One of the most difficult problems for a student of religion is the problem of how to relate different religious views of life. It is not difficult to say, ‘My religious orientation has the only truth,’ but the art of giving evidence and argument to support a view on how they should be compared is almost nonexistent. Because of this, the recent work that John Hick has done in this area deserves thoughtful consideration. Since I am working on a book (...) which is concerned with this issue, I am not only going to discuss Hick's views but also defend an alternative way of relating religious views of life. I hope this article will stimulate reactions which will be of help in my work on the book. (shrink)

The critics of Schleiermacher's hermeneutic are legion and its defenders few – due, to a great extent, to the popularity of Gadamer's Truth and Method and its attack on Schleiermacher. I believe that the critics of Schleiermacher have not understood him very well and the failure of his hermeneutics to gain very much respect lies, at least partially, to a lack of understanding of what he had to say. Besides, if we look at contemporary scholars who focus on the study (...) of language and how it functions we will find that they often have views very much like those found in Schleiermacher's discussion of hermeneutics. (shrink)