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The Barth-Brunner debate is one of the significant moments of the Protestant theological history in the 20 th century. The replica-exchange of the two outstanding figures of dialectical theology in 1934 not only includes the theological centres of gravity of Karl Barth and Emil Brunner, but also gives insight into the sparkling theological and spiritual atmosphere of the 1930s. Brunner’s interpretation reveals a specific version of natural theology, while Barth, in the spirit of New Reformation Theology, expresses his position in terms of the authority of the Word. In this essay until we explore the content of some points of the debate, we also briefly reconstruct the circumstances of its origin, as well as we mention its history and evaluation in Transylvania.

This work presents concisely the theological statements of a Swiss and a Hungarian theologian, Karl Barth and Lajos Erőss, regarding Buddhism. Both theologians belonged to the trend of orthodoxy in their respective countries. While they lived and worked in different contexts of space and time, nonetheless both strongly opposed the view of liberal theology that Christianity was merely one of the many world religions. Erőss and Barth dealt with comparative theology of religions within the framework of systematic theology, but they never accepted the conclusions of liberal theology. In this study, first I introduce Erőss’ life and work and briefly examine his opinion about Buddhism. Then I analyse Barth’ view about Japanese Zen Buddhism, especially with regard to the objectivity of his standards of comparative religion. The study critically reflects on how Christian dogmatic approach was applied by the theologians while they investigated other religions’ relation to Christianity, especially when the tenants about salvation was studied in those respective religions. The paper argues that Barth was able to transcend his theological mind up to a certain point yet bent his conclusion always towards his strong theological predetermined opinion which made him famous.

Die persönlichen und kollektiven tragischen Erfahrungen des zwanzigsten Jahrhunderts haben den französischen Philosophen Emmanuel Lévinas dazu geleitet, das bekannte biblische Gebot wieder ins Licht zu bringen. Der Imperativ, du sollst nicht töten hat in der Philosophie von Lévinas eine paradigmatische Funktion. Auf einer Seite unterstreicht Lévinas die göttliche Originalität des Verbotes, auf der anderen Seite betont er, dass diese Aufforderung fürs jeweilige Ich gültig ist, denn auf dem Gesicht des anderen steht immer zu lesen: Du sollst nicht töten!

In this study I intend to describe and introduce critically three basis approaches of Christianity, exclusivism, inclusivism and pluralism to other world religions and at the same time throw light on issues of interreligious dialogue and the problem of comparative theology. Having completed this task the paper deals with the novelty and fresh approach introduced by George Lindbeck a post liberal theologian and his approach will also be critically evaluated. It will be argued although Lindbeck’s cultural-linguistic model is useful for interreligious dialogue but it is a kind of repetition of the old liberal argument which also maintained the uniqueness of Christianity albeit in different mode than orthodox or traditional theology.