From the author of 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos comes a provocative hypothesis that explores the connection between what modern neuropsychology tells us about the brain and what rituals, myths, and religious stories have long narrated.

Jordan B. Peterson is a clinical psychologist and Professor at the University of Toronto and was formerly at Harvard University. He has published numerous articles on drug abuse, alcoholism and aggression.

Preface: Descensus ad Inferos
1. Maps of Experience: Object and Meaning
2. Maps of Meaning: Three Levels of Analysis
Normal and RevolutionaryLife: Two Prosaic Stories
Neuropsychological Function:The Nature of the Mind
Mythological Representation:TheConstitutent Elements of Experience
3. Apprenticeship and Enculturation: Adoption of a Shared Map
4. The Appearance of Anomaly: Challenge to the Shared Map
Introduction: The Paradigmatic Structure ofthe Known
Particular Forms of Anomaly
The Rise ofSelf-Reference, and the Permanent Contamination ofAnomaly with Death
5. The Hostile Brothers: Archetypes of Response to the Unknown
Introduction:The Hero and the Adversary
The Adversary: Emergence,Development and Representation
Heroic Adaptation:Voluntary Reconstruction of the Map ofMeaning
Conclusion: The Divinity of Interest