"The Patriarchs" by J. G. Bellett. Published by Good Press. Good Press publishes a wide range of titles that encompasses every genre. From well-known classics & literary fiction and non-fiction to forgotten−or yet undiscovered gems−of world literature, we issue the books that need to be read. Each Good Press edition has been meticulously edited and formatted to boost readability for all e-readers and devices. Our goal is to produce eBooks that are user-friendly and accessible to everyone in a high-quality digital format.

Philosophers, scientists and Atheists seem to have a tendency toward avoiding God in positing their premises. However, Divine Law should not be excluded from analysis. In actuality, God And The Bible have played more of a role in the education and development of the minds of major thinkers than you might think. In the Proven God, Balderston suggests that the Big Bang Theory and other scientific and philosophical conventions are influenced by the Divine, and indicative of the Truth: God is real. Denial of God too often reigns supreme, and For The wrong reasons. Through an exploration of the centuries' greatest thinkers, eyes will open To The farce that is a reality without God, who is the cause of all we enjoy, and who provides our enlightenment. In an interesting analysis of a broad range of philosophical viewpoints, Balderston explores those who have converted from being an atheist/non-believer to being Christianâ€'and maintained their logic. The book concludes with advice on how to live with doubt, An issue that is pervasive For The believer And The non-believer alike. Through our own doubts we experience our existence and understand our purpose. Allow this read to awaken you to a new enlightenment and age of reason, a clarification and understanding of modern thinking, And The attributes of the Divine.

The truth of Chan Buddhism—better known as “Zen”—is regularly said to be beyond language, and yet Chan authors—medieval and modern—produced an enormous quantity of literature over the centuries. To make sense of this well-known paradox, Patriarchs on Paper explores several genres of Chan literature that appeared during the Tang and Song dynasties (c. 600–1300), including genealogies, biographies, dialogues, poems, monastic handbooks, and koans. Working through this diverse body of literature, Alan Cole details how Chan authors developed several strategies to evoke images of a perfect Buddhism in which wonderfully simple masters transmitted Buddhism’s final truth to one another, suddenly and easily, and, of course, independent of literature and the complexities of the Buddhist monastic system. Chan literature, then, reveled in staging delightful images of a Buddhism free of Buddhism, tempting the reader, over and over, with the possibility of finding behind the thick façade of real Buddhism—with all its rules, texts, doctrines, and institutional solidity—an ethereal world of pure spirit. Patriarchs on Paper charts the emergence of this kind of “fantasy Buddhism” and details how it interacted with more traditional forms of Chinese Buddhism in order to show how Chan’s illustrious ancestors were created in literature in order to further a wide range of real-world agendas.

The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs is of especial interest to students of early Judaism and Christianity, though this importance is not always recognized. This collection preserves extra-biblical traditions about the sons of Jacob, it reflects a moral worldview of Jews and Christians around the turn of the era, and it casts light on its authors' eschatological imagination. Robert A. Kugler introduces the student to the Testaments' contents, their relationship to other texts of the era, textual witnesses and sources, and rehearses the debate regarding authorship, compositional history and purpose. He also examines the Testaments from the fresh perspective of rhetorical strategy, asking what sort of theological notions the Testaments would have conjured in the minds of early Jewish and Christian listeners or readers.

Patrons and Patriarchs breaks new ground in the study of clergy-court relations during the tumultuous period that spanned the collapse of the Tang dynasty (618–907) and the consolidation of the Northern Song (960–1127). This era, known as the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms, has typically been characterized as a time of debilitating violence and instability, but it also brought increased economic prosperity, regional development, and political autonomy to southern territories. The book describes how the formation of new states in southeastern China elevated local Buddhist traditions and moved Chan (Zen) monks from the margins to the center of Chinese society. Drawing on biographies, inscriptions, private histories, and government records, it argues that the shift in imperial patronage from a diverse array of Buddhist clerics to members of specific Chan lineages was driven by political, social, and geographical reorientations set in motion by the collapse of the Tang dynasty and the consolidation of regional powers during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms. As monastic communities representing diverse arrays of thought, practice, and pedagogy allied with rival political factions, the outcome of power struggles determined which clerical networks assumed positions of power and which doctrines were enshrined as orthodoxy. Rather than view the ascent of Chan monks and their traditions as instances of intellectual hegemony, this book focuses on the larger sociopolitical processes that lifted members of Chan lineages onto the imperial stage. Against the historical backdrop of the tenth century, Patrons and Patriarchs explores the nature and function of Chan lineage systems, the relationships between monastic and lay families, and the place of patronage in establishing identity and authority in monastic movements.