Fano Discovers a Universal Truth
581906
Doctor Seuss you have a competitor. Stefano combines rhyme and line to produce a children's book with a universal truth: to thyself be true. Good for kids to understand that if they always follow the crowd's wishes, ultimately they will be unhappy. Better to do what YOU want. Don't follow the crowd.
4797822
After reading "Song of the Heart", my soul filled with instant recognition of a dormant truth having been hidden from me.

Francine's extraordinary life, fraught with all of life's "ordinary" challenges made this book very difficult to put down. However, Francine's gifts revealed themselves to me in "The Structure of All That Is". The spiral living crystal of light embedded with millions of vibrations of light and sound corresponding to each soul's experience, present, past and future, which offered me a new way of looking at all of life.

As Francine explains, "we are all called upon to respond with enlightened hearts, minds and thoughts, emotions and actions embedded in this eternal time."..... Future generations may choose to respond by expanding on the imprints left by previous generations, making the path purer, clearer and more loving for the generations to follow. "In this way  humanity creates, from moment to moment, with its gift of free will, the world it chooses to live in."

We are never alone and always guided by the wisdom of all connected souls.

Thank you Francine!
with much love,

Marcy Smith
4399010
Peter Novak has synthesized a great deal of world philosophy and theology in his search for the meaning of death. This is a work in progress.  Division of Consciousness has started a movement of discovery.
We are  not the simple physical beings of biological science, nor are we merely  spirit inhabiting a body on a temporarary basis. Rather we are a complex  blend of spirit, soul, body, with an eternal history and infinite future.  The reconciliation between Eastern and Western thought is well underway  now.
This theory has legs.  It is robust.  A good theory has the ability  to predict and foreshadow events and discoveries before they occur.  Division theory does just that. There are not only parallels, but  explanations for existing beliefs that seem odd or without context in  various traditions.  Add division theory and they seem to make a lot more  sense.  To me, this is the strongest recommendation for his new paradigm.  Even religions the author has not yet studied are relevant to his theory  and enhance each other.
Through the website and email discussion group  Peter is accumulating more and more information and viewpoints.  The theory  is being refined, clarified, and is evolving. The contribution DT makes to  ones personal understanding of Life, the Universe and Everything is  different for each person, but powerful for most who dig into it and engage  the theory with an open mind.
This first book whets ones appetite for  more. I am eagerly awaiting the next book.  There is more than enough meat  here to give scholars and theologians something to chew for a very long  time. Further research into NDE's, OBE's, past life regressions,  psychotropic drug reactions and various spiritual and para-spiritual  experiences continues to enhance the theory.
Read the book and join in  the journey of discovery!  You will never look at life in exactly the way  same again. If it doesn't exactly fit perfectly for you now, just hold on.  Join the discussion group and help Peter with the next book.
363964
"The Electric Jesus" is more than a memoir, it is a modern discovery of one of the greatest lies ever told, that you are separate from the god experience. "The Electric Jesus" shows us that that power has always been within our own hearts.

Whether dusting off the obscurity of the Dead Sea scrolls and gnostic texts, or drawing parallels with the ancient archetypal imagery of DNA helixes and spirit entities of our ancestors, Jonathan Talat Phillip takes you on a beautiful journey to unfold the truth of our being through his own painful, comical, and enlightening experience.

Intelligent, personal, and engaging, that is "The Electric Jesus," and if new to the subject, be prepared for your mind to be pried open to a whole new expanse. This book will shake the foundation of what you thought you knew to be true, and just what our potential truly is as humans able to harness the Christ Consciousness and bring about profound changes in our inner most beings, and with so, the world.
4212916
The Revelation of St. John: Path to the Soul Initiation, by Zachary F. Landsdowne is without question the best interpretation of Revelation that I have read thus far.  The fantastical visions of St. John, laying and listening to a voice through a crack in a cave, on the Greek Island of Patmos, is, for most people, impossible to understand.  Many try to ascribe a worldly and physical view and interpretation to St. John's vision, which leaves, as one can imagine, most, either laughing or frightened.

Zachary F. Lansdowne, on the other hand, has made a giant leap into the spiritual self. By joining his experiences of psychology, philosophy and comparative religions, we have been given a complete process of the development of a spiritual self. The Book of Revelation becomes a progressive spiritual life process rather than a regressive life experience of physical punishment.

The Spiritual self, as the Lamb, is the center of this interpretation while the seven scrolls become the seven paths to enlightenment.  Each stage has a set of principles that corresponds to a present state of awareness and continues guiding the reader, helping them move into higher states of being.

With each chapter the reader moves higher in self awareness until he reaches the highest form of consciousness. According to Lansdowne, this is total spiritual awareness or what we call God.

Lansdowne's unique interpretation of Revelation, and I suspect, the original reason St. John layed in a damp cave to write it, gives his readers a practical guide that will bring them knowledge of the true nature of man, revealed through the process of total spiritual awareness.
2407205
Mariann Burke's book Reimagining Mary is profound.  She develops the theme of the Annunciation through exploring varieties of ways it has been depicted in great art, especially, though not only, Fra Angelico, and she does so in a way that will be illuminating for readers.  She links understandings of Mary, and especially of the Annunciation, with mythic experience that goes well beyond Christianity, and in this way she opens up possibilities of what Mary can mean for many people and many cultures.  Her inclusion of multiple pieces of art and her commentaries on these pieces make the art, the artists, and the Marian themes being explored come alive.  Her analysis according to Jungian themes also brings valuable insights, leading readers to awareness of Mary's significance that goes beyond the solely intellectual.

Burke leads the reader on a learning journey by describing her own explorations and greater awareness as these have evolved over several decades of serious research and deep contemplation.  She teaches us how to "look" at great art and shows us how much more can be seen in it if we appreciate the deep human archetypal experiences to which it is linked.  She is humble in her writing; truthful about her experiences, her limits and her questions in ways that validate and stimulate readers' own explorations.

The book includes wry humor throughout.  It is also very convincing, especially when she describes insights about proper (and improper) roles of women in organized religion that of necessity flow from her studies.  This is a very valuable book to read and then to continue to reflect on.
4950012
October 11, my last day in Florence, I wondered upon a small, private museum called Leonardo daVinci's Machines, where one can view reconstructions of ideas Leonardo put to paper, but did not necessarily build.  Gripped by the breadth and depth of his intellect, I decided I would read a complete biography when I got home.  What timing!  Isaacson's book came out October 17th, and I have just now completed it, along with savoring Christie's record-breaking sale of Leonardo's Salvatoi Mundo for 450 million dollars in the middle of reading it (I wrote a notation in the book above this painting).

Isaacson has a talent for biography (this book is my third of his), especially in bringing to life, in a wonderful, readable way, people of extraordinary genius.  Isaacson studied deeply, and really knows his subject; as I read, I was awed by Leonardo's work across multiple disciplines, yet amused by his tendency not to finish work---there is a reason there are only 20 or so extant daVinci paintings.  Isaacson is careful to provide detailed assessment of his major work, as well as bemoan his failure to ever put his thousands of pages of notes and observations into any published format, leaving students of his life to do their best.  I especially enjoyed Isaacson's conclusion, an application for readers to understand what made Leonardo's genius, and to learn from him.

If I have any complaint, it is that perhaps Isaacson discounted Leonardo's spiritual dimension.  Yes, he was a scientist, and not a fervent deist, but in an age saturated with belief in God, and his ability to see unity and analogy in creation, perhaps there was more to Leonardo's spiritual side than Isaacson would prefer to cede as a thoroughgoing humanist.
1009054
Before you read this book, open your mind to the possibility that the universe may be very different from your version of reality.  This is not a book about music theory or how to play the bass.  It is a wonderful and playful revelation about the relationship between Music and your life.  Both will change for the better if you are willing to leave behind what you already think you know.

Victor weaves an unbelievably believable tale which unites ideas about space, time, numbers, and nature into a new view of Music as a living, breathing being.  Fans of Richard Bach and Tom Brown, Jr., will enjoy this new perspective on their work.

Frankly, music players who are uncomfortable away from the written page of music will be uncomfortable with this book.  Improvisors of all kinds will know you have come home.
2326618
This book is not for the faint of faith because it places Truth ahead of Charity, as it should be, and therefore casts a critical eye on the watered-down implementation of the changes of Vatican II.

Romano Amerio's book has been ignored for many years, so it's so exhilarating to rediscover it in English in this era of Benedict XVI.  Not only does the book chronicle from many printed and oral sources where Vatican II's application fails, Iota Unum is also a veritable catechism, moral theology and apologetics tool for those who want to know Catholic Truth from the  spurious "love" feel-good post-Vatican II culture that holds the Church captive until now.

I love it that Amerio never left the Church despite the heartbreaks.  This book, the English edition of which is published by Sarto House, a publication of the SSPX, should help pave the way toward reconciliation between the LeFevbrists (the "independents," "integrists," "conciliarists," etc.) and the Vatican.  I also think the chapter on the Liturgy should have been placed up front, since it's the most important for lay readers, but a book like this should be thoroughly read and studied and not just skimmed.

An earlier review of Iota Unum says that Amerio didn't have much of a sense of humor, but I guess that's all right considering the serious topic of his tome.  But I did find a few places where I just could not help but laugh out loud - In the footnotes, where at times the English translator had to set the author straight in correctly interpreting the quotes and putting them in context.

So the translator, too, shares in the five-star rating for making the English edition technically superior to the Italian original.
4518422
Without once making specific or explicit reference to Catholicism, Shusaku Endo's membership in the Mystical Body of Christ is as clear as mountain water.  With superb craftsmanship and artistry, Endo depicts the nightmarish results of living one's life without seeking and obtaining that membership, without obedience to the commandments of the Lord and the teachings of His Church.

No, it's not a question of being holier than thou -- after all, we're all sinners.  Rather, it's a question of knowing the difference between right and wrong, between good and evil, and not pretending that there is no difference, or that the inverse might be true, or that there is no truth at all.

According to Endo, the character Suguro can go no further.  But we can.  If we don't shake off this diabolical disorientation, we can sink deeper and deeper into the sea of poison; wander further and further through the sinister halls of our own Fukuoka University Medical School.

I liked this book much more than what is generally considered Endo's masterpiece, "Silence", so poorly translated by the Christophobic William Johnston.  Michael Gallagher, translator of "The Sea and Poison", also pays some homage to oh-so trendy Christophobia.  His is not as egregious as Johnston's, however, and he's a much more careful translator.
1499421
Anyone who knows there is more to life than just the prerequsite blah, blah, blah of dogma that is handed down by those who think their version of reality is the only path to the Self, should read this book. The author has done extensive study of the Sanskrit version of the Gita as well as the interprepations of various renowned translations of this enlightening  bit of the Mahabarata epoch.
His approach to bringing this text into the 21st century, for those of us who do not believe in dogma, is Revise and Restate. It took more than ten years of meditation and reflection to arrive at an Absolute underestanding of the presented topic and the meanings of the Sanskrit words. This author makes the meanings of each verse studied accessible to todays seeker of True Wisdom.
Scott Teitsworth has presented his version without any coloratiion or destortion of the Truth espoused by his wisdom teachers. He passes this emlightenment on to us, the readers, and in so doing opens the doors to our inner Self allowing it to soar free.  .
1274557
After seeing this film twice at the Vancouver Film Festival, visiting from my home in Mexico, I could hardly wait to own it, even though it was only available in VHS. I find it fascinating and disturbing that Saura's masterpiece, as non-linear and right-brained as any great work of art, should be maligned by critics such as Roger Ebert, and others. Here's to those who've written their praise for the film on these pages!
This is extraordinary creation, a fusion of both outer and inner realities that the logical mind cannot grasp - and why must it? Does it really matter what happened factually to Goya? Aren't those fiery skies and the music of Boccherini,  reflecting the fire and brimstone in Goya's mind, enough to tell us that the film is mythic? Shakespeare did the same thing with his tragic heroes because the Elizabethans and the alchemists believed in "as above, so below". Macbeth's turmoil is reflected in the storms outside, and the bloody battles raging around him. Yet that's fiction and we believe this world is reality..
I buy few films, and I cherish this one. I'm still longing for  "Providence" to come out on DVD because Resnais  interweaves life and art from the same perspective...an old man, a writer, dying among his living, breathing creations. I live in an Mexico's oldest city, on a street named "Cinco de Mayo" Every day I'm reminded of Goya's painting, and this film is shown at least once a month on TV because the Mexicans love it - the Latin world has no problem suspending reality in the name of art - which is why Andre Breton called Mexico the ultimate surrealism. Thank you Saura, once again.
3745958
It is by exposing with clarity a synthesis of Jacques Maritain's writings that John Trapani is able to support an organic development of Maritain's system of thought on aesthetics. He is clearly not only well-acquainted with Maritain's writings, but furthermore, is a devoted disciple of his who can identify the principles rooted in the philosophy of St. Thomas and develop its "hidden springs" consonant with Maritain's initial inspiration.

Trapani takes the reader by the hand and defines the precise vocabulary necessary to navigate the paths already blazed before us. He instills the reader with the awareness of himself as a locus of the Divine through Poetic contemplation as he interfaces with a profound reality that also teems with the Divine.

Accessible to both the aspiring philosopher and soundly satisfying to the erudite one, Trapani's welcome expansion of the aesthetics of Jacques Maritain broadens the reader's horizons. And with such a thorough exposition, he only just begins to explain why the reader is justified in allowing himself to reverberate with the splendor of Poetically-inspired beauty. The intellectual illumination that gives witness to this splendor bears the very fingerprints of God. This precious contribution to the Thomistic synthesis leaves the reader basking in the wholesome warmth of never-before-spoken truth, indeed, but even more he is liberated by the deeper truths of both his dignity and his destiny.
4760446
In my recent (four-star) review of Aldous Huxley's "The Perennial Philosophy," I opined that Huxley's "Perennial vision" had been "flattened" due to the influence of Swami Prabhavananda's Vedanta philosophy. This reminded me that the only translation of Shankara's Crest Jewel of Wisdom (or Discrimination) I had read was Prabhavananda's, which I no longer have and hadn't read for decades. With this in mind, I decided to procure another version (this one) and review it.

This version had received all five-star reviews, and one reviewer who has read multiple translations of the text averred, "This version of the Crest Jewel of Wisdom is by far the most accurate and esoteric translation, in my humble opinion." The price was right for the Kindle edition--$3.99-- and after I downloaded it, I zipped through the short text in about an hour.

The first thing that hit me was the writing style of this 1895 translation:  lots of thees, thines, thous, and whences couched within old-fashioned nineteenth-century syntax. I seriously doubt if Shankara's original version read like this Theosophical Society translation. I didn't vibe with the style.

Shankara's Dharma, while ground-breaking at the time it was written, is unremarkable by today's spiritual standards. If this text were written by a contemporary Advaita Vedanta guru, it would be dismissed as unnoteworthy. Beyond describing the wonders of Self-realization and enjoining yogis to seek the Self by discerning between It and the non-self, there is little esoteric elaboration in the treatise.

Shankara, in a couple of places, differentiates between the individual Self and the universal Self, but he fails to elaborate on the distinction between the two or on how one can realize the latter after realizing the former. Here's an excerpt from the text that illustrates this:

"The binding is untied by perfect knowledge, not otherwise; the discerning of the Oneness of the Eternal and the Self is held by the scripture to be perfect knowledge. And this is accomplished by perfectly discerning between Self and not-self; thereafter discernment is to be gained between individual and universal Self."

Shankara's description of the bliss sheath, the final barrier to Self-realization, is unimpressive. Here's what he says:

"The principle sphere of the bliss-formed veil is in dreamless sleep; in dreaming and waking it is part manifest when blissful objects are beheld.

"Nor is this bliss-formed veil the higher Self. It is a form of objective nature; it is an effect caused by good acts accumulated in this changeful form."

I hate to say it, but I don't think Shankara groks the bliss sheath. The bliss sheath is simply the Energy, or Shakti, of the Self objectified. When this Energy is no longer objectified, then the plenary, or universal Self--Siva-Shakti-- is realized.

Whereas contemporary Advaita Vedantans and neo-Advaita Vedantans seem allergic to the quasi-dualistic term "union," Shankara repeatedly enjoins us to attain union with the Self; but again, he doesn't clarify how union with the individual Self [Atman] differs from union with the universal Self [Brahman].

I'm sure there are better translations of Shankara's Crest Jewel of Wisdom than this one, but I'm not motivated to sift through numerous versions to find the best one(s). Just as students of Buddhism should read Gautama, students of Advaita Vedanta should read Shankara. But I recommend finding a more refined and extensive translation of/commentary on his writings than what this version offers.
2841783
I highly recommend this book to those who are not familiar with Anthony de Mello, and to his fans and critics. The editor provides an excellent introduction to help us to have a better understanding and appreciation for de Mello's numerous writings. The selections give us a potential experience of personal awakening or freeing encounter with "God" or the Self of self. I hope there'll be an audio book edition with excerpts of deMello's retreat talks so that his mellow voice and hearty laughter can be captured while we read his writings. (Please cf. my review for Walking on Water for more background.)
1015541
Renate Craine's Hildegard is inspiring and really, a work of art in itself.  Recognizing that Hildegard's descriptions of her visions and their meaning are both historically and culturally conditioned in the depths of  the 12th century, and that reading her texts straight-on can be strange and  confusing, Renate's commentary is truly a masterful translation for the  modern western ear and idiom.  Renate has the rare  gift of timeless empathy that seems to easily transcend the centuries,  opening up Hildegard's complex symbolic language and making new connections  to things that I care about.  I am especially grateful for her exposition  of one central concept in Hildegard's writings, the Latin word  "viriditas" (fecundity or "greening power").  Renate, a  wise psychologist and spiritual director, shows how this ever-present  divine gift and power of viriditas bridges the deepest levels of our psyche  with the whole of creation and the cosmos.  Renate explains  Hildegard's vision of the cosmic Christ in plain language that suddenly  reveals important connections to the Jungian archetypal world, to  traditional Christian symbols, and to current, critically important  ecological concerns.  After reading Renate's book, I can't say enough  about the importance of Hildegard's vision of God who is working everything  out through Love in an interdependent cosmos, one that, at the limits of  our human understanding, is always appearing as healing, celebrating, and  revealing itself in the midst of suffering, death, Nature, and the  paradoxical, eternal play of Shadow and Light.
2507134
Any person who comes to the realisation that the earth is alive and full of energies not visible to the eye eventually wonders if the earth has any memory of Christ on Golgotha. This book gives ways that that questions can begin to be answered. Pogacnik is an artist and has developed a clairvoyance in regard to the elemental beings and the etheric forces that are all around us and active in the earth. From experiencing these forces, described in his books "Nature Spirits and Elemental Beings" and "Healing the Heart of the Earth" - Pogacnik then realises that he can use the same techniques to examine the Gospels. When he does so - a whole new layer of the Gospels is opened to him, and Marko is able to read the script of the "Fifth Gospel" buried in the Gospels themselves.  The book then discusses the union of Christ with Sophia, the heart of the earth, and enables us in a new way to comprehend the infinite magnitude of life in all its forms. This book is a must read for anyone interested in religion, new age, the environment and understanding our relationship to the many worlds around us.