Essential reading for anyone interested in the monastic tradition and those who follow it.
The noted traveler, journalist, and author turns to an unexpected subject: the monastic life of contemplation and meditation.
Iyer takes his title from the great fires that have lately ravaged California, where he has long retreated to a monastery run by Camaldolese monks, “the most contemplative congregation of Benedictines.” Contemplative the inhabitants may be, but they are very much people of the world. As he learns from another contemplative, this one a Zen monk in Japan, “Anyone can sit in a Zendo. The trick is to sit in the world.” The monks seemingly delight in defying stereotypes and misconceptions. (For one thing, they enjoy watching Monty Python on Sunday nights.) Iyer travels to other monasteries and other religious traditions, but Catholicism and Buddhism, which seem well suited to each other, occupy most of his attention. Some of his time is spent in the company of the gravel-voiced Leonard Cohen, the singer-songwriter who, though dying of cancer, kept busy doing his longtime work as a Buddhist monk in a mountain retreat above Los Angeles. One secret to Zen? “You can’t dwell on things.” Yet the world of things is always present, even in the transcendental mountains of Big Sur, perched over the roiling Pacific: great fires are burning, and though a Camaldolese brother reports of one that has consumed 130,000 acres, “other than that, all is quiet, and the bell calls us to morning prayers.” A lovely complement to the monastic writings of both Thomas Merton and Patrick Leigh Fermor, Iyer’s book speaks well to the qualities of those who live both outside and firmly within the daily world and the wisdom, rough and refined, that monks have to offer, as when one advises him, “If you do spot a mountain lion, make sure you don’t look like a deer!”
Essential reading for anyone interested in the monastic tradition and those who follow it.Pub Date: Jan. 14, 2025
ISBN: 9780593420287
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: Oct. 24, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2024
PERSPECTIVES
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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