When I bought this book, I didn't expect much. But, when it came I was astonished! It has all 12 birthstones and a whole lot more. Each page tells what the color of the gem is and also has a sentence or two telling about the folklore. With me being a rock collector, I loved this book. The information would be helpful to anyone. If they believed in that kind of stuff. For $3.50 I certainly got more than what I payed for!

This is a great read! Ray A. Young Bear's book is not as difficult to penetrate as some of Gerald Vizenor's stuff, but is just as smart. It isn't quite the way Louise Erdrich weaves her stories together, but his use of language and his ability to tell a story is just as good. He's poetic, magical, honest, and can paint pictures with words you won't forget.

What is it about? Well, it's about life. It is about the lives of a group of people from the heartland of America.

If you like Native American literature, get it. If you like poetry, get it. If you enjoy staying up and night and laughing with the characters in the books you read, and feeling their pain, I think you won't be disappointed.

No doubt you have seen the recent ads for a cheap little cloth bracelet decorated only with the letters "WWBD." They stand for "What Would the Buddha Do?" It's really a good question. So good that for ages it has stalked me everywhere I go.

Haunted by missing answers, but skeptical of the huge number of recent (often Tibetan-derived) Buddha books which now crowd every bookstore, my impulse was to try resurrecting whatever could be known of Indian Buddhism, especially at the time the Buddha was still living and for the century or two thereafter. I flattered myself that I would be blazing a very cunning trail, guaranteed to detour neatly around all the mistakes and errors which would certainly have been grafted onto his "pure" doctrine in the two and a half millennia since the Buddha died.

As I saw it, the challenge was primarily to identify the best translations of the oldest texts. Everything else would surely follow. This led me crashing headlong into the Pali scriptures, and I tore at them with all the finesse and sophistication of a grave robber on his first big heist.

The remarkable treasures found preserved in the Pali canon dazzled me. Indeed they still do. However I have gradually come to understand the significance of such treasures quite differently than I once did. And I have been persuaded (sometimes rather painfully) of the futility, arrogance, and chauvinistic myopia implicit in any attempt to reconstruct a pure, uncontaminated Buddhism on the assumption that others (including whole nations full of traditional practitioners) either lacked the sensitivity required to attract one to "truth," or were intellectually too lazy to reject whatever fallacy they just happened to stumble over.

I blush to admit how short-sighted, even mean-spirited my initial game-plan was. The chagrin this insight caused me is mitigated slightly by a realization that many others have preceded me down the very same path. A fair number of them have left their sun-bleached bones littering the trail to prove it.

Of course these are not precisely the same "bones" Schopen had in mind when choosing the title for his book "Bones, Stones and Buddhist Monks." But his work, along with many of his colleagues (especially Donald S. Lopez, Jr.), is a major source of some of the most persuasive lessons imaginable about what really does constitute a religion, and how an outsider can ever hope to go about comprehending the nature of one. The fact that the intellectual roots of both these authors sink deep into the very Tibetan studies I once avoided chastens me, and has itself helped to redefine my own conceptual horizons.

Schopen argues in particular that it is virtually impossible to develop a comprehensive understanding of any complex human social practice, especially including religion, totally from canonical texts alone. One must, he urges, factor into one's awareness the totality of sources of information available, such as ancient inscriptions, archaeological finds, and even accounts of and about practitioners applying their faith and beliefs in their own daily lives.

To the unsuspecting student, much of what Schopen reveals strikes home with the force of a well-aimed karate chop. A great deal of it goes directly against the grain of what many of us were convinced by our early religious training, in which it tended to be regarded as an article of faith that scriptural evidence was paramount, and all other concepts had to conform to it -- or be summarily discarded.

In stark contrast to this tradition, Schopen demonstrates unequivocally that, compared to the actual practice of Indian Buddhism, much of what the early texts would have us accept as "Buddhist" is at least limited, likely misleading, and perhaps even intentionally distorted. His most fundamental premise is disarming in the actual evidence for what are taken to be established facts in the history of Indian Buddhism. If nothing else, such an exercise makes it painfully obvious that most of those established facts totter precariously on very fragile foundations."

Schopen carefully dissects one after another traditional Western notion about Buddhism. Once he has the bones and muscles laid completely bare, he scrupulously compares archaeological facts against canonical assertions (and later assumptions derived therefrom). He then surgically cuts through more diseased tissue than one would find in the worst inner-city hospital -- and fallacious canonical assertions and assumptions scatter all over the operating room floor, where they remain embarrassingly messy, but no longer so dangerous to the patient.

Schopen establishes that early Indian Buddhism was, for the most part, scattered into numerous doctrinally autonomous communities of Buddhists, in many of which the "orthodox" canon was either irrelevant, altogether unknown, or at last ignored by all but a tiny number of literate, conservative elite.

Schopen's evidence persuades us overwhelmingly that early Buddhism monks (and their numerous, often underestimated nun-counterparts) were far more human in conduct, and far more Indian in outlook, than anything portrayed by the canonical texts. These early clerics seem to have been marked more indelibly by the Hindu heritage in which they had been reared than has usually been conceded. They may all have left home in favor of monastic life, but they still appear to have retained strong emotional ties to their parents, homes and traditional cultural heritage. Schopen's evidence is that they were "concerned -- even preoccupied -- with ritually depositing and elaborately housing the remains of at least some of the local monastic dead," though this particular topic is one about which the Pali canon happens to be inexplicably mute.

Despite heavy scholarly focus on the various Vinayas, the actual lives and practices of these monks and nuns do not ever appear to have been governed very rigidly by any sort of monolithic central text or law, but were subject instead to widely varying mores and customs, dependent largely on the area in which they were located. Many monks seem to have come from well-to-do families, and despite their decision to take holy orders it is not clear that they ever totally renounced all worldly goods. Far from the scriptural portrayal of an "isolated and socially disengaged" clergy, many of them apparently owned (or had access to) property and at least handled money. They were routinely responsible for commissioning and donating impressive and expensive works of art, emphatically including Buddha images (whose evolving cult there is reason to believe the monastic community itself was largely responsible for fostering and encouraging).

In dramatic contrast to what the Pali Vinaya would lead us to believe -- and directly contrary to a central and most fundamental Buddhist principle regarding the illusory nature of any immortal ego, personality or soul -- Schopen shows that the early monks certainly acted as though the Buddha's personality or entity survived his death and that, in his relics, stupas (and eventually sculptures), he continued to be present among them as though he were still full of life and even in need of suitable living accomodations. Surviving legal documents prove that these relics were thought fit to receive and own property -- and in their own name.

Unless one has made a habit of reading in the most far-flung and highly specialized journals and books about philosophy and religion, it is unlikely he will ever before have encountered any of the twelve papers collected in "Bones, Stones & Buddhist Monks." Despite their scholarly origins, however, these works turn out for the most part to be readable and reasonably user-friendly. Schopen writes with vigor, conviction and passion, but still has a sense of humor and is willing to help the reader by choosing interesting and comprehensible illustrations and examples.

Schopen takes no prisoners, and the reader must be prepared to have his most cherished beliefs and suppositions challenged -- even assaulted. I guarantee that, though Schopen may not exactly smash -- he is at least likely to put a dent in -- nearly every icon in sight, even including poor old T.W. Rhys Davids, whom I used to regard as the father-of-it-all, but who now (along with this long-suffering wife Caroline) seems to have become the fall-guy for so much of what went wrong in Western Buddhist scholarship.

As hard-nosed as he may occasionally get, Schopen does not write to discourage. Of course he admonishes the reader to be critical of sources, to consider all relevant evidence, and to reject any idea for which a suitable factual rationale cannot be found. However his intention is to affirm the search for truth, and to obect to that would be inexcusably perverse.

Come to think of it, this is awfully close to a stance the Buddha himself was known to take -- and the standard of proof to which he thought a new idea ought to

A wonderful text for the magician and the student of occult texts. Michael Best and Frank Brightman who edited and translated this edition give a scholarly intro and many footnotes along the way which are insightful and accurate. The Book of Secrets which has been translated many times in many languages throughout the years. Totaling 5 books: herbs; stones; beasts; marvels and planets. Each giving their mysterious compenents and each elements use in magic. I speculated the use and reality of some of these 'potions' in which one can make dogs stop barking at you, or turn invisible. However, one cant help but be intrigued and curious about some of these findings. I would guess that, due to its alchemical nature of the volume, that, like alchemy itself and the language of alchemy, it is written in a similar format, one of which is written in code and metaphor than for literate meanings and intents. Each one laid out in a clear and simple formula, what the potion does and what to do to achieve those results. Best and Brightman both argue the authenticity of the book, in that is was probably not written by Albertus Magnus himself who lived in the 1200's, but rather speculated to have been written sometime in the 1600's by a follower, based on the colloquial language of the text, where many books have been attributed to Albertus Magnus for the purpose of selling the book with a popular author. Definately a good book to add to anyones occult and magick library, as well as those that study witchcraft.

This book telling You about the history of Borobudur that's based on Buddhis

It was one of the funniest books that I have ever read. After reading this book, I felt that I knew more about baseball than I did before. I thought the author knew a lot about kids and the way they play baseball when they are young.

I picked up this book at a second hand bookstore and couldn't put it down. I'm really sorry to see that it is out of print. I hope this writer is still producing; i'm eagerly awaiting her next marvelous novel...

I love this book! It's so well put together, and the information is so easy to follow. It's a great guide for any new mother who is unsure at what age to give various foods to give babies. Encourages healthy eating at a young age too!

This wonderful new volume is a very readable and informative condensation of and expansion on Escohotado own previous publication, the lengthy three-volume 'Historia General de las Drogas'. Here, in a text finely balanced with history and science, he traces humanity's affair with drugs and intoxicants beginning with the third millenium B.C., and leading up to the modern hi-tech psycheledics. He traces some of the most popular drugs like caffeine and hemp back to their surprisingly early origins. Taking into account the involvement of drugs in early religious festivities, he offers an analysis how they've made an easy move from there to a more secular, pleasure-seeking culture, accompanied by the parallel villification of drugs by religion, the institution that played a leading role in their introduction to society. This concise book will make readers aware of the extent of the spread of drugs through history, and of the hopelessness of all attempts to make them disappear from future history as well.

Desperation can be the source of wisdom. I've known for a year that this fall I'll be teaching restoration and 18th century drama. Worse, I volunteered to do so. Worse yet, as of yesterday I had only 7 weeks left in which to pick a text of plays. And absolutely worst of all, while trying to look up restoration and 18th century texts on the Web, I found my own course staring me in the face: "English 232, Smith College, Gillian Kendall". Yikes! It was definitely time to find a text.

Nettleton saved me. I had been about to order a completely new edition of the plays (sample copy graciously sent to me by the publisher), albeit the edition was in many ways, well, let's say "not quite right for the course". Then I went to the library. Despite the recommendation of a friend -- a renowned 18th century expert -- I had been suspicious of Nettleton. The copyright on the edition I looked at was 17 years before I was born (sorry about the ageism, Mr. Nettleton). But the volume has everything. Lovely grandiose heroic drama (but not too much of it); Dryden's adaptation of Shakespeare's *Antony and Cleopatra*; five classic comedies of manners (the backbone of restoration drama), and a pleasant smorgasbord of the best of the 18th century.

I have a text. My students have a text. Life is good.