Civilization Books

This is one magnificent work. It covers the major themes of the Bible with detailed analysis and relevant sidebars so that anyone in a Bible study group or reading the Bible on their own can have a meaningful source of interpreatations. Each page is a new subject, which makes it simple to use. Pages can be read on their own or the entire book can be read. Bible verses are quoted on each topic so the reader is always aware of how the idea is being applied.

This work is less than 300 pages, but it is so rich in detail that one will not be able to skim through it in a couple of evenings. Once you start reading, it is hard to put down and is hard to not read every word on every page. This book helps one gain perspective and context. At the end is a summary of each book, including the apochrypha. In the main text, non-canonical books like the Gospel of Thomas are mentioned, so the reader can rest assured the author put as much scope and thought into this work as was practical.

Bible scholars, Bible study groups, general knowledge seekers, historians, philosphers, and many others will find this book extremely useful and user-friendly. Anyone disappointed in this wonderful volume is just not interested in learning.

This is a wonderful overview of the Bible illustrated with color art from down through the ages. Quotes are from the New Revised Standard Version, a translation which is favored by scholars for its accuracy. The comments are insightful, interesting and accurate. A great supplement to this book is THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO THE BOOK OF PROVERBS by Cody Jones. Numerous characters from throughout the Bible are pointed out who illustrate King Solomon's witty observations on human nature. Many of the riddles and mysteries of Proverbs are explored with surprising new answers. Proverbs are a treasury of God's wisdom and give practical applications of Biblical values in punchy memorable sayings.

Inden's book is commendable for giving a clear, thorough and courageous analysis of why scholars of many ilks have given the distorted image of India that we have today. The British wanted to justify their empire and loot, by positioning themselves as the civilizing force. The Germans built their "Aryan" identity as being at the center of history. The Jungians constructed the West as being rational and progressive, as compared to the 'world negating', irrational and mystical Indians. Post-independence Indian Marxists wanted to 'qualify' India for Marxism by having to prove its feudalistic character. All these served to build and solidify the theory of India as a sponge of civilization and with no agency to originate anything worthwhile. No wonder then that most treatments of India begin and end with caste and the multitude of social evils - all deemed too quickly to be its inherent qualities. Yet there is little coverage given to the appropriations by Westerners from India. Inden's book should be read by everyone with a serious interest to understand India.

To place modern scholarship on India in the proper context, it will be helpful to read this book. Inden dissects the colonialist prejudices of these scholars and shows how a lot about India that we take for granted is actually a construction of these Indologists.

Imagine New England and one thinks of rocky beaches, bucolic towns, grassroots democracy, intelectual, and progressive ideals. Imagine New England and one wants to be taken back to a purer, simpler, and more ideal time; a better life of white houses and steeple churches where one is apart of the history of who are and want to be as Americans and patriots.

In "Imagining New England," Joseph Conforti deconstructs the creation of the regional identify of New England in exquisite historical detail. In a blend of history and sociology, Professor Conforti searches for the "real" New England. The New England he had heard of but not seen or experienced as child growing up in the most un-New England of New England of cities, Fall River.

This book is a substantial contribution to American history. New England, the cultural invention, the concept, represents the best we want to be as Americans. It is a concept the country and the region itself continually reach for as an anchor to our roots despite the fact that the region itself long ago left it behind. Joseph Conforti captures the essence of this complex identity, both real and manufactured.

This is an exceptionally well researched and beautifully written book which, for me, opened up all kinds of new ideas about the nature of "region" and "place" in general, and New England in particular. I was fascinated from the earliest section describing how the "second generation" in New England inherited the region from their parents and tried to "reinvent" the place for their own purposes, all the way to the wonderful discussion of Frost and the evolution of Yankee magazine. Conforti develops the theory that the locus of New England moved from Boston, with a brief recapture by Plymouth, on to Connecticut and now to northern New England. (Anybody see the Boston Globe magazine last week about "Magnetic North"? It fits perfectly into Conforti's theme.) What happened to Lawrence and Fall River and the immigrant population; you'll have to read to find out. If you love New England, this book is highly readable, profound, and worth the price!

This is a fascinating series of interviews that appeared in "The Realist" with individuals that inflenced the American scene starting in the 1950s. One senses that neither Paul Krassner nor those being interviwed pulled any punches thereby allowing the reader to enter the mind set of the interviewees.

This book is the best book ever written! God I love this book I have read it oh I dont know like at least 100 times I love it that much not much of a science fiction fan but this book tells a story with out little green aliens everywhere it has people with life living within the pages I just bought the 2 others in the series I cant wait great book MUST READ and this means you!

The Importance of Charlemagne
By : Timothy Levi Biel
Reviewed by: A. Thomas
Period 2

The Importance of Charlemagne was written by Timothy Levi Biel. Timothy did write an excellent book. This book is the best source of information to do a project on or for independent reading. Charlemagne was a marvelous, wonderful, terrific, and a magnificent ruler. Charlemagne was born to King Pepin III and Queen Bertrada. Pepin was the ruler of the Franks and a great amount of land. Charles had a brother named Carloman.
I like this book. This book helped me on my project for school. The Importance of Charlemagne isn't a book on Charlemagne only, it also tells about all of Charlemagne's descendants, family, ancestors, friends, and other people in that time period. " Clovis had been a powerful and influential ruler, but the idea of a central government led by a king was not part of Frankish culture. "
" He loved foreigners and took great pain to make them welcome. So many visited him as a result that they were rightly held to be a burden not only to the palace, but to the entire realm. " This was written by Einhard in the book called Two Lives of Charlemagne. Einhard was a close, scholar, and an adviser to Charlemagne. The Importance of Charlemagne even has opinions that people wrote.
My favorite part in the book was when Charlemagne encourages and supports education for anyone in his. He built schools for children who don't have an education." Charles established free schools in villages and monasteries that were open to any boy, regardless of his social status." This was my favorite part in the book because education is important for everyday life. I didn't think that he would be built schools for the poor.

this book creates and heads different sections of Charlemagne's life. It helped me an incredible amount in my essay writing process, and it gives examples of every aspect of the king's life. His work with education is less talked about, but the entire book contains good quotes from Einhard and other books (Einhard - the two lives of Charlemagne is also a goood essay writing choice).

While reading this book I constantly had to remind myself that it was written in 1970-71, so prescient and prophetic were Steiner's insights. As a study of Western culture, an investigation into where--and what--we are historically and globally, it remains absolutely critical reading. Steiner read right what continue to be the major issues of our time: the generalized suspicions about the irrelevance of "high" culture when projected against 20th century political atrocities; the role of literacy in a progressively visual culture; the increasingly pervasive roles of various forms of music; the emerging pre-eminence of "facts," of a scientific mind-set and of scientific knowledge in general; the ethical and intellectual risks posed by the scientific unknowns--to name but a few themes in this dense, richly thought-out essay.

This is a thin book, unlike "No Passion Spent"; rigorously and earnestly investigatory, unlike "Errata." Ironically I came to this book last, but it is by far the most satisfying. In the former, only one essay, "Archives of Eden," touches on the large cultural questions examined here, and then more in the form of a rant; in the latter, what had by then become Steiner's familiar terrain seemed only to have been re-rehearsed, with no substantive new insights.

But here is Steiner at his least pretentious (he does have a tendency to flaunt his polylingual capacities), at his most profound and probing. It isn't easy reading and isn't intended to be. It has the earmark of a formidable mind investigating its time and space for its own sake, more out of its own curiosity and impulse to understand as of any desire to impress, or advance its host professionally.

Here is Steiner at the same amplitude as an Elias Canetti or a William Irwin Thompson--an encyclopedic generalist discussing broad cultural questions with command, eloquence and erudition.

A bold reflection about why the West lost her innocence by organizing the Holocaust.
For the author, the motives for the Holocaust lie in the subconscious and more particularly in the psychology of religion.
First, Moses gave us monotheism with an abstract, ruthless, almighty but absent God. Secondly, his son Christ, required in his Sermon of the Mount total self abandonment. Thirdly, there was the Messianic socialism of Marx, Trotski and Bloch.
The West took revenge by exterminating the people who saddled its subconscious with these inhuman utopian dreams.
The West lost her innocence; but how can it react against the committed barbarism: by the stoicism of a Freud, or by the cheerfulness of Nietzsche for the fact that we are only a few moments here on this gruesome planet.
This powerful text forces the reader to a serious reflection. I don't have any clinical psychoanalytical material at my disposal that confirms or denies the author's conjectures. So suggestions for other work in this field are very wellcome.
For me, this book is certainly not the whole truth, as there were among others, resentment for success, the search for a scapegoat for the economic depression or the more than ambivalent attitude of the Catholic Church.

I read this book for school. It was really good! Fairly easy to read, very simple, but interesting. I recommend this book to anyone who likes ancient Romans,Greeks,or Greek myths. 5-star!!!

Ian Andrew illustrates In Search Of A Homeland, a story of the Aneid and a tale of war which will appeal to any student of Greek mythology and history. Chapters present the story with plenty of illustration and color: it's hard to peg the readers and age group of this title, which will reach from grades 5-8.

In the beginning, according to all our western civilization textbooks, the dawn rose on the towering zigurats of Sumer, a thriving civilization, fully formed with irrigated agriculture and distinctive cuneiform script. This premise begs a lot of questions about what precisely happened during prehistory that led to the emergence of complex human societies and all of the associated accouterments.

Ristvet fills this pedagogical gap with her excellent book. She synthesizes the most current anthropological research using a multi-regional approach (both Old World and New World) addressing essential topics such as early religions, the development of technologies and material culture, and the origins of agriculture and literacy. Most importantly the author manages to present these complex topics in a prose that is engaging, straight-forward, and current.

I highly recommend this text to instructors of ancient history, western civilization, anthropology, and archaeology courses. Though, I bought it simply because I thought it would be a fascinating and enjoyable read. I was not disappointed.

I studied under this Prof at Georgia State University and she knows what she is talking about. I loved the book and bought it because she does excellent work.

This is a wonderful book. I have re-read it several times. I lived in Santa Cruz, California for many years, and I personally know some of the people he wrote about so accurately and insightfully, although I unfortunately do not know Mr. Houston.

This is kind of a joyful, thoughtful, updated FAREWELL TO MANZANAR, a modern journey around the Pacific Basin to see the context of our oneness as a people, the future of how we will coexist as Americans and Asians and Amerasians. Examines in a playful way the similarities we share as peoples, and the lessons we learn from each other about our cultures--our histories, and our shared humanity. Important lessons for the future as the boundaries fall away. Highly recommended

In studying the history of the Jews of Spain, Historians have performed a glaring dis-service by being ignorant of the two traditions thriving in Spain. In Southern Spain was the Andalusian tradition of Maimonides, representing the traditions of the Geonim and going back to the oral law of Moses. In Northern Spain, was the assimilated tradition of Nachmanidese. Specifically, this book shows very clearly that the Northern tradition of Spain was in fact an adoption of the values of the surronding Christian environment. By attacking Maimonidese, Nachmanidese was in fact attacking the teachings of the Geonim and ultimately, the oral law of Moses.

In a often emotional and always beautifully written expose, Rabbi, Prof. Faur shows that the persecuted have often adopted the values of the persecutors. In this, the tradition of Northern Spain was typical. The real miracle is that Maimonidese and his disciples, in an extraordinary exception to the commpon laws of history, steadfastly rejected the values of their persecutors -- even if this estranged them from their Jewish brethern who did.

Ultimately, only Maimonidese and his tradition have something to say today. This tradition is both modern and ancient: modern in thought and ancient in origin.

Finally, a book that speaks the truth!!!!

I applaud Chacham Faur's insightful and educated view of the Jewish phenomena know as the Spanish forced conversions during the Inquisitional period.
As with all of Chacham Faur's writings the reader is automatically transported into a delightful dialogue with the writers advanced knowledge and eloquent writing skills. With this said, I am very much in agreement with his assessments regarding the converso phenomena.
I also want to point out that I really enjoyed the prologue to the book. It is well stated and motivates one to jump right in and start turning the pages for a delightful journey to Andalusian Jewry, of which the Converso's belong to.
The Converso is a Jewish person who must be acknowledged as fully Jewish no matter what. As our Sephardic Rabbi's have stated they must be welcomed back to the Jewish fold even until this day or in the future, without going through humiliating conversion rituals. That is how it was in Amsterdam and how it should be now. Amsterdam being a great model to follow, showing us how to treat our returning correligionist, with dignity and respect, and allowing our brothers and sisters an opportunity to be fully integrated into mainstream Judaism. In itself this the greatest mitwah we, as Jews, can perpetuate towards all who come back to the fold i.e., to love them back and help in their return in anyway that we can. As history has shown, our Tudesco brethren have always behaved despairingly towards the Sephardim, whether in writing or actions. In many ways they are not the ones we should turn to for help. As Andalusian Jews, we must look to our own, history has proved this to be the only way to fight interreligious rivalries.
That is why I recommend this book to any Andelusian Sephardim, because for one, knowlege is power. And secondly, Chacham Faur is a master at Talmudic tought and Maimodean philosophy. It is a must read for all Sephardim or Tudescos who wish to gain a better understanding of the complexities of being Jewish in austere circumstances.