GENERAL COURSE DESCRIPTION The moment the bullet tore into the calf of my leg and a nearby explosion ruptured my eardrum, I collapsed. I yelled for a fellow officer to take over my unit before the medics injected me with morphine and loaded me onto an open personnel carrier headed to the field hospital. This was 1973, when Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack against Israel. I was a lieutenant, part of a paratrooper unit staffed with hundreds of highly trained young men ready to sacrifice themselves for the defense of their country. We were on the West-Egyptian side of the Suez Canal, hundreds of miles away from the border. Friendly and unfriendly gunfire was everywhere. Neither felt friendly . . . For the rest of the article on my (OZ) personal experience and reflection on sacrifice, click here. The September 11th tragedy and the daily suicide bombers in Iraq have underscored the importance of understanding the meaning of sacrifice. Sacrifice derives from the Latin word “sacrificium.” It is a combination of the words “sacer,” which means something set apart from the secular or profane for the use of supernatural powers, and “facere,” which means “to make.” In other words, sacrifice means to make something holy or pure in worship of the divine. Humans have sacrificed the life and blood of their own species. They have also sacrificed animals and animals’ blood, crops, such as flowers or rice, wine and honey, and many other symbolic offerings. The more modern, secular interpretation of sacrifice is the giving up of something valuable or important for somebody or something else considered to be of more value or importance. This introductory level course is comprised of three short articles. The first gives an overview of the psychological work of Jung and Freud along with other theories of sacrifice. It also provides an anthropological and historical review of sacrifice. The second article provides definitions, descriptions and resources on sacrifice, martyrdom, scapegoating, terrorism and suicide. The last article addresses one of the most common but often unacknowledged forms of sacrifice, that is, of the soldier in war.