Anthology of World Religions: Sacred Texts and Contemporary Perspectives

Anthology of World Religions explores the world's religious traditions by combining substantial overviews of their history, beliefs, and practices with selections from their texts and scriptures and commentary by contemporary practitioners and scholars. It covers each major religion's history, teachings, founder, leaders, practices, and the factors that are now challenging and changing it--secularism, modernism, pluralism, science, the status of women, and sectarian or factional conflicts. The introductory chapter reviews various approaches to the study of religion, defines religious terms and concepts, discusses theories of religion, and distinguishes between the insider and outsider perspectives on religious traditions. FEATURES Clear and concise writing that explains difficult concepts without oversimplifying Ample coverage of women and several readings by or about women within specific traditions Extensive pedagogy including time lines and maps, text boxes with background information or more details on relevant topics, explanatory notes before each reading, key terms, end-of-chapter study/discussion questions, and lists of suggested reading and online sources An Ancillary Resource Center containing an Instructor's Manual with Test Bank and PowerPoint lecture slides A Companion Website with resources for students including flashcards of key terms, links to further resources, self-quizzes, and discussion questions