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Key Terms
biblical criticism: is an umbrella term covering various techniques for applying literary historical-critical methods in analyzing and studying the Bible and its textual content. The word "criticism" is not to be taken in the negative sense ... Read more ...
hermeneutics: as the methodology of interpretation is concerned with problems that arise when dealing with meaningful human actions and the products of such actions, most importantly texts. Read more ...
British Library Sacred Texts
- British Library | Sacred Texts
"What is sacred? How do we extract meaning from sacred texts? Where do religious stories come from? How are these stories relevant to people today? The resources in this site will allow you to investigate all these questions and more." Explore the Library's Interactives.
The Bible
Christianity
- The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church
Explanations are provided for the various approaches to interpret and analyse the Bible. Find information on rhetorical analysis, sociological approach, approach through recourse to Jewish traditions of interpretation and the feminist approach, to name a few. - The Bible"The Bible is a book that Jews and Christians consider sacred. The faithful believe it is a collection of God's messages and instructions for his people, written down by individuals under divine influence. The content was originally passed down orally and was transcribed many years after the events described had occurred. "
- The Many Genres of Scripture
One of the most powerful and complex features of the Bible is that it consists of many different types, or genres, of texts. The major genres of Scripture include the following: narrative, poetry, wisdom, prophecy, gospels, epistles and apocalypse ..."
The TaNaK
Judaism
- The Complete Tanakh - Hebrew BibleEnglish translation of the entire Tanakh (Tanach) with Rashi's commentary. This Hebrew Bible was edited by esteemed translator and scholar, Rabbi A.J. Rosenberg.
- JudaismClick through Harvard's Religious Literacy Project on Judaism. Explore chapters on: God - Biblical Monotheism, Torah, Covenant and Constitution and more.
- Torah
"The Torah (Hebrew for "teaching") refers to the sacred scripture of the Jewish people as well as the scroll it is written on, their most identifiable physical symbol. The word has several meanings. Strictly speaking, it refers to the Pentateuch, the five books of Moses (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy). The entire text is said to have been dictated to Moses on Mount Sinai; these are the books contained in the Torah scroll that Jews read aloud in synagogues on the Sabbath and festivals." - Tanakh: Jewish Sacred Writings"Tanakh, an acronym derived from the names of the three divisions of the Hebrew Bible: Torah (Instruction, or Law, also called the Pentateuch), Neviʾim (Prophets), and Ketuvim (Writings)."
- Scriptures in Jewish Tradition, and Tradition as Jewish Scripture
On one level, there is a simple answer to the question "What is scripture for the Jews?" for roughly the past two thousand years, Jews have had a canon of twenty-four books that form the Jewish Bible, starting the Genesis and ending the Chronicles ... "
The Qur'an
Islam
- God as Father-Mother, And More"The article investigates how God was revealed as father-mother in Islam and the Qur'an. It relates the similarities between the Islamic thinking about God and the Christian conception of God as Father. It presents a prophetic hadith which likens God's relationship to human beings to a mother's relationship to her nursing infant. It provides an overview of the mother motif in Islam. It discusses the parallel between the God-revealed-as-father in the parable in the book of Luke of the Bible and the Divine revealed in Islam."
- Proof of God
Morgan Freeman meets a man who felt God's presence; learning how Muslims hear God's voice in the Quran; a tribe whose members believe they can channel divine healing power; a physicist with faith that science will lead him to God.
- The Qur'ān as the Voice of God"THE QUR'AN, the most recent of the major sacred scriptures, originated in the northwestern half of the Arabian peninsula during the first quarter of the seventh century when it was proclaimed by Muhammad. The Quran reveals a significant relationship to the tradition of the Jewish and Christian scriptures and echoes themes found in their midrashic and apocryphal writings."
- Qur'an: The Word of God"Many Muslims recite the Fātiḥah as part of their prayers every day. According to a saying attributed to the Prophet Muhammad, this surah contains the essence of the teachings of the Quran. The word for God in Arabic is “Allah,” which is the same word used by Arabic-speaking Christians to refer to God."
- The Qur'an and historical criticism
"The acceptance of the Koran as the word of God suggests that the so-called historical and textual study of the Koran is tantamount to questioning the historical existence of Jesus Christ, as some people in the West have claimed. The rules of biblical criticism do not apply to the Koran as God’s revelation, because what corresponds to the Bible is the hadith collection, which comprises the words and deeds of the Prophet of Islam as the Bible comprises the words and deeds of Jesus Christ ... "
HInduism
Hinduism
- Sacred Texts of the HindusAccording to Swami Vivekananda, "the accumulated treasury of spiritual laws discovered by different persons in different times" constitutes the sacred Hindu texts.
- Sacred Texts in HInduismHinduism is hard to define, for we cannot think in terms of a mainstream faith with a number of neat offshoots. Rather, it is a religion that embraces an enormous diversity of belief and practice, developed over millennia. It may help to form some idea of the distinctive nature of Hinduism by evoking the image of an ancient banyan tree.
- BBC - HInduismHindus believe that the Vedas texts were received by scholars direct from God and passed on to the next generations by word of mouth.
buddhism
Buddhism
- Buddhism's Sacred TextsBuddhism’s Sacred Texts are those religious texts which are part of the Buddhist tradition. The first Buddhist texts were initially passed on orally by Buddhist monastics but were later written down and composed as manuscripts in various Indo-Aryan languages and collected into various Buddhist canons.
- The Buddha and Buddhist Sacred TextsThe Buddha lived and taught in north-east India in the 5th century B.C.E., dying in his eightieth year. The Theravāda tradition puts his death in 486 B.C.E., while the Mahāyāna tradition has it in 368 B.C.E. Recent scholarly research suggests his most likely dates were 484–404 B.C.E.