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University of California Press

About the Book

Learning Love from a Tiger explores the vibrancy and variety of humans’ sacred encounters with the natural world, gathering a range of stories culled from Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Mayan, Himalayan, Buddhist, and Chinese shamanic traditions. Readers will delight in tales of house cats who teach monks how to meditate, shamans who shape-shift into jaguars, crickets who perform Catholic mass, rivers that grant salvation, and many others. In addition to being a collection of wonderful stories, this book introduces important concepts and approaches that underlie much recent work in environmental ethics, religion, and ecology. Daniel Capper’s light touch prompts readers to engage their own views of humanity’s place in the natural world and question longstanding assumptions of human superiority.

About the Author

Daniel Capper is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Religion at the University of Southern Mississippi and the author of Guru Devotion and the American Buddhist Experience.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations

Introduction: Into Muir’s Forest
1. All the Christian Birds Chanted
2. The Donkey Who Communed with Allah
3. Hindu Trees Tremble with Ecstasy
4. Sharing Mayan Natural Souls
5. Friendly Yetis
6. Enlightened Buddhist Stones
Epilogue: The Mountain Peaks Leaped and Danced
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Reviews

 
“Unique, wide ranging, and beautifully written, this powerful plea for more mutually constructive relationships offers an appreciation of the natural world and our neighbors in the nonhuman universe. Learning Love from a Tiger respects cultural differences and religious sensibilities even as it challenges human-on-human oppression.”
Paul Waldau, Professor of Anthrozoology, Canisius College

“Capper’s complex and timely work addresses the multifaceted ways that religions and nature shape each other. He points out that the results are often fraught with ambivalence, an important conclusion that leaves the reader without simple answers. This book both introduces various religious traditions and delves into the complicated environmental issues that intersect, in sometimes unanticipated ways, with religion.”
Laura Hobgood, Professor of Environmental Studies and Religion, Southwestern University