IX A Last Word

A Last Word other approaches. In theistic terms this is to say that I cannot know that other people’s visions may not also be revelations from God —and these perhaps fuller and more illuminating revelations than the one that I believe that I myself have received from Him. Moreover, the fact that I and my neighbour are following different roads is something that divides us much less than we are drawn together by the other fact that, in following different roads, we are both trying to approach the same mystery. All human beings who are seeking to approach the mystery in order to direct their lives in accordance with the nature and spirit of Absolute Reality or, in theistic terms, with the will of God—all these fellow seekers are engaged in an identical quest. They should recognize that they are spiritually brethren and should feel towards one another, and treat one another as such. Toleration does not become perfect until it has been transfigured into love.3 Thus, countless versions of religion appear to be in existence. The Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics has discovered 22 different concepts of God extant in different societies and it discusses the concept of God under 22 separate headings. 3. It follows that such an interpretation deprives the terms ‘prophethood’ and ‘termination of prophethood’ of their normal significance. Toynbee writes: The historian’s point of view is not incompatible with the belief that God has revealed Himself to Man for the purpose of helping Man to gain spiritual salvation that would be unattainable by Man’s unaided efforts; but the historian will be suspicious, a priori, of any presentation of this thesis that goes on to assert that a unique and final revelation has been given by God to my people in my time on my satellite of my sun in my galaxy. In this self-centered application of the thesis that God reveals Himself to His creatures, the historian will