The Unanimous Tradition: Essays on the Essential Unity of all Religions

The Unanimous Tradition: Essays on the Essential Unity of all Religions. Edited by Ranjit Fernando. Sri Lanka Institute of Traditional Studies, P.O.Box 1204, Colombo, 1999. Paperback US$29.95 . ISBN 955 9028 01 4 TBA 10 color and 10 monochrome plates

A collection of essays by:
Joseph Epes Brown Titus Burckhardt Rama P. Coomaraswamy Gai Eaton
Isaline B. Horner Toshiko Izutsu Martin Lings Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Lord Northbourne Marco Pallis Whitall N. Perry Leo Schaya
Frithjof Shuon Philip Sherrard William Stoddart Elemire Zolla

Their subjects range over the religious doctrines of East and West and the societies which derived from them, including especially their sacred art and their sciences. In addition, and no less importantly, they demonstrate that the whole of that view of the world and of the nature of things common to all religions is, for mankind, the normal view-properly referred to as the traditional point of view-and that this view is absolutely opposed to and cannot be reconciled with the fundamentally profane beliefs and ideals which Order The Unanimous Tradition from Amazon.com have dominated European thought since the Renaissance, resulting in the destruction of Western Christianity.

When this book was first published in 1991 as a luxurious hardback, the Daily News in an editorial remarked that it `can certainly be regarded as a landmark in Lankan publishing ... with its fine binding, its exquisite paper and hand-mounted plates ...', going on to add that, `equal to the presentation and far more important is the content (where) sixteen internationally eminent traditionalists have come together to pay tribute to (Ananda) Coomaraswamy in a manner that brings alive to the reader, whether he is an academic or a lay person, the traditional or religious worldview of pre-modern man in contradistinction to the present, Western-invented, materialistic worldview which dominates today's world.'

The words neatly summarise the contents of this book: the original edition was a long time in the making, thus prompting an American commentator, Alvin Moore Jr., well-known in this philosophical area, to describe it in the learned journal, Sophia, as an `extraordinary and long-awaited book' in addition to what he called its `excellence.' Other scholars worldwide have been equally generous in their praise. And now a paperback version of this book is available, text and 20 plates printed on smooth white paper and priced at US$29.95 or Rs. 2,250 in Sri Lanka. It is available at the Vijitha Yapa Bookshop and at the Barefoot Bookshop or by mail order only from the publishers.

This new edition has itself broken fresh ground. Simultaneously with its publication in Colombo, it has been released in North America and the UK. It is already available from the leading book suppliers on the Internet from Amazon or Barnet & Noble. It is probably the first Sri Lankan publication to be distributed throughout the major English-speaking countries.

"Tribute to Coomaraswamy" Ceylon Daily News review of The Unanimous Tradition
Other publications by traditional authors
1999 Ananda Coomaraswamy Oration
René Guénon's biography