Sacred Texts Interpreted: Religious Documents Explained. By Carl Olson. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2017. 2 vols. acid free $198 (ISBN 978-1-4408-4187-3). E-book available (978-1-4408-4188-0), call for pricing.

Sacred Texts Interpreted (STI) is a collection of religious texts from a variety of different religions. It begins with two brief chapters introducing this work and providing some general insight regarding how one should read sacred texts. The remaining thirteen chapters provide sacred texts from different religions: Baha’ism, Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Daoism, Hinduism, Islam, Jainism, Judaism, Mormonism, Shinto, Sikhism, and Zoroastrianism.

The purpose of this work is to provide a collection of sacred texts from differing religions in a single publication. Each section begins with a brief historical overview of a religion and the sacred texts that it uses. Each section assumes the reader knows very little about a specific religion and subsequently provides some basic background information on that religion.

The remainder of each chapter is sacred text, texts which serve a foundational role, from that religion. After each portion of text, STI provides commentary from the editor, Carl Olson. Olson is a professor of religious studies at Allegeheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania. The comments vary in length anywhere from a sentence or two to a half-page. They typically provide a summary of what the passage stated, with a handful of interpretive comments throughout.

While the work generally meets the purpose of providing a collection of sacred texts in one book, it would have limited uses in many libraries. Some may find the subject index helpful, particularly when perusing certain inquiries, such as, what the Mormon texts say about Jesus Christ. For this inquiry, the subject index points the reader to the various sacred texts in Mormonism that address this query. Unfortunately, however, this is the only index embedded into STI. Could it have included an index of the sacred texts which STI includes? Or, at least list the texts as part of the table of contents? This would have made it easier for a patron looking for the primary text of Sikhism’s Siddh Gosh 12 to know that STI includes it.

For a collection of historical texts, a timeline showing the chronological relationships between these differing religions, including the estimated times in which these various texts were written, would be incredibly beneficial. Unfortunately, STI does not include anything of this nature.

The final drawback of this work is the fact that many English translations of these primary religious texts are available online at no cost. As many academic libraries face stagnant or declining acquisition budgets, what would lure academic librarians to purchase this work for their institution? Unfortunately, the attractions are minimal.

While academic libraries may not find this work beneficial, it may be different for public and K12 school libraries. For a high school student coming to a K12 school library needing a quick bit of information on what Confucianism teaches, this may be a great asset to assisting that student. Likewise, public libraries may find it helpful for general queries relating to religious texts, particularly for patrons who are hesitant to use online sources.

Overall, STI provides access to religious texts with brief introductions and commentaries. Due to the lack of tools (i.e., multiple indexes, charts, etc.), the usefulness of STI is limited to basic inquiries, which may be more common in the context of K12 and public libraries than libraries at post-secondary institutions.—Garrett B. Trott, University Librarian, Corban University, Salem, Oregon