W.C. Smith's vastly erudite work asks how it is that certain texts have so seeped in to human life-in a rich, complex, and powerful way-as to be deemed sacred. Examining the history and use of scripture in the world's major religious traditions, he shows how and why scripture continues to carry momentous and at time appalling power in human affairs.

Wilfred Cantwell Smith is professor Emeritus of the Comparative History of Religion, Harvard University, where he also served for nine years as Director of the Center for the Study of World Religions and then as chair of the Committee on the Study of Religion.