A bewildering volume of occult lore.
The path to enlightenment lies in the soul’s rise over many lifetimes through way stations in the body, according to this debut theosophical treatise.
Ferro, who conducts workshops on healing, draws on the teachings of Madame Blavatsky, the 19th-century founder of theosophy, an esoteric philosophy encompassing Hindu and Buddhist traditions, Judeo-Christian themes, and much else. The book’s core is an exposition of the seven major chakras, which are complexes of bodily locations, associated glands, and psychic faculties. In ascending order, they are the Root chakra at the base of the spine (associated with the adrenal glands and basic trust); the Sacral chakra (gonads and sexuality/creativity); the Solar Plexus chakra (pancreas and emotions); the Heart chakra (thymus and love); the Throat chakra (thyroid and communication); the Brow or Third Eye chakra (pituitary and awareness); and atop the head the Crown chakra (pineal and spirituality). Each chakra is further differentiated into seven levels and has other aesthetic, astrological, and philosophical links. Thus, the Sacral chakra associates with the color orange, the “element” of water, and Mars, and imparts the “soul lesson” of learning “to balance our desires and sensations.” The gist of this labyrinthine scheme is that the soul, repeatedly reincarnating, learns the lessons of the chakras and thus attains a sublime understanding that lets it become pure spirit. (There are medical and psychiatric implications, too—the Sacral chakra influences impotence, appendicitis, and “drama queen” behavior, for example—but the book’s only useful therapeutic material is a brief primer on meditative communion with the “Ancestral Group Soul.”) The author throws in much intriguing theosophical history and cosmology on everything from “Root-races” to the transition from the Piscean to the Aquarian Age, the spirits of planets and solar systems, and mysterious entities such as Rays, Chains, and Globes. Some will like Ferro’s passionate hymns to love, peace, truth, and the oneness of all beings. But the theosophical doctrine here is often so jumbled and impenetrable—“The Ancestral Group Soul is made up of facets or aspects and develops along the planetary life, the ray on which it was created, the life-stream, the root-race, the initiation it is experiencing, the soul lessons and the spiritual qualities it is unfolding”—that many readers will be left scratching their heads.
A bewildering volume of occult lore.Pub Date: June 9, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-982228-59-0
Page Count: 156
Publisher: BalboaPress
Review Posted Online: Oct. 24, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Worthwhile reference stuffed with facts and illustrations.
A compendium of charts, time lines, lists and illustrations to accompany study of the Bible.
This visually appealing resource provides a wide array of illustrative and textually concise references, beginning with three sets of charts covering the Bible as a whole, the Old Testament and the New Testament. These charts cover such topics as biblical weights and measures, feasts and holidays and the 12 disciples. Most of the charts use a variety of illustrative techniques to convey lessons and provide visual interest. A worthwhile example is “How We Got the Bible,” which provides a time line of translation history, comparisons of canons among faiths and portraits of important figures in biblical translation, such as Jerome and John Wycliffe. The book then presents a section of maps, followed by diagrams to conceptualize such structures as Noah’s Ark and Solomon’s Temple. Finally, a section on Christianity, cults and other religions describes key aspects of history and doctrine for certain Christian sects and other faith traditions. Overall, the authors take a traditionalist, conservative approach. For instance, they list Moses as the author of the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible) without making mention of claims to the contrary. When comparing various Christian sects and world religions, the emphasis is on doctrine and orthodox theology. Some chapters, however, may not completely align with the needs of Catholic and Orthodox churches. But the authors’ leanings are muted enough and do not detract from the work’s usefulness. As a resource, it’s well organized, inviting and visually stimulating. Even the most seasoned reader will learn something while browsing.
Worthwhile reference stuffed with facts and illustrations.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2005
ISBN: 978-1-5963-6022-8
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
This a book of earlier, philosophical essays concerned with the essential "absurdity" of life and the concept that- to overcome the strong tendency to suicide in every thoughtful man-one must accept life on its own terms with its values of revolt, liberty and passion. A dreary thesis- derived from and distorting the beliefs of the founders of existentialism, Jaspers, Heldegger and Kierkegaard, etc., the point of view seems peculiarly outmoded. It is based on the experience of war and the resistance, liberally laced with Andre Gide's excessive intellectualism. The younger existentialists such as Sartre and Camus, with their gift for the terse novel or intense drama, seem to have omitted from their philosophy all the deep religiosity which permeates the work of the great existentialist thinkers. This contributes to a basic lack of vitality in themselves, in these essays, and ten years after the war Camus seems unaware that the life force has healed old wounds... Largely for avant garde aesthetes and his special coterie.
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 1955
ISBN: 0679733736
Page Count: 228
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1955
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