Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #12664 in Books
• Published on: 2005-10-13
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

Review
An important and fascinating book about the origin, history and impending demise of the ego - humanity's collective dysfunction. The Fall is highly readable and enlightening, as the author's acute mind is at all times imbued with the higher faculty of spiritual awareness. --Eckhart Tolle, author of A New Earth, The Power of Now and many more

It is my fervent wish that this important book will have a wide audience. In a world where the very existence of humanity is threatened, Steve Taylor offers a visionary yet practical path out of the morass that distorts human nature. --Stanley Krippner, Professor of Psychology, Saybrook Graduate School, California

This is an important book which deserves to be read widely. Ultimately Taylor brings a message of hope. He challenges us all to transcend the ego and integrate the intellectual brilliance it has given us with the intense connectedness and aliveness that spiritual practices can bring us. He challenges us to make a difference to the world by transforming ourselves through meditation and the pragmatic activities of service, living lightly and promoting social change. He presents a vision of a possible future in which there is no war ... male domination and social inequality, no shame of sex or the body, and no domination of other species and the natural world. Written in clear, lucid prose, this book is easy to read and Taylor s sources are well referenced for those who want to dig deeper. I strongly recommend it. , --Malcom Hollick, author The Science of Oneness

Stanley Krippner, Professor of Pscychology, Saybrook Graduate School, California
It is my fervent wish that this important book will have a wide audience.

Christopher Ryan, Institute of Advanced Medicine and Advanced Behavioral Technology, Juarez, Mexico
You are sure to find this well-argued, thoughtful, provocative and a pleasure to read.

Customer Reviews

liberating and enlightening
I bought this book after reading Eckhart Tolle's endorsement: "A fascinating and important book on the origin, development and the imminent demise of the ego...Highly readable and enlightening, as the author's acute mind is imbued with the higher faculty of spiritual awareness." Eckhart Tolle's books have changed my life so I was sure this book would be important for me too, and haven't been wrong. I've read it through over the last three days and feel also though my whole outlook on the world has been altered. This book is a complete revisioning of human history from a spiritual point of view, seeing human history in terms of the development of the ego, looking at how the ego has given rise to thousands of years of violence and oppression. Taylor looks in turn at warfare, male domination, social inequality, alienation from the body, abuse of the natural world and so on, showing how the over-developed sense of ego produces these problems.

The book makes the important point - using a massive range of research - that earlier human beings and many of the world's native peoples - did not have our strong sense of self or ego and so were free from all of this disorder. The book's depiction of how the insanity of so much human behaviour is produced by the ego is riveting and extremely impressive. After reading this there is no way you can look at "normal" human behaviour in the same way. Taylor makes it absolutely clear that what we consider as normal is, in many ways, insane. And just as impressively, Taylor puts together an extremely good case for the idea that we are beginning to transcend the insanity of the ego and moving into a new era. This is one of those books which makes you look at the world in a new light, and gives you inspiration and hope for the future. Somehow it gives me the inspiration to try to fight for a better world, to contribute to the collective change which is taking place, and rekindle the state of harmony which the human race has lost.

A book with a vast scope
This book is amazing - a review of human history over thousands of years and looking into the future as well - it has a vast scope. But most of all it has a powerful spiritual perspective, looking at how the human mind (the over-developed ego as the author calls it) has given birth to most of our problems in history and in terms of our own psychology. For the last 6000 years human life has been full of suffering - but now, according to the this book, we may be moving into a new evolutionary phase, in which we are beginning to transcend our insanity and the social and psychological problems which come from it. I saw this book recommended on Eckhart Tolle's website, and have not been disappointed. A powerful combination of history, psychology and spirtuality.

A life-changing read
This is one of the very best books that I have ever read. Whilst I don't always agree with everything he says, and there is a sense at times that he is selecting the evidence to fit his theories, the overall arguments of the book just feel profoundly right. It is like having something confirmed that you knew was right at some deep, almost unconscious level. The world seems very different afterwards. Fantastic stuff, and hugely readable. A must-read book.