INTRODUCTION
Professor Biography ............................................................................i
Course Scope .....................................................................................1
LECTURE GUIDES
LECTURE 1
Reading Other People’s Scriptures ....................................................4
LECTURE 2
Hinduism and the Vedas...................................................................11
LECTURE 3
What Is Heard—Upanishads ............................................................19
LECTURE 4
What Is Remembered—Epics ..........................................................26
LECTURE 5
Laws of Manu and Bhagavad Gita ...................................................33
LECTURE 6
Related Traditions—Sikh Scriptures .................................................40
LECTURE 7
Judaism—People of the Book ..........................................................47
LECTURE 8
Five Books of Torah ..........................................................................54
LECTURE 9
Prophets and Writings ......................................................................61
LECTURE 10
Apocrypha and Dead Sea Scrolls.....................................................68
ii
LECTURE 11
Oral Torah—Mishnah and Talmud ....................................................75
LECTURE 12
Related Traditions—Zoroastrian Scriptures 82
LECTURE 13
The Three Baskets of Buddhism 89
LECTURE 14
Vinaya and Jataka 96
LECTURE 15
Theravada Sutras 103
LECTURE 16
Mahayana Sutras ...........................................................................111
LECTURE 17
Pure Land Buddhism and Zen ........................................................118
LECTURE 18
Tibetan Vajrayana ...........................................................................126
LECTURE 19
Related Traditions—Jain Scriptures ...............................................134
LECTURE 20
Five Confucian Classics .................................................................141
LECTURE 21
Four Books of Neo-Confucianism...................................................149
LECTURE 22
Daoism and the Daodejing .............................................................156
LECTURE 23
The Three Caverns of Daoist Scriptures ........................................163
LECTURE 24
Related Traditions—Shinto and Tenrikyo .......................................170
LECTURE 25
Christian Testaments Old and New ................................................177
LECTURE 26
Gospels and Acts............................................................................184
LECTURE 27
Letters and Apocalypse ..................................................................191
LECTURE 28
Apocryphal Gospels .......................................................................198
LECTURE 29
Related Traditions—Mormon Scriptures.........................................206
LECTURE 30
Islam and Scriptural Recitation .......................................................213
LECTURE 31
Holy Qur’an ....................................................................................220
LECTURE 32
Hadith and Sufism ..........................................................................228
LECTURE 33
Related Traditions—Baha’i Scriptures ............................................235
LECTURE 34
Abandoned Scriptures—Egyptian and Mayan................................243
LECTURE 35
Secular Scripture—U.S. Constitution .............................................250
LECTURE 36
Heavenly Books, Earthly Connections ...........................................257
iv
SUPPLEmENTaL maTERIaL
Recommended Texts and Translations ..........................................264
Bibliography ....................................................................................268
Secular Scripture—U.S. Constitution
Lecture 35
In the last two lectures, we’ve speculated about which new religious writings are most likely to become part of the library of world scriptures in the future, and we’ve discussed sacred texts that are no longer supported by a faith community. In this lecture, we’ll continue to test our assumptions about sacred texts by turning the topic on its head: If it is really true that sacred texts are defined less by their specific contents than by the role they play in the lives of believers, is it possible to have writings that are basically secular in nature yet are treated as if they were scripture? Our test case will be the Constitution of the United States.
Informative Uses of Sacred Texts
• For a volume titled Rethinking Scripture, Miriam Levering used her fieldwork with Chinese Buddhist nuns to categorize different ways that scripture is received and used by believers, and she did so with an eye to comparative studies that might take into account different notions of the origins or contents of sacred texts. Levering outlined four “modes of reception”: informative, transactive, transformative, and symbolic.
• In the informative mode, it’s the ideas within the text that matter most. You will recall that the Mahayana canon is very large, and it is possible to devote one’s entire life to mastering just a portion of its contents. Some Buddhist nuns feel called to this work.
• In contrast, the Constitution is not long, yet thousands of people have also spent their lives analyzing, debating, and writing about every phrase it contains. Such efforts are justified because the words matter; they can spell the difference between retaining or losing property, exercising or being denied political rights, and more. The Constitution is a binding document that regulates not only the government but also the day-to-day lives of American citizens.
• There is obviously much more law than just the Constitution, but the Constitution holds a fundamental, paramount position. Other significant legal and historical sources may have second- or thirdtier status. For example, we might consider the 85 Federalist papers as something akin to the Muslim Hadith—not exactly scripture in the same way as the Qur’an but still a respected, authoritative source for its interpretation.
• Unlike most diverse religious traditions, there is a final authority to determine the meaning of the Constitution: the Supreme Court. Since 1790, the court has issued more than 30,000 opinions, and these, in turn, have been studied, cited, and argued about as binding documents. In another parallel with sacred texts discussed earlier in this course, the Supreme Court, like the Jewish Talmud, records and preserves its dissenting opinions.
Transactive Uses of Sacred Texts
• The second of the four modes sketched out by Levering is the transactive, which uses a text to make something happen. Levering describes how Buddhist nuns use the sutras in rituals intended for specific purposes, such as “to create merit” or “to offer devotion and praise.” With regard to the Constitution, legal professionals depend on it to make law, of course, but it is also used by the rest of us, particularly in ritual or ceremonial situations.
• The Declaration of Independence is more likely to be recited than the Constitution, particularly on the Fourth of July, a holiday created to honor its signing. On that day, students, politicians, and ordinary citizens often read the Declaration aloud at ceremonies or other gatherings. Our dispute with Britain has long since been resolved, but is it true that the words of the Declaration no longer matter?
o One sentence from the second paragraph may be the most important statement in American political culture: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
o From one perspective, the notion that all men are created equal is manifestly false, yet there is also a sense that these lines represent our highest values and aspirations: Everyone should be equal in dignity and worth and equal before the law. Intoning these words aloud, in public, has the effect of reinforcing our commitment to making our nation such a place.
• The Constitution is also used in ceremonial contexts. Every year, about half a million people from around the world fulfill the qualifications to become U.S. citizens. As part of the naturalization ceremony, they take an oath that they will “support and defend the Constitution,” similar to oaths taken by the president on inauguration day and members of the armed forces when they enlist.
• Many people can recite the preamble to the Constitution; they may know the wording of the First or Constitution Day, September 17, is commemorated by public schools with Second Amendments speeches, trivia contests, and other by heart; and activities focused on the U.S. Constitution. September 17—the day the Constitution was signed in 1787—is a national holiday. The Constitution is something that keeps Americans together and binds us to our past, even if we are not intimately familiar with all of its articles and sections.
Transformative and Symbolic Uses of Sacred Texts
• Sometimes scriptures are used not to influence one’s relationships with others or to change the world but to transform oneself. Levering reports, “As Chinese Buddhists read, listen to, study and comment on sutras in order to become informed by their account of reality, they also seek … to be transformed in their personal capacity to experience wisdom and compassion.” Are there times when people look to the founding documents of America as a source of private insight or inspiration or see them as manifestations of larger truths?
• One of the most religious-like facts about the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence is that we treat them as if they were icons or holy relics. Visitors can go to the National Archives in Washington, DC, and see original copies in a large bronze display case under bulletproof glass—similar to a shrine.
• Many famous lines from significant American documents and speeches are carved into monuments and buildings on the National Mall in Washington, including quotations from the Declaration of Independence on the Jefferson Memorial.
o Those who commissioned the monuments probably had transactive functions in mind, but those of us who walk through to read and reflect may find the experience transformative.
o Transactive, transformative, and symbolic aspects are combined when we display copies of the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution on our walls.
Additional Religious Parallels
• We can point to additional parallels between the founding documents of America and the sacred texts of the world. For example, like the letters of Saint Paul, the Declaration and the Constitution were not written with the idea that they would someday be canonized, yet over time, their stature has grown.
o In 1816, Jefferson complained, “Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence and deem them like the ark of the covenant, too sacred to be touched.” He well knew the arguments, horse-trading, and compromises that went into the creation of the Constitution. Jefferson went on to suggest that constitutions ought to change with the times.
o However, as early as 1796, George Washington included in his Farewell Address a plea that “the Constitution … be sacredly maintained.” Although the human origins of the Constitution are well documented, it is the latter impulse that has generally prevailed.
• Like the sacred texts of Confucianism, which were always regarded as the products of human effort, though done by sages, there has long been a temptation in the United States to regard the Founders as men blessed with preternatural wisdom and moral courage. A close look at their biographies and the transcripts of their deliberations quickly dispels assumptions of their near-divinity. Respect is due the oldest written national constitution still in force in the world, along with the men who crafted it, but it didn’t arrive immaculately from heaven.
• Another aspect of the Constitution that seems at least quasireligious is that there are different schools of interpretation, just as there are for the Vedas, the Bible, and the Qur’an. For the Constitution, these interpretive modes include
- textualism, which analyzes the exact meaning of the words;
- originalism, which looks to the intentions of those who drafted and ratified its provisions; and
- living constitutionalism, which prefers to read the document as having a dynamic meaning that can and should change to accommodate social and technological innovations.
• Sanford Levinson has written a fascinating book, Constitutional Faith, in which he identifies what he calls Protestant and Catholic strains in constitutional interpretation. This distinction may remind us of arguments over Protestant bias that we noted earlier. Some legal scholars and judges are more interested in origins than in developments, in the critical-historical analysis of the text rather than in later traditions, or in the legitimacy of individual as opposed to institutional determinations of meaning.
• Perhaps one reason that America has a text-based government is that it was largely settled by Protestants. Just as it seemed natural to them to look to a single volume of holy writ as the basis for religion, so also a government might have as its foundation a revered, authoritative political document. Further, America has always been something of an experiment—a nation created by a set of documents rather than a shared ethnicity, religion, or longstanding ties to the land. It’s not surprising that we regard our secular writings with almost religious-like devotion.
• Scholars have long debated the idea of “civil religion,” but some have now begun to talk about “constitutional idolatry,” wondering if we have gone too far in our deference to an 18thcentury document that is in some ways undemocratic, giving disproportionate political power to small states, rural districts, and the wealthy, and that sets up a divided form of government that has generally failed elsewhere in the world. “Idolatry” is a strong word, but it’s hard to imagine other political documents around the world being treated in the same way that Americans revere the Declaration and the Constitution.
• The Constitution, unlike most sacred texts, does not regard itself as having final authority but includes provisions for updating and amendments.
o Consequently, we end up with a document that resembles the Qur’an, in which some verses are thought to have been abrogated by later revelations, or the Bible, in which the New Testament explicitly rejects the requirements of the Law of Moses. Thus, the Constitution is not a closed canon.
o Indeed, it’s worth thinking about an even larger secular canon that might include
- Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address,
- Patrick Henry’s “Give me liberty or give me death” speech,
- the Seneca Falls “Declaration of Sentiments,” and others.
• A final piece of evidence about the equivalence of secular and religious sacred texts can be found in Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech.
One of the characteristics of sacred texts is that they often draw on earlier scriptures, and it is telling that King quotes from the Bible and the Declaration of Independence in much the same way: He treats both as unfulfilled promises of better days to come.
Suggested Reading
Kammen, ed., The Origins of the American Constitution.
Levering, “Scripture and Its Reception.”
Levinson, Constitutional Faith.
Meier, American Scripture.
Rakov, ed., The Annotated U.S. Constitution and Declaration of Independence.
Ravitch, and Thernstrom, eds., The Democracy Reader.
Questions to Consider
1. If texts are made sacred in relationship to a community, is it possible for basically secular texts to have scripture-like functions within a nation? Is there such a thing as “civic religion”?
2. What American political texts are most likely to be memorized, recited on holidays, or even carved in stone?
Heavenly Books, Earthly Connections
Lecture 36
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As we come to the end of this course, it might be useful to spend some time answering two questions: Where do we go from here, and what difference might the comparative study of scripture make in our lives? The first half of this lecture answers the first question by offering recommended readings for each of the major religious traditions we’ve studied. The second part of the lecture attempts to answer the second question by returning to the reasons we listed in Lecture 1 for studying other people’s scriptures. In particular, we’ll discuss how reading world scripture can help us better understand the lives of others and perhaps even provide greater insight into our own intellectual and spiritual commitments.
Readings from Early Religions
• If you read only one text from Hinduism, it should be the Bhagavad Gita. You might also try the Isha and Katha Upanishads, which provide a good introduction to Vedic literature.
• For Judaism, you might try something from each of the three sections of the Tanakh. From the Torah, you might sample Genesis, which includes some of the most famous stories in the Hebrew Bible. From the Prophets, read 2 Isaiah (chapters 40–55), which most scholars date to the 6th century B.C.E., during the Babylonian Exile. From the Writings, try the brief book of Ruth, a simple yet moving tale of ordinary people and extraordinary kindness.
o For those from a Christian background, it’s worth looking at the Jewish Publication Society translation of the Tanakh to see how Jews read their own sacred texts. As you recall, the entire Tanakh is regarded as holy, but the Torah is especially sacred and is read aloud in synagogues over the course of a year.
o Conservative Jews believe that the Torah was revealed by God to Moses, and some assert that it predated the world and was used as a blueprint for creation. Other Jews accept the results of the historical-critical method and view the Torah, like the Prophets and the Writings, as the product of many sources edited and revised over centuries.
o Jewish tradition claims that Moses received not only the written Torah at Mount Sinai but also the oral Torah, which was eventually written down in the 3rd century C.E. as the Mishnah, then later expanded into the two Talmuds. If you’re interested in exploring this literature, a good place to start is the tractate Aboth (“The Fathers”) in the fourth division of the Mishnah. The Aboth is a brief collection of wise sayings and moral maxims from famous rabbis.
• One of the most beloved texts from the Theravada tradition of Buddhism is the Dhammapada, which sets forth the basic principles of Buddhist doctrine and morality. The canon of Mahayana Buddhism is vast, but one book considered by many to be the fullest expression of the Buddha’s teachings is the Lotus Sutra. Read the first four chapters, which include the parables of the burning house and the prodigal son. From Zen Buddhism, read the Mumonkan (“Gateless Gate”), which is a 13th-century collection of 48 koans in the form of brief anecdotes about Zen masters and their students.
• For East Asian religion and philosophy, read the Analects of Confucius and the Daodejing. The Analects are brief, fairly straightforward sayings of Confucius. The Daodejing was originally an anonymous collection of wisdom sayings that was later attributed to Laozi and eventually elevated to the status of a divine text.
Readings from Common Era Religions
• Recommended readings for Christianity include one of the gospels, perhaps Luke; the book of Acts, which offers a history of the early Christian movement; and something from Paul, either Romans or 1 Corinthians. If you’re curious about Christian sacred texts outside the Bible, you might start with the Coptic Gospel of Thomas, which offers 114 short sayings attributed to Jesus.
• As we saw, Muslims view their scripture, the Qur’an, as a miraculous transcript of a heavenly book. It is God’s primary revelation to humankind, given to Muhammad with the angel Gabriel as a mediator, and most Muslims believe that the Qur’an is co-eternal with God, uncreated. Thus, for Islam, the choice of which sacred text to read is obvious. But the Qur’an, with its 114 suras, is a bit long.
o Newcomers might want to start with some of the shorter, earlier, more lyrical revelations toward the end of the volume, then read a few of the longer suras that appear at the beginning (2, “The Cow”; 4, “Women”; and 5, “The Table”).
o If you’re coming from a Jewish or Christian background, it might also be interesting to read some of the middle suras that are named after biblical characters: 10, “Jonah”; 12, “Joseph”; 19. “Mary”; or 71, “Noah.” And some Muslims feel that sura 112 contains the essence of Islam: “Say: He is God the One, God the eternal. He begot no one nor was He begotten. No one is comparable to Him.”
o If you’re interested in the Hadith, or traditions about the Prophet, the best place to begin is with Al-Nawawi’s 13thcentury collection Forty Hadith, which has long been the most popular introductory anthology of Hadith.
• The Adi Granth is the paramount scripture of Sikhism. As you recall, it’s a collection of poetry by the Sikh gurus and some of their Hindu and Muslim predecessors that was designated by the Tenth Guru as the perpetual Guru of the community. Two recommended readings in this tradition are The Name of My Beloved: Verses of the Sikh Gurus, translated by Nikky-Guninder Kaur Singh, and Songs of the Saints from the Adi Granth, translated by Nirmal Dass.
• The best avenue into the scriptures of the Latter-day Saints is, of course, the Book of Mormon, which was thought to have been miraculously translated from ancient gold plates that were given to Joseph Smith by the angel Moroni. Two recommendations here are
3 Nephi, which tells the story of the resurrected Jesus appearing to people in the Americas, and 1 Nephi, which gives a good sense of the narrative and characteristic themes of the book.
• Finally, if you’re curious about Baha’i, start with The Hidden Words—a collection of mystical sayings by Baha’u’llah. In addition, many have found the book Some Answered Questions to be a clear introduction to Baha’i teachings.
• In addition to reading some of the scriptures from this course, go on the Internet and look for examples of sacred texts in use, perhaps Vedic ceremonies, Buddhist sutra chanting, Qur’anic recitations, or the singing of the Adi Granth in a Sikh temple. Even better, try to attend a worship service of a religion that is not your own.
Concluding Our Study
• In our first lecture, we noted several good reasons to read other people’s scriptures: they’re easily accessible; they’re usually central to the faith tradition; they lend themselves to comparative study; they can be sources of wisdom, beauty, and awe; and they help us better understand the lives of others and perhaps even provide greater insight into our own intellectual and spiritual commitments.
• People often argue about religion, and scripture can sometimes be used as a weapon or a wedge, particularly because many sacred texts make strong, mutually exclusive claims about God, reality, and salvation. Yet reading scripture can also be a bridge between people with different ideas about God and reality. A sacred text may or may not contain the truth about unseen forces or other realms of existence, but it most certainly contains truths about millions of believers who have accepted the text as authoritative.
• If you want to understand what’s going on in the Middle East or in much of Africa, you need to read the Qur’an; many of the basic values of China and Japan will not make sense until you’ve considered the Confucian Analects and the Daodejing; and it’s impossible to grasp American politics and culture without a basic knowledge of the Bible. Reading sacred texts provides in-depth knowledge and takes you into the heart of various traditions.
• If you come from the background of a particular faith, it can be disconcerting or even threatening to realize that other people believe different things with just as much sincerity as you do and that from a certain perspective, all religions seem rather implausible. But it’s possible to remain true to one’s own faith tradition while acknowledging the good in others.
• Many people nowadays say that they are spiritual but not religious, perhaps because they are wary of the track record of religious institutions. This might lead some to pick and choose passages from the sacred texts of the world to create a unique, personalized faith. However, as personally satisfying as a few random verses might be, it is still important to read sacred texts in the context of their own traditions. Taking sacred texts seriously means appreciating their role in communities that provide support and solace but also make demands on believers.
The Scriptural Reasoning movement recognizes that Christians, Jews, and muslims may become aware of deep differences as they study one another’s texts.
• In the 1990s, Peter Ochs of the University of Virginia and David Ford at Cambridge began the Scriptural Reasoning movement, which encourages small groups of believers from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam to get together and read passages from their sacred texts. The point isn’t to disparage or convert but to understand and learn from one another. The model for interactions is hospitality—to be a gracious host when inviting outsiders to comment upon one’s own scriptures and an attentive guest when listening to insiders share their sacred texts.
• Scriptural Reasoning brings together adherents of the three Abrahamic religions, but an even broader vision of religious dialogue has been presented by the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists. In his book Toward a True Kinship of Faiths, he explores similarities and differences among Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, with constant attention to sacred texts.
o The Dalai Lama observes that an acceptance of religious pluralism does not necessarily undermine claims of exclusive truth. Even if all the major religions can’t be equally true, they can nevertheless be equally legitimate; they are worthy of respect because we can imagine why intelligent, moral people might choose to believe, even if we ourselves don’t share that belief.
o It seems true that reading other people’s sacred texts with empathy and understanding can make the world a better place. There will always be differences between religions that matter a great deal, but as we come to better understand and perhaps even admire those of different faith traditions, we can marvel at the religious diversity in the world and what those many traditions and scriptures mean in the human experience.
Suggested Reading
Gyatso, Toward a True Kinship of Faiths.
Ford, “An Interfaith Wisdom.” Smith, What Is Scripture?
Questions to Consider
1. Which sacred texts are most likely to reward reading by outsiders?
2. How can reading other people’s scriptures lead to greater harmony and understanding in the world?
3. What difference might the comparative study of sacred texts make in our lives?
Recommended Texts and Translations
Hinduism
Flood, Gavin, and Charles Martin, trans. The Bhagavad Gita: A New Translation. New York: W.W. Norton, 2012.
Miller, Barbara Stoler, trans. The Bhagavad-Gita: Krishna’s Counsel in Time of War. New York: Bantam, 1986.
Olivelle, Patrick, trans. Upanisads. Oxford World’s Classics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.
Patton, Laurie L., trans. The Bhagavad Gita. London: Penguin, 2008.
Roebuck, Valerie J., trans. The Upanishads. London: Penguin, 2003.
Judaism
Danby, Herbert, trans. The Mishnah. London: Oxford University Press, 1933.
Neusner, Jacob, trans. The Mishnah: A New Translation. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988.
Note on the Bible: The New American Bible (Catholic), the New International Version (evangelical), the New Jerusalem Bible (Catholic), and the Revised English Bible (ecumenical) are all good translations, though the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) is the most ecumenical and also the widely used version in academia. If you’re new to the Bible, the NRSV is recommended. For the Hebrew Bible, be sure to take a look at the Jewish Publication Society Tanakh.
Buddhism
Carter, John Ross, and Mahinda Palihawadana, trans. The Dhammapada: The Sayings of the Buddha. Oxford World’s Classics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.
Hurvitz, Leon, trans. Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma (The Lotus Sutra). Rev. ed. New York: Columbia University Press, 2009.
Roebuck, Valerie J., trans. The Dhammapada. London: Penguin, 2010.
Sekida, Katsuki, trans. and commentator, and A. V. Grimstone, ed. Two Zen Classics: Mumonkan and Hekiganroku. New York and Tokyo: Weatherhill, 1977.
Shibayama, Zenkei. Zen Comments on the Mumonkan. Translated by Sumiko Kudo. New York: Harper & Row, 1974.
Watson, Burton, trans. The Lotus Sutra. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993.
East Asian Religions
Dawson, Raymond. Confucius: The Analects. Oxford World’s Classics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.
Ivanhoe, Philip J., trans. The Daodejing of Laozi. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett, 2002.
Lau, D. C., trans. Confucius: The Analects. London: Penguin, 1979.
———, trans. Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching. London: Penguin, 1963.
Leys, Simon, trans. The Analects of Confucius. New York: Norton, 1997.
Mair, Victor H., trans. Tao Te Ching: The Classic Book of Integrity and the Way. New York: Bantam, 1990.
Christianity
“The Gospel of Thomas.” In Lost Scriptures: Books That Did Not Make It into the New Testament, edited by Bart D. Ehrman, pp. 19–28. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003.
Note on the Bible: The New American Bible (Catholic), the New International Version (evangelical), the New Jerusalem Bible (Catholic), and the Revised English Bible (ecumenical) are all good translations, though the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) is the most ecumenical and also the widely used version in academia. If you’re new to the Bible, the NRSV is recommended.
Islam
Abdel Haleem, M. A. S., trans. The Qur’an: A New Translation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.
Ali, Maulana Muhammad, trans. The Holy Qur’an with English Translation and Commentary. 7th rev. ed. Lahore: Ahamadiyya Anjuman Ishaat Islam, 2002.
———, trans. A Manual of Hadith. 2nd ed. Lahore: Ahamadiyya Anjuman Ishaat Islam, 1990.
Ibrahim, Ezzeddin, and Denys Johnson-Davies, trans. An-Nawawi’s Forty Hadith. Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society, 1997.
Khalidi, Tarif, trans. The Qur’an. New York: Penguin, 2008.
Newer Religions
Abdu’l-Baha. Some Answered Questions. Translated by Laura Clifford Barney. Wilmette, IL: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1990.
Baha’u’llah. The Hidden Words of Baha’u’llah. Translated by Shoghi Effendi. Wilmette, IL: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 2003
Dass, Nirmal, trans. Songs of the Saints from the Adi Granth. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000.
Hardy, Grant, ed. The Book of Mormon: A Reader’s Edition. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2003.
Singh, Nikky-Guninder Kaur, trans. The Name of My Beloved: Verses of the Sikh Gurus. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1995.
Bibliography
Abdel Haleem, M. A. S., trans. The Qur’an: A New Translation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.
Abdu’l-Baha. Some Answered Questions. Translated by Laura Clifford Barney. Wilmette, IL: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1990 (1908).
Alexander, Philip S., ed. and trans. Textual Sources for the Study of Judaism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990.
Ali, Maulana Muhammad, trans. The Holy Qur’an with English Translation and Commentary. 7th rev. ed. Lahore: Ahamadiyya Anjuman Ishaat Islam, 2002.
Alter, Robert, trans. The Five Books of Moses. New York: Norton, 2004.
Alter, Robert, and Frank Kermode, eds. The Literary Guide to the Bible. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987.
American Bible Society, “The State of the Bible, 2013.” http://www. americanbible.org/state-bible.
———. Synopsis of the Four Gospels, Revised Standard Version. Rev. ed. New York: American Bible Society, 2010.
Armstrong, Karen. The Bible: A Biography. New York: Grove Press, 2007.
Aston, William George, trans. Nihongi: Chronicles of Japan from the Earliest Times to A.D. 697. 2 vols. London: Kegan Paul and Japan Society of London, 1896.
Attar, Farid Ud-Din. Conference of the Birds. Translated by Afkham Darbandi and Dick Davis. London: Penguin, 1984.
———. Farid ad-Din ‘Atar’s Memorial of God’s Friends: Lives and Sayings of Sufis. Translated by Paul Losensky. New York: Paulist Press, 2009.
Attridge, Harold W. ed. Harper Collins Study Bible. Rev. ed. New York: HarperCollins, 2006. (Includes the New Revised Standard Version, with the Apocrypha.)
Baha’i Prayers: A Selection of Prayers Revealed by Baha’u’llah, the Bab, and Abdu’l-Baha. Wilmette, IL: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1991.
Baha’u’llah. Gleanings from the Writings of Baha’u’llah. Wilmette, IL: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1976.
———. The Kitab-i-Aqdas: The Most Holy Book. Wilmette, IL: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1992.
———. Writings of Baha’u’llah: A Compilation. Rev. ed. New Delhi: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1994.
Barlow, Philip. Mormons and the Bible: The Place of the Latter-day Saints in American Religion. New York: Oxford University Press, 1991.
Barton, Stephen C., ed. Cambridge Companion to the Gospels. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
Berlin, Adele, and Marc Zvi Brettler, eds. The Jewish Study Bible. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004. (Includes the JPS Tanakh translation.)
Blenkinsopp, Joseph. The Pentateuch: An Introduction to the First Five Books of the Bible. New York: Doubleday, 1992.
Bock, Felicia Gressitt, trans. Engi-Shiki: Procedures of the Engi Era. Books I–X. 2 vols. Tokyo: Sophia University, 1970–1972.
Bokenkamp, Stephen R. Early Daoist Scriptures. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997.
Bokser, Ben Zion, ed. and trans. The Talmud: Selected Writings. New York: Paulist Press, 1989.
Bowman, Matthew. The Mormon People: The Making of an American Faith. New York: Random House, 2012.
Boyce, Mary, ed. and trans. Textual Sources for the Study of Zoroastrianism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990.
———. Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices. London: Routledge, 2001.
Breen, John, and Mark Teeuwen. A New History of Shinto. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010.
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Brettler, Marc Zvi, Peter Enns, and Daniel J. Harrington. The Bible and the Believer: How to Read the Bible Critically and Religiously. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.
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