of the saints and angels, it is clear that the Christian God-concept owes much to Judaism, out of which the faith evolved (Molloy 344). As a matter of doctrine, the Christian Trinity has been interpreted in providential terms, with the three persons of God that express the divine nature being "essentially a relationship of love" (Molloy 363). The concept of the Trinity enables Christianity to show the divine role in cosmic and human psychological and physical experience, with God the Father representing the creative principle; Jesus as the Incarnation representing the loving engagement of God with humankind by way of Jesus' miracles and teachings and his voluntary death "in order to take upon himself the punishment that justice demands should fall on other human beings who have done wrong" (Molloy 361); and the Holy Spirit as the source of strength in the faith (363).
The figure of Jesus is central to Christian thought. Molloy cites two aspects of Jesus that distinguish Christianity among the monotheistic religions: (1) his "independence of thought," which was a necessary precursor of the break from traditional Judaism; and (2) his "emphasis on universal love--not just love for the members of one's own family, ethnic group, or religion" (348), which may have been derived from articulations in Jewish tradition but which, by way of the two great commandments (Molloy 350), he insisted must be put into actual practice by the evolving community of the faithful. That approach to human experience must be set beside the tradition, especially among the Pharisees, of "careful observation of religious laws and traditions" (Molloy 306). To put it another way, Jesus cut through the symbological details of religious piety as an index of human dignity and worth and told people to love one another. It turned out, of course, that Christianity adopted a whole range of rules and rituals of its own. Even so, the original intent, as it were, seems to hav...