Well-known and respected, this comprehensive history of religious experience explores the major world religions within a consistent framework based on the author's paradigm six dimensions of religion. It tells the story without entering unduly into technicalities and focuses on how the major religious traditions relate to human experience. It extends beyond information about the traditions to distill the essential patterns of both feelings and ideas that animate religious practice; contains photographs that evoke the flavor of religious rituals or experiences and maps that orient students to the geographic context of religious traditions.