The Big Picture: What the Religions of the World Teach Us About the Nature of Ultimate Reality

Over eight decades after his birth to missionary parents in China, Huston Smith now finds himself in an age of disbelief that has led to a spiritual crisis unlike any that history has previously known.

In The Big Picture, Smith draws from his lifetime of scholarship to describe for us the nature of ultimate reality. His description combines the most up-to-date findings of science with the enduring truths of the world's greatest religions, an alignment that offers firm grounds for hope. The vision is mystical and, as supported by the evidence Smith introduces, completely believable.

Join this distinguished author, scholar, and teacher as he explores:


What the world's great religions have in common, including their views of life after death
The unrivaled power of science to describe the physical world while being unable to deal with values, meanings, and purposes
The opportunity we now have to live in a complete world instead of the half worlds that religion and science have thought we had to choose between
And much more



From as far back as he can remember, Huston Smith tells us, his deepest longing has been to know the truth about the final nature of things. The Big Picture is the culmination of his quest for the widest-angle view of the world that is available to the human mind at this point in history.