Fallible Prophets and Apostles?

What distinguishes the witness of the prophets and the apostles, so that it can have this significance for the existence of the congregation and its proclamation to the world? After all, they were men fallible as we are, children of their time as we are of ours, and their spiritual horizon was as limited as ours—in significant ways, even more limited than ours. Whoever enjoys that sort of thing can again and again demonstrate that their natural science, conception of the world, and also to a great extent their morality cannot be binding for us. They told all sorts of sagas and legends and at least made free use of all kinds of mythological material. In many things they said—and in some important propositions—they contradicted each other. With few exceptions they were not remarkable theologians. They have only their election and calling to commend them. But this counts! Their many-sided testimony has, in its own way and in its own place, one and the same center, subject and content: Jesus of Nazareth,… (Barth, Karl, p.59, ‘God Here and Now’,2006)

Religious Roles in Judaism

The religion of the Jewish people, as it is presented in the Biblical texts appears to of been very much in the hands of men, and largely viewed through their eyes. God is portrayed as exclusively masculine with titles such as ‘Lord’ (Deut 10:17), ‘Husband’ (Hosea 2:16), and ‘King’ (Isaiah 43: 15).

Religious Roles in Hinduism

Since Vedic times, the religious climate of India has undergone many changes, and the living experiences of men and women throughout India’s long religious history have also been conciderably diverse.

The Middle Way of the Buddha

Beneath the Bodhi tree the future-buddha entered four subsequent states of meditation, and from these, he remembered his previous lives and gained understanding of the processes of Samsara that all forms of life are subject to. He saw that the cause of rebirth was ignorance which would only cease when the need for sense-pleasures were quenched. As his ignorance of the truth was dispelled he was set free, and seeing things as they truly are, he became an enlightened being. A Buddha.

The power of the Resurrection

I think we need to understand evil and sin as a state of imbalance. The word ‘sin’, in New Testament Greek, is Hamartano, which carries the meaning ‘to miss the mark’ (New Strong’s, 1996). Sin is the by-product of selfish desire, which springs into being when the self and its desires are not aligned with the Self and Desire of God. Imbalance left unchecked must result in destruction. The primeval imbalance, according to the Hebrew Scriptures, was the eating of the forbidden fruit in the eternal garden of God.