Does anyone else think that the reference to "universal" in the title might be a little bit presumptuous?

I will grant you: there is a lot of wisdom in the book, but its scope does not contain every religion by a longshot. Many Native American traditions are left out, as are all of the Neo-pagan ones. The Ancient Egyptian religion is touched for four stories. Akhnaton's hymn to the Aten-disk is included even though his excursion to semi-monotheism lasted a mere seventeen years, and is not even a pimple on the face of the Sphinx, especially given that the religion changed and grew for over 2,500 years -- longer than any other religion in the world -- and an undeniable influence in the creation of all three of the Western "world religions."

But enough of my particular prejudices.

The material that is in this book is, for the most part, golden. It very definitely shows that no religion in the world has a lock on either goodness or wisdom. More is the pity that the people who truly need to learn this will never see any of that proof.

Even if these folks did see, it would still not be enough to show them that religion is a creation of the culture that gave it birth. It is something that is difficult to export because whatever "pimples" it has will become glaring in the eyes of people not accustomed to the ways that gave it birth.

I think that this must be the biggest lesson learned from this collection. ( )

interesting ( )