Concept Pub. Co.

Christian ethics, issues and insights.

Stephen (theology and ethics, Faith Theological Seminary, Kerala, India) strives to help students of ethics and other readers develop a human and responsible approach to life. He discusses such matters as the theories of ethics, bioethics, war and peace, absolute and relative, and Gospel ethics. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Colors of truth; religion, self and emotions; perspectives of Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Zoroastrianism, Islam, Sikhism and contemporary psychology.

Faith lives in every culture, whether as a divine power, the human spirit or the endless void. Marwaha, Director of Centre for Empowerment of Women at the Institute for Human Science and Service in India, finds within faiths elements of fundamental psychological knowledge, including perspectives on emotions, identity and the concept of self. She examines how faiths approach the basic questions of who we are, why we are here, and where we will be after death. She concentrates on the self and emotions, but gives voice to such topics as the role of the self in relation to the divine and to other humans, the causes and consequences of emotion, the calculations behind what constitutes "us" and "them," the associations of kin and clan with the self, and the formation of the idea of community. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Divorce discourses; a Biblical dilemma.

Chetty (comparative religions, U. of KwaZulu-Natal) takes a long look at one of this extremely controversial aspect of Jewish and Christian life. He analyzes the contexts and contents of the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, showing how their statements supported the divorce of foreign wives by Israelites at the time, and examines Israelite society and its attitudes about the protection of women, social as well as religious. He also describes how the teachings of Jesus in fact elevated the status of women to that of men in marriage and made it less possible for unwanted wives to exist suspended between marriage and divorce at the whim of men who no longer loved them, or never did in the first place. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Ecology and quality of life in urban slums; an empirical study.

Rekha (psychology) and U.P. (economics, both: T.M. Bhagalpur U. India) report on almost all aspects of urban life in the cities of Munger and Bhagalpur, among them living conditions, food habits, psychological behavior, dress material ornaments used, types of recreation, musical instruments, theater, and cinema. They also look at levels of literacy, political life, caste conflict, and marketing. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Environment evolution and values.

Indian philosopher Chattopadhyaya reflects on human evolution, human- environment relations, and human-society relations, building over the course of 15 essays towards a theory of the dynamics of values. Much of the work can be seen as a defense of gradualism versus dualism, as Chattopadhyaya rejects human/nature, value/fact, and other dichotomies, leading him to insist on recognition of the cultural and environmental rootedness of ethical, political, and social values. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Experiments with truth and non-violence; the Dalai Lama in exile from Tibet.

Two Indian physicians offer an impassioned defense of the Tibetan independence struggle, with much of their discussion revolving largely but not entirely uncritically around the person of the 14th Dalai Lama and his avowed insistence on the efficacy of the tools of truth and non-violence. Their defense is in large part a chronological account of the politics of the Dalai Lama from his exile from Tibet in 1959 to the present, although diversions into religious-philosophical matters are not infrequent. The book could have benefited from the attention of a diligent editor. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

India and Central Asia; classical to contemporary periods.

Linked by geography, climate and geo-cultural similarities for centuries, these two regions also share socio-cultural, religions, political and economic contacts that run deep. This collection of papers addresses the background of common concerns about international terrorism, religious extremism and drug trafficking. Many papers here are drawn partially from an international seminar held by the Indian Council for Cultural Relations and Astha Bharati, Delhi in March 2004 in New Delhi, while some have been published in special editions of journals. The 21 papers cover evidence of historical, cultural and religious links (such as Buddhist iconography), the state of politics and geopolitics and democracy in Central Asia from both outside and in, with due consideration of natural resources and possible extractive markets, Islamic radicalism in Central Asia, especially after the collapse of the USSR, and the complex issues of energy reserves, not the least of which is economic. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Rediscovering Gandhi; v.1: Hind Swaraj, Gandhi's challenge to modern civilization.

In this first of a series of books intended to examine the relevance of Mahatma Gandhi in the new millennium, Misra (former vice-chancellor of the U. of Allahabad, India and chief technical advisor of the United Nations) revisits Gandhi's 1908 book Hind Swaraj, which for Misra is not only a book on how to win political freedom for India, it is "a Magna Carta for the freedom of the mind and evolution of human species from conscious and material beings to super-conscious and moral beings." In discussing Hind Swaraj he focuses on Gandhi's critique of modern industrial civilization, the power of Gandhi's concept of satyagraha or passive resistance, and Gandhi's ideas about modern education and technology. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)