Explanation of the differences between faith and testimony, and introduction of the idea of a "divine signature," blessings or answers given by God in dramatic, unusual, or precisely timed ways that make the answer seem "signed" by God.

The substance of this present work is liberation semiology. The world's own principle is love (agape). Our fellow creatures are co-symbols of emancipation from human violence. Creation is not, as influential modern thinkers envision, mere material, mere nature, to commodify and dominate for the freedom of an exclusive constituency of our species. The ecological crisis emerges from a tragic misfit between experiments with secular sovereignty and the continuance of Christian historicity. Either the Christian form of life (of time) is replaced, revealing a new ecological worldview, or we revive Christian sovereignty as a creative fit with the actuality of Christian historicity. This work wagers on the latter: Christian civilization is coextensive with ecological civilization.

Gnostic texts are filled with encounters of strange other worldly beings, journeys to visionary heavenly realms, and encounters with the presence and spirit of the divine. In Gnostic visions, author and Gnostic scholar Luke A. Myers presents evidence demonstrating how Gnostic visions were created and the connection these visions have to naturally occurring visionary compounds that are still in existence today. The culmination of more than ten years of research, Gnostic Visions advances the understanding of classical ethnobotany, Gnosticism, and the genesis of early Christian history. In this book the author discusses the prehistoric foundations of early human religion as well as the visionary religious traditions of the classical Greeks and Egyptians. Using these as a foundation, the book presents new and never before seen research explaining how Gnostic visions were created and what types of compounds were used by these ancient people to create them. Gnostic Visions presents evidence directly linking visionary Ayahuasca analogs with the creation of Gnostic and Hermetic visionary experiences. Gnostic Visions also describes the decline of Gnosticism, other visionary practices used in the Dark Ages and gives a brief tour of the visionary plants of the new world. In Gnostic visions, Myers tells of his personal experience with the divine and includes some of his own reflections of the importance of mankinds relationship to the natural world. He communicates that altered states of consciousness have been responsible for many of the most profound mystical religious experiences in human history.

Is the world one or many? Ji Zhang revisits this ancient philosophical question from the modern perspective of comparative studies. His investigation stages an intellectual exchange between Plato, founder of the Academy, and Ge Hong, who systematized Daoist belief and praxis. Zhang not only captures the tension between rational Platonism and abstruse Daoism, but also creates a bridge between the two.