"An important and quite beautiful book". ("Library Journal"). "[Eliade] throws a searching and humbling light on our modern fragmented existence". ([London] "Times Literary Supplement"). "Treatment of such subjects as the meaning of the sacred, sun and moon worship, water symbolism, sacred stones, fertility cults, the earth mother, symbols of regeneration and the myth of eternal renewal, will interest the general reader as well as the scholar". ("New York Times"). "It is doubtful that one could encounter a more impressive work of scholarship and insight...All serious students of religion would derive enormous profit from the reading of this work". ("Kirkus"). In this era of increased knowledge the essence of religious phenomena eludes the psychologists, sociologists, linguists, and other specialists because they do not study it as religious. According to Mircea Eliade, they miss the one irreducible element in religious phenomena - the element of the sacred. Eliade abundantly demonstrates universal religious experience and shows how humanity's effort to live within a sacred sphere has manifested itself in myriad cultures from ancient to modern times; how certain beliefs, rituals, symbols, and myths have, with interesting variations, persisted. Mircea Eliade's works include the multivolume "History of Religious Ideas". John C. Holt is a professor of religion at Bowdoin College and the author of "The Religious World of Kirti Sri: Buddhism, Art, and Politics of Late Medieval Sri Lanka".

在本書中，伊利亞德論證了神聖與世俗從本質上說即是人類生命存在的兩種基本形式或者方式，他以神聖與世俗的樣式剪裁了古代社會中的一切行為和觀念、時間、空間、節目、勞動、生活、居住、婚育、人會式……，這種神聖與世俗的樣式在伊利亞德那裡幾乎成了一種方法論，用來說明歷史，也解讀神話 ，用來分析一切神聖的現象，也用來說明所有世俗的生

《印度古典美学》系教育部“九五”规划社会科学研究基金项目“印度美学研究”的最终成果，是国内第一部运用跨学科、多视角的研究方法全面论述印度古典美学与艺术的学术著作。本书立足于印度广阔的文化背景来展开印度美学特点的论述，揭示了印度哲学思想、宗教、文学与美学和艺术理论的内在联系，阐明了印度思想对印度民族审美观念和艺术创造的影响。本书注重史论结合，既突显了印度美学思想发展的基本轨迹，分析了印度美学思想在不同历史日寸期的特征及变化的状况，又具体展示了戏剧、建筑、雕刻、绘画、音乐、舞蹈等印度艺术的美学魅力。

巴利學是一門以巴利語、巴利文獻、和巴利佛教為研究對象的學科。由於在語言、文獻、宗教等方面的重要性，此一學科在西方及日本學界，百多年來即廣受重視。
本書即是以巴利學為中心的一部論文集，內容包括巨觀和微觀兩方面。巨觀方面主要有：巴利學發展狀況之回顧與展望、巴利語介紹、巴利文獻評介，以及《漢譯南傳大藏經》之評析等，提供了認識此一學科的相關基礎知識。微觀方面主要是：語言研究和文本校勘。通過實務的案例研究，具體顯示巴利語本及漢譯本的種種問題，以及解決此等問題的實際操作方法和程序。此外，本書也提出了一個兼具典藏和教學、研究效能的「多語多本平行語料庫」的構想，以便提升巴利學研究的精審度，並開發種種新的研究可能。