The studies of the outstanding historian and religious scholar D.E. Furman (1943–2011) included in this collection cover different countries and eras. Their author is convinced of the multivariate nature of historical choice. His works reveal the general and the special, the natural and the accidental in historical development, and the impact of these factors on the political processes of today. The most difficult task - identifying the cultural and social consequences of various religions, the influence of the “cultural code” and the specific historical choice of a particular people on its development - according to D. Furman, cannot be solved completely, but striving to get closer to understanding the problem is necessary, for “the past lives with us, our feelings and thoughts are to a large extent determined by events not only recent, but also thousands of years ago.”