Life Governing Value (Pivotal value)

To eliminate bad karma in order to find release from repeated rebirths.

Founder

No specific founders, the Aryans, a loose-knit network of tribes, 4500 b.c.e.

Transcendent

Trinity: Brahma (Creator)

Vishnu (Preserver)

Shiva (Destroyer/Renewer)

 

 

Live Governing Value

To alleviate suffering by learning to direct selfish desires (tanha) until they are ultimately extinguished.

Then one can be free from mental, emotional or physical desires and released simply "to be."

Founder

Siddhartha Gautama, 563-480 b.c.e.

Transcendent

State of being called Nirvana, Enlightenment [Theravada Buddhism]

Buddha, a savior, who shares with others his divine grace or compassion.

[Mahayana Buddhism]

Life Governing Value

Harmony, unity and balance in all things

One flows with the life present in all things.

Founder

Lao-Tzu (first half of 6^th century b.c.e.) and his disciple, Chuang-Tzu (4^th century b.c.e.)

Lao-Tzu became convinced of the futility of a life of ambition, striving, and conformity to artificial social conventions.

Transcendent

The Tao

The flow of change

An Overall Governing Presence

Discovered or uncovered in all of life

In "popular" religion

Ancestral and other spirits

Life Governing Value

To live in harmony with the heavenly and earthly realms.

Founder

Confucius (born about 551 b.c.e.), and later interpreter, Mencius (4^th century b.c.e.)

Transcendent

Heaven

Harmony with Heaven meant conformity to the eternal moral code.

Harmony with Earth meant a ruler modeling the eternal moral code and followers imitating the model.

Life Governing Value

To live faithfully to the covenant initiated by the one God as the chosen people—chosen for responsible relationship.

Founder

Abraham (about 1750 b.c.e) and later Moses (about 1250 b.c.e.)

Transcendent

Yahweh, their God, as intimately related to the world and involved in its activities, guiding all of life.

Other: Angels, lying spirits

Life Governing Value

Becoming reconciled to God through faith in his son, Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ

Loving God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and your neighbor as yourself

Founder

Jesus, son of Mary, by the Holy Spirit

Transcendent

Trinity: Father (Origin); Son (God manifest in Jesus as Redeemer); Holy Spirit (God present in all of history

Other: Angels, Demons, Devil

Life Governing Value

Submission to God (Allah)

Founder

Muhammad, born 570 c.e.

Transcendent

Allah, One god

Other: Angels, demons, devil

 

In addition to this discussion, certain writings of the different traditions were read:

Words of Wisdom from the Traditions

Hinduism

The poem of the Universal Form

Bhagavad Gita

Buddhism

The Dhamapada

The path of dharma—of truth, of righteousness, of the central law that all of life is one.

Taoism

Tao Te Ching

Chapter 1

Confucianism

Sayings of Confucius

The Commonwealth State

Judaism

A Psalm of David

Psalm 139—The Inescapable God

Christianity

Sayings of Jesus

The woman with the alabaster jar

Book of Luke, chapter 7, verses 36-50

Islam

Allah’s Revelation to Muhammad

Surah XLVII, revealed at Al-Madinah (a chapter in the Qur’an (Koran)

"Quietness", A Poem of Rumi, a Sufi (Muslim mystic)