The Top Religious Texts From Around the World Teach Us These Valuable Lessons About Life

The top-selling books of an era offer a peek into what people of that time are seeking. The popularity of self-help and relationship books today shows that people crave understanding of themselves, rules for living, and deeper connections with others. The millions of copies sold of “Harry Potter” reveal hunger for friendship, fate, and a touch of magic. Memoirs and biographies satisfy a need to learn from others by watching them rise and fall.

All of this is why hearing that the Bible, Quran, Bhagavad Gita, and other religious texts continuously outsell “contemporary” books comes as either a shock or an obvious point for people.

The top religious texts of the world teach us the valuable lessons about life that we’re seeking whenever we pick up any book. In fact, these texts are more like “libraries” contained between hard covers than they are like chapter books. While the stories and “rules” contained within these books seem worlds away from our technologically evolved, science-focused world, the reality is that humans still haven’t solved many of the “heart” issues that have created strife, conflict, and a sense of longing for a redeemer of some kind in the time since the days of putting ink to animal skins. One doesn’t have to be a follower to enter into the mysteries and revelations they manifest.

Why Religious Books Continue to Be Appealing in a Modern World

At the core of most religious texts is a lesson on how to live in community with others in the context of personal salvation through relationships with deities or cosmic laws. With more than 5 billion copies sold, the Bible appeals to both religious and nonreligious readers today for its ability to tell stories of struggle and redemption spanning generations in a way that reads like a self-help book, relationship guide, steamy romance novel, and memoir rolled into one. The Quran also deeply covers the themes of man as individual, man in society, and man coexisting with nature. When picking up the Bhagavad Gita, readers are introduced to a code of conduct focusing on detachment, the self, and the cause-and-effect principle known as karma.

The Search for Meaning Moves Forward

Religious books are as popular today as they’ve ever been because of the simple fact that humans are still curious about themselves. Like readers attracted to self-help books, riveting fantasy novels, or tell-all memoirs, readers of religious books are looking for answers on what makes us tick. The fact that people are still ordering bibles in bulk in a world where they could read, watch, or listen to anything they can dream of demonstrates the staying power of the eternal search for answers about the human condition.