The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason

The Gifts of the Jews: How a Tribe of Desert Nomads Changed the Way Everyone Thinks and Feels

Thomas Cahill · 304 pages

The Great Transformation

Karen Armstrong · 496 pages

How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee

Bart D. Ehrman · 416 pages

New York Times bestselling author and Bible expert Bart Ehrman reveals how Jesus’s divinity became dogma in the first few centuries of the early church. The claim at the heart of the Christian faith is that Jesus of Nazareth was, and is, God. But this is not what the original disciples believed during Jesus’s lifetime—and it is not what Jesus claimed about himself. How Jesus Became God tells th

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

Yuval Noah Harari · 456 pages

From a renowned historian comes a groundbreaking narrative of humanity’s creation and evolution—a #1 international bestseller—that explores the ways in which biology and history have defined us and enhanced our understanding of what it means to be “human.” One hundred thousand years ago, at least six different species of humans inhabited Earth. Yet today there is only one—homo sapiens. What hap

The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future

Riane Eisler · 261 pages

"In prehistorical times, Eisler argues, women and men lived together in egalitarian communities devoted to nurturance; with the imposition of male domination, female values gave way to creeds of hierarchy, aggression, power, obedience. Eisler, a futurist, posits a new society based on the recovery of more humane values."--Library journal (6/1/85).

Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth

Reza Aslan · 336 pages

Two thousand years ago, an itinerant Jewish preacher walked across the Galilee gathering followers to establish the "Kingdom of God." He was tortured and executed as a state criminal. Within decades, his followers would call him God. Sifting through centuries of mythmaking, Reza Aslan sheds new light on one of history's most influential and enigmatic characters by examining Jesus through the lens

The Origin of Satan: How Christians Demonized Jews, Pagans and Heretics

Elaine Pagels · 214 pages

Who is Satan in the New Testament, and what is the evil that he represents? In this groundbreaking book, Elaine Pagels, Princeton's distinguished historian of religion, traces the evolution of Satan from its origins in the Hebrew Bible, where Satan is at first merely obstructive, to the New Testament, where Satan becomes the Prince of Darkness, the bitter enemy of God and man, evil incarnate. In

Doubt: A History: The Great Doubters and Their Legacy of Innovation from Socrates and Jesus to Thomas Jefferson and Emily Dickinson

Jennifer Michael Hecht · 551 pages

The Evolution of God

Robert Wright · 567 pages

In this sweeping narrative that takes us from the Stone Age to the Information Age, Robert Wright unveils a hidden pattern that the great monotheistic faiths have followed as they have evolved. Through the prisms of archaeology, theology, and evolutionary psychology, Wright's findings overturn basic assumptions about Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and are sure to cause controversy. He explains

Occidental Mythology

Joseph Campbell · 576 pages

The Bible as History

Werner Keller · 413 pages

The Works of Josephus: Complete and Unabridged, New Updated Edition

Flavius Josephus · 854 pages

The Christians as the Romans Saw Them

Robert L. Wilken · 214 pages

From Pliny the Younger (d. 113) to Julian the Apostate (d. 363): a well-written, well-organized, and generally helpful survey of what pagan critics said about Christianity. Wilken (History, Notre Dame) has no new material to offer--most anti-Christian propaganda has been lost or deliberately destroyed by the Church, and much of what survives is found in fragments quoted by Christian apologists--bu

The Trial of Socrates

I.F. Stone · 282 pages

In unravelling the long-hidden issues of the most famous free speech case of all time, noted author I.F. Stone ranges far and wide over Roman as well as Greek history to present an engaging and rewarding introduction to classical antiquity and its relevance to society today.The New York Timescalled this national best-seller an "intellectual thriller."

In the Shadow of the Sword: The Battle for Global Empire and the End of the Ancient World

Tom Holland · 526 pages

In the 6th century AD, the Near East was divided between two venerable empires: the Persian and the Roman. A hundred years on, and one had vanished forever, while the other seemed almost finished. Ruling in their place were the Arabs: an upheaval so profound that it spelled, in effect, the end of the ancient world. In The Shadow of the Sword, Tom Holland explores how this came about. Spanning Cons

The early Christians in Rome

H. D. M. Spence-Jones · 409 pages

Dying Every Day: Seneca at the Court of Nero

James Romm · 290 pages

Explores the moral struggles, political intrigues and violent vendettas that enmeshed Seneca, the ancient Roman writer and philosopher, in the brutal daily lives of the imperial family and the regime of his student, Nero.

The Wonder That Was India: A Survey of the History and Culture of the Indian Sub-Continent before the coming of the Muslims

Arthur Llewellyn Basham · 572 pages

When God Was a Woman

Merlin Stone · 265 pages

Here, archaeologically documented is the story of the religion of the Goddess. Known by many names, she reigned supreme in the Near and Middle East. How did the change in women's roles come about? By documenting the wholesale rewriting of myth and religious dogmans, Stone details an ancient conspiracy that laid the foundation for one of culture's greatest shams--the legend of Adam and fallen Eve.

The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts

Israel Finkelstein, Neil Asher Silberman · 400 pages

"In The Bible Unearthed two leading scholars, an archaeologist and a historian, combine a tour of the field of biblical archaeology with a explanation of how and why the Bible's historical saga differs so dramatically from the archaeological finds. They explain what the Bible says about ancient Israel and show how it diverges sharply from archaeological reality. They then offer a new version of t

Greek Religion: Archaic and Classical

Walter Burkert · 498 pages

A History of the Jews

Paul Johnson · 573 pages

God Against the Gods: The History of the War Between Monotheism and Polytheism

Jonathan Kirsch · 336 pages

As conflicts over religious extremism dominate our front pages, the bestselling author of The Harlot by the Side of the Road presents a work of history that could not be more timely: a surprising look back at the origins of religious intolerance during the tumultuous fourth century.This is the epic story of how classical paganism, with its tolerance for many deities and beliefs, lost a centuries-l

Killing Jesus: A History

Bill O'Reilly, Martin Dugard · 293 pages

The anchor of The O'Reilly Factor details the events leading up to the murder of the most influential man in history: Jesus of Nazareth. Nearly two thousand years after this beloved and controversial young revolutionary was brutally killed by Roman soldiers, more than 2.2 billion human beings attempt to follow his teachings and believe he is God. Killing Jesus will take readers inside Jesus's life