist Canon. Most other works were the usual texts on Qigong, Alchemy and very westernised approaches to Taoism. There was very little on real Taoist magic, and those that were published were mostly guesswork or so unwieldy as to be impractical. Thus the idea of this series of books was born.

The main focus of this volume is to introduce the reader to the real training methods, theory and spells used by the Chinese schools of magic. It is not an academic study nor a piece of missionary work from some Buddhistic-Taoist mix, such as Quanzhen or other orthodox Taoist 'churches'.

Here you will meet the methods of the Chinese schools of magic, their Gods, their methods and their way of working. If you are wondering why there is no bibliography, that's because the sources are an oral tradition and currently not in print.

I hope it opens the door for you and takes you beyond what you imagined Taoism to be.

The Metaphysical Bible Dictionary by R.C. Douglass is a comprehensive guide to the symbolic meaning of names in the Bible. The book provides an interpretation of the metaphysical and spiritual significance of the names of people, places, and things mentioned in the Bible. It offers insights into the deeper meanings of the stories and teachings found in the Bible, and how they can be applied to our daily lives. The dictionary is organized alphabetically, making it easy to find specific names and their meanings. This book is a valuable resource for anyone interested in exploring the spiritual and metaphysical aspects of the Bible.This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the old original and may contain some imperfections such as library marks and notations. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions, that are true to their original work.

OVER 1.3 MILLION COPIES IN PRINT WORLDWIDE!It takes courage for the soul to walk down a new and unfamiliar path. As people struggle to break free of personal problems in life, the tendency to rely on old, familiar patterns prevents them from exploring new solutions. It is times like these that a fresh perspective is needed to shed new light on a situation that will point the soul down a new path.

A Guide for the Advanced Soul: A Book of Insight was created just for this purpose, to be consulted in times of indecision and crisis so people can gain a new understanding of their questions, and provide guidance. At any moment, the Guide can be opened to any page and within the words will be the answer regardless of the specific challenge. The subconscious mind -- that well of intuition and creativity -- will instantly be redirected by the words and a sincere desire to grow.

Within A Guide for the Advanced Soul: A Book of Insight, every page holds a gift. Welcome the problems and discover their gifts!

Know the truth in your heart....Trust your direction....Open this book to any page....And there will be your answer.

Never has it been so effortless to activate your inner power and resilience than with the remarkable technique known as "resource tapping." Tapping In makes available for the first time a self-guided program for learning this revolutionary EMDR-related method.

With step-by-step instruction in bilateral stimulation (a core component of EMDR, or Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing), Tapping In teaches you a clinically recognized system for tapping both sides of the body to overcome trauma, boost confidence, calm the body on a deep, physiological level, and to respond better to stress.

Join world-renowned EMDR expert Dr. Laurel Parnell as she shares a series of easy-to-learn exercises to access your "latent positive resources"--your neurological foundation for internal resilience and stability.

Composed in the twelfth century in north-eastern Iran, Attar's great mystical poem is among the most significant of all works of Persian literature. A marvellous, allegorical rendering of the Islamic doctrine of Sufism - an esoteric system concerned with the search for truth through God - it describes the consequences of the conference of the birds of the world when they meet to begin the search for their ideal king, the Simorgh bird. On hearing that to find him they must undertake an arduous journey, the birds soon express their reservations to their leader, the hoopoe. With eloquence and insight, however, the hoopoe calms their fears, using a series of riddling parables to provide guidance in the search for spiritual truth. By turns witty and profound, The Conference of the Birds transforms deep belief into magnificent poetry.

New Mexico is many things. But as it changes and grows, there is a peculiar and essential feature of its unique, historical character that refuses to fade away-its ghost. Within these pages are a complete book compiled, containing extraordinary firsthand accounts of personal paranormal experiences and encounters throughout the Land of Enchantment.

The Healing Light (1947) by Agnes Sanford is a personal exploration and explanation of prayer and healing. By becoming a channel for God's love and power, Mrs. Sanford explains, we can heal ourselves, each other, and the world at large.

Agnes Sanford (b. 1897, d. 1982) was born in China, the daughter of a Presbyterian missionary. She spent her youth and teen years in Shanghai, until leaving for the United States to attend college. After completing her schooling, she returned to China in 1919. It was while working as an English teacher at Soochow Academy in Shanghai that she met and married her husband, the missionary Edgar Sanford.

The pair, along with their young son, returned to the U.S. in 1925, where Edgar received a job as a pastor in New Jersey. More children followed, but Agnes found herself depressed-a condition she suffered from for many years. When an Episcopalian priest, Hollis Colwell, laid hands on her and prayed over her, she found immediate relief from her symptoms.

Convinced by his healing abilities, Agnes began sending others to Colwell for healing. But he suggested that she, too, could channel the healing power of God. As she began to study God's Word in depth, she found that her prayers also could heal.

Agnes began to teach and write on the subject of healing. Her first book, The Healing Light, shares her simple techniques for creating the right environment within ourselves to welcome God's healing.

A recurring metaphor that she uses is that of electricity. If you flip on a light switch and the light doesn't come on, you would logically conclude that there is a problem with the lamp-not that electricity doesn't exist. Similarly, when our prayers aren't answered and healing doesn't come, it's not because there is no God, but because we are not properly connected to His love and energy.

She writes, "...just as a whole world full of electricity will not light a house unless the house itself is prepared to receive that electricity, so the infinite and eternal life of God cannot help us unless we are prepared to receive that life within ourselves."

Written in a friendly, conversational tone, Mrs. Sanford shares dozens of anecdotes of successful healing methods. While some of these modern miracles were accomplished through her own prayers, many others were the result of her sharing her techniques with others and allowing them to heal themselves.

While Mrs. Sanford was raised Presbyterian, her healing does not only live within the rigid confines of religious ideology. Her stories of healing include Jews, Roman Catholics, and children too young to understand any particular theology. As Glenn Clark explains in the introduction, her healing powers came "through simple exposure to the climate of faith and love."

A decade after its release, The Healing Light became a foundational work of the Charismatic Movement. This theological movement within Christianity holds that baptism with the Holy Spirit can lead to a new awareness of reality, as well as gifts from God including gifts of healing, miraculous powers, prophecy, and speaking in tongues. This is in contrast to the more mainstream cessationist theology, which states that God's miracles only briefly existed in New Testament times, and ceased during the early centuries A.D.

Mrs. Sanford was a prolific writer and speaker. She wrote over fifteen books and traveled extensively to minister in New Zealand, Australia, Scotland, Holland, and England. In her later years, she devoted her prayer energy to steadying the fault lines of Southern California, hoping to prevent or lessen the impact of earthquakes in the region. Interestingly, there were only three major earthquakes in the area in the 17 years that she lived and prayed there.

This book is a companion to The New Man by Dr Maurice Nicoll.

It discusses, in relation to the Gospels, the idea that real religion is about another man, latent but unborn, in every man. The end of this transformation of a man is thought of as The Mark to be aimed at.

The author explains that in the Gospels the word translated as sin means in the literal Greek missing the mark, as of a spear thrown at some object and failing to hit it. And from meaning to miss the mark it came to mean failing in one's purpose, and so erring or wrong doing.

It is Dr Nicoll's contention that when a man is overpowered by outer life and influenced only by all that acts upon him from outside, and argues only from what he can see, he is machine-driven by his senses, and internally, the wrong way round. He is dominated by external life and has no life in himself. That part of him which is truly himself, and from which his own individual existence and growth can begin is lost. It is in the wrong place. And this is sin. That is, in this sense, everyone has missed the mark, missed the idea of his own existence.

Meditations by Howard Thurman on timeless religious themes: A Sense of History, A Sense of Self, A Sense of Presence, and For the Quiet.Originally written for the bulletin at the Church for the Fellowship of All Peoples in San Francisco.

Presenting the life and teachings of Gautama Buddha, drawn directly from 24 Pali, Sanskrit, and Chinese sources--and retold by beloved Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh

Retold in Thich Nhat Hanh's inimitably beautiful style, this book traces the Buddha's life over the course of 80 years--partly through the eyes of Svasti, the buffalo boy, and partly through the eyes of the Buddha himself. Old Path White Clouds is a classic of religious literature.

"I have not avoided including the various difficulties the Buddha encountered, both from his own disciples and in relation to the wider society. If the Buddha appears in this book as a man close to us, it is partly due to recounting such difficulties."
--Thich Nhah Hanh, from the Afterword

This Arabic / English side-by-side translation of the Koran (Al-Qur'an) brings together one of the best known translations in the English language - Maulana Muhammad Ali's classic text, juxtaposed with the original Arabic Koran. After careful examination, Maulana Muhammad Ali's translation was selected due to its careful fidelity in accurately conveying the meanings of the Arabic while maintaining fluidity in the English. The Arabic text contains all diacritical marks to aid students to master pronunciation in Koran recitation.