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by Karen Armstrong
Blending history, sociology and spirituality, Armstrong offers a compelling and compassionate study of a radical form of religious expression that is critically shaping the course of world history. Says The New York Times, "One of the most penetrating, readable, and prescient accounts of the fundamentalist movements in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam."
442 pp.
Price: $16.00
by Willis Barnstone & Marvin Meyer, eds.
This single volume is comprised of a rich and diverse collection of gnostic texts in a translation allowing the spirit of the original texts to shine forth. Says the Library Journal, "The selection of texts ranges across two millennia and various cultures." Says Publishers Weekly, "This book may well be the most comprehensive collection of gnostic texts ever gathered in one volume."
Remaindered copies; good condition, with no underlining.
Softcover, Glossary, Bibliography, Index, 860 pp.
Originally $35.
Price: $17.00
edited with introductions by Willis Barnstone
These ancient scriptures are collected for the first time in one volume: Visionary Wisdom Texts, Christian Apocrypha, Gnostic Gospels, Dead Sea Scrolls, Jewish Pseudepigrapha and Kabbalah. Each excluded from the official canon of the Old and New Testaments. Barnstone is a poet and Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Comparative Literature at Indiana University.
Remaindered copies, good condition, with no underlining.
Softcover, Glossary, Appendicies, Bibliography, Index, 773 pp. Originally $30.
Price: $15.00
by Thomas Burton
Burton traces the evolution of Christian serpent handling from its beginnings in East Tennessee. Through first-person interviews and photos, he gives a unique picture of the people who are often distorted by the media as members of a "snake religion" or a "snake cult" because of their unorthodox beliefs and practices. The handling of serpents and fire, healing through laying-on-of-hands, speaking in tongues and drinking poison are seen as acts of Christian obedience that demonstrate the power of the Holy Spirit.
344 pp.
Click for a review of Serpent-Handling Believers
Price: $22.00
by Maria del Carmen Tapia
Opus Dei (God's Work), regarded as the most conservative, mysterious and tightly organized lay groups in the Roman Catholic Church, founded in 1928 by a young Spanish priest, has 75,000 members worldwide. Maria del Carmen Tapia joined "The Work," as it is known, in 1948 and worked at the highest levels as major superior of the Women's Branch before leaving 18 years later. A compelling narrative, she describes in detail the inner workings of Opus Dei, critics call it the "Holy Mafia," and her nearly six years of daily contact with its founder, Monsignor Jose Maria Escriva de Balaguer, whose beatification in 1992 raised a storm of protest for the haste and irregularity of its procedures.
364 pp.
Price: $23.00
commentary by Meister Eckhart
This is an in-depth exploration of the Lord's Prayer with a commentary by Meister Eckhart. According to Gurdjieff "Most ancient prayers have nothing in common with petitions; they are, as it were, 'recapitulations'. By repeating them aloud or to himself a man endeavors to experience what is in them—their content—with his mind and feeling, concentrating and reflecting on the real sense of each word—what it really means to him, how he can understand it. In this way, many ideas will become connected in his thinking and many thoughts relating to the words of the prayer will pass through his mind. And then it is precisely these thoughts which can do for him what he asks God to do." The prayer, according to Ouspensky, is divided into three and these three divisions are again triply divided.
159 pp.
Price: $30.00
by Mark H. Gaffney
In the 3rd century C.E., the Catholic bishop Hippolytus composed A Refutation of All Heresies, which chiefly targeted the Naassenes, a Gnostic sect. He gave in full their "Naassene Sermon," a recounting of Jesus' actual teachings at the Last Supper. Gaffney deciphers its highly symbolic, message intended for an inner circle of disciples whose practices would restore the lost connection to God, the central revelation being God's immanence, which allowed spiritual realization in this life.
Notes, Appendices, Bibliography, Index, 296 pp.
Price: $19.00
translated by Andrew Gaus
Most translations are the work of committees which interpret the original text through theological doctrines and dogmas that arose centuries after the books were written. Gaus's approach is to render the translation as it would have been read in the original, unvarnished Greek language. Stripped away are thick layers of convention and 'Biblical' language that often cloud the meaning of the original words.
508 pp.
Price: $22.00
by René Guénon
Addressing the role of sacred languages and the principle of initiation in the Christian tradition, Guénon then examines esoteric themes and organizations such as the Holy Grail, Guardians of the Holy Land, the Sacred Heart, Fedeli d'Amore and 'Courts of Love,' and the secret language of Dante. He closes with a lengthy study on St. Bernard of Clairvaux.
115 pp.
Price: $19.00
by Jean-Yves Leloup
Incorporating the recent discovery of the Gospel of Judas with other gospels and various apocryphal texts, Leloup probes the deeper meanings of the biblical presentation to argue that Judas' betrayal was Jesus' idea. His betrayal would show the "evil" in humankind and set Judas by Jesus' side in eternity. "There where I am, " said Jesus, "is where I wish you, too, to be."
174 pp.
Price: $15.00
by Jean-Yves Leloup
The first complete English language translation of the original Coptic Gospel of Mary. An orthodox theologian, Leloup's translation and insightful line-by-line commentary reveals the eminence of the divine feminine and abiding love of nature in early Christian thought, as contrasted to the more well-known dualistic and ascetic interpretations of Christianity. Mary Magdalene was considered by the apostle John to be the founder of Christianity because she was the first witness to the Resurrection.
178 pp.
Price: $15.00
by Jean-Yves Leloup, foreword by Jacob Needleman
In this new translation of the gospel from the Coptic, Leloup, an Orthodox theologian and professor of theology, philosophy and psychology, shows that this text—long condemned by the Church as "the works of the flesh"—is really the sacred initiatic union between male and female principles that once was the heart of Christianity's sacred mystery.
173 pp.
Price: $15.00
by Jean-Yves Leloup, foreword by Jacob Needleman
In this new translation of a collection of Jesus' teachings in 114 logia, or sayings, scholar-mystic Leloup shows that they have much in common with Gnostics of nondualistic schools. In preaching of the coming of a new man, the genesis of the man of knowledge, Jesus describes a journey from limited to unlimited consciousness.
228 pp.
Price: $15.00
by Payam Nabarz
Flourishing from the late second century B.C.E. until 400 A.D., the origins, history and spiritual and philosophical tenets of this ancient Roman mystery religion of Mithraism has deep connections to Zorastrianism and heavily influenced Christian doctrine and symbolism—for example, the god Mithras was born of a virgin in a cave on December 25.
Photos, index, 230 pp.
Price: $15.00
by Maurice Nicoll
A further elucidation of the themes explored in his The New Man, Nicoll examines the idea of sin which he takes in its original Greek meaning of missing the mark, as in a spear thrown at some object and failing to hit it. Subjects dealt with include the Parable of the Sower, the Grain of Mustard Seed, Metanoia, War in Heaven and Esoteric Schools.
257 pp.
Price: $26.00
by Maurice Nicoll
Employing a rare example of intellectual intuition and erudition, Nicoll sifts the New Testament Gospels to reveal the esoteric teaching beneath their surface interpretation. Subjects include the idea of temptation, the Marriage at Cana, the Good Samaritan, Laborers in the Vineyard, Judas Iscariot, Sermon on the Mount, Necessity of Prayer, and the Kingdom of Heaven.
202 pp.
Price: $30.00
by Elaine Pagels and Karen King
The recent discovery of the Gospel of Judas, newly translated by Karen King, restores the vibrant and tumultuous experience of early Christianity—as opposed to the unbroken procession of a uniform faith which has been systematically put forward. Elaine Pagels, a world-renowned expert on early Christianity, brings the necessary depth of context and subtlety for a true evaluation of the gospel's meaning and import. This new Judas the reader encounters is much in accord with how Gurdjieff spoke of him more than 70 years ago.
Softcover, index, 198 pp.
Price: $15.00
by Deborah Vansau McCauley and Laura E. Porter with photos by Warren C. Brunner
Hidden deep in the hills of central Appalachia, thousands of tiny one-room churches, many built to hold no more than a dozen people, have quietly carried on their worship services in an unbroken chain for two centuries. The interviews and photographs that the authors spent five years collecting, give expression to the river baptisms, homecomings, serpent handling, tent evangelism, and radio preaching of this heritage.
Large format volume, 360 photographs, 224 pp.
Price: $28.00