Our primary drive as humans, say the authors of this anthology of religious and philosophical writings, is not sexual or to do with any biological or socially conditioned impulse: It is hunger for meaning.

It is only in addressing the huge, fundamental questions such as "Who am I?", "Why death?" and the like that humankind finds itself capable of withstanding the worst and abiding in the best. The selections in this book are a survey of that universal quest for understanding and are particularly relevant to the awakening taking place in the world today as old orders crumble. The authors call this questioning Real Philosophy. It is not academic: it knows that intellect must be coupled with feeling in order to nourish the whole person and the holistic vision.

Heraclitus, the Grail, Chuang Tzu, St. Augustine, the Upanishads and the Epic of Gligamesh, Dostoyevsky, Tagore, Wittgenstein, Rilke, to name but a few -- such are the guardians of the traditional human values we need to reclaim as individuals, say Needleman and Appelbaum, in order to break the spell both of 'scientism' and 'religionism' and to rediscover our own moral worth.