After a general survey of the situation in China, attention turns to Daoism and Confucianism and the conflicting interpretations of their key concepts of ‘the Way’ and ‘Heaven.’ A number of reasons are given for considering their approach religious. With Daoism the specific case considered is how Christianity might learn from its approach to the beginning and end of life, in critique of the traditional doctrine of the Fall at the beginning and too tenacious a desire for permanence at its end. With Confucianism the social value of ritual is considered. The work of Daniel Bell and Stephen Angle are used to argue the need for the sacred underpinning of contemporary democracy. Finally, the extent of the change in Buddhism as it adopted the Mahayana position is considered. Here most attention is devoted to the type of arguments deployed for the necessity of change from Shakyamuni’s original message, particularly as presented in the Lotus Sutra.

As a way of encouraging learning from others, this chapter seeks to demonstrate the various ways in which the development of Judaism and Christianity alike displayed profound debts to the wider culture of pagan belief and practice. The story is first told in respect of the way in which archaeological research has transformed our understanding of Judaism. It also argues that it would be quite wrong to have a low view of the religious practice and belief of the ancient Middle East and Egypt. The second half of the chapter turns to consider two significant influences from classical culture on Christianity, the mystery cults and pagan philosophy. In the latter case attention is drawn to more recent evaluations of later Neo-Platonism and theurgy. The chapter ends with a discussion of polytheism.

Having accepted a measure of truth in all the religions discussed, and sometimes that the greater truth lies elsewhere than in present Christian conviction, this final chapter considers what implications might follow. The first section develops a model for revelation that parallels certain philosophical approaches to ethics and aesthetics, arguing that cultural constraints are enriching in the way they ensure beliefs arise at the most effective period and place. The central section discusses the two areas where eastern and western religions appear most opposed. The claim that the divine is both personal and impersonal is defended, while some challenges to the reality of the world within Christianity are found to parallel eastern ideas. A final section then contends that the history of religion can be seen to be concerned with creative transformations both in the past and in the future. As examples from the past Buddhism’s move from no-self to interdependence is considered, alongside Christianity’s from hierarchy to kenosis

The first section of the chapter explores the history of the religion from its origins in the Vedas up to the present time. The remainder of the chapter is then devoted to two more practical areas where Christianity might have something to learn. The first is Hinduism’s different attitude to the visual and its ability both to critique western stress on the absolute character of the word and to offer an alternative perspective on how, through the concept of darshan, Christianity could better appreciate its own liturgical settings. The question of gender as applied to divinity is then explored through Hinduism’s treatment of female deities, partly through the myths themselves, partly through Francis Clooney’s comparative studies and partly through consideration of Kali’s imagery in her two main temples in Kolkota and Ramakrishna’s accompanying meditations.

After a general survey attention is first paid to the transformations Shintoism has undergone over the centuries, with its present stress on the environment used to illumine tensions in Christianity between the transcendent and the immanent. With Buddhism two very different forms are contrasted, Zen and Pure Land. With the former modern American, English and European appropriations are first analysed, including the work of Jack Kerouac, Charles Johnson, D. T. Suzuki and Alan Watts. Thereafter, a positive value is assigned to Zen aesthetics (especially in its positive evaluation of impermanence), while a more critical assessment is offered of its ’emptiness’ doctrine. Various versions of Pure Land are then discussed. Not only is Karl Barth’s negative judgement firmly rejected but also its notions of grace treated as illuminating for Christianity’s own approach to the subject.

Both because Islam arose later than Christianity and because of its present largely negative reputation, this chapter is structured somewhat differently from its predecessors. A first section looks at its historical relations with culture, stressing first positive aspects and then the distortions noted by Edward Said and his followers, as well as the more general, detrimental effect of western imperialism. The second section then explores historical restraints upon fundamentalism; first in the four Sunni schools through analogy, abrogation and chains of transmission. Mystical Sufism is then portrayed as an unjustifiably marginalised alternative. The final section then looks at contemporary options, taking first modern Muslim contextualisation before noting possible reasons why Christians could legitimately endorse Mohammad’s modification of earlier biblical stories. The variety of its present forms demonstrates the extent to which it can be seen to be pulled in opposing directions, hope in openness to new ideas restrained by warning pressures to ossify its past.

The first part of the chapter offers three reasons for going beyond the three most common types of approach in exclusivism, pluralism or inclusivism (always seen as culminating in one’s own religion). These are the transformations of the modern world in which other faiths are now often one’s immediate neighbour; changing perceptions of the origins of the major faiths (in which the impact of specific contexts is fully acknowledged); and the need to reject over-simple explanations for religious phenomena, whether from believer or non-believer. The second part then presents the preferred model of revelation across the religions as rather like a beautiful but incomplete pattern only partially visible on broken pots. Taking the revelatory dimension seriously involves going beyond the ‘equalities’ of pluralism in two ways: entering sympathetically into the historical evolution of each of the religions and being prepared to identify where that religion might carry better or more profound truth than one’s own.