At a moment when the world is asking "Can the religions get along?" Abraham stands as the shared ancestor of Jews, Christians, and Muslims. He holds the key to our deepest fears -- and our possible reconciliation. Bruce Feiler set out on a personal quest to better understand our common patriarch. Traveling in war zones, climbing though caves and ancient shrines, and sitting down with the world's leading religious minds, Feiler discovers the untold story of the man who defines faith for half the world. Both immediate and timeless, Abraham is a powerful, universal story, the first ever interfaith portrait of the man God chose to be his partner. Thoughtful, perceptive, and inspiring in a way that has endeared Bruce Feiler to readers around the world, Abraham offers a rare vision of hope that will redefine what we think about our neighbors, our future, and ourselves. Also includes an excerpt from the New York Times bestseller Walking the Bible. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.

Feiler, who penned last year's bestseller Walking the Bible, once again offers a winning combination of history, travel and spiritual memoir. Arguing that Abraham, the purported "father" of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, "holds the breadth of the past and perhaps the dimensions of the future in his life story," Feiler sets out to recover Abraham as he is portrayed in all three religions. The book's first half addresses what the Bible and Koran say about Abraham, his call to monotheism, and his sons Isaac and Ishmael. Particularly fascinating are Feiler's discussions of how the three religious traditions invented stories about Abraham to supplement the rather skeletal canonical version and even borrowed these stories from one another, as when Muslim traditions about Abraham and Ishmael began appearing in eighth-century Jewish commentaries. The second half very poignantly delves into each faith tradition and discusses how the Abraham narratives relate to contemporary religious and political conflicts. No one writes description quite like Feiler. His claim, for example, that "the Holy Sepulcher is to a church what Picasso is to a portrait a cubist vision of fractured beauty" is an arresting and perfectly imagined analogy, and he mellifluously depicts the Arabic language as "flowing, evolved, [and] sculpted, like a dune." More important than Feiler's masterful wordsmithing is his passionate engagement of the subject matter. Italics are everywhere, yet they don't feel overused; Feiler has a keen sense of what is at stake when these three religions claim Abraham as their father. This is a joy to read.Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

9/11 Journalist Feiler, a fifth-generation American Jew from the Deep South, wrote the best-selling Walking the Bible, his account of his own journey through the deserts of the Old Testament. This slighter follow-up focuses on the patriarch of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity, whose story lies at the heart of the ongoing strife that began in the Middle East. The author climbs into caves in Hebron, walks the desert of Haran, and taxis through war zones in Jerusalem, interviewing scholars of the Koran and the Bible to understand the founder of monotheism. His conclusion is that straightforward discussion between Abraham's heirs, conducted in academic settings and in houses of worship around the globe, may begin to heal our wounds. The publication date is timed for the week of the September 11 anniversary, and the publisher and author are arranging interfaith dialogs in institutions around the United States. An additional purchase for public libraries.-Joyce Smothers, student, Princeton Theological Seminary, NJCopyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

The first monotheist (and, Feiler argues, the first martyr), Abraham serves as a patriarch for three very different faiths--Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Feiler begins with Abraham as we meet him in Genesis: old, married to Sarah, fatherless, and childless. But the old man fathers Ishmael through Sarah's servant Hagar, and then Sarah becomes miraculously pregnant with Isaac. This is the symbolic beginning of the rift between Jews and Muslims (Jews trace their lineage through Isaac, Muslims through Ishmael), and much of the book explores how Jewish, Christian, and Islamic understandings of Abraham have expressed historic and contemporary interfaith disagreements. Feiler discusses dozens of «Abrahams,» from the Abraham used to justify pacifism to the one seen as a model of sacrifice, the patriarch of martyrs. Along the way, Feiler poses some fascinating theological questions, but this isn't dry reading at all. Like his hugely popular Walking the Bible (2000), Feiler keeps our interest by mixing theological meditation with adventurous travelogue and sly wit. And this quietly brilliant examination of Abraham, which begins as part lit-crit thesis and part theological treatise, becomes, in the end, a passionate and prayerful argument for peace between faiths. John Green. From: Syndetics Solutions, Inc. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.

Bruce Feiler is the author of six books, and a frequent contributor to National Public Radio, he writes for the New York Times, Washington Post, and Gourmet. He lives in New York City Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.

Rock of Abraham
Home	3
God of Abraham
1 Birth	17
2 Call	36
Children of Abraham
3 Ishmael	57
4 Isaac	82
People of Abraham
5 Jews	113
6 Christians	136
7 Muslims	160
Blood of Abraham
8 Legacy	189
Hope of Abraham
Unity	221
Blessings	227
Readings	229
Questions	233
Passages	237

Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.