From the Back Cover

"I strongly endorse this volume and …I have personally learned from the journal in the decade since its founding…. [These essays] offer us a world—or better, a Reality—that is more than merely material, and a view of Religion that is more than merely exclusivist and literalist. And it is this wisdom-offering—none other than the Perennial Philosophy—that can become truly "saving" for our times…." —Huston Smith, author of The World Religions
"This anthology offers a cross-section of articles representative of Sophia, the journal whose ten-year anniversary it celebrates. Yet it offers more: for behind these articles stands a common culture, a wisdom shared. It is this culture, this authentic sophia, that the anthology, by virtue of its artful selection, is admirably suited to convey." —Wolfgang Smith, author of Cosmos and Transcendence, and The Quantum Enigma
"The Essential Sophia…. is a call to rediscover the reason and purpose of our human sojourn in this world in our rich and varied traditions." —Rusmir Mahmutcehajic, former Vice President of the Bosnia-Herzegovina, founder of International Forum Bosnia, and author of Bosnia the Good: Tolerance and Tradition and Sarajevo Essays
"Very probably the most important traditional publication at this time in the United States." —Axis Mundi
Contributors Include:
Jean Borella William C. Chittick Rama P. Coomaraswamy René Guénon Brian Keeble Patrick Laude Martin Lings Rusmir Mahmutcehajic Alvin Moore, Jr. Seyyid Hossein Nasr Frithjof Schuon Huston Smith Wolfgang Smith Charles Le Gai Eaton Timothy Scott


Product Description

Ranging across the meaning and importance of Tradition, Art, Science, and Nature, and including comprehensive biographical essays, this volume contains some of the most important writings of the last decade.

From the Inside Flap

In the Introduction that follows this foreword, Professor Seyyed Hossein Nasr sets forth the aims and accomplishments of Sophia in so exact and eloquent a manner that there is very little I can add to this volume, except to strongly endorse this volume and to say how much I have personally learned from the journal in the decade since its founding. My next step would be to say how important—it would not be going too far to say "saving"—the traditionalist perspective is for redeeming our times. By directing our gaze toward the perennial wisdom of the traditional worlds, these authors show us that what our world most requires is nothing short of a wholesale reorientation of its outlook, for "as a man thinks, so he becomes," said the Buddha. What do the traditionalist authors have to say to our times? That neither scientistic humanism nor religious fundamentalism can provide us with lasting solutions—for both options ultimately lead to ruin, whether of body or soul. Scientistic humanism has led, or rather has, fed us to the technological juggernaut of globalization—a monoculture world economy, fueled by consumerism and greed, which must inevitably lead to both cultural and environmental disaster as our planet’s finite resources are plundered at an alarming rate, leaving countless indigenous peoples and cultures destitute. Religious fundamentalism, on the other hand, with its intolerant exclusivism and militant hatred of the "other," can likewise find no viable principle for co-existence with people of other faiths and cultures. "Let not hatred of a people cause you to transgress the measure," says the Koran, in response to those in our times who would have recourse to terror killings. Having directed us away from these options, the traditionalists offer us a world—or better, a Reality—that is more than merely material, and a view of Religion that is more than merely exclusivist and literalist. And it is this wisdom-offering—none other than the Perennial Philosophy—that can become truly "saving" for our times, provided we have the courage to listen, learn, and truly live its teachings. But anything more I might say about the