Samadhi, also called samapatti, in Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, and yogic schools refers to a state of meditative consciousness. In yogic traditions, and in the tradition of Buddhist commentaries on which the Burmese Vipassana movement …

Lao-Tse (also known as Laozi or Lao-Tze) was a Chinese philosopher credited with founding the philosophical system of Taoism. He is best known as the author of the Tao Te Ching, the work that exemplifies …

Sigurd, nicknamed “Snake’s Eye,” was a Viking warrior in the mid-9th century. According to The Tale of Ragnar Lodbrok, he is one of the sons of the legendary Viking Ragnar Lodbrok from Norse mythology. Sigurd …

Africans had their own form of worship and religion before Europeans discovered the continent and felt the need to introduce Christianity, through which they claimed to show Africans the “one true God.” That is why …

The Babylonians had many gods. Some of them were Sumerian, others Akkadian and other later groups, and others imported from the mountainous regions to the north and east of Mesopotamia. These Babylonian gods reflected the …

Details of Phoenician mythology, gods, and religious practices are scarce due to the lack of surviving written records. These are mainly from inscriptions excavated in various Phoenician cities, as no religious works such as a …

The old pagan gods, those legendary figures from the Norse, Greek, Roman, and many other belief systems, are fascinating subjects. These gods had all the emotional fallibility of human beings, but all the power of …

The Olmec gods belonged to the mythology of this pre-Hispanic culture, which was the first great civilization in Guatemala and Mexico. The Olmecs inhabited the tropical region of south-central Mexico, now occupied by the states …