Bible Stories

We study other religions not to find fault, but to consider what is admirable in what others have found and to enlarge our own experience. Each of the religions we have covered has a particular genius, something central it has to offer. Read more

Can there be an atheistic religion? If so, is Buddhism that religion?

Unlike Hinduism, which can point to no one founder, and of which the origins are hidden in mystery, Buddhism sprang into being in an identifiable period of history (the sixth century BC), and owes its beginnings to a founder about whom we know a good deal.

The figure of Gautama the Buddha, or ‘awakened one’, is much encrusted with legend. But we can discern a real person — gentle, compassionate, courteous. At the age of about forty he made a great discovery. He felt a compulsion to pass on his discovery to others, spent the next forty years preaching, and left behind a community which has carried on his work to the present day. Read more