Our Biblical Heritage: The Way in Ancient China and the West

The Holy Bible is most often seen as a religious handbook, but in this groundbreaking study it is shown in its true role as a guide to self-dedication and self-awareness. Without trespassing upon the territory of religion, there is a need to take stock of the way we look at scripture and of all that can be known about its underlying process of growth. This study looks at new information to see how scriptural composition came to address the self as a whole, independent of worldly change. "Our Biblical Heritage" uses Chinese scriptures as the key to unlocking The Bible's true purpose. By comparing the structure and methodology of the two ancient traditions of religious writing, their true common purpose emerges. The key term connecting eastern and western is "Covenant". The choice of covenant, or contract, explains the soul's relationship to both the self and Divinity - described in the West as The Lord and The Son of Man and in Chinese writing as Central Authority (Huang Di) or Yellow Emperor. In the Chinese system the Covenant is said to be the first stage of three linking The Spirit of God with The Breath of God, or that which interconnects Heaven and Earth. In the Holy Bible, Covenant begins with Noah, is renewed through Moses, David and Solomon, but is only finally fulfilled in the Book of Revelation. After the introductory use of myth and legend in both East and West came The Law, apparently formulated in the texts ascribed to the Four Sages and characterised by the Three Yi (conforming to mind) and Three Yi (conforming to nature) in the east, and in the biblical books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. With the establishment of family, clan, nation and kingdom comes the struggle to reconcile immersion in the world with purity of soul. This forms the counterpoint to the texts of prophecy, leading to Divine intervention in the world through the coming of the Son of Man, described in the Gospels. Ultimately, then, there is no division between internal and external. All are infused with Divine potential. The perennial companionship extends inward to that which transcends thought and feeling; but it also extends outward beyond Heaven and Earth into the very connection between soul and body. The Law in China extends outward into the doctrine of pneuma and soma, leading to the medical application of acupuncture and moxibustion and implying the rightness of a holistic approach to all human activities. Through the Way of God (Dao) and by the Grace of God (De) we can overcome struggle and reconcile being in the world with integrity of soul.