The Gnostic revival of the Enlightenment witnessed the erection of what could be called the “Kantian Rift,” an epistemological barrier between external reality and the mind of the percipient. Arbitrarily proclaimed by German philosopher Immanuel Kant, this barrier rendered the world as a terra incognita. Suddenly, the world “out there” was deemed imperceptible and unknowable. In addition to the outer world, the cherished metaphysical certainties of antiquity—the soul, a transcendent order, and God—swiftly evaporated. The way was paved for a new set of modern mythmakers who would populate the world “out there” with their own surrogates for the Divine. Collectively, these surrogates could be referred to as the Beyond because they epistemologically and ontologically overwhelm humanity. In recent years, the Beyond has been invoked by theoreticians, literary figures, intelligence circles, and deep state operatives who share some variant of a technocratic vision for the world. In turn, these mythmakers have either directly or indirectly served elitist interests that have been working toward the establishment of a global government and the creation of a New Man. Their hegemony has been legitimized through the invocation of a wrathful earth goddess, a technological Singularity, a superweapon, and extraterrestrial “gods.” All of these are merely masks for the same counterfeit divinity... the Beyond.

"Why do American political leaders regularly invoke the Founding Fathers, and what are the effects of their doing so? The author of this book links this rhetorical strategy to the rise of patriarchal white supremacy and Christian nationalism in the modern United States"--

When we engage in a daily relationship with angels, our lives become filled with a vast array of heavenly sparks that inform us of the divinity within even the most mundane activities Come and see for yourself how to invoke angels, and discover a new way to experience your world. Rabbi David A. Cooper Have you ever experienced something so extraordinary as to leave you wondering whether some higher power or force were responsible? We do not need to sit and wait for the finger of Grace to tap us on the shoulder, explains Rabbi David A. Cooper, rather, we can practice the invocation of angels cultivating profound experiences that immediately open us to guidance and blessings from the Divine. Invoking Angels presents a complete program of daily meditations and prayers to help practitioners of any faith find self-empowerment through an active relationship with angels, which Cooper views as an energetic realm that serves as a medium in which God, humankind, and all of creation are interconnected. Join this master kabbalist, scholar, and storyteller as he takes us back to the teachings of the Torah, the Bible, and other sacred texts to reveal the original vision of angels and the universe we co-create with them. With the unique format of a book with guided invocations on CD, Invoking Angels is meant to complement an existing spiritual practice, comfort the sick, invite wisdom, and help anyone seeking an intimate awareness of these divine forces at work around us. Guided meditations and prayers on CD include; An Archangel Meditation for openheartedness and courage A Guardian Angel Meditation for protection in any situation A meditation on the Divine Presence (the Shekhina) Meditations for invoking the supreme angels Metatron and Sandalphon to experience profound awareness and sufficiency, and more below First Page.

There is a common misconception that to practice Zen is to practice meditation and nothing else. In truth, traditionally, the practice of meditation goes hand-in-hand with moral conduct. In Invoking Reality, John Daido Loori, one of the leading Zen teachers in America today, presents and explains the ethical precepts of Zen as essential aspects of Zen training and development. The Buddhist teachings on morality—the precepts—predate Zen, going all the way back to the Buddha himself. They describe, in essence, how a buddha, or awakened person, lives his or her life in the world. Loori provides a modern interpretation of the precepts and discusses the ethical significance of these vows as guidelines for living. "Zen is a practice that takes place within the world," he says, "based on moral and ethical teachings that have been handed down from generation to generation." In his view, the Buddhist precepts form one of the most vital areas of spiritual practice.

With their dramatic descriptions of black masses and cannibalistic feasts, the records generated by the Basque witch-craze of 160914 provide us with arguably the most demonologically-stereotypical accounts of the witches sabbath or akelarre to have emerged from early modern Europe. While the trials have attracted scholarly attention, the most substantial monograph on the subject was written nearly forty years ago and most works have focused on the ways in which interrogators shaped the pattern of prosecutions and the testimonies of defendants. Invoking the Akelarre diverts from this norm by employing more recent historiographical paradigms to analyze the contributions of the accused. Through interdisciplinary analyses of both French- and Spanish-Basque records, it argues that suspects were not passive recipients of elite demonological stereotypes but animated these received templates with their own belief and experience, from the dark exoticism of magical conjuration, liturgical cursing and theatrical misrule to the sharp pragmatism of domestic medical practice and everyday religious observance. In highlighting the range of raw materials available to the suspects, the book helps us to understand how the fiction of the witches sabbath emerged to such prominence in contemporary mentalities, whilst also restoring some agency to the defendants and nuancing the historical thesis that stereotypical content points to interrogatorial opinion and folkloric content to the voices of the accused. In its local context, this study provides an intimate portrait of peasant communities as they flourished in the Basque region in this period and leaves us with the irony that Europes most sensationally-demonological accounts of the witches sabbath may have evolved out of a particularly ardent commitment, on the part of ordinary Basques, to the social and devotional structures of popular Catholicism.

Through the essays in this volume, we see how the failure of the state becomes a moment to ruminate on the artificiality of this most modern construct, the failure of nationalism, an opportunity to dream of alternative modes of association, and the failure of sovereignty to consider the threats and possibilities of the realm of foreignness within the nation-state as within the self. The ambition of this volume is not only to complicate standing representations of Pakistan. It is take Pakistan out of the status of exceptionalism that its multiple crises have endowed upon it. By now, many scholars have written of how exile, migrancy, refugeedom, and other modes of displacement constitute modern subjectivities. The arguments made in the book say that Pakistan is no stranger to this condition of human immigrancy and therefore, can be pressed into service in helping us to understand our present condition.

Simultaneously a handbook and a critique of one, Beyond Craft combines an orientation to the field of creative writing with an insight into current scholarship surrounding creative writing pedagogy. A much-needed alternative to the traditional craft guide, this text pairs advice and exercises on composition with an illuminating commentary on the issues surrounding these very techniques. Teaching the craft whilst apprising students of the issues of craft pedagogy, this book allows them to gain an awareness of how current pedagogy comes at the expense of larger and increasingly relevant cultural concerns. Westbrook and Ryan bring emerging writers into the larger conversations that define the field, inviting them to: - Contextualize their own writing practices and educational experiences in relation to the history of creative writing as an academic discipline. - Determine how New Critical lore and Romantic mythology may affect-even distort-their understanding of literary production. - Critically examine their notions of authorship, collaboration, and invention in relation to contemporary literary and rhetorical theory. - Understand and evaluate the economic, social, political, and professional challenges facing creative writers today. - Analyze the contemporary literary marketplace not only to identify potential publication contexts but also to understand how issues of diversity and bias affect writing communities. - Reflect on how increasingly rapid technological developments may affect their own writing and the future of literature. Earnestly self-aware throughout, Beyond Craft both inducts new writers into the field of creative writing and infuses them with an understanding of the wider dialogue surrounding their craft.

The Land beyond the Horizon is a mystic play, conveying respect and understanding for diversity of religion, philosophy and spirituality. It also contains elements of Egyptian mythology and Rosicrucian philosophy, like the altruistic ideal of Bringing back the Greater Light to humanity _ which is in essence not much different from the ideal of world peace. In fact, The Land beyond the Horizon in this play symbolises just that; the long and difficult journey which humanity still has to travel, before global peace can be manifested; on a collective, macrocosmic level level, and also on an individual level. The play stipulates the philosophy that Evil exists in this world _ and even in our hearts _ but that we also have the power to vanquish Evil , by acting together in solidarity, if we are willing to identify and confront that evil. The volume also contains poetry, where Mark evokes the mystic, primordial beauty of Africa, taking you on a fantastic journey to the Land Beyond the Horizon

* Powerful, passionate and highly topical critique of humanitarian intervention* International political theorist with eight top-selling books"Whoever invokes humanity wants to cheat."In this first time translation in English, Danilo Zolo considers Carl Schmitt's maxim in the context of the "humanitarian war" waged against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in the Spring of 1999 by 19 NATO countries. This erudite and disturbing book is a political, legal and philosophical reflection on an extraordinary display of Western Power and its present and future impact on the global system of international relations.Zolo's account of the war is located within the context of the irresistible drive of globalization which he argues brings economic, financial and military, ecological and ethnic-religious turbulence in its wake. Not only the future of the Balkan region, he suggests, is at stake here, but the fate of international law, the future role of the United Nations and the political destiny of Europe.

Across this volume, readers encounter the author’s qualitative inquiry into the lives of women academics, including herself, who originated from working-class or poverty-class backgrounds. Unconventionally conveyed, these encounters take shape as a self-speculative critique of the author’s feminist research practice, moving readers into the folds of the work to consider what constructivist, poststructural, and material feminist theories and methodologies do to the story she was able to tell at the time that she told it.