It is part of our culture to call those we consider to be lacking in culture a 'Philistine'. This, of course, is a derivative of a biblical reference, and for the past 4000 years of so, the Philistines have been a mysterious people about whom not much was known, save that they were supposedly uncultured.

This, however, is a very distorted view, primarily due to the fact that the Philistines, being in close competition with the tribes of Israel for the same piece of real estate, were viewed as foreign, alien, and the enemy. Eventually the united tribes of Israel won out over the Philistines, and wrote the primary historical references we have about their foe, and thus, we get the victor's view--and in Biblical times, it was quite traditional that any enemy be seen as devoid of redeeming features.

In fact, there are still no examples of Philistine writing that have been found--rather curious, considering the large settlements (cities, in fact) that have been discovered that would be of Philistine origin or population. Could it be that this group was, as a people, illiterate? This is very remote possibility, but still has to be considered.

There is a problem with determining the origin of the Philistines, too. There are two different origins ascribed to them. In the biblical record, the Philistines are included among 'the sons of Egypt' (Gen. 10:14) as well as in Ezekiel, the are linked to an obscure tribe called the Cherethites (Ez 25:16), which is related to the inhabitants of the isle of Caphtor (Jeremiah 47:4), which is unknown. Of course, it makes sense that the Israelites first encounter with the Philistines would have been in Egypt, for the Sea Peoples settled in various spots along the south-eastern Mediterranean, and there are references on Egyptian stelae and battle-monuments to Sea Peoples most likely kin to, if not in fact, the Philistines.

Of course, the Semitic root of the word Philistine (p-l-sh) also is the root of the words 'to wander' and 'to invade'. Pottery evidence shows similarities to technique and design for pottery making to that of other late Mycenaean peoples, pointing once again to a sea-origin for the Philistines. It is likely that the Philistines were invaders and marauders (similar to the Danes and Vikings of early English history) who eventually settled in relatively safe coastal lands (having been fairly definitively defeated in their attempts to enter Egypt by Ramesses II).

Interestingly, while most biblically-referenced Philistine cities have been located, not all have; likewise, Philistine settlements and even one city with no biblical references have been found. Trude and Moshe Dothan, both archaeologists of note with particular interest in the Philistines, put together this wonderful book based on their own researches and field work. High praise goes to archaeologists who take the time to publish their findings; it is a great scandal of the profession today that so much research goes unpublished, awaiting an archaeology of a different sort by future generations who try to resurrect the work using libraries rather than sand brushes.

The Dothans explore the tomb evidence, the ruins of settlements and cities, the pottery fragments, as well as reported histories and possible references from sources both biblical and extra-biblical. From these, we discern a culture quite different from the typical biblical diatribe.

+ The Philistines had a refined sense of art, that combined Greek, Minoan, and Egyptian styles with innovations of their own, in architecture, religious icons, pottery, and burial practices.

+ The artistic designs of the Philistines were actually quite beautiful by any standards.

+ As a city people, the Philistines were concerned for and maintained good economic relationship along trade routes (a common concern this part of the world) as well as among the people in the countryside, with whom they largely lived in peaceful cooperation.

+ Social stability remained high among the Philistines, and declined more or less with the general Mycenaean decline.

+ The Philistines were not a homogeneous group, but were used to diversity of ethnicities in their cities.

+ Most likely the Philistines were not finished off by the tribes of Israel, but rather the same rise of Assyria and Babylon which destroyed Israel and Judah sounded the death knell for the Philistines as well.

This fascinating book will cause the reader to re-evaluate all previous notions of who the Philistines were. Rich with detailed drawings, maps, and archaeological/architectural renderings, including plates of photographs (including my personal favourites, the bichrome pottery ware with typical bird motif from Ashdod), this book is a fun and educational tour of a largely ignored people who have more significance than would appear at first glance.

This small work is monumental in its implications. Trude and her husband Moshe (now deceased) summarize their work in excavating Ashdod in modern Israel. They draw upon their many years of hands-on, field work as well as the efforts of others.
Ashdod was one of the five cities of the Philistine "pentapolis" so-called.

Students of the huge turmoil in the Mediterranean of the 1300-1100 BCE period will find this a must read. The Dothan's work along with the work of others clearly suggest that this period in human history may have been the most significant in human time for Egypt, the Levant, Crete, Cyprus and all of the Aegean islands and the associated peoples. The Greeks, Hittites, Mycenaeans, Phonecians, Hebrews, Assyrians, Egyptians and not the least, the Philistines, were all dramatically effected. The impact of these enormous movements and cultural shifts is with us today.

The Dothans conclude that the Philistines, as one of the "sea peoples," --one that is not necessarily ethnically homogeneous-- settled peaceably in some parts of Palestine and farmed and produced crafts, both similar to and different from, those they brought with them; their locally produced pottery incorporated motifs from the entire region. Their entry was not a matter of brutal conquest and destruction of all the settled inhabitants they encountered. Philistine influence is clearly shown to have reached well beyond the immediate environs of the "five cities."

A special bonus incorporated into "People of the Sea" is the discussion of Yigael Yadin's ideas about a group of people from the sea that became one of the "tribes" of Israel or almost so. Most readers will find this discussion fascinating.

This is a highly readable account of the Dothan's research. Few can quarrel with the thoroughness of the work on which the findings are based. One might quarrel with what is surely one if not the most important conclusions only because it is too subtly stated! The Philistines were deliberately characterized by their neighbors as other than what they truly were. The Bible projects infamy, the facts otherwise.

The Philistines were both accomplished and sophisticated contributors to the cultures of the Levant. This reviewer suspects the work of the Dothans will stand for a long time. Their goal was surely not to expose the Judean writers and editors of the Old Testament as political propagandists. But there it is.

7-21-2002 psb

I never received the book. You farmed out my request to some other organization, but the book never reached me and my account was credited back. So if you can find it, I'm still interested. After 3/14 my address will be 1250 Humboldt St., Apt. 805, Denver CO 80218. I don't know what my e-mail address will be.

Sanford Watzman

We love this book. My daughter really enjoys reading the pictures as we go through the story. And with a picky eater in the house Nicky helps us try new foods.

Picky Nicky is a good book for 3-5 year olds. After you read the first page you just want to keep on reading. Since it is a picture reading you and/or your kids will learn their animals, fruits, vegetables and much much more! Picky Nicky is a book about a girl that won't eat the dinner her Mom and Dad have prepared for her. She only wants to eat spaghetti! There are 24 flash cards in the back of the book. The pictures act as a glossary.

My daughter got this book as a gift when she was two. It has been a favorite ever since and now it is helping her learn to read.

This book is a wonderfully told life story of an amazing woman! I couldnt put it down!

This book is, in one sense, the biography of a woman whose family has always lived in Jerusalem but in another sense it is a novel of one woman's life as she grows up, falls in love, gets married, has children, loses her son and child.

It is also a novel of how politics and personal life intersect: here we find Arab-Jewish relations ruptured during the Hebron Massacre only to be re-constituted again after the formation of the State of Israel; here we find Raquela's son killed in one war amongst many; here we see the international aid traded for guns in the refugee camps. And above all, here we see the heartbreak and the triumph of one woman, one Jerusalemite, who lives in her own country.

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in Israel and Israelis, be they Arab or Jews or Christian.

I enjoyed this book very much and couldn't wait to finish it to see what happened next. I also learned alot from this book on how the people of that time had coped, had courage, and the strength to try and live their lives. I though of Raquela as an ingretible woman with lots of strenght and mental power.

This delightful book tells the story of the bear Reggie, who travels to Africa for a safari with his owner. His handwritten account records everything he sees in a journal/scrapbook format that is accompanied by beautiful illustrations. A wonderful book for any age. Also check out the follow up, Journey Up the Nile.

I have been on a safari with each of my daughters and am going on another with my son, his wife and 3 young grands this summer. Mailed them Reggie's book which was so beguiling I had to get another copy for my daughters to share with me. Needless to say I love the East African experience and this book gives some useful information in a fun, easily accessible and creative way.

I was apprehensive that a book ostensibly written by a teddy bear would get sneers from my teen aged son, however, despite a few pages of cuteness at the start, the book was so well done in art work and content, and mirrored our own safari experiences so well, that Nick loved it. He even, abeit a bit sheepishly, liked the teddy bear humor. If this book succeeds so well with a cynical teen, it should work for everyone. Read this book before you go to East Africa, then re-read it (and get a little misty-eyed) after you return.

This gracefully written book tells an adventure story. It's set in the late 60s and early 70s, the time of the Great Society when hopes were high for breaking down barriers of Class and Race. It's full of unforgettable characters : Parents who live in East Harlem, near the market under the train tracks, and teachers and other people who come from outside the community and soon are engaged in learning how to work within it. Very relevant to the present day challenges of teaching and parenting.

With the start of the school year approaching, there is no better time to learn from the men and women whose struggles are documented in this wonderfully written book. The account of their journey to create better schools and better futures for the children in their community is both engaging and inspiring.

This is an exceptional book. I'm not an educator and found it spell binding. What I found most extraordinary was that, against so many odds, there were so many successes and that the school continues. The efforts of the families and teachers is humbling. One of the outstanding aspects of the book is the description of the way in which issues of class were confronted and dealt with. This seems to be an issue over which many well-intentioned efforts to change "the system" stumble. This account offers valuable insight as to how such challenges must be met. This book is of great value to anyone concerned with social change. It's also well written, which is a treat.

While his theories are inescapably controversial, Immanuel Velikovsky's genius has to be recognized. In this book, he pulls together Talmudic, Babylonian, and Egyptian texts, amongst others, to show that Ramses II of Egypt was actually a contemporary of Nebuchanezzar, King of Babylonia. In the process, he seeks to demonstrate that the entire known history of the Hittite Empire is a mistake, that there was no such civilization, and that our modern take on history is false. Sound like hogwash? Maybe, but it is presented very well, and addresses all of the issues as they arise. You may not agree with the theory, but poking holes in it will be tough. A challenging read, and by the end you have the feeling of having been through a good mystery book...you will spend hours thinking about the time frame in efforts to disprove the book. Highly reccommended.

Ramses II And His Time takes up the story from the end of Velikovsky's book Oedipus And Akhnaton, but can also be read by itself. In this book the author revises the period of the Chaldean or Neo-Babylonian empire. He makes a rather convincing case that these Chaldeans were not indigenous to the city of Babylon and that they were really the Hittites of Asia Minor. He draws parallels between the emperors of Babylon and the Chaldean kings. At the same time in Egypt, Velikovsky identifies the 19th dynasty of Seti and Ramses with the 26th dynasty of Psamtik, Necho and Apries.

This period in Velikovsky's revised history starts with the first confrontation between what the author considers the contemporaries Ramses II and Nebuchadnezzar and ends with the Persian conquest of Libya and Egypt, from where the story continues in the aforementioned book Peoples Of The Sea. In between there are informative discussions of the origin of the alphabet, the pictographic script of the Hittites, the ruins of Yazilikaya and other monuments of Asia Minor, the Israel stele of Mernepthah and the lamentations of Jeremiah.

The epilogue is devoted to the counterarguments that Velokovsky expected from the critics. The pieces here include titles like Tanis And Sais, How Long Did Seti And Ramses II Reign?, Two Suppiluliumas, Bronze And Iron, Scarabs And Stratigraphy. The synchronical tables that follow lays out his revised history of this era for Egypt, Judah, Chaldea, Lydia-Phrygia, Media-Persia and Greece.

There are 30 black and white illustrations including the Steles of Essarhaddon and Ramses II at Nahr El Kelb, the sarcophagus of Ahiram, The Lion Gate Of Hattussas, The Israel Stele Of Merneptah and The Mummy Of Ramses II. The book concludes with a thorough index.

The fact that Ramses II lived at the end of the 7th century BC and was the same person as Pharao Necho II of the Scriptures may not be widely accepted, but Velikovsky's brilliant writing style certainly sparked a renewed interest in ancient history and still provides great reading pleasure. I recommend this classic of alternative history to all readers who are interested in the ancient history of the Middle East, Egyptology and biblical archaeology.

This book should be read by anyone about to read anything regarding the Hittites, by Bible students, or anyone interested in ancient Egypt or ancient history in general. Ramses II is one of the best known names from the New Kingdom, and has an entirely undeserved role in most attempts to synchronize the Old Testament with what passes for the conventional chronology of the ancient Near East.

This volume of the multivolume "Ages In Chaos" discusses the identical nature of the 19th and 26th dynasties of Egypt's New Kingdom. The basic framework is "Theses for the Reconstruction of Ancient History", published in 1945 and available online. Lesser lights have tried to revise the nineteenth century's version of the dynasties -- the pseudochronology still in use today -- but only succeed where they follow Velikovsky.

Perhaps the lapse of decades after the 1952 publication of "Ages In Chaos" caused this later volume to be poorly received, but it could be read first without any disorientation. All of Velikovsky's books are available on the used search engines, and it is generally only a matter of time before they become available again.

See also Velikovsky's other works (new and used), and:

-:- The Synchronized Chronology by Roger Henry
-:- A New Approach to the Chronology of Biblical History from Abraham to Samuel by Gerald E. Aardsma
-:- Pharaohs and Kings by David Rohl
-:- Centuries of Darkness by Peter James et al
-:- Murder of Tutankhamen by Bob Brier
-:- Giving Goliath His Due by Neal Bierling (suffers from the author's reliance on the conventional pseudochronology, available online)

Walk inside the universe of World Music is not easy. You have the feeling to moove in a jungle of names, titles and unknown instruments. A Guide is necessary to understand and help you for orientation. This book is good for primers and experts, speaking about generes, origins, musicians and their best records. From the 1994's first edition the new release is more rich and reflects the high number of World Music records released in the last five years. I think you are in presence of the best guide you can buy today on the matter.

World Music appeared in 1994 and became a fine resource: here is the first volume of a 2-volume edition; this first volume covering Africa, Europe and the Middle East with expanded musical references, over 80 articles from experts, extensive discographies organized by country and photos and directors of world music labels and specialty stores. An outstanding reference and a 'must' for avid world music listeners. Don't miss the Rough Guide Music Sampler CD, which provides a satisfyingly diverse sampler of some of the most famous names in world music from Carlos Gardel's tangos to Inti-Illimani's Andean sounds and the Soul Brothers' special South African beats.

I am biased: I love the Rough Guide series of CDs. They have opened my ears and mind to worlds I not only never knew existed but also couldn't have imagined. This revision and expansion of the original Rough Guide to World Music is dazzling in its diversity. I agree with the first reviewer about its strengths and weaknesses. However, if you love the exploration of music and are willing to acknowledge that no encyclopedic work can but scratch surfaces, you'll love this book.

Now in an updated and expanded second edition, The Rushdie Affair: The Novel, The Ayatollah, And The West by Daniel Pipes (Director of the Middle East Forum and a columnist for the "New York Post" and the "Jerusalem Post", studies the events that played out when Salman Rushdie's novel "The Satanic Verses" was denounced by Muslim clerics as blasphemous to Islam, resulting in a confrontation that led to an Iranian edict demanding the execution of the author. Scrutinizing not only modern history, but also what it shows about further relations between different nations and world views, The Rushdie Affair is a informed and informative account which is very highly recommended for anyone seeking a better understanding contemporary Islam in general, and this defining controversy in particular.

Here is one example: the title of Rushdie's book. Pipes explains that while in English "the Satanic verses" is a plain ordinary phrase that refers to an embaraasing event in Islamic history, this phrase is not used in Arabic. Most Muslims won't recognize the event by that designation; Muslims call it something quite different. But when "verses" is translated into Arabic the word used refers specifically to Quranic verses. So the title is translated roughly as "The Satanic Verses of the Quran" or "The Satanic Quran".

Don't assume from this that Pipes if profferring an apologetic. He is not; this book is critical of "fundamentalist Islam". But Pipes is careful to explain how such Muslims think and react.

Salman Rushdie is brilliant. He knows who to derive from and steal from: James Joyce being one of his main sources. Good for him. If you're going to steal, steal from the best. Joyce's footprints are all over THE SATANIC VERSES. I felt at home. And Rushdie's tough and demanding like Joyce. Even moreso because he's dealing with issues western readers are not familiar with. So you have to go slow and get internet help (plenty available). Slowly, the novel begins to take shape. It's a book of dreams and nightmares bounded by the first and last very moving chapters about Chamcha's domestic crises with his father and ensuing alienation. Chamcha's torn between cultures, a lost searching soul, an alienated man. He's also an intellectual prig who wears many protective masks to conceal his sufferings and with which he explores religious and emotional wanderings. Read the first and last chapters to make contact with the down to earth domestic issues of the novel. Very moving. In between, you have this massive and intensive and witty and funny and dark and brilliant exploration of Muslim religion as seen from a willing/unwilling, searching unbeliever's point of view. He mocks and participates all at the same time. The language is gorgeous because it moves on many levels--from slang to pop to literary to religious, back and forth--and from the point of view of two languages and cultures. At one minute it's blasphemous, at another it's holy...and it's always a rich and makes the reader smile, smile, smile at the author's brilliance and learning. It's linguistic magic. What does it all add up to? You got me. I haven't scratched the surface. It may or may not add up. Talk to me in a year.

What I like best about the book is the way in which it traces the historical development of calligraphy. The author's Japan bias matches my own (I got into calligraphy in Japan) and so I didn't particularly mind the heavy Japan slant. What I found frustrating was the lack of a pronunciation guide, especially for the Sanskrit. Given the diacritics in use, I would have liked to have known how to pronounce the dotted consonants, etc. It would be nice to learn more about Khmer and Thai calligraphy also, but I turn to other books...

Sacred Calligraphy of the East takes you through the scripts used in the sacred writings of religions and nations of East Asia. If the book would have just been a wide collection of calligraphic examples, this would have been a good enough reason to get the book. But the book is more than this: It actually teaches you to draw these characters. It's a wonderful book.

Two years ago, at a Zen retreat, I needed something to relax my mind. The priest who headed the retreat had, at his house, an assortment of books from which to choose. I didn't want something cerebral. I fingered his library and came upon John Steven's "Sacred Calligraphy of the East." It was perfect! It offered pictures from which I was able to relax and study the historical progress of Eastern calligraphic forms. Since then, I have bought the book for myself and I continually refer to it when in need. That may seem rather odd: I don't really know why the book relaxes me and gives me solice, but I am quite grateful to John Stevens for his contribution to the art and to my life.

A story of a courageous strong woman. Descriptions of the environment (land & conditions) enticing. I found myself being scared right along side of Olive. A real adventure story.

A fresh, uncomplicated tale of the people who adventured north in the past. Action packed, engaging and reveling, this book will remain for ever one of my favorite adventure and romance stories. It shows much about how people may face a foreign environment, difficulties, and above all themselves. All comes out in very simple and clear language, with suits the story and the characters divinely.

This was a favorite, and it was done with no bad words or violence, other than from nature, I loved it and still wonder what happened to Olive and her second husband after they were married and flew off in the airplane. I watch it everytime it comes on tv. I have taped it and shown it many times to company.