Customer Reviews

The Celestine Prophecy

5 star:		(283)
4 star:		(93)
3 star:		(61)
2 star:		(60)
1 star:		(261)

 

 

Redfield's writing is awkward, the dialogue enormously clumsy, and the details obviously poorly researched. It is painfully clear throughout the book that the 'story' is merely an ill-fitting vehicle for communicating Redfield's beliefs. Unfortunately, these "Insights" are very rarely insightful. Redfield takes some legitimate Eastern spirituality (the benefits of meditation, vegetarianism, and abandoning a fast-paced materialistic life, for example), and attempts to combine it with his own New Age musings. Unfortunately, the result is convoluted, illogical and often down-right silly. In general this book is neither illuminating nor entertaining.

The Celestine Prophecy is not the best novel ever written, in fact to some it may seem hookie. What was great about this book, and in my opinion any book, was that it helped me grasp many of the ideas that had been swimming around in my head but could not be put into a working formula. Its one of those books that makes you say "yeah, I knew that, but I couldn't find the words." As the story unfolds so do aspects of the reader's self. Each chapter, or insight, revealed something new about who I was and who I wanted to be.
Many of the ideas discussed in this book are nothing new. They are at the core of many eastern philosophies and are heavily influenced by mysticism. But who cares! Each interpretation of these ideas is in its own way unique. Its like listening to a radio station that plays a certain jeanra of music: each song has a common feel and yet each has its own personality.

All in all, it may not be a literary masterpiece but The Celestine Prophecy is a must read. It will move you in places that have been forgotten, ignored, or that have been suffocoated by the monotonies of western culture and idealogy.

I was surprised by this book. I expected a feel-good broth of New Age cliches, but instead found a number of honest and wise Insights into human behavior. The Celestine Prophesy can be viewed as a spiritual guide, but its foundation is good human psychology. Written as an adventure about a man searching Peru for an anciet manuscript, the book explains the Nine Insights contained in the manuscript and discusses each insight's meaning for humans as both individuals and members of a society. The central theme is that we are constantly evolving, and this evolution will bring us to a higher level of spirituality. The goal is to tap into the natural energy of the universe. While the characters seem able to do this with suprising ease, it is a goal more people should try to follow. The author suggests that many of our problems come from our desire to pull energy from other people instead of finding within ourselves and within the natural world. Redfield offers the idea of the love-addition; he (or The Manuscript) suggests that our desire for male or female energry (depending on your gender) leads us to become addicted to a person of the opposite sex. But since addiction is destructive to a healthy relationship, our needs wind up hindering our ability to achieve a successful union. The "manuscript" suggests that once people learn to pull energy from the world around them, they will no longer fall into this love addiction.

Another useful concept is the idea of the control drama: that we each have a behavioral mode which we use to draw energy from others, and that this mode, or drama, is carried with us from childhood to adulthood. We must recognize this drama and work to overcome it because it is a way of draining the energy of others.

If this review seems to contain the word "energy" a lot, it's because The Celestine Prophesy is mostly about finding energy within us and without. While the ultimate goal is to achieve a spiritual reawakening, one can use many of these insights without following a spiritual path. The Celestine Prophesy can be used to heighten one's self-awareness, and as such, it is a useful tool. I felt better after reading it, and how can a book receive a higher recommendation? At times it's didactic, but Redfield mixes in enough narrative to keep the book from becoming a philosophical tract. I would recommend this book to anyone who's looking for a greater awareness of self and nature. It contains much wisdom and encouragement.

Okay, perhaps the story isn't any more insightful than the latest occurances on Days of Our Lives. Who cares. The purpose of this book isn't to be a literary revelation... It's a spiritual one. Take a moment and read the reviews that follow(or at least as many as you can). You'll notice that people either love it or hate it. If you read "The Celestine Prophecy" closely enough, you'll know why this is so...and that reason is crucially important for all of us to understand. Let's keep things in perspective here...Look at the nuber of copies sold worldwide! Look at the number of reviews presented here! This book is having major implications around the world,and at an extremely appropriate time. It has given people an appreciation for themselves, their environment, and the people around them, and as far as I'm concerned, there can never be anything wrong with that. My life was changed forever by reading this book...as well as millions of others' have been. Above all, this is an important work for the spiritual to reaffirm themsleves, the lost to find hope, and most critically essential to the lot of us in between.

Many people criticize this book because they just don't understand it in depth. This book is not meant to be read superficially. The insights are meant to be studied and applied.

There are two main types of critics to this book:
Those that are ultra-religious and those how only believe that the physical plane is the only reality(To them there is no God or spiritual world) My expirience in the spiritual path have only proved to me that the nine insights are not only real, but they can improve your life like many people could only imagine. I myself have seen the energy fields(especially my own). The concepts of energy fields is not new to oriental cultures, but it's fairly new to occidentals.
I've also expirienced the "coincidences", which I know that they're not products of chance(do you remember your guardian angel bedtime stories?).

Everybody should read this book if your remotely interested in going on a deeper spiritual path than the one that conventional religion gives us. Many religions focus on external rituals, following a bunch of rules, and seeing God as someone existing outside themselves(Totally contary to what Jesus Christ originally tought:"Look for the kingdom of God within you"). If you wish to go even deeper into the subject, all this you'll find it in the Celestine prophecy and in the second book, "The Tenth Insight"(an excellent sequal).

For those that don't understand the message in this book, don't worry because we are all in diffrent levels in our spiritual evolution. Your time will also come since it is a law of nature and of the cosmos that we all progress.

READ, STUDY AND APPLY THIS BOOK AND YOU WON'T BE SORRY

I liked this book but I was a bit disappointed by the first half. I found that it goes a bit slow at first and when it's getting really interesting, it stops abruptly. Now I want to read the sequel for sure! I understand the fact that you need to "absorb" each insight in order to get to the next spiritual "level". Although, only the last three insights (according to me) give a brand new view and truth...
The writing was not bad but not the best neither! My grade would be more 2 stars and a half than 3 stars.

You've got to know how to take this book. It's an odd and creepy mix of interesting points/insights, and misleading/spiritually-dangerous gobbledygook.

Read it right and you'll learn to:
• Take people as individuals. Each time you meet someone look for their best and try and bring it out in them;
• Be aware of the spiritual world and, hopefully look to the right source;
• Take opportunities presented to you and make the most of situations; hone and trust your instincts;
• Communicate to others (especially in a group context) with a more relaxed - namely, ultimately, a less pride-ridden/competitive - air and attitude. Give them space. We all communicate better when we feel we have time and mental space.

If you're weak-minded and believe everything you read/hear/see, (or even - especially - what I'd call modern, 'new-age'-minded) the book will either 'inspire' you - 'change your life!', or have a slow and resonating brain-washing effect, and either way you'll end up:
• Being aware of the spiritual world but looking to the wrong sources (i.e. - what the book encourages - the dangerous bit). You'll find yourself trying to communicate with trees;
• Freaking your friends out (and possibly losing a few) by staring strangely at them whilst trying to visualize and connect with their 'energy';
• Gaining new friends with the same new-found approach to life and humanity, and you can all stare freakily at each other, sharing a wonderful experience!!;
• Bringing up a (note: singular) strange and hugely imbalanced child.

So there's my two cents' worth. Some will heartily disagree, but they'll most likely fall into the second of the two categories.

The book is not that bad and the insight stuff is actually interesting but I couldn't take anything serious in this book because I realize the author never bother to visit Peru. If he ever visited Perú he coudn't have say that he arrived to Machu Pichu by car, that's impossible!! Also, the author does not describe accurately any of the places visited in the book, and the distances between places are impossible. And the worst thing of all: he actually said that the Mayas were in Peru!! Totally wrong!!! The INCAS, not the MAYAS were the ones living in Peru thousands of years ago!! (the Mayan empire extended from central america to the south of Mexico). Could the autor at least have done the minimun research so not to insult the reader??? And what about that EVERYONE in Peru just happen to speak english? In the interior of Peru, people speaks QUECHUA, not spanish, how come they will be able to speak and understand english?? I can continue complaining but what's the point? Everything seems just fake...Sorry...

About 6 years ago, post-college, I bought this book, as several acquaintances who SEEMED to be very bright and inspired recommended it to me, with a sly wink and a knowing nod and a comment like, "THIS BOOK WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE". I took it with me on a visit to Paris, opened it up at a small, artsy cafe, thinking that if I were on the verge of being extraordinarily enlightened, it had better happen somewhere pretentious and beatnik-y. I spent the afternoon laughing out loud and sharing various amateurly-written excerpts with my roommate. We had tears rolling down our cheeks, disbelieving of the fact that someone went as far as to PUBLISH this pile of rubbish and that it purports to be so deeeeeep. The ONLY reason I managed to get through the book is that I was dying to know what the hype was all about and how so many people could be swayed/inspired by this stupid, melodramatic story and by the writing style, reminiscent of my own early elementary school creative writing attempts. I wanted to discover the big mysterious epiphany about which everyone had been raving. Turns out, there wasn't one. I consider myself to be quite down-to-earth, spiritual and open-minded; yet while slogging through this foolish tripe, felt as if some dirty, demented hippie had just puked up the literary equivalent of The Woodstock Brown Acid.

I read this book many years ago when it first came out. Now that the latest book "The Tenth Insight" has been released l decided that l would start over at the beginning of the series and read it once again and l am glad that l have done so. What a nice surprise this was for me. I can see that l have changed my outlook from when l first read this book. So it is just as good the second time around but for totally different reasons. Anyone who enjoys reading books that talk about how we are evolving into a new spirituality will enjoy this book. Even though it is fiction the basis of the book is based on truth about how human kind is evolving into a new way of life.