This book is both practicably useful and nearly worthless. It is worthless as scholarship. It is useful as a source of ideas.

Not all scholarly works include references. Some truths are obvious and need no corroboration. Graham's work is of another kind and should have them. He has no references because his ideas sound remarkably like the esoteric systems of some secret orders. One such organization headquartered on an island near England, uses studies in various mythologies to teach a nearly identical cosmology.

Three things are painfully clear. First, Mr. Graham has little, if any, knowledge of Bible languages, a requirement even the poorest seminary imposes on its students. Second, he has not heeded his own advice and read other's viewpoints. There are better non-mystical cosmologies than his, done by recognized scholars who refer to sources, Zecharia Sitchin among the foremost. Compared to those alternatives, Graham falls to the ground. Third, Graham hasn't the courage of his convictions, and tells us nothing of himself or how he came to know what he presents as truth. Has he has any academic accomplishments?

The thing to be pitied is that Graham has many truths scattered about; not diamonds, but more the occasional smooth, translucent rock in a pile of common gravel. How he came by them is a mystery, and that puts me in mind of John Wesley's definition of fools and madmen: "From right premises, fools draw wrong conclusions, and from wrong premises madmen draw right conclusions." Learning if Lloyd Graham might be either of these isn't worth slogging through nearly 500 pages of verbosity laced with bitterness and arrogance. "The Myths and Gods of India: The Classic Work on Hindu Polytheism from the Princeton Bollingen Series" by Alain Danielou is a much better source for this information, and is available from Amazon.

Is Graham's work useful? Yes, in two ways. First, for the resourceful preacher, it is a fountain of inspiration. Reverse the negatives, fold the interpretation of the older myth into the Bible story, and viola! Sorry, Mr. Graham, but after all, you should not be surprised that a churchman would do this. Second, let it be rewritten in 150 pages, some references added, and if not a small biography, then at least a photograph, that we might see (if not permitted to know) who Lloyd Graham is.

Wow, I'm surprised at all the negative reviews here. I usually expect this sort of thing from fanatics. I think those who find so much fault in this book, either haven't fully read it, lack a logical mind to understand it, or perhaps lack the imagination to consider other possibilities beyond the "Creationism/ Big Bang-Evolution Paradigms". Also, I don't think it's necessary to have a purely "scholarly" work in this case. Graham's main thrust is to compare these ancient mythologies through the process of "correspondence and analogy" to which he adds a conclusion which he thinks is reasonable. Besides, "scholars" can often be trapped in the same old ways of thinking, particularly when it comes to translations of ancient texts. Many beliefs about the meanings of texts have been based on the assumption that the earlier translations were correct. Much of western though is based on these assumptions on top of assumptions about the myths. Therefore a new look, uncluttered by past assumptions, is at least refreshing. On the science criticism, I don't think any theory of planetary origins are set in stone. The current theory of the "Big Bang" has evidence that can be studied, and is based on sound logic, but I don't think you could find any open-minded scientist who would say that Graham's (or the myth's authors) theory is impossible.

Perhaps the only real problem with this book is Graham's arrogance. I think he would have been much better off using phrases such as "I believe" and/or "it seems likely they (the original myth's authors) believed, or meant", although he often uses the phrase: "with our theory".

Any way you look at it, this book is a must read. Even if you just get some of the meanings of the Judeo/Christian myths, you can have loads of fun checking out the others from which they were derived and see some of hidden the allegorical meanings.

The controversy which is so perseveringly carried on in our own day between supernaturalists and rationalists, rests on the failure to recognize the allegorical nature of all religion. -- Schopenhauer

Though this book offers no reference to the author or a bibliography. If you are a student of mythology you will see where he stands. The truth is sometimes hard to swallow. Exspecially if your life has been controled by Fear and Guilt. The bible offers to many contridictions, and its history, for the most part is incorrect. Now if you were to gather most of his footnotes you could make a bibliography of your own. Or if you are not a lazy couch potatoe, you can read the other myths, some that were written 100 to 1000 or more years before the bible to see the correlation. The bible was written by the had of man, with greed and focus on the material world. Once Humans make the decision to Love, we can end this 2000 year old hypocrisy.