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SHAPES OF TRUTH

Name: SHAPES OF TRUTH
Author: Neal Allen
ISBN: 978-0-578-83908-0

DISCOVER GOD INSIDE YOU

by Neal Allen ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 9, 2021

An intriguing but uneven spiritual manual.

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A guide calls for finding the divine by looking within.

Although Allen flatly says that his work is about God, he quickly clarifies this assertion. “I don’t care what your religion is, and I don’t care if you’re an atheist,” he writes. “None of that has any bearing on what I’ll cover in this book.” Oddly, he then immediately moves on to claiming that there exists, hidden in the body of every human, a set of 35 “embodied concepts that describe qualities of God.” According to the author, these qualities include things like strength, nourishment, vulnerability, identity, space, gratitude, and an array of different kinds of love: personal love, passionate love, universal love, “merging” love, and so on. Each of these, Allen explains, is “a way of seeing the divine in everyday life” and setting about answering so-called big questions like “Who am I? What’s God? What will it be like to die?” The author sees these embodied concepts as essentially physical manifestations. Imagine, he asks his readers, that you’re in the presence of somebody who’s suffering, and instead of feeling your response as “compassion,” you find “a soft brick sitting inside your upper chest cavity, glowing emerald green, tender to the touch and bringing tears to your eyes.” In his ambitious guide, Allen describes each of these “thirty-five issues and their corresponding divine body-forms” in ways that readers of spiritualist/New Age literature will find comforting, inspiring, and predictable. In addition, his narrative style is easy and readable throughout the earnest work. But those not already onboard may become perplexed, and the confusion will start virtually on Page 1, with Allen’s contention that his intensely religion-saturated book doesn’t care whether or not a reader is, for instance, an atheist. They may also question his contention that all of his 35 concepts are actually real, scientifically verifiable, physical components, including gratitude.

An intriguing but uneven spiritual manual.

Pub Date: Jan. 9, 2021

ISBN: 978-0-578-83908-0

Page Count: 276

Publisher: Pearl Publications

Review Posted Online: April 10, 2021

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

BODY, MIND & SPIRIT | PHILOSOPHY & RELIGION | SELF-HELP

ROSE BOOK OF BIBLE CHARTS, MAPS AND TIME LINES

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ROSE BOOK OF BIBLE CHARTS, MAPS AND TIME LINES

by Timothy Paul Jones ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 2005

Worthwhile reference stuffed with facts and illustrations.

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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 â€œHow 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

Categories:

PHILOSOPHY & RELIGION

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THE MYTH OF SISYPHUS

AND OTHER ESSAYS

by Albert Camus ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 26, 1955

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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.