In the Jewish tradition, going back to Jacob, many fathers have written down whatever wisdom they might have attained in their lives in order to pass along that wisdom to their heirs. It is called an ethical will. Written as a testimony and a testament, in an epistolary format, this book is a compendium of the wisdom of a father, who has spent a lifetime studying the teachings of the Jewish tradition, as well as literary and philosophical traditions of the West. The insights taken from those traditions, which explore the life of the soul, are intended for anyone who has a soul. The book is organized around eighteen words that form the foundations of human life. The number eighteen is taken from the Hebrew word for "life," chai, which has a numerical value of eighteen. Among the words at the heart of these reflections are faith, goodness, responsibility, meaning, gratitude, prayer, love, and others.

Despite perennial interest in Pliny the Elder’s Natural History, the world’s first encyclopedia, as a record of the prodigious, the quotidian, and the useful in Rome in the first century AD, for centuries Pliny has been derided as little more than an inept compiler of facts and marvels intellectually incapable of formulating a cogent argument supported through the selective marshaling of his materials. In Pliny’s Defense of Empire, Laehn offers a radical reinterpretation of the architecture of Pliny’s encyclopedia, exposing fundamental errors in the inherited understanding of the text traceable to its initial reception in ancient Rome. Recognition of the text’s true structure reveals that Pliny’s encyclopedia is in fact a first-rate work of political philosophy constituting an apology for Roman imperial expansionism grounded in a sophisticated account of human nature. Correcting the accreted errors and prejudices of nearly 2,000 years of faulty Plinian scholarship, Laehn critically examines one of the most persuasive apologies for the Roman Empire ever written and succeeds in rehabilitating the Elder Pliny as one of the world’s greatest political thinkers. An excellent resource and a must read for scholars in political theory, philosophy, and classical studies.

In 136 clear concise pages Hineni: Prayerbook Hebrew for Adults prepares adult learners for full participation in Shabbat morning services.

A comprehensive guide to Jewish spiritual practices, with explanations based on Talmudic and Midrashic texts as well as Hasidic and mystical stories, includes a survey of daily prayers, Shabbat rituals, holidays, Torah study, Jewish meditation, and more.

“This NIV Zondervan Study Bible is a tremendous tool for informed Bible reading and study. I highly recommend this publication.” Tim Keller, Redeemer Presbyterian Church, New York City “Let the NIV Zondervan Study Bible equip you for more faithful theological thinking and doctrinal integrity.” R. Albert Mohler, Jr., President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary The NIV Zondervan Study Bible, featuring Dr. D. A. Carson as general editor, is built on the truth of Scripture and centered on the gospel message. An ambitious and comprehensive undertaking, Dr. Carson, with committee members Dr. T. Desmond Alexander, Dr. Richard S. Hess, Dr. Douglas J. Moo, and Dr. Andrew David Naselli, along with a team of over 60 contributors from a wide range of evangelical denominations and perspectives, crafted all-new study notes and other study tools to present a biblical theology of God’s special revelation in the Scriptures. To further aid the readers’ understanding of the Bible, also included are full-color maps, charts, photos and diagrams. In addition, a single-column setting of the Bible text provides maximum readability. 8.9-point type size

A brilliant novel by the Norwegian master Dag Solstad Bjorn Hansen, a respectable town treasurer, has just turned fifty and is horrified by the thought that chance has ruled his life. Eighteen years ago he left his wife and their two-year-old son for his mistress, who persuaded him to start afresh in a small, provincial town and to devote himself to an amateur theater.In time that relationship also faded, and after four years of living alone Bjorn contemplates an extraordinary course of action that will change his life forever. He finds a fellow conspirator in Dr. Schiotz, who has a secret of his own and offers to help Bjorn carry his preposterous plan through to its logical conclusion. But the sudden reappearance of his son both fills Bjorn with new hope and complicates matters. The desire to gamble with his comfortable existence proves irresistible, however, taking him to Vilnius in Lithuania, where very soon he cannot tell whether he’s tangled up in a game or reality. Dag Solstad won the Norwegian Critics Prize for Literature for Novel 11, Book 18, a concentrated uncompromising existential novel that puts on full display the author’s remarkable gifts and wit.

Before her death in 1985 at the age of fifty-one, Marian Engel had published seven novels, two collections of short stories, and numerous essays and articles. Despite this impressive output and various literary honours, including a Governor General's Award for her novel Bear, Engel's writing has not received the critical attention it deserves. A comprehensive study of Engel's body of work, Lifelines fills a major gap in Canadian literary criticism.

Eloquent, practical and wise, this book by one of the world’s most important scientists—and two time Pulitzer Prize winner—should be read and studied by anyone concerned with the fate of the natural world. It "makes one thing clear ... we know what we do, and we have a choice" (The New York Times Book Review). E.O. Wilson assesses the precarious state of our environment, examining the mass extinctions occurring in our time and the natural treasures we are about to lose forever. Yet, rather than eschewing doomsday prophesies, he spells out a specific plan to save our world while there is still time. His vision is a hopeful one, as economically sound as it is environmentally necessary.