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The Book of Nature: The Astonishing Beauty of God’s First Sacred Text
We live inside a nautilus of prayer--if only we open our senses and perceive what is infused all around. Throughout millennia and across the monotheistic religions, the natural was often revered as a sacred text. By the Middle Ages, this text was given a name, "The Book of Nature," the first, best entry point for encounter with the divine. The very act of "reading" the world, of focusing our attention on each twinkling star and unfurling blossom, humbles us and draws us into sacred encounter. As we grapple to make sense of today's tumultuous world, one where nature is at once a damaged and damaging source of disaster, as well as a place of refuge and retreat, we are called again to examine how generously it awaits our attention and devotion, standing ready to be read by all. Weaving together the astonishments of science; the profound wisdom and literary gems of thinkers, poets, and observers who have come before us; and her own spiritual practice and gentle observation, Barbara Mahany reintroduces us to The Book of Nature, an experiential framework of the divine. God's first revelation came to us through an ongoing creation, one that--through stillness and attentiveness to the rumblings of the heavens, the seasonal eruptions of earth, the invisible pull of migration, of tide, and of celestial shiftings--draws us into sacred encounter. We needn't look farther for the divine.
191 pages, Hardcover
Published March 21, 2023
13 people are currently reading
379 people want to read
About the author
Barbara Mahany
8 books30 followersFrom the front pages of the Chicago Tribune, to her revered page-two columns, Barbara Mahany has opened her heart and told her stories and the stories of her family’s life that have drawn in thousands of readers for decades. She writes from the well of her Christian-Jewish marriage. Bracingly honest and heart-achingly daring, she explores the sacred mysteries with a voice, recognizable and clear. She is a sought-after speaker, and writing teacher. She lives in Wilmette, Illinois.
She and her husband, Blair Kamin, the Tribune's Pulitzer Prize-winning architecture critic, have two sons, Will, a senior at Amherst College, and Teddy, an eighth grader. Slowing Time: Seeing the Sacred Outside Your Kitchen Door (Abingdon Press, October 2014) is her first book. During the 2012-2013 academic year, when her husband was a Nieman Journalism Fellow at Harvard University, Mahany and her family lived in Cambridge, MA. Mahany, originally a pediatric oncology nurse and short on undergraduate humanities courses, indulged as a Nieman affiliate in as many literature, poetry, African-American history, global health, religion, and long-form narrative writing courses as she could possibly consume at Harvard College and Harvard Divinity School.
She and her husband, Blair Kamin, the Tribune's Pulitzer Prize-winning architecture critic, have two sons, Will, a senior at Amherst College, and Teddy, an eighth grader. Slowing Time: Seeing the Sacred Outside Your Kitchen Door (Abingdon Press, October 2014) is her first book. During the 2012-2013 academic year, when her husband was a Nieman Journalism Fellow at Harvard University, Mahany and her family lived in Cambridge, MA. Mahany, originally a pediatric oncology nurse and short on undergraduate humanities courses, indulged as a Nieman affiliate in as many literature, poetry, African-American history, global health, religion, and long-form narrative writing courses as she could possibly consume at Harvard College and Harvard Divinity School.
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February 2, 2023
Thomas Aquinas spoke of two books in which God is revealed---Scripture and Nature. Karl Barth, of course, wasn't so sure that nature could reveal God to us. He had his reasons, which were valid in his context. But, what about us? Might we do so? Perhaps!
I was sent an advanced reading copy of Barbara Mahany's "The Book of Nature," in which she shares ways in which nature does reveal the divine. She brings to the conversation her own Christian faith, but also her immersion into Judaism through her marriage. Together, these two witnesses bring out important dimensions of nature's witness. The subtitle is revealing: The Astounding Beauty of God's First Sacred Text." Before there was scripture, there was nature, speaking to humanity the presence of God the creator. In this book, we explore the various elements of that sacred text.
The author, Barbara Mahany is a freelance journalist and author, with many of her essays appearing in the Chicago Tribune. She writes about nature, spirituality, and interfaith considerations and how they intersect. We see that present in her book. As noted above, she engages this subject from a progressive Roman Catholic perspective, that brings into the conversation her personal encounters with Judaism. Together these two perspectives provide a lens for a conversation with nature.
In an introductory chapter speaking about "Reading the Book of Nature," Mahany notes that "mine is the God of sunrise and nightfall, the breath behind birdsong and breeze in the oaks. Mine is the God of a thousand voices, a thousand lights, and gazillions of colors. Whether I notice or not, mine is the God who never hits pause when it comes to creation: inventing, reinventing, tweaking, editing, starting from scratch all over again, day after day after heavenly day" (p. 8). We see this vision of God present throughout the book. In her engagement with this Two-Book theology, she draws on a number of sources, including Celtic spirituality, as well as Eastern thought, Judaism, Sufism, and indigenous traditions. What we have here, by her own acknowledgment is an expression of panentheism (not pantheism). God is in nature but not the same as nature. In essence, this book serves as an invitation to the reader, especially the Christian reader, to once again engage nature so as to see, hear, and sense God's presence in nature. This book invites us not only to be present in nature but the pay attention to its voice.
Mahany describes the meditations found in the book as "prayerful immersions into the earthly kaleidoscope where the sacred awaits --- by there pulses through each an awareness that, as a planet, we are teetering on a very thin edge: this blessed creation, the whole of it is in peril." (p. 28). In other words, this isn't just a nature-based spirituality, it is also a call to recognize the challenges facing the Book of Nature (including climate change). So, we engage with this Book, so that we might see and experience God's presence as a result.
Mahany divides the meditations into three sections. The first section is titled "The Earthly," where she speaks of gardens, woods, the water's edge, and the earth's turning. The second section is titled "The Liminal." Here she considers the lives of birds, as well as "Gentle Rain, Thrashing Storm," Wind, and the First Snow. Finally, we come to "The Heavenly." Here she explores the images of the Dawn, Dusk, Stars, and Moon. As we wander through nature, with Mahany as a guide, we experience a sense of wonder as to what is revealed here. She's especially taken with certain Jewish texts as well as Thoreau, as well as Annie Dillard, to name a few of her companions along the way.
Mahany concludes the book with an epilogue where she offers "Lamentations for the Book of Nature." This is a recognition of the ephemerality of nature, its fragility, and its brokenness. She's concerned that we are not as attentive to the Book of Nature as we should, and thus "we no longer hear the voices of the rivers, the mountains, or the sea ---the murmurs of this holy earth." (p. 147). While she laments the loss, she also invites us to pay attention to these voices, including the birds outside the back door.
To read Mahany's meditations, and take in the "Litany's of Astonishment" that follow each of the sections, is to reengage with the Book of Nature, and as a result take notice of God's presence as the creator and lover of creation.
I was sent an advanced reading copy of Barbara Mahany's "The Book of Nature," in which she shares ways in which nature does reveal the divine. She brings to the conversation her own Christian faith, but also her immersion into Judaism through her marriage. Together, these two witnesses bring out important dimensions of nature's witness. The subtitle is revealing: The Astounding Beauty of God's First Sacred Text." Before there was scripture, there was nature, speaking to humanity the presence of God the creator. In this book, we explore the various elements of that sacred text.
The author, Barbara Mahany is a freelance journalist and author, with many of her essays appearing in the Chicago Tribune. She writes about nature, spirituality, and interfaith considerations and how they intersect. We see that present in her book. As noted above, she engages this subject from a progressive Roman Catholic perspective, that brings into the conversation her personal encounters with Judaism. Together these two perspectives provide a lens for a conversation with nature.
In an introductory chapter speaking about "Reading the Book of Nature," Mahany notes that "mine is the God of sunrise and nightfall, the breath behind birdsong and breeze in the oaks. Mine is the God of a thousand voices, a thousand lights, and gazillions of colors. Whether I notice or not, mine is the God who never hits pause when it comes to creation: inventing, reinventing, tweaking, editing, starting from scratch all over again, day after day after heavenly day" (p. 8). We see this vision of God present throughout the book. In her engagement with this Two-Book theology, she draws on a number of sources, including Celtic spirituality, as well as Eastern thought, Judaism, Sufism, and indigenous traditions. What we have here, by her own acknowledgment is an expression of panentheism (not pantheism). God is in nature but not the same as nature. In essence, this book serves as an invitation to the reader, especially the Christian reader, to once again engage nature so as to see, hear, and sense God's presence in nature. This book invites us not only to be present in nature but the pay attention to its voice.
Mahany describes the meditations found in the book as "prayerful immersions into the earthly kaleidoscope where the sacred awaits --- by there pulses through each an awareness that, as a planet, we are teetering on a very thin edge: this blessed creation, the whole of it is in peril." (p. 28). In other words, this isn't just a nature-based spirituality, it is also a call to recognize the challenges facing the Book of Nature (including climate change). So, we engage with this Book, so that we might see and experience God's presence as a result.
Mahany divides the meditations into three sections. The first section is titled "The Earthly," where she speaks of gardens, woods, the water's edge, and the earth's turning. The second section is titled "The Liminal." Here she considers the lives of birds, as well as "Gentle Rain, Thrashing Storm," Wind, and the First Snow. Finally, we come to "The Heavenly." Here she explores the images of the Dawn, Dusk, Stars, and Moon. As we wander through nature, with Mahany as a guide, we experience a sense of wonder as to what is revealed here. She's especially taken with certain Jewish texts as well as Thoreau, as well as Annie Dillard, to name a few of her companions along the way.
Mahany concludes the book with an epilogue where she offers "Lamentations for the Book of Nature." This is a recognition of the ephemerality of nature, its fragility, and its brokenness. She's concerned that we are not as attentive to the Book of Nature as we should, and thus "we no longer hear the voices of the rivers, the mountains, or the sea ---the murmurs of this holy earth." (p. 147). While she laments the loss, she also invites us to pay attention to these voices, including the birds outside the back door.
To read Mahany's meditations, and take in the "Litany's of Astonishment" that follow each of the sections, is to reengage with the Book of Nature, and as a result take notice of God's presence as the creator and lover of creation.
March 17, 2023
Stepping into the Giant Prayer Book of Nature
Toward the end of The Wizard of Oz, the good witch Glinda is preparing to send Dorothy back to Kansas and asks Dorothy what she has learned through all of her tumultuous adventures. Dorothy hems and haws a bit as she answers, then she realizes that her experiences in the Technicolor land of Oz have jolted her into an entirely new appreciation of what she once thought of as the boring black-and-white land of rural Kansas. Finally, Dorothy tells Glinda:
"If I ever go looking for my heart’s desire again, I won’t look any farther than my own backyard; because if it isn’t there, I never really lost it to begin with."
Dorothy Gale never actually appears among the more than 100 famous folks quoted in Barbara Mahany’s new The Book of Nature: The Astonishing Beauty of God’s First Sacred Text. But I am crediting Dorothy in this overview of Barbara’s new book as having prophetically captured the spiritual impulse behind this remarkable collection of meditations.
Barbara’s latest book is truly “remarkable,” because her aim is nothing short of “bedazzlement”—trying to summon all of our senses to a fresh appreciation of, quite literally, the natural world in our own back yards from gardens, trees and birds to wind, snow, dawn, dusk and the stars at night.
Down through the millennia, she explains, great writers and spiritual sages have “read” this “book of nature” as a revelatory gift from God. She writes:
“Mine is the God of sunrise and nightfall, the breath behind birdsong and breeze in the oaks. Mine is the God of a thousand voices, a thousand lights, and gazillions of colors. Whether I notice or not, mine is the God who never hits pause when it comes to creation: inventing, reinventing, tweaking, editing, starting from scratch all over again, day after day after heavenly day.”
Detailing the many perspectives readers will find in this collage of reflections, the American Library Association’s recommendation of her book begins with these lines:
“Writing with a nurse’s foundation, a scientist’s eye, a theologian’s mind, and a poet’s soul, journalist Mahany contemplates God’s presence as revealed in nature—God’s ‘first sacred text.’ Tracing the Judeo-Christian belief that scripture succeeds and augments nature by directing humanity to knowledge of the divine, Mahany looks to nature itself, marveling at its intricacies and blending scientific facts with literary descriptions that all point unquestionably to a grand designer worthy of worship.”
Beyond the revelations of this nature-based approach to spirituality, in these pages readers also will discover a second spiritual discipline that will be of particular interest to anyone who loves writing, enjoys self-expression or pursues the vocations of teaching or preaching.
Barbara doesn’t fully unveil this second spiritual practice until the middle page of this book, page 87 to be precise. That’s the page where she pauses to explain how she assembled this new book with its kaleidoscope of citations to other writers and sages. She was able to amass these vast resources—this crowdsourcing of her own book—through many years of a daily practice known as keeping a “commonplace.”
Despite the name, it’s certainly not a common term, today, but perhaps you recall seeing that unusual term somewhere? The practice stretches back many centuries as a sort of first cousin to keeping a daily diary or journal. Rather than simply recording one’s own notes in a notebook, a commonplace is a sort of scrapbook of collected bits and pieces from other writers and published sources.
Barbara began doing this during the many years she wrote for The Chicago Tribune. As she was working on her own reading, research and reporting through those years, she would save “all the best little bits I found.” This “squirreling away,” as she describes it, is the heart of the practice followed by writers and scholars from ancient Greeks to the Renaissance—to many writers today.
Sherlock Holmes created huge commonplace volumes for his personal library on a wide range of subjects. As Holmes researched the clues in one particular case, he turned to his commonplacing and Arthur Conan Doyle describes the great sleuth digging into a series of these tomes while sitting “upon the floor like some strange Buddha, with crossed legs, the huge books all round him.”
In fact, there is a long tradition of “commonplacing” among mystery writers. For example, a master of the “webwork plot,” Harry Stephen Keeler, would actually combine his mystery manuscripts and his commonplacing by pasting newspaper clippings into the pages of his early drafts.
Within literary circles, commonplacing keeps popping up as a valuable resource. W.H. Auden published one of his volumes, titled A Certain World—a Commonplace Book. The legendary comic book creator Alan Moore and novelist Virginia Woolf both have followed the “commonplacing tradition.” And today, fans of Lemony Snicket’s YA novels have read about this practice. Dozens of bestsellers over the years have amounted to commonplaces devoted to a particular theme, especially books that are collections of the best last words, eulogies and obituaries. In his book, Shining Brightly, Howard Brown describes how Babson College founder Roger Babson spread happiness each day of his life with his own commonplacing practice of sharing his joyful quotations with people he met. In Guide for Caregivers, Benjamin Pratt also recommends carrying your commonplace quotes with you on slips of paper to share with others.
In this book, Barbara describes the spiritual gifts of this process—and the reflections that spring from it—as “choreography” and the winding spiritual pathway through these reflections as “ideas wriggling around deep in your soul.”
If you want to start your own spiritual practice with the real-life book of nature—perhaps in your own back yard or in natural areas near your home—Barbara closes her book with a 30-page treasure map. Well, you might not recognize it, at first glance, as a map. But that’s what she lays out.
Part of this map is a detailed list of the 200 or so books by more than 100 writers that she explored as she prepared this manuscript. Then, she curates her own list with a section she calls “A Bookshelf of Wonder.” In these pages, she walks us through her library, pulls out books one or two at a time and explains in a paragraph why each selection might be valuable for her readers to explore.
Toward the end of The Wizard of Oz, the good witch Glinda is preparing to send Dorothy back to Kansas and asks Dorothy what she has learned through all of her tumultuous adventures. Dorothy hems and haws a bit as she answers, then she realizes that her experiences in the Technicolor land of Oz have jolted her into an entirely new appreciation of what she once thought of as the boring black-and-white land of rural Kansas. Finally, Dorothy tells Glinda:
"If I ever go looking for my heart’s desire again, I won’t look any farther than my own backyard; because if it isn’t there, I never really lost it to begin with."
Dorothy Gale never actually appears among the more than 100 famous folks quoted in Barbara Mahany’s new The Book of Nature: The Astonishing Beauty of God’s First Sacred Text. But I am crediting Dorothy in this overview of Barbara’s new book as having prophetically captured the spiritual impulse behind this remarkable collection of meditations.
Barbara’s latest book is truly “remarkable,” because her aim is nothing short of “bedazzlement”—trying to summon all of our senses to a fresh appreciation of, quite literally, the natural world in our own back yards from gardens, trees and birds to wind, snow, dawn, dusk and the stars at night.
Down through the millennia, she explains, great writers and spiritual sages have “read” this “book of nature” as a revelatory gift from God. She writes:
“Mine is the God of sunrise and nightfall, the breath behind birdsong and breeze in the oaks. Mine is the God of a thousand voices, a thousand lights, and gazillions of colors. Whether I notice or not, mine is the God who never hits pause when it comes to creation: inventing, reinventing, tweaking, editing, starting from scratch all over again, day after day after heavenly day.”
Detailing the many perspectives readers will find in this collage of reflections, the American Library Association’s recommendation of her book begins with these lines:
“Writing with a nurse’s foundation, a scientist’s eye, a theologian’s mind, and a poet’s soul, journalist Mahany contemplates God’s presence as revealed in nature—God’s ‘first sacred text.’ Tracing the Judeo-Christian belief that scripture succeeds and augments nature by directing humanity to knowledge of the divine, Mahany looks to nature itself, marveling at its intricacies and blending scientific facts with literary descriptions that all point unquestionably to a grand designer worthy of worship.”
Beyond the revelations of this nature-based approach to spirituality, in these pages readers also will discover a second spiritual discipline that will be of particular interest to anyone who loves writing, enjoys self-expression or pursues the vocations of teaching or preaching.
Barbara doesn’t fully unveil this second spiritual practice until the middle page of this book, page 87 to be precise. That’s the page where she pauses to explain how she assembled this new book with its kaleidoscope of citations to other writers and sages. She was able to amass these vast resources—this crowdsourcing of her own book—through many years of a daily practice known as keeping a “commonplace.”
Despite the name, it’s certainly not a common term, today, but perhaps you recall seeing that unusual term somewhere? The practice stretches back many centuries as a sort of first cousin to keeping a daily diary or journal. Rather than simply recording one’s own notes in a notebook, a commonplace is a sort of scrapbook of collected bits and pieces from other writers and published sources.
Barbara began doing this during the many years she wrote for The Chicago Tribune. As she was working on her own reading, research and reporting through those years, she would save “all the best little bits I found.” This “squirreling away,” as she describes it, is the heart of the practice followed by writers and scholars from ancient Greeks to the Renaissance—to many writers today.
Sherlock Holmes created huge commonplace volumes for his personal library on a wide range of subjects. As Holmes researched the clues in one particular case, he turned to his commonplacing and Arthur Conan Doyle describes the great sleuth digging into a series of these tomes while sitting “upon the floor like some strange Buddha, with crossed legs, the huge books all round him.”
In fact, there is a long tradition of “commonplacing” among mystery writers. For example, a master of the “webwork plot,” Harry Stephen Keeler, would actually combine his mystery manuscripts and his commonplacing by pasting newspaper clippings into the pages of his early drafts.
Within literary circles, commonplacing keeps popping up as a valuable resource. W.H. Auden published one of his volumes, titled A Certain World—a Commonplace Book. The legendary comic book creator Alan Moore and novelist Virginia Woolf both have followed the “commonplacing tradition.” And today, fans of Lemony Snicket’s YA novels have read about this practice. Dozens of bestsellers over the years have amounted to commonplaces devoted to a particular theme, especially books that are collections of the best last words, eulogies and obituaries. In his book, Shining Brightly, Howard Brown describes how Babson College founder Roger Babson spread happiness each day of his life with his own commonplacing practice of sharing his joyful quotations with people he met. In Guide for Caregivers, Benjamin Pratt also recommends carrying your commonplace quotes with you on slips of paper to share with others.
In this book, Barbara describes the spiritual gifts of this process—and the reflections that spring from it—as “choreography” and the winding spiritual pathway through these reflections as “ideas wriggling around deep in your soul.”
If you want to start your own spiritual practice with the real-life book of nature—perhaps in your own back yard or in natural areas near your home—Barbara closes her book with a 30-page treasure map. Well, you might not recognize it, at first glance, as a map. But that’s what she lays out.
Part of this map is a detailed list of the 200 or so books by more than 100 writers that she explored as she prepared this manuscript. Then, she curates her own list with a section she calls “A Bookshelf of Wonder.” In these pages, she walks us through her library, pulls out books one or two at a time and explains in a paragraph why each selection might be valuable for her readers to explore.
April 19, 2023
The Book of Nature is a beautiful exploration of the overlap of religion and our natural world, how nature is a sacred text and an encounter with the Divine.
February 24, 2024
I found The Book of Nature an uneven read. The book is an odd weave of lots of books -- poetry, nature writing, and religious perspectives -- with personal accounts of the author's experiences with Nature. Although the "book of nature" is presented as the first book of God (and there is a theological tradition of this), there doesn't seem to be a basic theme around which all these pieces are organized. The author's personal encounters of nature are sometimes sentimentalized and often recorded with colorful language that is contrived and surely doesn't communicate the experience as the author wishes. I found it surprising that among the many religious works the author quotes, she neglects The Canticle of Creatures of St. Francis of Assisi.
I found the author's difficulty with severe storms, any kind of destruction and death in Nature curious -- after all, these are completely natural processes. Yet, the author seems to remove natural law and God from these, other than to say God feels as she does -- or she feels as God does (questionable theology). The author also seems to equate her garden which she plants and manipulates (at least to some extent) with Nature to be lean at best. Does she not recall I Kings 19 when God spoke to Elijah that God specifically was not in the events of Nature? I found the treatment of Nature as all beauty and harmonious a bit trite, neglectful of the full range of Nature. On the other hand, there are a few passages where the author does seem to bring this different considerations into a meaningful and resonant tone.
I began reading this as part of my devotional reading but found it completely unsuitable for this. The best I can say is that the author should rethink the book, reimagine it -- I believe she may be capable of a much better work. To possible readers I would suggest not reading this book but making a reading list from the sources the author uses and mostly, spend time outdoors in Nature, searching.
I found the author's difficulty with severe storms, any kind of destruction and death in Nature curious -- after all, these are completely natural processes. Yet, the author seems to remove natural law and God from these, other than to say God feels as she does -- or she feels as God does (questionable theology). The author also seems to equate her garden which she plants and manipulates (at least to some extent) with Nature to be lean at best. Does she not recall I Kings 19 when God spoke to Elijah that God specifically was not in the events of Nature? I found the treatment of Nature as all beauty and harmonious a bit trite, neglectful of the full range of Nature. On the other hand, there are a few passages where the author does seem to bring this different considerations into a meaningful and resonant tone.
I began reading this as part of my devotional reading but found it completely unsuitable for this. The best I can say is that the author should rethink the book, reimagine it -- I believe she may be capable of a much better work. To possible readers I would suggest not reading this book but making a reading list from the sources the author uses and mostly, spend time outdoors in Nature, searching.
March 14, 2023
I have always appreciated and adored my neighbor,
fellow mom of boys, and lover of words, who is Barbara. But this one, wow, was spun from the Divine. It came at the perfect moment in my life where I was looking for the space my spirituality was seeking, and it had been drawing me into nature. I just didn't realize how profoundly I was seeking it until I read Barbara's holy inspired book. Not only does she describe her own personal journey, but offers us the added wisdom of science, of poetry,
mythology, and of course the multilayers of scripture and spiritual seekers of all sorts. I will keep my guide book on hand as the seasons change and moonlight ebbs and flows.
fellow mom of boys, and lover of words, who is Barbara. But this one, wow, was spun from the Divine. It came at the perfect moment in my life where I was looking for the space my spirituality was seeking, and it had been drawing me into nature. I just didn't realize how profoundly I was seeking it until I read Barbara's holy inspired book. Not only does she describe her own personal journey, but offers us the added wisdom of science, of poetry,
mythology, and of course the multilayers of scripture and spiritual seekers of all sorts. I will keep my guide book on hand as the seasons change and moonlight ebbs and flows.
October 26, 2023
Steeped in both Jewish and Roman Catholic tradition and with a mind as keen as her eyesight, author Barbara Mahany offers readers a feast of awe, in a buffet of language as exquisite as the creation she describes. I savored every page. If you hunt God's character and beauty in the created world and love considering and discussing ways it's transcribed into the written word, I trust you will, too.
June 7, 2024
I have not finished this book, this is a book that I will have to read in small chunks. Each page is its own lyrical journey and I enjoy copying all the different quotes in my journal. Highly recommended.
January 14, 2024
I almost gave up on this book. I thought about giving it two stars. But once I started it, I didn’t want to quit. And I’m glad I didn’t.
What irritated me early on in the book became some of my favorite aspects of the book: the author writes lyrically and with very precise word choices AND she references so many writers it almost seemed like none of it was her own. But, now I have a REALLY handy reference book for future reading (she includes an annotated short bibliography of her favorite authors, by topic, and a traditional more complete bibliography of everything referenced in the book).
After completing it, I definitely recommend it… just read it during the day, not when you’re wanting to fall asleep. There’s too much good stuff to think about. In fact, it’s a good book to ready slowly, almost prayerfully, to really “steep” yourself in it, as one of my favorite conversationalists used to say.
What irritated me early on in the book became some of my favorite aspects of the book: the author writes lyrically and with very precise word choices AND she references so many writers it almost seemed like none of it was her own. But, now I have a REALLY handy reference book for future reading (she includes an annotated short bibliography of her favorite authors, by topic, and a traditional more complete bibliography of everything referenced in the book).
After completing it, I definitely recommend it… just read it during the day, not when you’re wanting to fall asleep. There’s too much good stuff to think about. In fact, it’s a good book to ready slowly, almost prayerfully, to really “steep” yourself in it, as one of my favorite conversationalists used to say.
June 28, 2023
When Ms. Mahany kept referring to the ancient "Book of Nature," I somehow figured I had missed something along the way because I had not heard of it. This is not exactly well explained in the beginning but now I have an understanding of it: "relationship between religion and science is a religious and philosophical concept originating in the Latin Middle Ages which views nature as a book to be read for knowledge and understanding." (thanks Wikipedia)
So the "Book of Nature" is really nature as a teacher, one that has been around quite literally forever and it continues to teach us. This book is an interesting exploration of Jewish and Christian (especially Catholicism) concepts as the author was raised Catholic and her husband is Jewish and they honor both belief systems.
This is for spiritual explorers and those concerned about destructive climate change and of course those who get filled up inside by being in nature. Our author uses a lot of high-level language (big words!). She is clearly very caring, introspective and intelligent. Possibly could have made this a bit more accessible for the average reader. There is an impressive list of annotations for further reading as well as a great bibliography.
So the "Book of Nature" is really nature as a teacher, one that has been around quite literally forever and it continues to teach us. This book is an interesting exploration of Jewish and Christian (especially Catholicism) concepts as the author was raised Catholic and her husband is Jewish and they honor both belief systems.
This is for spiritual explorers and those concerned about destructive climate change and of course those who get filled up inside by being in nature. Our author uses a lot of high-level language (big words!). She is clearly very caring, introspective and intelligent. Possibly could have made this a bit more accessible for the average reader. There is an impressive list of annotations for further reading as well as a great bibliography.
March 13, 2024
Small, but rich and full of insights into the mysteries that surround us every day. Mahany does what Mary Oliver admonishes us on how to live: Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it. This book does just that. The author has paid attention and is astonished and now she's telling about it. Nature abounds things that spark awe, if only we would slow down and notice. Inspirational, a great blend of science, wonder, and spiritual responses. A book to read slowly, to savor, to reread. Plus I had to constantly look up the meanings of words.
Love the ending bibliography - more inspiration and encouragement to learn, to live with our eyes, senses, and mind open to all that nature and God has for us.
Second reading with a book group: Excellent! The other people also enjoyed it - finding inspiration to read the Book of Nature, to look, to see, to be in awe, to be led to God through nature.
Love the ending bibliography - more inspiration and encouragement to learn, to live with our eyes, senses, and mind open to all that nature and God has for us.
Second reading with a book group: Excellent! The other people also enjoyed it - finding inspiration to read the Book of Nature, to look, to see, to be in awe, to be led to God through nature.
May 20, 2024
Why do publishers make it so doggoned difficult to read wonderful books like this by printing them in tiny, tiny fonts? Is that an 8 pt font? Sure looks like it....
The writing itself is wonderful...very meditative...I am hoping they publish this in paperback with a larger font...the small print made a superior book difficult to read.
The writing itself is wonderful...very meditative...I am hoping they publish this in paperback with a larger font...the small print made a superior book difficult to read.
September 10, 2023
A great introduction and comprehensive look at what Opening the Book of Nature meant to the 3 main Christian traditions. A great read for those interested in the connection between the sacred and the world of Nature.
September 20, 2023
Well written and insightful. Religious, without being overly preachy.
September 24, 2023
One of the best books I have read this year. I will recommend this book to everyone!! Beautifully written and poetic throughout. This is a slow savory read.
April 15, 2024
This was a spectacularly written book, spiritual, yet not trying to focus on anyonel religion. Full of such imagery and Melody, and the extra bibliography is exceptionally helpful.
May 3, 2023
This is a book that will inspire and delight us as we seek to face what Thomas Merton called the "unspeakable secret" that "paradise is all around us and we do not understand it." Throughout this dazzling book Barbara Mahany invites us to honor this immeasurable treasure and understand its fragile beauty, at least a little more faithfully, as we learn to discover what the ancients called "the book of nature." She writes with a poet's eye and a lover's heart, and feels her way forward with a gardener's seasoned hands and a prophet's keen conscience.
Her prose is as luscious as it is provocative, summoning us to open ourselves to creation's infinitely varied life and explore it as a paradise-on-earth that is as mysterious and magnificent as it is imperiled by our often reckless disregard for its integrity. In writing that both challenges and provokes Barbara offers us what she describes as "prayerful immersions into the earth's kaleidoscope where the sacred awaits," recognizing at the same time that this fragile beauty (of which we are a part) is imperiled by human violence and indifference. Throughout the pages of this marvelous book, she awakens us to the wonder of this life and the majesty of this earth, reminding us that our misuse of this "paradise" diminishes us and threatens to bring about our demise. "It’s ours to love, this Book of Nature," she writes, "offering page after page to pore over--this book with its infinite lessons, its thousand embraces." It's also ours to protect, she insists, enticing us to see our role in cherishing and defending the fierce but also fragile web of life borne by this earth. She draws widely and deeply from the wisdom of those who tend this living "book," reminding us that we are part of its unfolding script as she calls us to honor it with reverence, delight in it with wonder, and uphold it with respect. With a poet's sensibility she invites us to discover the "embeddedness of the divine in all creation," and warns that losing a sense of "the holiness, otherness, wonder, and beauty in all of creation" causes us to lose "one of the most central parts of being human" (Paul Kingsnorth).
She also recalls John Keats' notion of "the poetry of the earth" as our birthright and destiny, and in chapters that are alluring in voice, poetic in sensibility, and prophetic at heart, she coaxes us to turn from an indifference to "the book of Nature" that would squander this treasure of which we are a part. Her sources are a diverse chorus of voices drawn from the world's "book" religions and literatures as well as the oral traditions of earth-centered wisdom from indigenous and "first nations" peoples. She derives her inspiration and provocation from the ranks of scientists and writers, activists and artists who found traces of the sacred in their own experience, often without recourse to ancient religions with their scriptures and traditions. If you hope to hope to find one book to cherish this year, for the sake of the earth's future and our own, search no more. Let this be this one.
Her prose is as luscious as it is provocative, summoning us to open ourselves to creation's infinitely varied life and explore it as a paradise-on-earth that is as mysterious and magnificent as it is imperiled by our often reckless disregard for its integrity. In writing that both challenges and provokes Barbara offers us what she describes as "prayerful immersions into the earth's kaleidoscope where the sacred awaits," recognizing at the same time that this fragile beauty (of which we are a part) is imperiled by human violence and indifference. Throughout the pages of this marvelous book, she awakens us to the wonder of this life and the majesty of this earth, reminding us that our misuse of this "paradise" diminishes us and threatens to bring about our demise. "It’s ours to love, this Book of Nature," she writes, "offering page after page to pore over--this book with its infinite lessons, its thousand embraces." It's also ours to protect, she insists, enticing us to see our role in cherishing and defending the fierce but also fragile web of life borne by this earth. She draws widely and deeply from the wisdom of those who tend this living "book," reminding us that we are part of its unfolding script as she calls us to honor it with reverence, delight in it with wonder, and uphold it with respect. With a poet's sensibility she invites us to discover the "embeddedness of the divine in all creation," and warns that losing a sense of "the holiness, otherness, wonder, and beauty in all of creation" causes us to lose "one of the most central parts of being human" (Paul Kingsnorth).
She also recalls John Keats' notion of "the poetry of the earth" as our birthright and destiny, and in chapters that are alluring in voice, poetic in sensibility, and prophetic at heart, she coaxes us to turn from an indifference to "the book of Nature" that would squander this treasure of which we are a part. Her sources are a diverse chorus of voices drawn from the world's "book" religions and literatures as well as the oral traditions of earth-centered wisdom from indigenous and "first nations" peoples. She derives her inspiration and provocation from the ranks of scientists and writers, activists and artists who found traces of the sacred in their own experience, often without recourse to ancient religions with their scriptures and traditions. If you hope to hope to find one book to cherish this year, for the sake of the earth's future and our own, search no more. Let this be this one.
June 26, 2025
"Admire the Lord by contemplating crewtion." -- St. John Chrysostom
I am a practicing Christian, but it is not unusual for practicing Christians to have doubts and struggles with faith. One time I was sitting on my back porch, killing time on my smart phone, and a tiny insect, no bigger than the crosspiece of the "t" in at&t, landed on the screen. I watched as it walked around and preened itself and flapped its wings before flying off, so perfect and so alive, and giving me spiritual assurance as I contemplated this seemingly-insignificant creature. God often reaches out to us through the wonders of creation, even the simplest ones, to help us know His presence.
That is what this book is about. Every religion has its sacred texts and stories, but most of make reference to a second sacred text: creation itself. Some are more firmly-rooted and focused their than others. The motif is all over the sacred texts of Judaism and Christianity, though it often takes a back seat to doctrine and ethics and, in modern times, a science-based approach to nature.
Barbara Mahany operates from a Judaeo-Christian point of view: she is Catholic and her husband is Jewish and their family observes both traditions. She makes reference to other religions as well. From a Judaeo-Christian perspective, she points out how the sun and moon and stars, created by God to light the world but also to be a sign of the seasons, also influenced the observance and symbolism of holy days for our spiritual ancestors who were much closer to knowing the real life found in creation than we modern tend to be. From her home in the Chicago suburbs near Lake Michigan, she also shares her experiences of God on the lakeshore, in her garden, in a woods or in a field of flowers, in all the life forms and forces of nature. It's a miracle all around us, if we just have eyes to see it.
This is a beautifully-written and profoundly-spiritual book. It is loaded with quotes and provides lots of suggestion for further reading. It was good for my spiritual growth. Just as when I tried my hand and drawing and painting years ago and I noticed that I was beginning to look at and see everything differently, so I have begun to look at see everything differently from reading this book. So thanks Barbara Mahany, and tiny insect, and the God who makes Himself known through everything around us.
I am a practicing Christian, but it is not unusual for practicing Christians to have doubts and struggles with faith. One time I was sitting on my back porch, killing time on my smart phone, and a tiny insect, no bigger than the crosspiece of the "t" in at&t, landed on the screen. I watched as it walked around and preened itself and flapped its wings before flying off, so perfect and so alive, and giving me spiritual assurance as I contemplated this seemingly-insignificant creature. God often reaches out to us through the wonders of creation, even the simplest ones, to help us know His presence.
That is what this book is about. Every religion has its sacred texts and stories, but most of make reference to a second sacred text: creation itself. Some are more firmly-rooted and focused their than others. The motif is all over the sacred texts of Judaism and Christianity, though it often takes a back seat to doctrine and ethics and, in modern times, a science-based approach to nature.
Barbara Mahany operates from a Judaeo-Christian point of view: she is Catholic and her husband is Jewish and their family observes both traditions. She makes reference to other religions as well. From a Judaeo-Christian perspective, she points out how the sun and moon and stars, created by God to light the world but also to be a sign of the seasons, also influenced the observance and symbolism of holy days for our spiritual ancestors who were much closer to knowing the real life found in creation than we modern tend to be. From her home in the Chicago suburbs near Lake Michigan, she also shares her experiences of God on the lakeshore, in her garden, in a woods or in a field of flowers, in all the life forms and forces of nature. It's a miracle all around us, if we just have eyes to see it.
This is a beautifully-written and profoundly-spiritual book. It is loaded with quotes and provides lots of suggestion for further reading. It was good for my spiritual growth. Just as when I tried my hand and drawing and painting years ago and I noticed that I was beginning to look at and see everything differently, so I have begun to look at see everything differently from reading this book. So thanks Barbara Mahany, and tiny insect, and the God who makes Himself known through everything around us.
October 11, 2025
There is much to commend this book, an exploration of Nature and how it can inspire us if we pay attention. But the author’s over-use of obscure words when a quotidian one (her favourite!) would do, and writing that seems contrived and self-consciously poetic (over use of simile, alliteration and other obvious poetic devices), as well as constant quotes from other authors, sometimes made me feel similarly to having over-indulged in too rich food. The science she included was interesting, and her descriptions of her own experience enlightening even if at times overly sentimental and a bit anthropocentric (as when seeing some parts of nature as ugly or distressing). The content was worthwhile and much of it worth re-visiting, but it could use a major re-write. It does include a well annotated book list and bibliography, and I did like it enough to order my own copy.
April 9, 2025
This is beautifully and thoughtfully written. Each chapter is like a poem and meditation. I borrowed it from the library but intend to buy a copy to have on hand whenever I need some inspiration. Also, she has an entire section at the end where she talks about her favorite books on each chapter's topics, so now I see another big book order in my future.
March 27, 2024
God is in everything, woods, water, wind, birds ,etc.
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