Review: Great primer for a historical overview of meditation
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 03 28, 2014
If you are ready to learn more about the religious historical uses of meditation or some of the claims made by meditation movements, I encourage you to download this free ebook. At 59 pages (tablet sized/Kindle equivalent, read at normal font/type size) it is a well written, easy to read, slightly technical e-book on the historical uses of meditation in world religions (though we only get a nod as "new age"), by a professor of biology.I especially found it fascinating that meditation has been around for a long period of time and used/mentioned by all the major world religions. It seems conclusive that meditation has been used to bring about feelings of spiritual transformation or knowledge.It also seems (to me) that Transcendental Meditation sounds a lot like the con that Scientologists push. You don't need to spend a lot of money to learn to meditate and gain benefit from the practice. The possible dangers of Kundalini meditation (awakening Kundalini) would also have been interesting to read about if it had been included (it's not).For me the downside of this ebook is twofold. 1.) the abrupt conclusion doesn't match well with the introduction. There are scientific studies done on what benefits meditation brings to the individual. A quick Google search brings up Wiki which lists lots of hyperlinks [...]so having a list at the end of the book to studies both for and against would have improved the claims vs. science title.2.) The name and cover graphic to the e-book could be greatly improved. Since the book really didn't cite scientific studies in abundance the claims vs. science name is misleading to its interesting content. The cover picture is more fitting for a book on chakras. There are also about half a dozen spacing errors on paragraphs through I didn't find it hard to follow along.Overall, at a free price tag, definitely worth the read for those wanting to know more about meditation than sit down, close eyes and breathe.Reviewed by Cinnabarys.com