Abrahamic religions
Encyclopedia
Abrahamic religions are the monotheistic
faiths
emphasizing and tracing their common origin to Abraham
or recognizing a spiritual tradition identified with him. They are one of the three major divisions in comparative religion
, along with Indian religions (Dharmic) and East Asian religions
(Taoic).
, it was estimated that 54% of the world's population (3.8 billion people) considered themselves adherents of the Abrahamic religions, about 30% of other religions, and 16% of no religion.
The three major Abrahamic religions are, in chronological order of founding, Judaism
, Christianity
, and Islam
. Judaism regards itself as the religion of the descendants of Jacob
,Jacob is also called Israel
, a name the Bible
states he was given by God, a grandson of Abraham. It has a strictly unitary view of God
, and the central holy book for almost all branches is the Hebrew Bible
, as elucidated in the oral law
.
Christianity began as a sect of Judaismcf. Judaizer, Messianic Judaism
in the Mediterranean Basin
With several centers, such as Rome, Jerusalem, Alexandria, Thessaloniki and Corinth, Antioch, and later spread outwards, eventually having two main centers in the empire, one for the Western Church and one for the Eastern Church in Rome and Constantinople
respectively by the 5th century AD
of the 1st century CE
and evolved into a separate religion—the Christian Church
—with distinctive beliefs and practices. Jesus
is the central figure of Christianity, considered by almost all denominations to be divine
, typically as one person of a Triune God
.Triune God
is also called the "Holy Trinity" The Christian Bible is typically held to be the ultimate authority, alongside Sacred Tradition
in some Apostolic See
s, such as Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy.
Islam arose in Arabia
Islam arose specifically in Hejaz
cities of Mecca
and Medina
of Arabia in the 7th century CE with a strictly unitary view of God
.The monotheistic view of God in Islam is called tawhid
which is essentially the same as the conception of God in Judaism
Muslim
s (adherents of Islam) typically hold the Qur'an
to be the ultimate authority, as revealed and elucidated through the teachings and practices
Teachings and practices of Muhammad
are collectively known as the sunnah
, similar to the Judaic concepts of oral law
and exegesis
, or talmud
and midrash
of a central, but not divine, prophet, Muhammad. Less well-known Abrahamic religions, originally offshoots of Shi'a Islam
, include the Bahá'í Faith
Historically, the Bahá'í Faith arose in 19th century Persia, in the context of Shi'a Islam
, and thus may be classed on this basis as a divergent strand of Islam, placing it in the Abrahamic tradition. However, the Bahá'í Faith considers itself an independent religious tradition, which draws from Islam but also other traditions. The Bahá'í Faith may also be classed as a new religious movement
, due to its comparatively recent origin, or may be considered sufficiently old and established for such classification to not be applicable. and Druze
.
The three main Abrahamic religions have certain similarities. All are monotheistic, and conceive God to be a transcendent Creator-figure and the source of moral law, and their sacred narratives feature many of the same figures, histories and places in each, although they often present them with different roles, perspectives and meanings. They also have many internal differences based on details of doctrine and practice. Christianity divided into three main branches (Catholic, Orthodox
and Protestant
), dozens of significant denominations, and even more smaller ones. Islam has two main branches (Sunni
and Shi'a), each having a number of denominations. Judaism also has a small number of branches, of which the most significant are Orthodox
, Conservative
and Reform
. At times the different religions – and often branches within the same religions – have had bitter conflicts with each other.
All the major Abrahamic religions claim a direct lineage to Abraham.
Other terms sometimes used include Abrahamic faiths, Abrahamic traditions, religions of Abraham, Abrahamic monotheistic religions, semitic religions, Semitic monotheistic religions, and Semitic one god religions.
However, the term 'Abrahamic faiths,' while helpful, is also misleading. It conveys an unspecified historical and theological commonality that is problematic on closer examination. While there is commonality among the religions, in large measure their shared ancestry is peripheral to their respective foundational beliefs and thus conceals crucial differences. For example, the common Christian beliefs of Incarnation
, Trinity
, and Jesus' Resurrection
are not accepted by Judaism and Islam (see for example Islamic view of Jesus' death
.) There are key beliefs in both Islam and Judaism that are not shared by most of Christianity (such as strict monotheism
and adherence to the Law
), and key beliefs of Islam and Christianity not shared by Judaism (such as the Prophet
ic and Messianic
position of Christ, respectively), and so on.
revealed himself to the patriarch Abraham.
conflicts with Jewish and Muslim concepts of monotheism. They reject the incarnation
of God in Christ; the defining feature of the Christian religion, in which salvation is based on a doctrine of atonement - most commonly substitutionary atonement
(for Protestants) and ransom, victory of Christ
or satisfaction (for Eastern Orthodox and Catholic
s) - through faith in Jesus Christ as Saviour. Although Christianity does not profess to believe in three gods, rather three persons, or hypostases, united in one essence
, or ousia, in the Godhead
, the one "Almighty God," the concept of the Trinity is categorically rejected by the other major Abrahamic religions (and by certain non-mainstream—generally defined by the similarity of beliefs to the Nicene Creed
- sects
of Christianity, such as Oneness Pentecostal
s, Unitarians
, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormon
s, and Christian Scientists). Since the conception of divine Triunity is not amenable to tawhid
, the Islamic doctrine of monotheism, Islam considers Christianity to be variously polytheistic or idolatrous. The worship of Jesus
, or the ascribing of partners to God, is categorically denounced as the heresy
of idolatry by Islam. The incarnation of God in to human form is denounced as a heresy by Judaism. The single largest religious sect of any religion - and the largest Christian sect, Roman Catholicism, with 1.1-1.3 billion adherents - as many as all sects of Islam combined - the second largest Christian sect, Eastern Orthodoxy, with 250-350 million adherents, and the vast majority of Protestant denomination
s (total ~750 million adherents) together making up more than 2 billion of the 2.1-2.2 billion Christians living as of 2010
, defend the doctrine of the Trinity - indeed, Trinitarianism is often used as one marker of orthodox
Christian thought and doctrine
. Jesus (Arabic
: Isa
or Yasu
, among Muslims and Arab Christians
respectively) is common between Christianity, Islam, and Baha'i Faith
, but with vastly differing conceptions, viewed as God incarnate
and the Saviour of mankind
by Christians, and as a Prophet of Islam by Muslim
s, and a Manifestation of God
by Baha'is.
and angelic messengers and who reveals the divine will through inspired Scriptures. They also affirm that obedience to this creator God is to be lived out historically, and that one day God will unilaterally intervene in human history on the day of judgment and will determine for all humanity their eternal destinies of heaven or hell based upon a person's beliefs and actions.
This theological continuity among the Abrahamic religions is profound, especially given that the great religions of Eastern Asia, the dominant schools of Greek philosophy, and almost all other religious and philosophical systems of modernity and postmodernity cannot claim anything close to this level of doctrinal continuity. '
to prophets, and each religion recognizes that God revealed teachings up to and including those in their own scripture.
orientation: all these religions speak of a choice between good and evil, which is associated with obedience or disobedience to a single God and to Divine Law
.
world view of history and destiny, beginning with the Creation of the world and the concept that God works through history, and ending with a Resurrection of the dead
and final judgment
and World to Come
.
Even though members of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam do not all claim Abraham as an ancestor, some members of these religions have tried to claim him as exclusively theirs.
Abraham is primarily a revered ancestor or patriarch (referred to as Avraham Avinu אברהם אבינו "Abraham our father") to whom God made several promises: chiefly, that he would have numberless descendants, who would receive the land of Canaan (the "Promised Land
.") According to Jewish tradition, Abraham was the first post-Flood prophet to reject idolatry
through rational analysis, although Shem
and Eber
carried on the tradition from Noah
.
—a Jew considered the Son of God
through whom God promised to bless all the families of the earth. For Christians, Abraham is a spiritual forebear as well as/rather than a direct ancestor depending on the individual's interpretation of Paul the Apostle
, with the Abrahamic Covenant "reinterpreted so as to be defined by faith in Christ rather than biological descent" or both by faith as well as a direct ancestor; in any case, the emphasis is placed on faith being the only requirement for the Abrahamic Covenant to apply; see also New Covenant
and Supersessionism
. In Christian belief, Abraham is a role model
of faith, and his obedience to God by offering Isaac
is seen as a foreshadowing
of God's offering of his son Jesus
.
The tendency of Christian commentators to interpret God's promises to Abraham as applying to Christianity rather than Judaism, whose adherents rejected Jesus
, is derived from Paul's interpretation of all descendants who believe in God as being spiritual descendants of Abraham. However, in both cases he refers to these spiritual descendants as the "sons of God
" rather than "children of Abraham".
) with his first son, Isma'il, a symbol of which is every mosque. Ibrahim (Abraham
) is the first in a genealogy
for Muhammad. Islam considers Abraham to be the "first Muslim" (Surah 3)—the first monotheist in a world where monotheism was lost, and the community of those faithful to God, thus being referred to as ابونا ابرهيم or "Our Father Abraham", as well as Ibrahim al-Hanif
or "Abraham the Monotheist". Islam holds that it was Ishmael, (Isma'il, Muhammad's ancestor) rather than Isaac, whom Ibrahim was instructed to sacrifice. In addition to this spiritual lineage, the northern Adnan
i Arab tribes
trace their lineage to Isma'il, and thus to Abraham. Abraham is also recalled in certain details of Muslim Hajj
(pilgrimage).
Abraham had eight sons by three women: Ishmael
by his wife's servant Hagar
, Isaac
by his wife Sarah
and six by his wife or concubine Keturah
.
, an account of the Israelite
s' relationship with God
from their earliest history until the building of the Second Temple
(c. 535 BCE). Abraham
is hailed as the first Hebrew
and the father of the Jewish people
. One of his grandsons was Judah
, from whom the religion ultimately gets it name. The Israelites were initially a number of tribes who lived in the Kingdom of Israel
and Kingdom of Judah
. After being conquered and exiled, some members of the Kingdom of Judah eventually returned to Israel. They later formed an independent state under the Hasmonean dynasty in the 2nd and 1st centuries BCE, before becoming a client kingdom of the Roman Empire
, which also conquered the state and dispersed its inhabitants. From the 2nd to the 6th centuries Jews wrote the Talmud
, a lengthy work of legal rulings and Biblical exegesis which—along with the Tanakh—is a key text of Judaism.
as a sect within Judaism initially led by Jesus
. His followers viewed him as the Messiah
; after his crucified
and death they came to view him as God incarnate
, who was resurrected
and will return
at the end of time to judge the living and the dead
and create an eternal Kingdom of God
. Within a few decades the new movement split from Judaism. After several periods of alternating persecution and relative peace vis a vis the Roman authorities under different administrations, Christianity became the state church of the Roman Empire
during the reign of Theodosius the Great with the 27 February 380 Edict of Thessalonica
, but has been split into various churches from its beginning
. An attempt was made by the Byzantine Empire
to unify Christendom
, at least within the empire, through the Seven Ecumenical Councils and establishment of the Pentarchy
, but this formally failed with the East–West Schism
of 1054. In the 16th century the birth and growth of Protestantism
further split Christianity into many denominations.
) and Cyrus the Great
(al-Khidr
). The teachings of Quran are presented as the direct revelation and words of Allah
, and earlier scriptures are considered to have been corrupted over time. Islam (meaning "submission", in the sense of submission to Allah) is universal (like the other faiths, membership is open to anyone); like Judaism, it has a strictly unitary conception of Allah, called tawhid
, or "strict" or "simple" monotheism. Early disputes over who would lead Muslims following the death of Muhammad led to a split between Sunni
and Shia, Islam's two main denominations.
. In both Judaism and Islam, God is viewed as a single divine being; this view is not shared by Christianity which views God as an indivisible Trinity
. While the Christians hold that the Trinity is the same as the Judaic and Islamic singular divine being view of God, the distinction is sufficiently huge as to require an overt explanation on the part of the Christians and on the part of the Islamic faith which restates the issue with an admonition in chapter 112 of the Qur'an
.
Jewish theology is based on the Hebrew Bible
, where the nature and commandments of God are revealed through the writings of Moses
, the Torah
, the writings of the prophet
s, psalmists and other ancient canonized scriptures, together with the Torah known as the Tanakh
. Additionally, it usually has a basis in its Oral Law
, as recorded in the Mishnah
and Gemora that form the Talmud
.
This Supreme Being is referred to in the Hebrew Bible in several ways, such as Elohim, Adonai or by the four Hebrew letters "Y-H-V (or W) -H" (the tetragrammaton
), which observant Jews do not pronounce as a word. The Hebrew words Eloheynu (Our God) and HaShem (The Name), as well as the English names "Lord" and "God", are also used in modern-day Judaism. The latter is sometimes written "G-d" in reference to the taboo against pronouncing the tetragrammaton.
The word "Elohim" has the Hebrew plural ending "-īm", which some Biblical scholars have taken as support for the general notion that the ancient Hebrews were polytheists in the time of the patriarchs; however, as the word itself is used with singular verbs, this hypothesis is not accepted in traditional Jewish thought. Jewish texts point out other words in Hebrew used in the same manner according to the rule of Hebrew Grammar, denoting respect, majesty and deliberation, similar to the royal plural in English and ancient Egyptian, and the use of the plural form "vous" for individuals of higher standing in modern French. Jewish Biblical scholars and historical commentary on the passage also suggest that Elohim in the plural form indicates God in conjunction with the heavenly court, i.e., the Angels. Some Kabbalistic texts explain the use of the Elohim as a pluralistic singularity, one essence sustaining all levels of creation from the mundane physical to the sublime and Holy spiritual.
; but that this was never obvious until the Word of God (the divine Logos
) became flesh and dwelt among us (see John 1
). Also, despite the fact that the Angel of the Lord
spoke to the Patriarchs, revealing God to them, it has always been only through the Spirit of God
granting them understanding, that men have been able to later perceive that they had been visited by God himself. After Jesus was raised from the dead
—according to Christian scriptures—this ancient Hebrew witness of how God reveals himself as Messiah came to be seen in a very different light. It was then that Jesus' followers began to speak widely of him as God himself, although this had already been revealed to certain individuals during his ministry. Examples were the Samaritan woman in Shechem and Jesus' closest apostles.
This belief gradually developed into the modern formulation of the Trinity
, which is the doctrine that God is a single entity (singular God), but that there is a "triunity" in God, which has always been evident albeit not understood. This mysterious "triunity" is hypostatic; that is, there are three hypostases (personae in Latin
) or "persons" of the Godhead
(though this is a often misleading English rendering). In the traditional Christian concept, God the Father
(the Source) has only revealed himself through his eternal Word (who was incarnated in human history as Jesus Christ). The three different hypostases are not "Gods" because they are one, and share the same Divine Nature
; they are the one and the same God. The Father is the Begetter, the Son is the eternally Begotten, and the Spirit eternally proceeds from both (in Catholicism and Protestantism) or from just the Father (in Eastern Orthodoxy).
Non-trinitarian views have constructed various theological understandings, ranging from Binitarianism
to Modalism. Some non-trinitarians would understand that the three are not three but one playing three different roles, in three different ages or dispensations
. In the Age of the Father, as Jehovah
. In the Age of the Son, as Jesus. And finally in the Age of the Holy Spirit, with a New Name, as the Second Coming of Christ. However, it should be noted that some Christian denominations reject the trinity and follow nontrinitarian
beliefs, Jehovah Witnesses being but one of them.
is the Arabic name for God ("ʾilāh" is the Arabic term used for a deity or a god in general). Islamic tradition also describes the 99 names of God. These 99 names describe attributes of God, including Most Merciful, The Just, The Peace and Blessing, and the Guardian. Islamic belief in God is distinct from Christianity in that God has no progeny. This belief is summed up in chapter
112 of the Qur'an
titled Al-Ikhlas, which states "Say, he is Allah (who is) one, Allah is the Eternal, the Absolute. He does not beget nor was he begotten. Nor is there to Him any equivalent.".
Muslim
s believe that the Jewish God is the same as their God, and that Jesus
was a divinely inspired prophet and was neither God nor His son. The Qur'an also draws a similitude between Jesus and Adam
—the first human being created by God—saying they were both 'created without a father' by God who said the simple word "Be" (Arabic: kun). Thus, both the Torah
and the Gospels are believed to be based upon divine revelation, but most Muslims believe them to have been corrupted
(both accidentally, through errors in transmission, and intentionally by certain Jews and Christians over the centuries). Muslims revere the Qur'an as the final uncorrupted word of God, or 'The Final Testament' as revealed through the last prophet, Prophet Muhammad
. Muhammad is regarded as the "Seal of the Prophets" i.e. the last in a long chain, and Islam as the final monotheist faith, perfect in all respects as taught by the Qur'an.
, a Hebrew acronym standing for Torah
(Law or Teachings), Nevi'im
(Prophets) and Ketuvim
(Writings). These are complemented by and supplemented with various (originally oral) traditions: Midrash
, the Mishnah
, the Talmud
and collected rabbinical writings. The Tanakh (or Hebrew Bible
) was composed between 1,400 BCE, and 400 BCE by Jewish prophets, kings, and priests
. The Hebrew text of the Tanakh, and the Torah in particular, is considered holy, down to the last letter: transcribing is done with painstaking care. An error in a single letter, ornamentation or symbol of the 300,000+ stylized letters that make up the Hebrew Torah text renders a Torah scroll unfit for use; hence the skills of a Torah scribe are specialist skills, and a scroll takes considerable time to write and check.
, which is largely the same as the Hebrew Bible
, and the New Testament
. The latter comprises four accounts of the life and teachings of Jesus (the Four Gospels, traditionally attributed to the apostle Matthew
; the apostle John
; Mark
, a student of the apostle Peter
; and Luke
, a student of the apostle Paul
), as well as several other writings by the apostles (such as Paul). They are usually considered to be divinely inspired
, and together comprise the Christian Bible
. Thus, Christians consider the fundamental teachings of the Old Testament, in particular the Ten Commandments
, as valid (see Biblical law in Christianity
for details). However, they believe that the coming of Jesus as the Messiah and saviour of humankind as predicted in the Old Testament
would shed light on the true relationship between God and mankind by restoring the emphasis of universal love and compassion, as mentioned in the Great Commandment
, above the other commandments, also de-emphasising the more "legalistic
" and material precepts of Mosaic Law
(such as circumcision
and the dietary constraints and temple rites). Some Christians believe that the link between Old and New Testaments in the Bible means that Judaism has been superseded
by Christianity as the "new Israel", and that Jesus' teachings described Israel not as a geographic place, but rather an association with God and promise of salvation in Heaven
, a revisionist position rejected by Jews and others.
The vast majority of Christian faiths (generally including Catholicism
, Orthodox Christianity
, Anglicanism
and most forms of Protestantism
) derive their beliefs from the conclusions reached by the First Council of Nicaea
in 325 in a document known as the Nicene Creed
. This describes the belief that God
(as a Trinity
of distinct persons with one substance) became human on earth
, born as Jesus
pursuant to the Old Testament
scriptures, was crucified by humanity, died and was buried, then was resurrected by God on the third day to rise and enter the Kingdom of Heaven
and "sit
at the right hand of God
" with a promise to return
and establish a World to Come
. Christians generally believe that faith in Jesus
is the way to achieve salvation
and to enter into Heaven and/or receive Eternal life
, and that salvation is a gift given by the grace of God.
The vast majority of Christian faiths (including Catholicism, Orthodox Christianity, and most forms of Protestantism) recognize that the Gospels were passed on by oral tradition, and were not set to paper until decades after the death of Jesus, and that the extant versions are copies of those originals. The version of the Bible considered to be most valid (in the sense of best conveying the true meaning of the word of God) has varied considerably: the Greek Septuagint, the Syriac Peshitta
, the Latin
Vulgate
, the English King James Version
and the Russian Synodal Bible have been authoritative to different communities at different times. In particular, Christians usually consult the Hebrew version of the Old Testament
when preparing new translations, although some believe that the Septuagint should be preferred, as it was the Bible of the Early Christian Greek Church, and because they believe its translators used a different Hebrew Bible to the ones that make up the current Masoretic Hebrew text, as there are some variant readings of the Dead Sea Scrolls
confirmed by the Septuagint. In the same sense that the Jewish mystics viewed the Torah
as something living and existing prior to any written text, so too do Christians view the Bible and Jesus himself as God's "Word
" (or logos
in Greek), transcending written documents.
The sacred scriptures of the Christian Bible are complemented by a large body of writings by individual Christians and councils of Christian leaders (see canon law
). Some Christian churches and denominations consider certain additional writings to be binding; other Christian groups consider only the Bible to be binding (sola scriptura
).
, comprising 114 sura
s ("chapters of the Qur'an"). However, Muslim
s also believe in the religious texts of Judaism and Christianity in their original forms, albeit not the current versions (which they believe to be corrupted
). According to the Qur'an (and mainstream Muslim belief), the verses of the Qur'an were revealed by Allah through the Archangel Jibrail to Muhammad on separate occasions. These revelations were written down and also memorized by hundreds of hafiz. These multiple sources were collected into one official copy and given its present order in 653 by the third Caliph.
The Qur'an mentions and reveres several of the Israelite prophets, including Moses and Jesus, among others (see also: Prophets of Islam
). The stories of these prophets are very similar to those in the Bible. However, the detailed precepts of the Tanakh and the New Testament
are not adopted outright; they are replaced by the new commandments accepted as revealed directly by Allah (through Gabriel) to Muhammad and codified in the Qur'an.
Like the Jews with the Torah, Muslims consider the original Arabic
text of the Qur'an as uncorrupted and holy to the last letter, and any translations are considered to be interpretations of the meaning of the Qur'an, as only the original Arabic text is considered to be the divine scripture.
Like the Rabbinic Oral Law
to the Hebrew Bible, the Qur'an is complemented by the Hadith
, a set of books by later authors recording the sayings of the prophet Muhammad. The Hadith interpret and elaborate Qur'anic precepts. Islamic scholars have categorized each Hadith at one of the following levels of authenticity or isnad: genuine (sahih), fair (hasan) or weak (da'if).
By the 9th century, six major Hadith collections
were accepted as reliable to Sunni Muslims.
Shia Muslims, however, refer to other authenticated hadiths instead. They are known collectively as The Four Books
.
The Hadith and the life story of Muhammad (sira) form the Sunnah
, an authoritative supplement to the Qur'an. The legal opinions of Islamic jurists (Faqīh
) provide another source for the daily practice and interpretation of Islamic tradition (see Fiqh
.)
The Qur'an
contains repeated references to the "religion of Abraham" (see Suras 2:130,135; 3:95; 6:123,161; 12:38; 16:123; 22:78). In the Qur'an, this expression refers specifically to Islam; sometimes in contrast to Christianity and Judaism, as in Sura 2:135, for example: 'They say: "Become Jews or Christians if ye would be guided (to salvation)." Say thou (O Muslims): "Nay! (I would rather) the Religion of Abraham the True, and he joined not gods with Allah." ' In the Qur'an, Abraham is declared to have been a Muslim (a hanif
, more accurately a "primordial monotheist
"), not a Jew nor a Christian (Sura 3:67).
and/or bring about the Kingdom of God
on Earth; in other words, the Messianic prophecy. Judaism awaits the coming of the Jewish Messiah
; the Jewish concept of Messiah differs from the Christian concept in several significant ways, despite the same term being applied to both. The Jewish Messiah is not seen as a "god", but as a mortal man who by his holiness is worthy of that description. His appearance is not the end of history, rather it signals the coming of the world to come.
Christianity awaits the Second Coming
of Christ, though Full Preterists believe this has already happened. Islam awaits both the second coming of Jesus (to complete his life and die) and the coming of Mahdi
(Sunnis
in his first incarnation, Shi'a
as the return of Muhammad al-Mahdi
).
Most Abrahamic religions agree that a human being comprises the body, which dies, and the soul, which is capable of remaining alive beyond human death and carries the person's essence, and that God will judge each person's life accordingly after death. The importance of this and the focus on it, as well as the precise criteria and end result, differs between religions.
of an afterlife (see Naboth
and the Witch of Endor
), Judaism focuses on this life and how to lead a holy life to please God, rather than future reward, and its attitude can be mostly summed up by the rabbinical observation that at the start of Genesis, God clothed the naked (Adam and Eve); at the end of Deuteronomy, he buried the dead (Moses
) and the Children of Israel mourned for 40 days before getting on with their lives.
and what constitutes afterlife
. Most Christian approaches either include different abodes for the dead (Heaven
, Hell
, Limbo
, [Purgatory]]) or universal reconciliation
in which all souls are made in the image of God. A small minority teach annihilationism
, the doctrine that those persons who are not reconciled to God simply cease to exist (though the Roman Catholic Church has no official teaching on what kind of place hell is, and indeed allows that it might be a locale of oblivion).
Those who worship and remember God are promised eternal abode in a physical and spiritual Paradise. Heaven is divided into seven levels
, with the highest level of Paradise being the reward of those who have been most virtuous, the prophets, and those killed while fighting for Allah (martyrs).
Upon repentance to God, many sins can be forgiven, on the condition they are not repeated, as God is supremely merciful. Additionally, those who believe in God, but have led sinful lives, may be punished for a time, and then eventually released into Paradise. If anyone dies in a state of Shirk
(i.e., associating God in any way, such as claiming that He is equal with anything or denying Him), this is not pardonnable—he or she will stay forever in Hell.
Once a person is admitted to Paradise, this person will abide there for eternity.
, Sabbath, or jumu'ah
; this custom is related to the biblical story of Genesis, where God created the universe in six days, and rested in the seventh.
practice is guided by the interpretation of the Torah
and the Talmud
. Before the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem
, Jewish priests offered sacrifices
there two times daily; since then, the practice has been replaced, until the Temple is rebuilt, by Jewish men being required to pray three times daily, including the chanting
of the Torah
, and facing in the direction of Jerusalem's Temple Mount
. Jewish women's prayer obligations vary by denomination; in contemporary orthodox practice, women do not read from the Torah
and are only required to say certain parts of these daily services. Other practices include circumcision
, dietary laws
, Shabbat
, Passover
, Torah study
, Tefillin
, purity
and others
. Conservative Judaism
, Reform Judaism
and the Reconstructionist
movement all move away, in different degrees, from the strict tradition of the law.
All versions of Judaism share a common, specialized calendar, containing many festivals. The calendar is lunisolar, with lunar months and a solar year (an extra month is added every second or third year to allow the shorter lunar year to "catch up" to the solar year). All streams observe the same festivals, but some emphasize them differently. As is usual with its extensive law system, the Orthodox have the most complex manner of observing the festivals, while the Reform pay more attention to the simple symbolism of each one.
is usually not ritualised, while group prayer may be ritual or non-ritual according to the occasion. During church services some form of liturgy
is frequently followed. Rituals are performed during sacraments, which also vary from denomination to denomination and usually include baptism
and communion
, and may also include confirmation, confession
, last rites
and holy orders. Catholic worship practice is governed by the Roman Missal
and other documents. Individuals, churches and denominations place different emphasis on ritual - some denominations consider most ritual activity optional, see Adiaphora
, particularly since the Protestant Reformation
.
. The first pillar is the belief in the oneness of Allah, and in Muhammad as his final and most perfect prophet. The second is to pray five times daily (salat
) towards the direction (qibla
) of the Kaaba
in Mecca
. The third pillar is Zakah, a portion of one's wealth given to the poor or to other specified causes, which means the giving of a specific share of one's wealth and savings to persons or causes, as is commanded in the Qur'an and elucidated as to specific percentages for different kinds of income and wealth in the hadith
. The normal share to be paid is two and a half percent of one's earnings: this increases if labour was not required, and increases further if only capital or possessions alone were required (i.e. proceeds from renting space), and increases to 50% on "unearned wealth" such as treasure-finding, and to 100% on wealth that is considered haram
, as part of attempting to make atonement for the sin, such as that gained through financial interest (riba
). Fasting
(sawm
) during the ninth month of the Muslim lunar calendar, Ramadan
, is the fourth pillar of Islam, to which all Muslims after the age of puberty in good health (as judged by a Muslim doctor to be able fast without incurring grave danger to health: even in seemingly-obvious situations, a "competent and upright Muslim physician" is required to agree), that are not menstruating are bound to observe - missed days of the fast for any reason must be made up, unless there be a permanent illness, such as diabetes, that prevents a person from ever fasting. In such a case, restitution must be made by feeding one poor person for each day missed. Finally, Muslims are also required, if physically able, to undertake a pilgrimage
to Mecca
at least once in one's life: it is strongly recommended to do it as often as possible, preferably once a year. Only individuals whose financial position and health are severely insufficient are exempt from making Hajj (e.g. if making Hajj would put stress on one's financial situation, but would not end up in homelessness or starvation, it is still required). During this pilgrimage, the Muslims spend three to seven days in worship, performing several strictly-defined rituals, most notably circumambulating the Kaaba
among millions of other Muslims and the "stoning of the devil
" at Mina
. At the end of the Hajj
, the heads of men are shaved, sheep and other halal
animals, notably camel
s, are slaughtered as a ritual sacrifice by bleeding out at the neck according to a strictly-prescribed ritual slaughter method similar to the Jewish kashrut
, to commemorate the moment when, according to Islamic tradition, Allah replaced Abraham's son Ishmael
(contrasted with the Judaeo-Christian tradition that Isaac
was the intended sacrifice) with a sheep, thereby preventing human sacrifice. The meat from these animals is then distributed locally to needy Muslims, neighbours and relatives. Finally, the hajji puts of ihram and the hajj is complete.
for males as a matter of religious obligation, as does Islam
as part of Sunnah (the practice is not mandated by the Qur'an
).
Western Christianity
replaced that custom with a baptism
ceremony varying according to the denomination, but generally including immersion, aspersion
or anointment with water. The Early Church (Acts 15, the Council of Jerusalem
) decided that circumcision is not required for Gentile Christians. The Council of Florence
in the 15th century prohibited it. Paragraph #2297 of the Catholic Catechism calls non-medical amputation or mutilation immoral. Many countries with majorities of Christian adherents have low circumcision rates (with the notable exceptions of the United States and the Philippines
). Coptic Christianity
and Ethiopian Orthodoxy still observe circumcision. See also Aposthia
.
Male circumcision is among the rites of Islam and is part of the (in Arabic): fitrah, or the innate disposition and natural character and instinct of the human creation.
Judaism and Islam have strict dietary laws, with permitted food known as kosher in Judaism, and halal
in Islam. These two religions prohibit the consumption of pork
; Islam prohibits the consumption of alcoholic beverage
s of any kind. Halal restrictions can be seen as a modification of the kashrut
dietary laws, so many kosher foods are considered halal; especially in the case of meat, which Islam prescribes must be slaughtered in the name of God. Hence in Morocco
Muslims used to consume kosher food. Similarly, some foods not considered kosher are considered halal in Islam.
With rare exceptions, Christians do not consider the Old Testament's strict food laws as relevant for today's church; see also Biblical law in Christianity
. Most Protestants have no set food laws, but there are minority exceptions.
The Roman Catholic Church believes in observing abstinence and penance. For example, all Fridays through the year and the time of Lent are penitential days. The law of abstinence requires a Catholic from 14 years of age until death to abstain from eating meat on Fridays in honor of the Passion of Jesus on Good Friday. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
obtained the permission of the Holy See for Catholics in the U.S. to substitute a penitential, or even a charitable, practice of their own choosing. Eastern Rite Catholics have their own penitential practices as specified by the Code of Canons for the Eastern Churches.
The Seventh-day Adventist Church
(SDA) embraces numerous Old Testament rules and regulations such as tithing, Sabbath observance, and Jewish Food laws. Therefore, they do not eat pork, shellfish, or other foods considered unclean under the Old Covenant
. The "Fundamental Beliefs" of the SDA state that their members "are to adopt the most healthful diet possible and abstain from the unclean foods identified in the Scriptures." among others
In the Christian Bible, the consumption of strangled animals and of blood was forbidden by Apostolic Decree and are still forbidden in the Greek Orthodox Church, according to German theologican Karl Josef von Hefele
, who, in his Commentary on Canon II of the Second Ecumenical Council held in the 4th century at Gangra, notes: "We further see that, at the time of the Synod of Gangra, the rule of the Apostolic Synod [the Council of Jerusalem
of Acts 15] with regard to blood and things strangled was still in force. With the Greeks, indeed, it continued always in force as their Euchologies still show." He also writes that "as late as the eighth century, Pope Gregory the Third
, in 731, forbade the eating of blood or things strangled under threat of a penance of forty days."
Jehovah's Witnesses
abstain from eating blood and from blood transfusions based on .
and time of worship
. It is observed differently in Judaism and Christianity and informs a similar occasion in several other Abrahamic faiths. Though many viewpoints and definitions have arisen over the millennia, most originate in the same textual tradition. Though not a day of rest (creation does not make God tired and therefore He did not rest on the 7th day in Muslim belief), Islam holds Friday as a day of special prayer.
as such since the end of the Second Temple era
. Judaism states that non-Jews can achieve righteousness by following Noahide Laws
, a set of seven universal commandments non-Jews are expected to follow. In this context, the Rambam (Rabbi Moses Maimonides, one of the major Jewish teachers) commented: "Quoting from our sages, the righteous people from other nations have a place in the world to come, if they have acquired what they should learn about the Creator". Because the commandments applicable to the Jews are much more detailed and onerous than Noahide laws, Jewish scholars have traditionally maintained that it is better to be a good non-Jew than a bad Jew, thus discouraging conversion. In the U.S., as of 2003 28% of married Jews were married to non-Jews. See also Conversion to Judaism
.
. Many Christian organizations, especially Protestant churches, send missionaries
to non-Christian communities throughout the world. See also Great Commission
. Forced conversion
s to Catholicism have been documented at various points throughout history. The most prominently cited allegations are the conversions of the pagans after Constantine
; of Muslims, Jews and Eastern Orthodox during the Crusades
; of Jews and Muslims during the time of the Spanish Inquisition
, where they were offered the choice of exile, conversion or death; and of the Aztecs by Hernan Cortes
. Forced conversions to Protestantism have occurred as well, notably during the Reformation
, especially in England and Ireland (see recusancy
and Popish plot
).
Forced conversions are condemned as sinful by major denominations such as the Roman Catholic Church
, which officially states that forced conversions pollute the Christian religion and offend human dignity, so that past or present offenses are regarded as a scandal (a cause of unbelief). According to Pope Paul VI, "It is one of the major tenets of Catholic doctrine that man's response to God in faith must be free: no one therefore is to be forced to embrace the Christian faith against his own will."
, which the devout believe is the only path to salvation from hellfire (a view not necessarily substantiated by the Qur'an). Most mainstream Muslim groups say that the verse that reads "Let there be no compulsion in religion" means "the apostate is threatened with punishment in the next world only" and prevents Muslims from using violence to spread the religion. This has been contested by critics such as Bat Ye'or
and Robert Spencer who believe that Muhammad, by his own example, sought forced universal conversion of non-Muslims. For example, in the Sahih al-Bukhari
(Volume 1, Book 2, Number 24) Muhammad says, "I have been ordered (by Allah) to struggle against the people until they testify that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah and that Muhammad is Allah's Apostle." The Qu'ran says, "If then, ye (the wrongdoers or mushrikun, commonly translated as "unbelievers") repent, it were best for you; but if ye turn away, know ye that ye cannot frustrate Allah. And proclaim a grievous penalty to those who reject Faith." "...fight and slay the unbelievers
wherever ye find them, and seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war)..." "Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth." These verses, being in context of a particular historic war only, thus, do not indicate that Islam permits killing or forcing people in the name of religion. However, it is the ijma
, or unanimous opinion of Islamic scholars from the 8th century until the present day, that these verses do indeed command the faithful to rule the world under the Shariah: they also are acknowledged as being the final and eternal word of Allah on matters of war and peace, abrogating earlier verses, and apply for all times, not just a specific war of the past.
Another similar verse as stated above states Let there be no compulsion in religion: Truth stands out clear from Error: whoever rejects evil and believes in Allah hath grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold, that never breaks. And Allah heareth and knoweth all things. (Yusuf Ali translation of verse in AL-BAQARA) shows the basic principles of Islam, to believe in God and avoid committing evil acts. The evil acts are described clearly in the Qur'an. It is also important to understand that earlier verses of the Qu'ran are subject to be substituted by later additions through the process of abrogation: thus Surah 9:5 and 9:29, along with other more violent verses, cancel out and supersede peaceful ones, as they were revealed later in Muhammad's prophetic career.
During the Ummayad dynasty Muslim rulers imposed a Jizya
(poll tax) on dhimmi
s (non-Muslims living under Islamic rule), something that some argue encouraged conversion. However, Muslims refer to the Zakat
that every Muslim is obliged to pay as an indication that Muslims would still have to pay more tax than a non-Muslim, refuting the claim that the Jizya somehow encouraged conversion. However, the jizya was not a set percentage like the zakat (set at 2.5%), but could be raised arbitrarily, and often was in periods of piety and Islamic fervour. The Jizya also afforded the dhimmis limited protection by the ruler from outside enemies, but not necessarily from the ruler and his subjects, as pogroms were not infreqeunt and exemption form serving in the army at the cost of loss of freedom, franchise, and humiliation.
Islam has missionaries
. They are known as Dawah
networks and encourage followers to learn about Islam. Since the founding of Islam, Dawah networks and schools have traveled all over the world with the objective of garnering converts to Islam, places such as India
, present day Pakistan
, Malaysia, Indonesia
, Russia
, Central Asia
, parts of Africa
, the Balkans
and Eurasia
have all successfully garnered converts through these networks and schools. Presently, many Dawah schools aim to gain more followers.
The word "dawah" literally means "invitation", as in an invitation towards a food banquet. Muslims are required to explain and elucidate their beliefs to interested parties who are then free to either accept or reject what they hear. The Prophets, according to the Koran, were commanded to say "We are only conveyors (of the message)." - i.e. whether to accept or not is down to individual choice and discretion and each person is responsible for their own actions and beliefs.
Islam distinguishes between "People of the Book
"—followers of the Abrahamic religions, which include the group referred to as Sabians
—and other religious beliefs. While members of all religions are encouraged to convert, penalties and compulsions on People of the Book are less.
Openly Jewish and Muslim people were expelled rather than killed, but many submitted to forced conversion
to Catholicism to avoid expulsion. The Inquisitors often did not trust the converts, and persecuted them cruelly for being secret adherents of their original religions, which was often true but sometimes fabricated. Jewish forced converts were known as "anusim
," or sometimes by the pejorative "morrano
(pig)."
However, some of the restriction of Abrahamic to these three is due only to tradition in historical classification. Therefore, restricting the category to these three religions has come under criticism. The religions listed below here claim Abrahamic classification, either by the religions themselves, or by scholars who study them.
Though smaller and younger than the well known Abrahamic religions, the Bahá'í Faith is significant because of its activities, distribution and numbers. The religion is almost entirely contained in a single, organized, hierarchical community, and is also recognized as the second-most geographically widespread religion after Christianity. The Association of Religion Data Archives
estimated some 7.6 million Bahá'ís in 2005.
Bahá'u'lláh
, the founder, affirms the highest religious station for Abraham and generally for prophets mentioned among the other Abrahamic religions, and has claimed a lineage of descent from Abraham through Keturah
and Sarah
. Additionally Bahá'u'lláh actually did lose a son, Mírzá Mihdí
. Bahá'u'lláh, then in prison, eulogized his son and connected the subsequent easing of restrictions to his son's dying prayer and compared it to the intended sacrifice of Abraham
’s son.
The religion also shares many of the same commonalities of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The religion emphasizes monotheism and believes in one eternal transcendent God. See God in the Bahá'í Faith. The religion accepts the premise, and is a victim, of the theme of a Prophetic tradition pattern in that it accepts the founders of the previous major Abrahamic religions as Manifestations of God come with revelation
under one God and has been persecuted
and rejected as a religion. Bahá'ís believe that Bahá'u'lláh is the latest, though not last, of the series of messengers of God and that this series of interventions by God in human history has been progressive, each revelation from God more complete and based on the teachings of those that preceded it, and each preparing the way for the next.
, Druzes, Mandeans, and Rastafari movement
. These religions are regional: Samaritans largely in Israel and the West Bank, Yazidi among the Kurds though there has been some emigration, Druze among the Syrians and Lebanese, Mandean largely in Iraq, Rastafari mostly in Jamaica.
Monotheism
Monotheism is the belief in the existence of one and only one god. Monotheism is characteristic of the Baha'i Faith, Christianity, Druzism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Samaritanism, Sikhism and Zoroastrianism.While they profess the existence of only one deity, monotheistic religions may still...
faiths
Religion
Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values. Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to...
emphasizing and tracing their common origin to Abraham
Abraham
Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...
or recognizing a spiritual tradition identified with him. They are one of the three major divisions in comparative religion
Comparative religion
Comparative religion is a field of religious studies that analyzes the similarities and differences of themes, myths, rituals and concepts among the world's religions...
, along with Indian religions (Dharmic) and East Asian religions
East Asian religions
In the study of comparative religion, the East Asian religions form a subset of the Eastern religions...
(Taoic).
, it was estimated that 54% of the world's population (3.8 billion people) considered themselves adherents of the Abrahamic religions, about 30% of other religions, and 16% of no religion.
The three major Abrahamic religions are, in chronological order of founding, Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
, Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
, and Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
. Judaism regards itself as the religion of the descendants of Jacob
Jacob
Jacob "heel" or "leg-puller"), also later known as Israel , as described in the Hebrew Bible, the Talmud, the New Testament and the Qur'an was the third patriarch of the Hebrew people with whom God made a covenant, and ancestor of the tribes of Israel, which were named after his descendants.In the...
,Jacob is also called Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
, a name the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
states he was given by God, a grandson of Abraham. It has a strictly unitary view of God
God in Judaism
The conception of God in Judaism is strictly monotheistic. God is an absolute one indivisible incomparable being who is the ultimate cause of all existence. Jewish tradition teaches that the true aspect of God is incomprehensible and unknowable, and that it is only God's revealed aspect that...
, and the central holy book for almost all branches is the Hebrew Bible
Tanakh
The Tanakh is a name used in Judaism for the canon of the Hebrew Bible. The Tanakh is also known as the Masoretic Text or the Miqra. The name is an acronym formed from the initial Hebrew letters of the Masoretic Text's three traditional subdivisions: The Torah , Nevi'im and Ketuvim —hence...
, as elucidated in the oral law
Halakha
Halakha — also transliterated Halocho , or Halacha — is the collective body of Jewish law, including biblical law and later talmudic and rabbinic law, as well as customs and traditions.Judaism classically draws no distinction in its laws between religious and ostensibly non-religious life; Jewish...
.
Christianity began as a sect of Judaismcf. Judaizer, Messianic Judaism
Messianic Judaism
Messianic Judaism is a syncretic religious movement that arose in the 1960s and 70s. It blends evangelical Christian theology with elements of Jewish terminology and ritual....
in the Mediterranean Basin
Mediterranean Basin
In biogeography, the Mediterranean Basin refers to the lands around the Mediterranean Sea that have a Mediterranean climate, with mild, rainy winters and hot, dry summers, which supports characteristic Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub vegetation...
With several centers, such as Rome, Jerusalem, Alexandria, Thessaloniki and Corinth, Antioch, and later spread outwards, eventually having two main centers in the empire, one for the Western Church and one for the Eastern Church in Rome and Constantinople
Constantinople
Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...
respectively by the 5th century AD
Christianity in the 5th century
The 5th century would see further fracturing of the State church of the Roman Empire. Emperor Theodosius II called two synods in Ephesus, one in 431 and one in 449 AD, that addressed the teachings of then-Patriarch of Constantinople Nestorius and similar teachings...
of the 1st century CE
Common Era
Common Era ,abbreviated as CE, is an alternative designation for the calendar era originally introduced by Dionysius Exiguus in the 6th century, traditionally identified with Anno Domini .Dates before the year 1 CE are indicated by the usage of BCE, short for Before the Common Era Common Era...
and evolved into a separate religion—the Christian Church
Christian Church
The Christian Church is the assembly or association of followers of Jesus Christ. The Greek term ἐκκλησία that in its appearances in the New Testament is usually translated as "church" basically means "assembly"...
—with distinctive beliefs and practices. Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
is the central figure of Christianity, considered by almost all denominations to be divine
God the Son
God the Son is the second person of the Trinity in Christian theology. The doctrine of the Trinity identifies Jesus of Nazareth as God the Son, united in essence but distinct in person with regard to God the Father and God the Holy Spirit...
, typically as one person of a Triune God
Trinity
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons : the Father, the Son , and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct yet coexist in unity, and are co-equal, co-eternal and consubstantial . Put another way, the three persons of the Trinity are of one being...
.Triune God
Trinity
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons : the Father, the Son , and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct yet coexist in unity, and are co-equal, co-eternal and consubstantial . Put another way, the three persons of the Trinity are of one being...
is also called the "Holy Trinity" The Christian Bible is typically held to be the ultimate authority, alongside Sacred Tradition
Sacred Tradition
Sacred Tradition or Holy Tradition is a theological term used in some Christian traditions, primarily in the Roman Catholic, Anglican, Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox traditions, to refer to the fundamental basis of church authority....
in some Apostolic See
Apostolic See
In Christianity, an apostolic see is any episcopal see whose foundation is attributed to one or more of the apostles of Jesus.Out of the many such sees, five acquired special importance in Chalcedonian Christianity and became classified as the Pentarchy in Eastern Orthodox Christianity...
s, such as Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy.
Islam arose in Arabia
Arabian Peninsula
The Arabian Peninsula is a land mass situated north-east of Africa. Also known as Arabia or the Arabian subcontinent, it is the world's largest peninsula and covers 3,237,500 km2...
Islam arose specifically in Hejaz
Hejaz
al-Hejaz, also Hijaz is a region in the west of present-day Saudi Arabia. Defined primarily by its western border on the Red Sea, it extends from Haql on the Gulf of Aqaba to Jizan. Its main city is Jeddah, but it is probably better known for the Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina...
cities of Mecca
Mecca
Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...
and Medina
Medina
Medina , or ; also transliterated as Madinah, or madinat al-nabi "the city of the prophet") is a city in the Hejaz region of western Saudi Arabia, and serves as the capital of the Al Madinah Province. It is the second holiest city in Islam, and the burial place of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad, and...
of Arabia in the 7th century CE with a strictly unitary view of God
God in Islam
In Islamic theology, God is the all-powerful and all-knowing creator, sustainer, ordainer, and judge of the universe. Islam puts a heavy emphasis on the conceptualization of God as strictly singular . God is unique and inherently One , all-merciful and omnipotent. According to the Islamic...
.The monotheistic view of God in Islam is called tawhid
Tawhid
Tawhid is the concept of monotheism in Islam. It is the religion's most fundamental concept and holds God is one and unique ....
which is essentially the same as the conception of God in Judaism
God in Judaism
The conception of God in Judaism is strictly monotheistic. God is an absolute one indivisible incomparable being who is the ultimate cause of all existence. Jewish tradition teaches that the true aspect of God is incomprehensible and unknowable, and that it is only God's revealed aspect that...
Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
s (adherents of Islam) typically hold the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
to be the ultimate authority, as revealed and elucidated through the teachings and practices
Sunnah
The word literally means a clear, well trodden, busy and plain surfaced road. In the discussion of the sources of religion, Sunnah denotes the practice of Prophet Muhammad that he taught and practically instituted as a teacher of the sharī‘ah and the best exemplar...
Teachings and practices of Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
are collectively known as the sunnah
Sunnah
The word literally means a clear, well trodden, busy and plain surfaced road. In the discussion of the sources of religion, Sunnah denotes the practice of Prophet Muhammad that he taught and practically instituted as a teacher of the sharī‘ah and the best exemplar...
, similar to the Judaic concepts of oral law
Halakha
Halakha — also transliterated Halocho , or Halacha — is the collective body of Jewish law, including biblical law and later talmudic and rabbinic law, as well as customs and traditions.Judaism classically draws no distinction in its laws between religious and ostensibly non-religious life; Jewish...
and exegesis
Exegesis
Exegesis is a critical explanation or interpretation of a text, especially a religious text. Traditionally the term was used primarily for exegesis of the Bible; however, in contemporary usage it has broadened to mean a critical explanation of any text, and the term "Biblical exegesis" is used...
, or talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
and midrash
Midrash
The Hebrew term Midrash is a homiletic method of biblical exegesis. The term also refers to the whole compilation of homiletic teachings on the Bible....
of a central, but not divine, prophet, Muhammad. Less well-known Abrahamic religions, originally offshoots of Shi'a Islam
Shi'a Islam
Shia Islam is the second largest denomination of Islam. The followers of Shia Islam are called Shi'ites or Shias. "Shia" is the short form of the historic phrase Shīʻatu ʻAlī , meaning "followers of Ali", "faction of Ali", or "party of Ali".Like other schools of thought in Islam, Shia Islam is...
, include the Bahá'í Faith
Bahá'í Faith
The Bahá'í Faith is a monotheistic religion founded by Bahá'u'lláh in 19th-century Persia, emphasizing the spiritual unity of all humankind. There are an estimated five to six million Bahá'ís around the world in more than 200 countries and territories....
Historically, the Bahá'í Faith arose in 19th century Persia, in the context of Shi'a Islam
Shi'a Islam
Shia Islam is the second largest denomination of Islam. The followers of Shia Islam are called Shi'ites or Shias. "Shia" is the short form of the historic phrase Shīʻatu ʻAlī , meaning "followers of Ali", "faction of Ali", or "party of Ali".Like other schools of thought in Islam, Shia Islam is...
, and thus may be classed on this basis as a divergent strand of Islam, placing it in the Abrahamic tradition. However, the Bahá'í Faith considers itself an independent religious tradition, which draws from Islam but also other traditions. The Bahá'í Faith may also be classed as a new religious movement
New religious movement
A new religious movement is a religious community or ethical, spiritual, or philosophical group of modern origin, which has a peripheral place within the dominant religious culture. NRMs may be novel in origin or they may be part of a wider religion, such as Christianity, Hinduism or Buddhism, in...
, due to its comparatively recent origin, or may be considered sufficiently old and established for such classification to not be applicable. and Druze
Druze
The Druze are an esoteric, monotheistic religious community, found primarily in Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Jordan, which emerged during the 11th century from Ismailism. The Druze have an eclectic set of beliefs that incorporate several elements from Abrahamic religions, Gnosticism, Neoplatonism...
.
The three main Abrahamic religions have certain similarities. All are monotheistic, and conceive God to be a transcendent Creator-figure and the source of moral law, and their sacred narratives feature many of the same figures, histories and places in each, although they often present them with different roles, perspectives and meanings. They also have many internal differences based on details of doctrine and practice. Christianity divided into three main branches (Catholic, Orthodox
Eastern Orthodox Church
The Orthodox Church, officially called the Orthodox Catholic Church and commonly referred to as the Eastern Orthodox Church, is the second largest Christian denomination in the world, with an estimated 300 million adherents mainly in the countries of Belarus, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Georgia, Greece,...
and Protestant
Protestantism
Protestantism is one of the three major groupings within Christianity. It is a movement that began in Germany in the early 16th century as a reaction against medieval Roman Catholic doctrines and practices, especially in regards to salvation, justification, and ecclesiology.The doctrines of the...
), dozens of significant denominations, and even more smaller ones. Islam has two main branches (Sunni
Sunni Islam
Sunni Islam is the largest branch of Islam. Sunni Muslims are referred to in Arabic as ʾAhl ūs-Sunnah wa āl-Ǧamāʿah or ʾAhl ūs-Sunnah for short; in English, they are known as Sunni Muslims, Sunnis or Sunnites....
and Shi'a), each having a number of denominations. Judaism also has a small number of branches, of which the most significant are Orthodox
Orthodox Judaism
Orthodox Judaism , is the approach to Judaism which adheres to the traditional interpretation and application of the laws and ethics of the Torah as legislated in the Talmudic texts by the Sanhedrin and subsequently developed and applied by the later authorities known as the Gaonim, Rishonim, and...
, Conservative
Conservative Judaism
Conservative Judaism is a modern stream of Judaism that arose out of intellectual currents in Germany in the mid-19th century and took institutional form in the United States in the early 1900s.Conservative Judaism has its roots in the school of thought known as Positive-Historical Judaism,...
and Reform
Reform Judaism
Reform Judaism refers to various beliefs, practices and organizations associated with the Reform Jewish movement in North America, the United Kingdom and elsewhere. In general, it maintains that Judaism and Jewish traditions should be modernized and should be compatible with participation in the...
. At times the different religions – and often branches within the same religions – have had bitter conflicts with each other.
Etymology
It has been suggested that the phrase, "Abrahamic religion," may simply mean that all these religions come from one spiritual source. Christians refer to Abraham as a "father in faith." There is an Islamic religious term, Millat Ibrahim (The nation of Abraham), indicating that Islam sees itself as having practices tied to the traditions of Abraham. In addition to Jewish direct birth descendancy from Abraham, adherents follow his practices and ideals as the first of the three spiritual "fathers," Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.All the major Abrahamic religions claim a direct lineage to Abraham.
- Abraham is recorded in the TorahTorahTorah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
as the ancestor of the Israelites through his son IsaacIsaacIsaac as described in the Hebrew Bible, was the only son Abraham had with his wife Sarah, and was the father of Jacob and Esau. Isaac was one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites...
, born to SarahSarahSarah or Sara was the wife of Abraham and the mother of Isaac as described in the Hebrew Bible and the Quran. Her name was originally Sarai...
through a promisePromiseA promise is a commitment by someone to do or not do something.In the law of contract, an exchange of promises is usually held to be legally enforceable, according to the Latin maxim pacta sunt servanda.- Types :...
made in Genesis. All variants of Judaism through the early 20th century (prophetic, rabbinic, reform, and conservative) were founded by Israelite descendants. - The basic text of Christianity is the Bible, the first part of which, the Old TestamentOld TestamentThe Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
, is a modified form of the Jewish Hebrew BibleHebrew BibleThe Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
, leading to the same ancestry claim as above. - It is the Islamic tradition that Muhammad, as an ArabArabArab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
, is descended from AbrahamAbrahamAbraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...
's son IshmaelIshmaelIshmael is a figure in the Hebrew Bible and the Qur'an, and was Abraham's first born child according to Jews, Christians and Muslims. Ishmael was born of Abraham's marriage to Sarah's handmaiden Hagar...
. Jewish tradition also equates the descendants of Ishmael, "Ishmaelites", with Arabs, as the descendants of IsaacIsaacIsaac as described in the Hebrew Bible, was the only son Abraham had with his wife Sarah, and was the father of Jacob and Esau. Isaac was one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites...
by JacobJacobJacob "heel" or "leg-puller"), also later known as Israel , as described in the Hebrew Bible, the Talmud, the New Testament and the Qur'an was the third patriarch of the Hebrew people with whom God made a covenant, and ancestor of the tribes of Israel, which were named after his descendants.In the...
named IsraelIsraelThe State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
are the "Israelites".
Other terms sometimes used include Abrahamic faiths, Abrahamic traditions, religions of Abraham, Abrahamic monotheistic religions, semitic religions, Semitic monotheistic religions, and Semitic one god religions.
However, the term 'Abrahamic faiths,' while helpful, is also misleading. It conveys an unspecified historical and theological commonality that is problematic on closer examination. While there is commonality among the religions, in large measure their shared ancestry is peripheral to their respective foundational beliefs and thus conceals crucial differences. For example, the common Christian beliefs of Incarnation
Incarnation
Incarnation literally means embodied in flesh or taking on flesh. It refers to the conception and birth of a sentient creature who is the material manifestation of an entity, god or force whose original nature is immaterial....
, Trinity
Trinity
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons : the Father, the Son , and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct yet coexist in unity, and are co-equal, co-eternal and consubstantial . Put another way, the three persons of the Trinity are of one being...
, and Jesus' Resurrection
Resurrection
Resurrection refers to the literal coming back to life of the biologically dead. It is used both with respect to particular individuals or the belief in a General Resurrection of the dead at the end of the world. The General Resurrection is featured prominently in Jewish, Christian, and Muslim...
are not accepted by Judaism and Islam (see for example Islamic view of Jesus' death
Islamic view of Jesus' death
The issue of the crucifixion and death of Jesus is important to Muslims as they believe that Jesus will return before the end of time. Muslims believe Jesus was not crucified, but was raised bodily to heaven by God....
.) There are key beliefs in both Islam and Judaism that are not shared by most of Christianity (such as strict monotheism
Monotheism
Monotheism is the belief in the existence of one and only one god. Monotheism is characteristic of the Baha'i Faith, Christianity, Druzism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Samaritanism, Sikhism and Zoroastrianism.While they profess the existence of only one deity, monotheistic religions may still...
and adherence to the Law
Religious law
In some religions, law can be thought of as the ordering principle of reality; knowledge as revealed by a God defining and governing all human affairs. Law, in the religious sense, also includes codes of ethics and morality which are upheld and required by the God...
), and key beliefs of Islam and Christianity not shared by Judaism (such as the Prophet
Prophet
In religion, a prophet, from the Greek word προφήτης profitis meaning "foreteller", is an individual who is claimed to have been contacted by the supernatural or the divine, and serves as an intermediary with humanity, delivering this newfound knowledge from the supernatural entity to other people...
ic and Messianic
Messiah
A messiah is a redeemer figure expected or foretold in one form or another by a religion. Slightly more widely, a messiah is any redeemer figure. Messianic beliefs or theories generally relate to eschatological improvement of the state of humanity or the world, in other words the World to...
position of Christ, respectively), and so on.
Common aspects
The unifying characteristic of Judaism, Christianity and Islam is that all accept the tradition that GodGod
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
revealed himself to the patriarch Abraham.
Monotheism
All Abrahamic religions claim to be monotheistic, worshiping an exclusive God, though known by different names. All of these religions believe that God creates, is one, rules, reveals, loves, judges, and forgives. However, Christianity's Trinitarian doctrineTrinity
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons : the Father, the Son , and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct yet coexist in unity, and are co-equal, co-eternal and consubstantial . Put another way, the three persons of the Trinity are of one being...
conflicts with Jewish and Muslim concepts of monotheism. They reject the incarnation
Incarnation
Incarnation literally means embodied in flesh or taking on flesh. It refers to the conception and birth of a sentient creature who is the material manifestation of an entity, god or force whose original nature is immaterial....
of God in Christ; the defining feature of the Christian religion, in which salvation is based on a doctrine of atonement - most commonly substitutionary atonement
Substitutionary atonement
Technically speaking, substitutionary atonement is the name given to a number of Christian models of the atonement that all regard Jesus as dying as a substitute for others, "instead of" them...
(for Protestants) and ransom, victory of Christ
Christus Victor
The term Christus Victor refers to a Christian understanding of the atonement which views Christ's death as the means by which the powers of evil, which held humankind under their dominion, were defeated...
or satisfaction (for Eastern Orthodox and Catholic
Catholic
The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...
s) - through faith in Jesus Christ as Saviour. Although Christianity does not profess to believe in three gods, rather three persons, or hypostases, united in one essence
Ousia
Ousia is the Ancient Greek noun formed on the feminine present participle of ; it is analogous to the English participle being, and the modern philosophy adjectival ontic...
, or ousia, in the Godhead
Godhead (Christianity)
Godhead is a Middle English variant of the word godhood, and denotes the Divine Nature or Substance of the Christian God, or the Trinity. Within some traditions such as Mormonism, the term is used as a nontrinitarian substitute for the term Trinity, denoting the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit not as...
, the one "Almighty God," the concept of the Trinity is categorically rejected by the other major Abrahamic religions (and by certain non-mainstream—generally defined by the similarity of beliefs to the Nicene Creed
Nicene Creed
The Nicene Creed is the creed or profession of faith that is most widely used in Christian liturgy. It is called Nicene because, in its original form, it was adopted in the city of Nicaea by the first ecumenical council, which met there in the year 325.The Nicene Creed has been normative to the...
- sects
Sociological classifications of religious movements
Sociologists have proposed various classifications of religious movements. The most widely used classification in the sociology of religion is the church-sect typology. The typology states that churches, ecclesia, denominations and sects form a continuum with decreasing influence on society...
of Christianity, such as Oneness Pentecostal
Oneness Pentecostal
Oneness Pentecostalism refers to a grouping of denominations and believers within Pentecostal Christianity, all of whom subscribe to the nontrinitarian theological doctrine of Oneness...
s, Unitarians
Unitarianism
Unitarianism is a Christian theological movement, named for its understanding of God as one person, in direct contrast to Trinitarianism which defines God as three persons coexisting consubstantially as one in being....
, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormon
Mormon
The term Mormon most commonly denotes an adherent, practitioner, follower, or constituent of Mormonism, which is the largest branch of the Latter Day Saint movement in restorationist Christianity...
s, and Christian Scientists). Since the conception of divine Triunity is not amenable to tawhid
Tawhid
Tawhid is the concept of monotheism in Islam. It is the religion's most fundamental concept and holds God is one and unique ....
, the Islamic doctrine of monotheism, Islam considers Christianity to be variously polytheistic or idolatrous. The worship of Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
, or the ascribing of partners to God, is categorically denounced as the heresy
Heresy
Heresy is a controversial or novel change to a system of beliefs, especially a religion, that conflicts with established dogma. It is distinct from apostasy, which is the formal denunciation of one's religion, principles or cause, and blasphemy, which is irreverence toward religion...
of idolatry by Islam. The incarnation of God in to human form is denounced as a heresy by Judaism. The single largest religious sect of any religion - and the largest Christian sect, Roman Catholicism, with 1.1-1.3 billion adherents - as many as all sects of Islam combined - the second largest Christian sect, Eastern Orthodoxy, with 250-350 million adherents, and the vast majority of Protestant denomination
Christian denomination
A Christian denomination is an identifiable religious body under a common name, structure, and doctrine within Christianity. In the Orthodox tradition, Churches are divided often along ethnic and linguistic lines, into separate churches and traditions. Technically, divisions between one group and...
s (total ~750 million adherents) together making up more than 2 billion of the 2.1-2.2 billion Christians living as of 2010
Major religious groups
The world's principal religions and spiritual traditions may be classified into a small number of major groups, although this is by no means a uniform practice...
, defend the doctrine of the Trinity - indeed, Trinitarianism is often used as one marker of orthodox
Orthodoxy
The word orthodox, from Greek orthos + doxa , is generally used to mean the adherence to accepted norms, more specifically to creeds, especially in religion...
Christian thought and doctrine
Doctrine
Doctrine is a codification of beliefs or a body of teachings or instructions, taught principles or positions, as the body of teachings in a branch of knowledge or belief system...
. Jesus (Arabic
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
: Isa
ISA
Isa is the name by which Jesus is known in the Muslim world.Isa may also refer to:* Isha Upanishad, Hindu religious text* Isa , 2004 album by Enslaved* Isa , common Arabic and Turkish male name...
or Yasu
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
, among Muslims and Arab Christians
Arab Christians
Arab Christians are ethnic Arabs of Christian faith, sometimes also including those, who are identified with Arab panethnicity. They are the remnants of ancient Arab Christian clans or Arabized Christians. Many of the modern Arab Christians are descendants of pre-Islamic Christian Arabian tribes,...
respectively) is common between Christianity, Islam, and Baha'i Faith
Bahá'í Faith
The Bahá'í Faith is a monotheistic religion founded by Bahá'u'lláh in 19th-century Persia, emphasizing the spiritual unity of all humankind. There are an estimated five to six million Bahá'ís around the world in more than 200 countries and territories....
, but with vastly differing conceptions, viewed as God incarnate
Incarnation
Incarnation literally means embodied in flesh or taking on flesh. It refers to the conception and birth of a sentient creature who is the material manifestation of an entity, god or force whose original nature is immaterial....
and the Saviour of mankind
Redeemer (Christianity)
In Christian theology, Jesus is sometimes referred to as a Redeemer. This refers to the salvation he is believed to have accomplished, and is based on the metaphor of redemption, or "buying back". Although the New Testament does not use the title "Redeemer", the word "redemption" is used in several...
by Christians, and as a Prophet of Islam by Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
s, and a Manifestation of God
Manifestation of God
The Manifestation of God is a concept in the Bahá'í Faith that refers to what are commonly called prophets. The Manifestations of God are a series of personages who reflect the attributes of the divine into the human world for the progress and advancement of human morals and civilization...
by Baha'is.
Theological continuity
All the Abrahamic religions affirm one personal eternal God who created the universe, who rules history, who sends propheticProphecy
Prophecy is a process in which one or more messages that have been communicated to a prophet are then communicated to others. Such messages typically involve divine inspiration, interpretation, or revelation of conditioned events to come as well as testimonies or repeated revelations that the...
and angelic messengers and who reveals the divine will through inspired Scriptures. They also affirm that obedience to this creator God is to be lived out historically, and that one day God will unilaterally intervene in human history on the day of judgment and will determine for all humanity their eternal destinies of heaven or hell based upon a person's beliefs and actions.
This theological continuity among the Abrahamic religions is profound, especially given that the great religions of Eastern Asia, the dominant schools of Greek philosophy, and almost all other religious and philosophical systems of modernity and postmodernity cannot claim anything close to this level of doctrinal continuity. '
Scripture
All Abrahamic religions believe that God guides humanity through revelationRevelation
In religion and theology, revelation is the revealing or disclosing, through active or passive communication with a supernatural or a divine entity...
to prophets, and each religion recognizes that God revealed teachings up to and including those in their own scripture.
Ethical orientation
An ethicalEthics
Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...
orientation: all these religions speak of a choice between good and evil, which is associated with obedience or disobedience to a single God and to Divine Law
Divine law
Divine law is any law that in the opinion of believers, comes directly from the will of God . Like natural law it is independent of the will of man, who cannot change it. However it may be revealed or not, so it may change in human perception in time through new revelation...
.
Eschatological world view
An eschatologicalEschatology
Eschatology is a part of theology, philosophy, and futurology concerned with what are believed to be the final events in history, or the ultimate destiny of humanity, commonly referred to as the end of the world or the World to Come...
world view of history and destiny, beginning with the Creation of the world and the concept that God works through history, and ending with a Resurrection of the dead
Resurrection of the dead
Resurrection of the Dead is a belief found in a number of eschatologies, most commonly in Christian, Islamic, Jewish and Zoroastrian. In general, the phrase refers to a specific event in the future; multiple prophesies in the histories of these religions assert that the dead will be brought back to...
and final judgment
Last Judgment
The Last Judgment, Final Judgment, Day of Judgment, Judgment Day, or The Day of the Lord in Christian theology, is the final and eternal judgment by God of every nation. The concept is found in all the Canonical gospels, particularly the Gospel of Matthew. It will purportedly take place after the...
and World to Come
World to Come
The World to Come is an eschatological phrase reflecting the belief that the "current world" is flawed or cursed and will be replaced in the future by a better world or a paradise. The concept is similar to the concepts of Heaven and the afterlife, but Heaven is another place generally seen as...
.
Importance of Jerusalem
- Judaism: Jerusalem became Judaism's holiest city in 1005 BCE when DavidDavidDavid was the second king of the united Kingdom of Israel according to the Hebrew Bible and, according to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, an ancestor of Jesus Christ through both Saint Joseph and Mary...
established it as the capital of Israel, and his son SolomonSolomonSolomon , according to the Book of Kings and the Book of Chronicles, a King of Israel and according to the Talmud one of the 48 prophets, is identified as the son of David, also called Jedidiah in 2 Samuel 12:25, and is described as the third king of the United Monarchy, and the final king before...
built the First Temple on Mount Moriah. Since the Hebrew BibleHebrew BibleThe Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
relates that Isaac's sacrificeBinding of IsaacThe Binding of Isaac Akedah or Akeidat Yitzchak in Hebrew and Dhabih in Arabic, is a story from the Hebrew Bible in which God asks Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac, on Mount Moriah...
took place there, Mount Moriah's importance for Jews pre-dates even these prominent events. Jews thrice daily pray in its direction, including in their prayers pleas for the restoration and the rebuilding of the Holy Temple (the Third Temple) on mount Moriah, close the Passover service with the wistful statement "Next year in built Jerusalem," and recall the city in the blessing at the end of each meal. Jerusalem has served as the only capital of all five Jewish states that have existed in Israel since 1400 BC (the United Kingdom of Israel, the Kingdom of JudahKingdom of JudahThe Kingdom of Judah was a Jewish state established in the Southern Levant during the Iron Age. It is often referred to as the "Southern Kingdom" to distinguish it from the northern Kingdom of Israel....
, Yehud MedinataYehud MedinataYehud Medinata or simply Yehud, was an Achaeminid autonomous province covering Judea and parts of Samaria, located south to Eber-Nari...
, the Hasmonean Kingdom, and modern IsraelIsraelThe State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
). It has been majority Jewish since about 1852 and continues through today.
- Christianity: Jerusalem was an early center of Christianity. The PaganReligion in ancient RomeReligion in ancient Rome encompassed the religious beliefs and cult practices regarded by the Romans as indigenous and central to their identity as a people, as well as the various and many cults imported from other peoples brought under Roman rule. Romans thus offered cult to innumerable deities...
Romans under EmperorRoman EmperorThe Roman emperor was the ruler of the Roman State during the imperial period . The Romans had no single term for the office although at any given time, a given title was associated with the emperor...
VespasianVespasianVespasian , was Roman Emperor from 69 AD to 79 AD. Vespasian was the founder of the Flavian dynasty, which ruled the Empire for a quarter century. Vespasian was descended from a family of equestrians, who rose into the senatorial rank under the Emperors of the Julio-Claudian dynasty...
, in order to end the First Jewish Revolt, used forces lead by Vespasian's son and heir to the throne, Titus to lay siege to Jerusalem, sack the city, and destroy the Second TempleSecond TempleThe Jewish Second Temple was an important shrine which stood on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem between 516 BCE and 70 CE. It replaced the First Temple which was destroyed in 586 BCE, when the Jewish nation was exiled to Babylon...
in 70 AD (eventually building a shrine to Jupiter Capitolinus in its place). In 135 AD, under HadrianHadrianHadrian , was Roman Emperor from 117 to 138. He is best known for building Hadrian's Wall, which marked the northern limit of Roman Britain. In Rome, he re-built the Pantheon and constructed the Temple of Venus and Roma. In addition to being emperor, Hadrian was a humanist and was philhellene in...
, as a response to another Jewish revolt against Roman rule (the Third Jewish Revolt of Simon Bar Kochba), the Romans further expelled all Jews from the area, after three revolts in 70 years, to ensure another revolt was not forthcoming. This is when the area surrounding Jerusalem, until then called Roman Judaea, first was given the name "Palestine", or "Syria PalaestinaSyria PalaestinaSyria Palæstina was a Roman province between 135CE and 390CE. It had been established by the merge of Roman Syria and Roman Judaea, following the defeat of the Bar Kokhba Revolt in 135 CE. In 193 Syria-Coele was split to form a separate provincial locality...
". There has been a continuous Christian presence there since. William R. Kenan, Jr., professor of the history of Christianity at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, writes that from the middle of the 4th century to the Islamic conquest in the middle of the 7th century, the Roman province of PalestineSyria PalaestinaSyria Palæstina was a Roman province between 135CE and 390CE. It had been established by the merge of Roman Syria and Roman Judaea, following the defeat of the Bar Kokhba Revolt in 135 CE. In 193 Syria-Coele was split to form a separate provincial locality...
was a Christian nation with Jerusalem its principal city. According to the New TestamentNew TestamentThe New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....
, JerusalemJerusalem in ChristianityFor Christians, Jerusalem's place in the ministry of Jesus and the Apostolic Age gives it great importance, in addition to its place in the Old Testament, the Hebrew Bible.-Jerusalem in the New Testament and early Christianity:...
was the city Jesus was brought to as a child to be presented at the temple and for the feast of the PassoverPassoverPassover is a Jewish holiday and festival. It commemorates the story of the Exodus, in which the ancient Israelites were freed from slavery in Egypt...
. He preached and healed in Jerusalem, unceremoniously drove the money changersJesus and the Money ChangersThe narrative of Jesus and the money changers, commonly referred to as the cleansing of the Temple, occurs in all four canonical gospels of the New Testament....
in disarray from the temple there, held the Last SupperLast SupperThe Last Supper is the final meal that, according to Christian belief, Jesus shared with his Twelve Apostles in Jerusalem before his crucifixion. The Last Supper provides the scriptural basis for the Eucharist, also known as "communion" or "the Lord's Supper".The First Epistle to the Corinthians is...
in an "upper room" (traditionally the CenacleCenacleThe Cenacle , also known as the "Upper Room", is the term used for the site of The Last Supper. The word is a derivative of the Latin word cena, which means dinner....
) there the night before he is said to have died on the cross, was arrested in GethsemaneGethsemaneGethsemane is a garden at the foot of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem most famous as the place where, according to Biblical texts, Jesus and his disciples are said to have prayed the night before Jesus' crucifixion.- Etymology :...
. The six parts to Jesus' trial—three stages in a religious court and three stages before a Roman court—were all held in Jerusalem. His crucifixionCrucifixionCrucifixion is an ancient method of painful execution in which the condemned person is tied or nailed to a large wooden cross and left to hang until dead...
at GolgothaCalvaryCalvary or Golgotha was the site, outside of ancient Jerusalem’s early first century walls, at which the crucifixion of Jesus is said to have occurred. Calvary and Golgotha are the English names for the site used in Western Christianity...
, his burial nearby (traditionally the Church of the Holy SepulchreChurch of the Holy SepulchreThe Church of the Holy Sepulchre, also called the Church of the Resurrection by Eastern Christians, is a church within the walled Old City of Jerusalem. It is a few steps away from the Muristan....
), and his resurrection and ascension and prophecy to returnSecond ComingIn Christian doctrine, the Second Coming of Christ, the Second Advent, or the Parousia, is the anticipated return of Jesus Christ from Heaven, where he sits at the Right Hand of God, to Earth. This prophecy is found in the canonical gospels and in most Christian and Islamic eschatologies...
all are said to have occurred or will occur there.
- Islam: Jerusalem, the city of David and Christ, became a very holy place to Muslims, like MeccaMeccaMecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...
and MedinaMedinaMedina , or ; also transliterated as Madinah, or madinat al-nabi "the city of the prophet") is a city in the Hejaz region of western Saudi Arabia, and serves as the capital of the Al Madinah Province. It is the second holiest city in Islam, and the burial place of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad, and...
. The Al-Aqsa mosque, which translates to "farthest mosque" in suraSuraA sura is a division of the Qur'an, often referred to as a chapter. The term chapter is sometimes avoided, as the suras are of unequal length; the shortest sura has only three ayat while the longest contains 286 ayat...
Al-IsraAl-IsraSura Al-Isra , also called Sura Bani Isra'il , is the 17th chapter of the Qur'an, with 111 verses.-Content:...
in the Qur'anQur'anThe Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
, and its surroundings are addressed in the Qur'an as "the holy land". Later Muslim tradition as recorded in the ahadith identifies al-Aqsa with a mosque in Jerusalem; nothing in the Qur'an supplies this connection (nor a connection to the Dome of the RockDome of the RockThe Dome of the Rock is a shrine located on the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem. The structure has been refurbished many times since its initial completion in 691 CE at the order of Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik...
). The first Muslims did not pray toward Mecca, but toward Jerusalem: the qibla was switched to Mecca as part of a complete break with Judaism, when it became obvious that the Jews would not accept Muhammad as a prophet. Another reason for its significance is its connection with the MiʿrājIsra and Mi'rajThe Isra and Mi'raj , are the two parts of a Night Journey that, according to Islamic tradition, the Islamic prophet Muhammad took during a single night around the year 621. It has been described as both a physical and spiritual journey...
, where, according to traditional Muslim piety, Muhammad ascended through the Seven heavens on a winged mule named BuraqBuraqAl-Burāq is a mythological steed, described as a creature from the heavens which transported the prophets. The most commonly told story is how in the 7th century, Al-Buraq carried the Islamic prophet Muhammad from Mecca to Jerusalem and back during the Isra and Mi'raj or "Night Journey", which is...
, guided by the Archangel Gabriel, beginning from the Foundation Stone on the Temple MountTemple MountThe Temple Mount, known in Hebrew as , and in Arabic as the Haram Ash-Sharif , is one of the most important religious sites in the Old City of Jerusalem. It has been used as a religious site for thousands of years...
, in modern times under the Dome of the RockDome of the RockThe Dome of the Rock is a shrine located on the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem. The structure has been refurbished many times since its initial completion in 691 CE at the order of Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik...
.
The significance of Abraham
For Jews
For Jews, Abraham is, through Isaac and Jacob, the founding patriarch of the children of Israel. God promised Abraham: "I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you." With Abraham, God entered into "an everlasting covenant throughout the ages to be God to you and to your offspring to come."Abraham is primarily a revered ancestor or patriarch (referred to as Avraham Avinu אברהם אבינו "Abraham our father") to whom God made several promises: chiefly, that he would have numberless descendants, who would receive the land of Canaan (the "Promised Land
Promised land
The Promised Land is a term used to describe the land promised or given by God, according to the Hebrew Bible, to the Israelites, the descendants of Jacob. The promise is firstly made to Abraham and then renewed to his son Isaac, and to Isaac's son Jacob , Abraham's grandson...
.") According to Jewish tradition, Abraham was the first post-Flood prophet to reject idolatry
Idolatry
Idolatry is a pejorative term for the worship of an idol, a physical object such as a cult image, as a god, or practices believed to verge on worship, such as giving undue honour and regard to created forms other than God. In all the Abrahamic religions idolatry is strongly forbidden, although...
through rational analysis, although Shem
Shem
Shem was one of the sons of Noah in the Hebrew Bible as well as in Islamic literature. He is most popularly regarded as the eldest son, though some traditions regard him as the second son. Genesis 10:21 refers to relative ages of Shem and his brother Japheth, but with sufficient ambiguity in each...
and Eber
Eber
Eber is an ancestor of the Israelites, according to the "Table of Nations" in and . He was a great-grandson of Noah's son Shem and the father of Peleg born when Eber was 34 years old, and of Joktan. He was the son of Shelah a distant ancestor of Abraham...
carried on the tradition from Noah
Noah
Noah was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the tenth and last of the antediluvian Patriarchs. The biblical story of Noah is contained in chapters 6–9 of the book of Genesis, where he saves his family and representatives of all animals from the flood by constructing an ark...
.
For Christians
Christians view Abraham as an important exemplar of faith, and a spiritual, as well as physical, ancestor of JesusJesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
—a Jew considered the Son of God
Son of God
"Son of God" is a phrase which according to most Christian denominations, Trinitarian in belief, refers to the relationship between Jesus and God, specifically as "God the Son"...
through whom God promised to bless all the families of the earth. For Christians, Abraham is a spiritual forebear as well as/rather than a direct ancestor depending on the individual's interpretation of Paul the Apostle
Paul of Tarsus and Judaism
The relationship between Paul of Tarsus and Second Temple Judaism continues to be the subject of much scholarly research, as it is thought that Paul played an important role in the relationship between Christianity and Judaism as a whole...
, with the Abrahamic Covenant "reinterpreted so as to be defined by faith in Christ rather than biological descent" or both by faith as well as a direct ancestor; in any case, the emphasis is placed on faith being the only requirement for the Abrahamic Covenant to apply; see also New Covenant
New Covenant
The New Covenant is a concept originally derived from the Hebrew Bible. The term "New Covenant" is used in the Bible to refer to an epochal relationship of restoration and peace following a period of trial and judgment...
and Supersessionism
Supersessionism
Supersessionism is a term for the dominant Christian view of the Old Covenant, also called fulfillment theology and replacement theology, though the latter term is disputed...
. In Christian belief, Abraham is a role model
Role model
The term role model generally means any "person who serves as an example, whose behaviour is emulated by others".The term first appeared in Robert K. Merton's socialization research of medical students...
of faith, and his obedience to God by offering Isaac
Binding of Isaac
The Binding of Isaac Akedah or Akeidat Yitzchak in Hebrew and Dhabih in Arabic, is a story from the Hebrew Bible in which God asks Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac, on Mount Moriah...
is seen as a foreshadowing
Foreshadowing
Foreshadowing or adumbrating is a literary device in which an author indistinctly suggests certain plot developments that might come later in the story.-Repetitive designation and Chekhov's gun:...
of God's offering of his son Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
.
The tendency of Christian commentators to interpret God's promises to Abraham as applying to Christianity rather than Judaism, whose adherents rejected Jesus
Rejection of Jesus
The Canonical Gospels of the New Testament include some accounts of the rejection of Jesus in the course of his ministry. Judaism's view of Jesus, Jesus in Islam, and the view of the Historical Jesus all differ from Christian views of Jesus.-Hometown rejection:...
, is derived from Paul's interpretation of all descendants who believe in God as being spiritual descendants of Abraham. However, in both cases he refers to these spiritual descendants as the "sons of God
Sons of God
Sons of God is a phrase used in Levantine Bronze and Iron Age texts to describe the "divine council" of the major gods.- The term "sons of God" :...
" rather than "children of Abraham".
For Muslims
There are several reasons why Abraham is significant in Islam. For Muslims, Abraham is a prophet, the "messenger of God" who stands in the line from Noah to Muhammad, to whom Allah gave revelations,, who "raised the foundations of the House" (i.e., the KaabaKaaba
The Kaaba is a cuboid-shaped building in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, and is the most sacred site in Islam. The Qur'an states that the Kaaba was constructed by Abraham, or Ibraheem, in Arabic, and his son Ishmael, or Ismaeel, as said in Arabic, after he had settled in Arabia. The building has a mosque...
) with his first son, Isma'il, a symbol of which is every mosque. Ibrahim (Abraham
Abraham
Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...
) is the first in a genealogy
Genealogy
Genealogy is the study of families and the tracing of their lineages and history. Genealogists use oral traditions, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kinship and pedigrees of its members...
for Muhammad. Islam considers Abraham to be the "first Muslim" (Surah 3)—the first monotheist in a world where monotheism was lost, and the community of those faithful to God, thus being referred to as ابونا ابرهيم or "Our Father Abraham", as well as Ibrahim al-Hanif
Hanif
Hanif is a term that refers to those who maintain the pure monothestic Muslim beliefs of the patriarch Ibrahim. More specifically, in Islamic thought it refers to the people during the period known as the Age of Ignorance, who were seen to have rejected idolatry and retained some or all of the...
or "Abraham the Monotheist". Islam holds that it was Ishmael, (Isma'il, Muhammad's ancestor) rather than Isaac, whom Ibrahim was instructed to sacrifice. In addition to this spiritual lineage, the northern Adnan
Adnan
Adnan is the traditional ancestor of the Adnani Arabs of northern, central and western Arabia, as opposed to the Qahtani of Southern and south eastern Arabia who descend from Qahtan.-Origin:...
i Arab tribes
Tribes of Arabia
Tribes of Arabia refers to Arab clans hailing from the Arabian Peninsula.Much of the lineage provided before Ma'ad relies on biblical genealogy and therefore questions persist concerning the accuracy of this segment of Arab genealogy...
trace their lineage to Isma'il, and thus to Abraham. Abraham is also recalled in certain details of Muslim Hajj
Hajj
The Hajj is the pilgrimage to Mecca, Saudi Arabia. It is one of the largest pilgrimages in the world, and is the fifth pillar of Islam, a religious duty that must be carried out at least once in their lifetime by every able-bodied Muslim who can afford to do so...
(pilgrimage).
The religions
-
- See also section Other Abrahamic religions
Ishmael
Ishmael is a figure in the Hebrew Bible and the Qur'an, and was Abraham's first born child according to Jews, Christians and Muslims. Ishmael was born of Abraham's marriage to Sarah's handmaiden Hagar...
by his wife's servant Hagar
Hagar (Bible)
Hagar , according to the Abrahamic faiths, was the second wife of Abraham, and the mother of his first son, Ishmael. Her story is recorded in the Book of Genesis, mentioned in Hadith, and alluded to in the Qur'an...
, Isaac
Isaac
Isaac as described in the Hebrew Bible, was the only son Abraham had with his wife Sarah, and was the father of Jacob and Esau. Isaac was one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites...
by his wife Sarah
Sarah
Sarah or Sara was the wife of Abraham and the mother of Isaac as described in the Hebrew Bible and the Quran. Her name was originally Sarai...
and six by his wife or concubine Keturah
Keturah
According to the Hebrew Bible, Keturah or Ketura was the woman whom Abraham, the patriarch of the Israelites, married after the death of his wife, Sarah. Keturah bore Abraham six sons, Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shuah....
.
Judaism
Judaism's oldest text is the TanakhTanakh
The Tanakh is a name used in Judaism for the canon of the Hebrew Bible. The Tanakh is also known as the Masoretic Text or the Miqra. The name is an acronym formed from the initial Hebrew letters of the Masoretic Text's three traditional subdivisions: The Torah , Nevi'im and Ketuvim —hence...
, an account of the Israelite
Israelite
According to the Bible the Israelites were a Hebrew-speaking people of the Ancient Near East who inhabited the Land of Canaan during the monarchic period .The word "Israelite" derives from the Biblical Hebrew ישראל...
s' relationship with God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
from their earliest history until the building of the Second Temple
Second Temple
The Jewish Second Temple was an important shrine which stood on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem between 516 BCE and 70 CE. It replaced the First Temple which was destroyed in 586 BCE, when the Jewish nation was exiled to Babylon...
(c. 535 BCE). Abraham
Abraham
Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...
is hailed as the first Hebrew
Hebrews
Hebrews is an ethnonym used in the Hebrew Bible...
and the father of the Jewish people
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
. One of his grandsons was Judah
Judah
The name Judah can refer to:*Judah , fourth son of the Biblical patriarch Jacob All later individuals, groups and places of this name are directly or indirectly derived from this Judah....
, from whom the religion ultimately gets it name. The Israelites were initially a number of tribes who lived in the Kingdom of Israel
Kingdom of Israel
The Kingdom of Israel was, according to the Bible, one of the successor states to the older United Monarchy . It was thought to exist roughly from the 930s BCE until about the 720s BCE, when the kingdom was conquered by the Assyrian Empire...
and Kingdom of Judah
Kingdom of Judah
The Kingdom of Judah was a Jewish state established in the Southern Levant during the Iron Age. It is often referred to as the "Southern Kingdom" to distinguish it from the northern Kingdom of Israel....
. After being conquered and exiled, some members of the Kingdom of Judah eventually returned to Israel. They later formed an independent state under the Hasmonean dynasty in the 2nd and 1st centuries BCE, before becoming a client kingdom of the Roman Empire
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
, which also conquered the state and dispersed its inhabitants. From the 2nd to the 6th centuries Jews wrote the Talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
, a lengthy work of legal rulings and Biblical exegesis which—along with the Tanakh—is a key text of Judaism.
Christianity
Christianity began in the 1st centuryChristianity in the 1st century
The earliest followers of Jesus composed an apocalyptic, Jewish sect, which historians refer to as Jewish Christianity. The Apostles and others following the Great Commission's decree to spread the teachings of Jesus to "all nations," had great success spreading the religion to gentiles. Peter,...
as a sect within Judaism initially led by Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
. His followers viewed him as the Messiah
Messiah
A messiah is a redeemer figure expected or foretold in one form or another by a religion. Slightly more widely, a messiah is any redeemer figure. Messianic beliefs or theories generally relate to eschatological improvement of the state of humanity or the world, in other words the World to...
; after his crucified
Crucifixion of Jesus
The crucifixion of Jesus and his ensuing death is an event that occurred during the 1st century AD. Jesus, who Christians believe is the Son of God as well as the Messiah, was arrested, tried, and sentenced by Pontius Pilate to be scourged, and finally executed on a cross...
and death they came to view him as God incarnate
Incarnation
Incarnation literally means embodied in flesh or taking on flesh. It refers to the conception and birth of a sentient creature who is the material manifestation of an entity, god or force whose original nature is immaterial....
, who was resurrected
Resurrection of Jesus
The Christian belief in the resurrection of Jesus states that Jesus returned to bodily life on the third day following his death by crucifixion. It is a key element of Christian faith and theology and part of the Nicene Creed: "On the third day he rose again in fulfillment of the Scriptures"...
and will return
Second Coming
In Christian doctrine, the Second Coming of Christ, the Second Advent, or the Parousia, is the anticipated return of Jesus Christ from Heaven, where he sits at the Right Hand of God, to Earth. This prophecy is found in the canonical gospels and in most Christian and Islamic eschatologies...
at the end of time to judge the living and the dead
Last Judgment
The Last Judgment, Final Judgment, Day of Judgment, Judgment Day, or The Day of the Lord in Christian theology, is the final and eternal judgment by God of every nation. The concept is found in all the Canonical gospels, particularly the Gospel of Matthew. It will purportedly take place after the...
and create an eternal Kingdom of God
Kingdom of God
The Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Heaven is a foundational concept in the Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam.The term "Kingdom of God" is found in all four canonical gospels and in the Pauline epistles...
. Within a few decades the new movement split from Judaism. After several periods of alternating persecution and relative peace vis a vis the Roman authorities under different administrations, Christianity became the state church of the Roman Empire
State church of the Roman Empire
The state church of the Roman Empire was a Christian institution organized within the Roman Empire during the 4th century that came to represent the Empire's sole authorized religion. Both the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox churches claim to be the historical continuation of this...
during the reign of Theodosius the Great with the 27 February 380 Edict of Thessalonica
Edict of Thessalonica
The Edict of Thessalonica, also known as Cunctos populos, was delivered on 27 February 380 by Theodosius I, Gratian, and Valentinian II in order that all their subjects should profess the faith of the bishops of Rome and Alexandria...
, but has been split into various churches from its beginning
Early centers of Christianity
Early Christianity spread from Western Asia, throughout the Roman Empire, and beyond into East Africa and South Asia, reaching as far as India. At first, this development was closely connected to centers of Hebrew faith, in the Holy Land and the Jewish diaspora...
. An attempt was made by the Byzantine Empire
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...
to unify Christendom
Christendom
Christendom, or the Christian world, has several meanings. In a cultural sense it refers to the worldwide community of Christians, adherents of Christianity...
, at least within the empire, through the Seven Ecumenical Councils and establishment of the Pentarchy
Pentarchy
Pentarchy is a term in the history of Christianity for the idea of universal rule over all Christendom by the heads of five major episcopal sees, or patriarchates, of the Roman Empire: Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem...
, but this formally failed with the East–West Schism
East–West Schism
The East–West Schism of 1054, sometimes known as the Great Schism, formally divided the State church of the Roman Empire into Eastern and Western branches, which later became known as the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church, respectively...
of 1054. In the 16th century the birth and growth of Protestantism
Protestantism
Protestantism is one of the three major groupings within Christianity. It is a movement that began in Germany in the early 16th century as a reaction against medieval Roman Catholic doctrines and practices, especially in regards to salvation, justification, and ecclesiology.The doctrines of the...
further split Christianity into many denominations.
Islam
Islam is based on the teachings of the Quran. Though it considers Muhammad to be the supreme prophet, Islam teaches that every prophet preached Islam, providing a historical back-story for the religion by co-opting Jewish and Christian prophets, and adding others, such as Alexander (Dhul-QarnaynDhul-Qarnayn
Dhul-Qarnayn , literally "He of the Two Horns" or "He of the two centuries" is a figure mentioned in the Qur'an, the sacred scripture of Islam, where he is described as a great and righteous ruler who built a long wall that keeps Gog and Magog from attacking the people who he met on his journey...
) and Cyrus the Great
Cyrus the Great in the Qur'an
Cyrus the Great in the Qur'an is a theory that holds that the character of Dhul-Qarnayn, mentioned in the Qur'an, is in fact Cyrus the Great. Dhul-Qarnayn is mentioned in the Qur'an. The story of Dhul-Qarnayn appears in sixteen verses of the Qur'an, specifically the 16 verses 18:83-98...
(al-Khidr
Al-Khidr
Khidr or Al-Khidr is a revered figure in Islam, whom the Qur'an describes as a righteous servant of God, who possessed great wisdom or mystic knowledge, represented iconically by a fish...
). The teachings of Quran are presented as the direct revelation and words of Allah
Allah
Allah is a word for God used in the context of Islam. In Arabic, the word means simply "God". It is used primarily by Muslims and Bahá'ís, and often, albeit not exclusively, used by Arabic-speaking Eastern Catholic Christians, Maltese Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox Christians, Mizrahi Jews and...
, and earlier scriptures are considered to have been corrupted over time. Islam (meaning "submission", in the sense of submission to Allah) is universal (like the other faiths, membership is open to anyone); like Judaism, it has a strictly unitary conception of Allah, called tawhid
Tawhid
Tawhid is the concept of monotheism in Islam. It is the religion's most fundamental concept and holds God is one and unique ....
, or "strict" or "simple" monotheism. Early disputes over who would lead Muslims following the death of Muhammad led to a split between Sunni
Sunni Islam
Sunni Islam is the largest branch of Islam. Sunni Muslims are referred to in Arabic as ʾAhl ūs-Sunnah wa āl-Ǧamāʿah or ʾAhl ūs-Sunnah for short; in English, they are known as Sunni Muslims, Sunnis or Sunnites....
and Shia, Islam's two main denominations.
God
All the Abrahamic religions are monotheisticMonotheism
Monotheism is the belief in the existence of one and only one god. Monotheism is characteristic of the Baha'i Faith, Christianity, Druzism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Samaritanism, Sikhism and Zoroastrianism.While they profess the existence of only one deity, monotheistic religions may still...
. In both Judaism and Islam, God is viewed as a single divine being; this view is not shared by Christianity which views God as an indivisible Trinity
Trinity
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons : the Father, the Son , and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct yet coexist in unity, and are co-equal, co-eternal and consubstantial . Put another way, the three persons of the Trinity are of one being...
. While the Christians hold that the Trinity is the same as the Judaic and Islamic singular divine being view of God, the distinction is sufficiently huge as to require an overt explanation on the part of the Christians and on the part of the Islamic faith which restates the issue with an admonition in chapter 112 of the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
.
Judaism
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
, where the nature and commandments of God are revealed through the writings of Moses
Moses
Moses was, according to the Hebrew Bible and Qur'an, a religious leader, lawgiver and prophet, to whom the authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed...
, the Torah
Torah
Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
, the writings of the prophet
Prophet
In religion, a prophet, from the Greek word προφήτης profitis meaning "foreteller", is an individual who is claimed to have been contacted by the supernatural or the divine, and serves as an intermediary with humanity, delivering this newfound knowledge from the supernatural entity to other people...
s, psalmists and other ancient canonized scriptures, together with the Torah known as the Tanakh
Tanakh
The Tanakh is a name used in Judaism for the canon of the Hebrew Bible. The Tanakh is also known as the Masoretic Text or the Miqra. The name is an acronym formed from the initial Hebrew letters of the Masoretic Text's three traditional subdivisions: The Torah , Nevi'im and Ketuvim —hence...
. Additionally, it usually has a basis in its Oral Law
Oral law
An oral law is a code of conduct in use in a given culture, religion or community application, by which a body of rules of human behaviour is transmitted by oral tradition and effectively respected, or the single rule that is orally transmitted....
, as recorded in the Mishnah
Mishnah
The Mishnah or Mishna is the first major written redaction of the Jewish oral traditions called the "Oral Torah". It is also the first major work of Rabbinic Judaism. It was redacted c...
and Gemora that form the Talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
.
This Supreme Being is referred to in the Hebrew Bible in several ways, such as Elohim, Adonai or by the four Hebrew letters "Y-H-V (or W) -H" (the tetragrammaton
Tetragrammaton
The term Tetragrammaton refers to the name of the God of Israel YHWH used in the Hebrew Bible.-Hebrew Bible:...
), which observant Jews do not pronounce as a word. The Hebrew words Eloheynu (Our God) and HaShem (The Name), as well as the English names "Lord" and "God", are also used in modern-day Judaism. The latter is sometimes written "G-d" in reference to the taboo against pronouncing the tetragrammaton.
The word "Elohim" has the Hebrew plural ending "-īm", which some Biblical scholars have taken as support for the general notion that the ancient Hebrews were polytheists in the time of the patriarchs; however, as the word itself is used with singular verbs, this hypothesis is not accepted in traditional Jewish thought. Jewish texts point out other words in Hebrew used in the same manner according to the rule of Hebrew Grammar, denoting respect, majesty and deliberation, similar to the royal plural in English and ancient Egyptian, and the use of the plural form "vous" for individuals of higher standing in modern French. Jewish Biblical scholars and historical commentary on the passage also suggest that Elohim in the plural form indicates God in conjunction with the heavenly court, i.e., the Angels. Some Kabbalistic texts explain the use of the Elohim as a pluralistic singularity, one essence sustaining all levels of creation from the mundane physical to the sublime and Holy spiritual.
Christianity
Christians believe that the God worshiped by the faithful Hebrew people of the pre-Christian era has always revealed himself as he did through JesusJesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
; but that this was never obvious until the Word of God (the divine Logos
Logos
' is an important term in philosophy, psychology, rhetoric and religion. Originally a word meaning "a ground", "a plea", "an opinion", "an expectation", "word," "speech," "account," "reason," it became a technical term in philosophy, beginning with Heraclitus ' is an important term in...
) became flesh and dwelt among us (see John 1
John 1
John 1 is the first chapter in the Gospel of John in the New Testament of the Christian Bible.-Analysis:The first chapter of the Gospel of John can be divided in two parts:The first part John 1 is the first chapter in the Gospel of John in the New Testament of the Christian Bible.-Analysis:The...
). Also, despite the fact that the Angel of the Lord
Angel of the Lord
The Angel of the Lord is one of many terms in the Hebrew Bible used for an angel. The Biblical name for angel, מלאך mal'ach, which translates simply as "messenger," obtained the further signification of "angel" only through the addition of God's name, as The Angel of the Lord (or the Angel of...
spoke to the Patriarchs, revealing God to them, it has always been only through the Spirit of God
Holy Spirit
Holy Spirit is a term introduced in English translations of the Hebrew Bible, but understood differently in the main Abrahamic religions.While the general concept of a "Spirit" that permeates the cosmos has been used in various religions Holy Spirit is a term introduced in English translations of...
granting them understanding, that men have been able to later perceive that they had been visited by God himself. After Jesus was raised from the dead
Resurrection of Jesus
The Christian belief in the resurrection of Jesus states that Jesus returned to bodily life on the third day following his death by crucifixion. It is a key element of Christian faith and theology and part of the Nicene Creed: "On the third day he rose again in fulfillment of the Scriptures"...
—according to Christian scriptures—this ancient Hebrew witness of how God reveals himself as Messiah came to be seen in a very different light. It was then that Jesus' followers began to speak widely of him as God himself, although this had already been revealed to certain individuals during his ministry. Examples were the Samaritan woman in Shechem and Jesus' closest apostles.
This belief gradually developed into the modern formulation of the Trinity
Trinity
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons : the Father, the Son , and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct yet coexist in unity, and are co-equal, co-eternal and consubstantial . Put another way, the three persons of the Trinity are of one being...
, which is the doctrine that God is a single entity (singular God), but that there is a "triunity" in God, which has always been evident albeit not understood. This mysterious "triunity" is hypostatic; that is, there are three hypostases (personae in Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
) or "persons" of the Godhead
Godhead
Godhead , may refer to:*Deity*Divinity, the quality of being God*Conceptions of God*Godhead , the totality of gods, in Platonism the Transcendent One....
(though this is a often misleading English rendering). In the traditional Christian concept, God the Father
God the Father
God the Father is a gendered title given to God in many monotheistic religions, particularly patriarchal, Abrahamic ones. In Judaism, God is called Father because he is the creator, life-giver, law-giver, and protector...
(the Source) has only revealed himself through his eternal Word (who was incarnated in human history as Jesus Christ). The three different hypostases are not "Gods" because they are one, and share the same Divine Nature
Godhead (Christianity)
Godhead is a Middle English variant of the word godhood, and denotes the Divine Nature or Substance of the Christian God, or the Trinity. Within some traditions such as Mormonism, the term is used as a nontrinitarian substitute for the term Trinity, denoting the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit not as...
; they are the one and the same God. The Father is the Begetter, the Son is the eternally Begotten, and the Spirit eternally proceeds from both (in Catholicism and Protestantism) or from just the Father (in Eastern Orthodoxy).
Non-trinitarian views have constructed various theological understandings, ranging from Binitarianism
Binitarianism
Binitarianism is a Christian theology of two personae, two individuals, or two aspects in one Godhead . Classically, binitarianism is understood as strict monotheism — that is, that God is an absolutely single being; and yet with binitarianism there is a "twoness" in God...
to Modalism. Some non-trinitarians would understand that the three are not three but one playing three different roles, in three different ages or dispensations
Dispensation (period)
In certain religions, a dispensation is a distinctive arrangement or period in history that forms the framework through which God relates to mankind.-Protestant dispensations:...
. In the Age of the Father, as Jehovah
Jehovah
Jehovah is an anglicized representation of Hebrew , a vocalization of the Tetragrammaton , the proper name of the God of Israel in the Hebrew Bible....
. In the Age of the Son, as Jesus. And finally in the Age of the Holy Spirit, with a New Name, as the Second Coming of Christ. However, it should be noted that some Christian denominations reject the trinity and follow nontrinitarian
Nontrinitarianism
Nontrinitarianism includes all Christian belief systems that disagree with the doctrine of the Trinity, namely, the teaching that God is three distinct hypostases and yet co-eternal, co-equal, and indivisibly united in one essence or ousia...
beliefs, Jehovah Witnesses being but one of them.
Islam
There is only one God in Islam. AllahAllah
Allah is a word for God used in the context of Islam. In Arabic, the word means simply "God". It is used primarily by Muslims and Bahá'ís, and often, albeit not exclusively, used by Arabic-speaking Eastern Catholic Christians, Maltese Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox Christians, Mizrahi Jews and...
is the Arabic name for God ("ʾilāh" is the Arabic term used for a deity or a god in general). Islamic tradition also describes the 99 names of God. These 99 names describe attributes of God, including Most Merciful, The Just, The Peace and Blessing, and the Guardian. Islamic belief in God is distinct from Christianity in that God has no progeny. This belief is summed up in chapter
Sura
A sura is a division of the Qur'an, often referred to as a chapter. The term chapter is sometimes avoided, as the suras are of unequal length; the shortest sura has only three ayat while the longest contains 286 ayat...
112 of the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
titled Al-Ikhlas, which states "Say, he is Allah (who is) one, Allah is the Eternal, the Absolute. He does not beget nor was he begotten. Nor is there to Him any equivalent.".
Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
s believe that the Jewish God is the same as their God, and that Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
was a divinely inspired prophet and was neither God nor His son. The Qur'an also draws a similitude between Jesus and Adam
Adam
Adam is a figure in the Book of Genesis. According to the creation myth of Abrahamic religions, he is the first human. In the Genesis creation narratives, he was created by Yahweh-Elohim , and the first woman, Eve was formed from his rib...
—the first human being created by God—saying they were both 'created without a father' by God who said the simple word "Be" (Arabic: kun). Thus, both the Torah
Torah
Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
and the Gospels are believed to be based upon divine revelation, but most Muslims believe them to have been corrupted
Tahrif
Taḥrīf is an Arabic term used by Muslims with regard to irreparable alterations Islamic tradition claims Jews and Christians have made to Biblical manuscripts, specifically those that make up the Tawrat , Zabur and Injil .Traditional Muslim scholars, based on Qur'anic and other traditions, maintain...
(both accidentally, through errors in transmission, and intentionally by certain Jews and Christians over the centuries). Muslims revere the Qur'an as the final uncorrupted word of God, or 'The Final Testament' as revealed through the last prophet, Prophet Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
. Muhammad is regarded as the "Seal of the Prophets" i.e. the last in a long chain, and Islam as the final monotheist faith, perfect in all respects as taught by the Qur'an.
Religious scriptures
All these religions rely on a body of scriptures, some of which are considered to be the word of God—hence sacred and unquestionable—and some the work of religious men, revered mainly by tradition and to the extent that they are considered to have been divinely inspired, if not dictated, by the divine being.Jewish
The sacred scriptures of Judaism are the TanakhHebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
, a Hebrew acronym standing for Torah
Torah
Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
(Law or Teachings), Nevi'im
Nevi'im
Nevi'im is the second of the three major sections in the Hebrew Bible, the Tanakh. It falls between the Torah and Ketuvim .Nevi'im is traditionally divided into two parts:...
(Prophets) and Ketuvim
Ketuvim
Ketuvim or Kəṯûḇîm in actual Biblical Hebrew is the third and final section of the Tanak , after Torah and Nevi'im . In English translations of the Hebrew Bible, this section is usually entitled "Writings" or "Hagiographa"...
(Writings). These are complemented by and supplemented with various (originally oral) traditions: Midrash
Midrash
The Hebrew term Midrash is a homiletic method of biblical exegesis. The term also refers to the whole compilation of homiletic teachings on the Bible....
, the Mishnah
Mishnah
The Mishnah or Mishna is the first major written redaction of the Jewish oral traditions called the "Oral Torah". It is also the first major work of Rabbinic Judaism. It was redacted c...
, the Talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
and collected rabbinical writings. The Tanakh (or Hebrew Bible
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
) was composed between 1,400 BCE, and 400 BCE by Jewish prophets, kings, and priests
Kohen
A Kohen is the Hebrew word for priest. Jewish Kohens are traditionally believed and halachically required to be of direct patrilineal descent from the Biblical Aaron....
. The Hebrew text of the Tanakh, and the Torah in particular, is considered holy, down to the last letter: transcribing is done with painstaking care. An error in a single letter, ornamentation or symbol of the 300,000+ stylized letters that make up the Hebrew Torah text renders a Torah scroll unfit for use; hence the skills of a Torah scribe are specialist skills, and a scroll takes considerable time to write and check.
Christian
The sacred scriptures of most Christian groups are the Old TestamentOld Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
, which is largely the same as the Hebrew Bible
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
, and the New Testament
New Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....
. The latter comprises four accounts of the life and teachings of Jesus (the Four Gospels, traditionally attributed to the apostle Matthew
Matthew the Evangelist
Matthew the Evangelist was, according to the Bible, one of the twelve Apostles of Jesus and one of the four Evangelists.-Identity:...
; the apostle John
John the Evangelist
Saint John the Evangelist is the conventional name for the author of the Gospel of John...
; Mark
Mark the Evangelist
Mark the Evangelist is the traditional author of the Gospel of Mark. He is one of the Seventy Disciples of Christ, and the founder of the Church of Alexandria, one of the original four main sees of Christianity....
, a student of the apostle Peter
Saint Peter
Saint Peter or Simon Peter was an early Christian leader, who is featured prominently in the New Testament Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles. The son of John or of Jonah and from the village of Bethsaida in the province of Galilee, his brother Andrew was also an apostle...
; and Luke
Luke the Evangelist
Luke the Evangelist was an Early Christian writer whom Church Fathers such as Jerome and Eusebius said was the author of the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles...
, a student of the apostle Paul
Paul of Tarsus
Paul the Apostle , also known as Saul of Tarsus, is described in the Christian New Testament as one of the most influential early Christian missionaries, with the writings ascribed to him by the church forming a considerable portion of the New Testament...
), as well as several other writings by the apostles (such as Paul). They are usually considered to be divinely inspired
Biblical inspiration
Biblical inspiration is the doctrine in Christian theology that the authors and editors of the Bible were led or influenced by God with the result that their writings many be designated in some sense the word of God.- Etymology :...
, and together comprise the Christian Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
. Thus, Christians consider the fundamental teachings of the Old Testament, in particular the Ten Commandments
Ten Commandments
The Ten Commandments, also known as the Decalogue , are a set of biblical principles relating to ethics and worship, which play a fundamental role in Judaism and most forms of Christianity. They include instructions to worship only God and to keep the Sabbath, and prohibitions against idolatry,...
, as valid (see Biblical law in Christianity
Biblical law in Christianity
Christian views of the Old Covenant have been central to Christian theology and practice since the circumcision controversy in Early Christianity. There are differing views about the applicability of the Old Covenant among Christian denominations...
for details). However, they believe that the coming of Jesus as the Messiah and saviour of humankind as predicted in the Old Testament
Old Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
would shed light on the true relationship between God and mankind by restoring the emphasis of universal love and compassion, as mentioned in the Great Commandment
Great Commandment
The Great Commandment, or Greatest Commandment, is an appellation applied to either the first, or both, of two commandments which appear in , and...
, above the other commandments, also de-emphasising the more "legalistic
Legalism (theology)
Legalism, in Christian theology, is a sometimes-pejorative term referring to an over-emphasis on discipline of conduct, or legal ideas, usually implying an allegation of misguided rigour, pride, superficiality, the neglect of mercy, and ignorance of the grace of God or emphasizing the letter of...
" and material precepts of Mosaic Law
613 mitzvot
The 613 commandments is a numbering of the statements and principles of law, ethics, and spiritual practice contained in the Torah or Five Books of Moses...
(such as circumcision
Circumcision controversy in early Christianity
There is evidence of a controversy over religious male circumcision in Early Christianity. A Council of Jerusalem, possibly held in approximately 50 AD, decreed that male circumcision was not a requirement for Gentile converts. This became known as the "Apostolic Decree" and may be one of the...
and the dietary constraints and temple rites). Some Christians believe that the link between Old and New Testaments in the Bible means that Judaism has been superseded
Supersessionism
Supersessionism is a term for the dominant Christian view of the Old Covenant, also called fulfillment theology and replacement theology, though the latter term is disputed...
by Christianity as the "new Israel", and that Jesus' teachings described Israel not as a geographic place, but rather an association with God and promise of salvation in Heaven
Heaven (Christianity)
Traditionally, Christianity has taught Heaven as a place of eternal life and the dwelling place of Angels and the Throne of God, and a kingdom to which all the elect will be admitted...
, a revisionist position rejected by Jews and others.
Catholicism
Catholicism is a broad term for the body of the Catholic faith, its theologies and doctrines, its liturgical, ethical, spiritual, and behavioral characteristics, as well as a religious people as a whole....
, Orthodox Christianity
Eastern Orthodox Church
The Orthodox Church, officially called the Orthodox Catholic Church and commonly referred to as the Eastern Orthodox Church, is the second largest Christian denomination in the world, with an estimated 300 million adherents mainly in the countries of Belarus, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Georgia, Greece,...
, Anglicanism
Anglicanism
Anglicanism is a tradition within Christianity comprising churches with historical connections to the Church of England or similar beliefs, worship and church structures. The word Anglican originates in ecclesia anglicana, a medieval Latin phrase dating to at least 1246 that means the English...
and most forms of Protestantism
Protestantism
Protestantism is one of the three major groupings within Christianity. It is a movement that began in Germany in the early 16th century as a reaction against medieval Roman Catholic doctrines and practices, especially in regards to salvation, justification, and ecclesiology.The doctrines of the...
) derive their beliefs from the conclusions reached by the First Council of Nicaea
First Council of Nicaea
The First Council of Nicaea was a council of Christian bishops convened in Nicaea in Bithynia by the Roman Emperor Constantine I in AD 325...
in 325 in a document known as the Nicene Creed
Nicene Creed
The Nicene Creed is the creed or profession of faith that is most widely used in Christian liturgy. It is called Nicene because, in its original form, it was adopted in the city of Nicaea by the first ecumenical council, which met there in the year 325.The Nicene Creed has been normative to the...
. This describes the belief that God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
(as a Trinity
Trinity
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons : the Father, the Son , and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct yet coexist in unity, and are co-equal, co-eternal and consubstantial . Put another way, the three persons of the Trinity are of one being...
of distinct persons with one substance) became human on earth
Incarnation
Incarnation literally means embodied in flesh or taking on flesh. It refers to the conception and birth of a sentient creature who is the material manifestation of an entity, god or force whose original nature is immaterial....
, born as Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
pursuant to the Old Testament
Old Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
scriptures, was crucified by humanity, died and was buried, then was resurrected by God on the third day to rise and enter the Kingdom of Heaven
Kingdom of God
The Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Heaven is a foundational concept in the Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam.The term "Kingdom of God" is found in all four canonical gospels and in the Pauline epistles...
and "sit
Session of Christ
The Christian doctrine of the Session of Christ or heavenly session says that Jesus Christ is seated at the right hand of God the Father in Heaven—the word "session" is an archaic noun meaning "sitting." Although the word formerly meant "the act of sitting down," it no longer has that meaning in...
at the right hand of God
Right Hand of God
The Right Hand of God or God's Right Hand may refer to the Hand of God often referred to in the Bible and common speech as a metaphor for the omnipotence of God and as a motif in art...
" with a promise to return
Second Coming
In Christian doctrine, the Second Coming of Christ, the Second Advent, or the Parousia, is the anticipated return of Jesus Christ from Heaven, where he sits at the Right Hand of God, to Earth. This prophecy is found in the canonical gospels and in most Christian and Islamic eschatologies...
and establish a World to Come
World to Come
The World to Come is an eschatological phrase reflecting the belief that the "current world" is flawed or cursed and will be replaced in the future by a better world or a paradise. The concept is similar to the concepts of Heaven and the afterlife, but Heaven is another place generally seen as...
. Christians generally believe that faith in Jesus
Faith in Christianity
Faith, in Christianity, has been most commonly defined by the biblical formulation in the Letter to the Hebrews as "'the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen". Most of the definitions in the history of Christian theology have followed this biblical formulation...
is the way to achieve salvation
Salvation
Within religion salvation is the phenomenon of being saved from the undesirable condition of bondage or suffering experienced by the psyche or soul that has arisen as a result of unskillful or immoral actions generically referred to as sins. Salvation may also be called "deliverance" or...
and to enter into Heaven and/or receive Eternal life
Eternal life (Christianity)
In Christianity the term eternal life traditionally refers to continued life after death, rather than immortality. While scholars such as John H. Leith assert that...
, and that salvation is a gift given by the grace of God.
The vast majority of Christian faiths (including Catholicism, Orthodox Christianity, and most forms of Protestantism) recognize that the Gospels were passed on by oral tradition, and were not set to paper until decades after the death of Jesus, and that the extant versions are copies of those originals. The version of the Bible considered to be most valid (in the sense of best conveying the true meaning of the word of God) has varied considerably: the Greek Septuagint, the Syriac Peshitta
Peshitta
The Peshitta is the standard version of the Bible for churches in the Syriac tradition.The Old Testament of the Peshitta was translated into Syriac from the Hebrew, probably in the 2nd century AD...
, the Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
Vulgate
Vulgate
The Vulgate is a late 4th-century Latin translation of the Bible. It was largely the work of St. Jerome, who was commissioned by Pope Damasus I in 382 to make a revision of the old Latin translations...
, the English King James Version
King James Version of the Bible
The Authorized Version, commonly known as the King James Version, King James Bible or KJV, is an English translation of the Christian Bible by the Church of England begun in 1604 and completed in 1611...
and the Russian Synodal Bible have been authoritative to different communities at different times. In particular, Christians usually consult the Hebrew version of the Old Testament
Masoretic Text
The Masoretic Text is the authoritative Hebrew text of the Jewish Bible and is regarded as Judaism's official version of the Tanakh. While the Masoretic Text defines the books of the Jewish canon, it also defines the precise letter-text of these biblical books, with their vocalization and...
when preparing new translations, although some believe that the Septuagint should be preferred, as it was the Bible of the Early Christian Greek Church, and because they believe its translators used a different Hebrew Bible to the ones that make up the current Masoretic Hebrew text, as there are some variant readings of the Dead Sea Scrolls
Dead Sea scrolls
The Dead Sea Scrolls are a collection of 972 texts from the Hebrew Bible and extra-biblical documents found between 1947 and 1956 on the northwest shore of the Dead Sea, from which they derive their name...
confirmed by the Septuagint. In the same sense that the Jewish mystics viewed the Torah
Torah
Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
as something living and existing prior to any written text, so too do Christians view the Bible and Jesus himself as God's "Word
Word
In language, a word is the smallest free form that may be uttered in isolation with semantic or pragmatic content . This contrasts with a morpheme, which is the smallest unit of meaning but will not necessarily stand on its own...
" (or logos
Logos
' is an important term in philosophy, psychology, rhetoric and religion. Originally a word meaning "a ground", "a plea", "an opinion", "an expectation", "word," "speech," "account," "reason," it became a technical term in philosophy, beginning with Heraclitus ' is an important term in...
in Greek), transcending written documents.
The sacred scriptures of the Christian Bible are complemented by a large body of writings by individual Christians and councils of Christian leaders (see canon law
Canon law
Canon law is the body of laws & regulations made or adopted by ecclesiastical authority, for the government of the Christian organization and its members. It is the internal ecclesiastical law governing the Catholic Church , the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox churches, and the Anglican Communion of...
). Some Christian churches and denominations consider certain additional writings to be binding; other Christian groups consider only the Bible to be binding (sola scriptura
Sola scriptura
Sola scriptura is the doctrine that the Bible contains all knowledge necessary for salvation and holiness. Consequently, sola scriptura demands that only those doctrines are to be admitted or confessed that are found directly within or indirectly by using valid logical deduction or valid...
).
Islamic
Islam's holiest book is the Qur'anQur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
, comprising 114 sura
Sura
A sura is a division of the Qur'an, often referred to as a chapter. The term chapter is sometimes avoided, as the suras are of unequal length; the shortest sura has only three ayat while the longest contains 286 ayat...
s ("chapters of the Qur'an"). However, Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
s also believe in the religious texts of Judaism and Christianity in their original forms, albeit not the current versions (which they believe to be corrupted
Tahrif
Taḥrīf is an Arabic term used by Muslims with regard to irreparable alterations Islamic tradition claims Jews and Christians have made to Biblical manuscripts, specifically those that make up the Tawrat , Zabur and Injil .Traditional Muslim scholars, based on Qur'anic and other traditions, maintain...
). According to the Qur'an (and mainstream Muslim belief), the verses of the Qur'an were revealed by Allah through the Archangel Jibrail to Muhammad on separate occasions. These revelations were written down and also memorized by hundreds of hafiz. These multiple sources were collected into one official copy and given its present order in 653 by the third Caliph.
The Qur'an mentions and reveres several of the Israelite prophets, including Moses and Jesus, among others (see also: Prophets of Islam
Prophets of Islam
Muslims identify the Prophets of Islam as those humans chosen by God and given revelation to deliver to mankind. Muslims believe that every prophet was given a belief to worship God and their respective followers believed it as well...
). The stories of these prophets are very similar to those in the Bible. However, the detailed precepts of the Tanakh and the New Testament
New Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....
are not adopted outright; they are replaced by the new commandments accepted as revealed directly by Allah (through Gabriel) to Muhammad and codified in the Qur'an.
Like the Jews with the Torah, Muslims consider the original Arabic
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
text of the Qur'an as uncorrupted and holy to the last letter, and any translations are considered to be interpretations of the meaning of the Qur'an, as only the original Arabic text is considered to be the divine scripture.
Like the Rabbinic Oral Law
Oral law
An oral law is a code of conduct in use in a given culture, religion or community application, by which a body of rules of human behaviour is transmitted by oral tradition and effectively respected, or the single rule that is orally transmitted....
to the Hebrew Bible, the Qur'an is complemented by the Hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
, a set of books by later authors recording the sayings of the prophet Muhammad. The Hadith interpret and elaborate Qur'anic precepts. Islamic scholars have categorized each Hadith at one of the following levels of authenticity or isnad: genuine (sahih), fair (hasan) or weak (da'if).
By the 9th century, six major Hadith collections
Six major Hadith collections
The six major Hadith collections are collections of hadith by Islamic scholars who, approximately 200 years after Muhammad's death and by their own initiative, collected "hadith" attributed to Muhammad...
were accepted as reliable to Sunni Muslims.
- Sahih al-BukhariSahih al-BukhariṢaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī , as it is commonly referred to, is one of the six canonical hadith collections of Islam. These prophetic traditions, or hadith, were collected by the Persian Muslim scholar Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Bukhari, after being transmitted orally for generations. Muslims view this as one of...
- Sahih MuslimSahih MuslimSahih Muslim is one of the Six major collections of the hadith in Sunni Islam, oral traditions relating to the words and deeds of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad. It is the second most authentic hadith collection after Sahih Al-Bukhari, and is highly acclaimed by Sunni Muslims...
- Sunan ibn Majah
- Sunan Abu Dawood
- Jami al-Tirmidhi
- Sunan an-Nasa'ii
Shia Muslims, however, refer to other authenticated hadiths instead. They are known collectively as The Four Books
The Four Books
The Four Books is a Twelver Shiʿa term referring to their four best known hadith collections.The books are:Shi'a Muslims use different books of ahadith than Ahl al-Sunnah's Six major Hadith collections...
.
The Hadith and the life story of Muhammad (sira) form the Sunnah
Sunnah
The word literally means a clear, well trodden, busy and plain surfaced road. In the discussion of the sources of religion, Sunnah denotes the practice of Prophet Muhammad that he taught and practically instituted as a teacher of the sharī‘ah and the best exemplar...
, an authoritative supplement to the Qur'an. The legal opinions of Islamic jurists (Faqīh
Faqih
A Faqīh is an expert in fiqh, or, Islamic jurisprudence.A faqih is an expert in Islamic Law, and, as such, the word Faqih can literally be generally translated as Jurist.- The definition of Fiqh and its relation to the Faqih:...
) provide another source for the daily practice and interpretation of Islamic tradition (see Fiqh
Fiqh
Fiqh is Islamic jurisprudence. Fiqh is an expansion of the code of conduct expounded in the Quran, often supplemented by tradition and implemented by the rulings and interpretations of Islamic jurists....
.)
The Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
contains repeated references to the "religion of Abraham" (see Suras 2:130,135; 3:95; 6:123,161; 12:38; 16:123; 22:78). In the Qur'an, this expression refers specifically to Islam; sometimes in contrast to Christianity and Judaism, as in Sura 2:135, for example: 'They say: "Become Jews or Christians if ye would be guided (to salvation)." Say thou (O Muslims): "Nay! (I would rather) the Religion of Abraham the True, and he joined not gods with Allah." ' In the Qur'an, Abraham is declared to have been a Muslim (a hanif
Hanif
Hanif is a term that refers to those who maintain the pure monothestic Muslim beliefs of the patriarch Ibrahim. More specifically, in Islamic thought it refers to the people during the period known as the Age of Ignorance, who were seen to have rejected idolatry and retained some or all of the...
, more accurately a "primordial monotheist
Fitra
Fitra, or fitrah , is an Arabic word meaning ‘disposition’, ‘nature’, ‘constitution’, or ‘instinct’. In a mystical context, it can connote intuition or insight...
"), not a Jew nor a Christian (Sura 3:67).
End times and afterlife
In the major Abrahamic religions, there exists the expectation of an individual who will herald the time of the endEschatology
Eschatology is a part of theology, philosophy, and futurology concerned with what are believed to be the final events in history, or the ultimate destiny of humanity, commonly referred to as the end of the world or the World to Come...
and/or bring about the Kingdom of God
Kingdom of God
The Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Heaven is a foundational concept in the Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam.The term "Kingdom of God" is found in all four canonical gospels and in the Pauline epistles...
on Earth; in other words, the Messianic prophecy. Judaism awaits the coming of the Jewish Messiah
Jewish Messiah
Messiah, ; mashiah, moshiah, mashiach, or moshiach, is a term used in the Hebrew Bible to describe priests and kings, who were traditionally anointed with holy anointing oil as described in Exodus 30:22-25...
; the Jewish concept of Messiah differs from the Christian concept in several significant ways, despite the same term being applied to both. The Jewish Messiah is not seen as a "god", but as a mortal man who by his holiness is worthy of that description. His appearance is not the end of history, rather it signals the coming of the world to come.
Christianity awaits the Second Coming
Second Coming
In Christian doctrine, the Second Coming of Christ, the Second Advent, or the Parousia, is the anticipated return of Jesus Christ from Heaven, where he sits at the Right Hand of God, to Earth. This prophecy is found in the canonical gospels and in most Christian and Islamic eschatologies...
of Christ, though Full Preterists believe this has already happened. Islam awaits both the second coming of Jesus (to complete his life and die) and the coming of Mahdi
Mahdi
In Islamic eschatology, the Mahdi is the prophesied redeemer of Islam who will stay on Earth for seven, nine or nineteen years- before the Day of Judgment and, alongside Jesus, will rid the world of wrongdoing, injustice and tyranny.In Shia Islam, the belief in the Mahdi is a "central religious...
(Sunnis
Sunni Islam
Sunni Islam is the largest branch of Islam. Sunni Muslims are referred to in Arabic as ʾAhl ūs-Sunnah wa āl-Ǧamāʿah or ʾAhl ūs-Sunnah for short; in English, they are known as Sunni Muslims, Sunnis or Sunnites....
in his first incarnation, Shi'a
Shi'a Islam
Shia Islam is the second largest denomination of Islam. The followers of Shia Islam are called Shi'ites or Shias. "Shia" is the short form of the historic phrase Shīʻatu ʻAlī , meaning "followers of Ali", "faction of Ali", or "party of Ali".Like other schools of thought in Islam, Shia Islam is...
as the return of Muhammad al-Mahdi
Muhammad al-Mahdi
Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥasan al-Mahdī is believed by Twelver Shī‘a Muslims to be the Mahdī, an ultimate savior of humankind and the final Imām of the Twelve Imams...
).
Most Abrahamic religions agree that a human being comprises the body, which dies, and the soul, which is capable of remaining alive beyond human death and carries the person's essence, and that God will judge each person's life accordingly after death. The importance of this and the focus on it, as well as the precise criteria and end result, differs between religions.
Judaism
Judaism's views on the afterlife ("the Next World") are quite diverse. This can be attributed to the fact that although there clearly are traditions in the Hebrew BibleHebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
of an afterlife (see Naboth
Naboth
Naboth "the Jezreelite," is the central figure of a story from the Old Testament. According to the story, Naboth was the owner of a plot on the eastern slope of the hill of Jezreel...
and the Witch of Endor
Witch of Endor
The Witch of Endor, sometimes called the Medium of Endor, was a woman who called up the ghost of the recently deceased prophet Samuel, at the demand of King Saul of the Kingdom of Israel in the First Book of Samuel, chapter...
), Judaism focuses on this life and how to lead a holy life to please God, rather than future reward, and its attitude can be mostly summed up by the rabbinical observation that at the start of Genesis, God clothed the naked (Adam and Eve); at the end of Deuteronomy, he buried the dead (Moses
Moses
Moses was, according to the Hebrew Bible and Qur'an, a religious leader, lawgiver and prophet, to whom the authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed...
) and the Children of Israel mourned for 40 days before getting on with their lives.
Christianity
Christians have more diverse and definite teachings on the end timesEnd times
The end time, end times, or end of days is a time period described in the eschatological writings in the three Abrahamic religions and in doomsday scenarios in various other non-Abrahamic religions...
and what constitutes afterlife
Afterlife
The afterlife is the belief that a part of, or essence of, or soul of an individual, which carries with it and confers personal identity, survives the death of the body of this world and this lifetime, by natural or supernatural means, in contrast to the belief in eternal...
. Most Christian approaches either include different abodes for the dead (Heaven
Heaven (Christianity)
Traditionally, Christianity has taught Heaven as a place of eternal life and the dwelling place of Angels and the Throne of God, and a kingdom to which all the elect will be admitted...
, Hell
Hell
In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...
, Limbo
Limbo
In the theology of the Catholic Church, Limbo is a speculative idea about the afterlife condition of those who die in original sin without being assigned to the Hell of the damned. Limbo is not an official doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church or any other...
, [Purgatory]]) or universal reconciliation
Universal reconciliation
In Christian theology, universal reconciliation is the doctrine that all sinful and alienated human souls—because of divine love and mercy—will ultimately be reconciled to God.Universal salvation may be related to the perception of a problem of Hell, standing opposed to ideas...
in which all souls are made in the image of God. A small minority teach annihilationism
Annihilationism
Annihilationism is a Christian belief that apart from salvation the death of human beings results in their total destruction rather than their everlasting torment. It is directly related to the doctrine of conditional immortality, the idea that a human soul is not immortal unless it is given...
, the doctrine that those persons who are not reconciled to God simply cease to exist (though the Roman Catholic Church has no official teaching on what kind of place hell is, and indeed allows that it might be a locale of oblivion).
Islam
In Islam, God is said to be "Most Compassionate and Most Merciful" (Qur'an 1:1, as well as the start of all suras but one). However, God is also "Most Just"; Islam prescribes a literal Hell for those who disobey God and commit gross sin. Those who obey God and submit to God will be rewarded with their own place in Paradise. While sinners are punished with fire, there are also many other forms of punishment described, depending on the sin committed; Hell is divided into numerous levels.Those who worship and remember God are promised eternal abode in a physical and spiritual Paradise. Heaven is divided into seven levels
Jannah
Jannah , is the Islamic conception of paradise. The Arabic word Jannah is a shortened version meaning simply "Garden". According to Islamic eschatology, after death, one will reside in the grave until the appointed resurrection on . Muslims believe that the treatment of the individual in the life...
, with the highest level of Paradise being the reward of those who have been most virtuous, the prophets, and those killed while fighting for Allah (martyrs).
Upon repentance to God, many sins can be forgiven, on the condition they are not repeated, as God is supremely merciful. Additionally, those who believe in God, but have led sinful lives, may be punished for a time, and then eventually released into Paradise. If anyone dies in a state of Shirk
Shirk (polytheism)
In Islam, shirk is the sin of idolatry or polytheism. i.e. the deification or worship of anyone or anything other than the singular God, or more literally the establishment of "partners" placed beside God...
(i.e., associating God in any way, such as claiming that He is equal with anything or denying Him), this is not pardonnable—he or she will stay forever in Hell.
Once a person is admitted to Paradise, this person will abide there for eternity.
Worship and religious rites
Worship, ceremonies and religion-related customs differ substantially among the Abrahamic religions. Among the few similarities are a seven-day cycle in which one day is nominally reserved for worship, prayer or other religious activities - ShabbatShabbat
Shabbat is the seventh day of the Jewish week and a day of rest in Judaism. Shabbat is observed from a few minutes before sunset on Friday evening until a few minutes after when one would expect to be able to see three stars in the sky on Saturday night. The exact times, therefore, differ from...
, Sabbath, or jumu'ah
Jumu'ah
Jumu'ah is a congregational prayer that Muslims hold every Friday, just after noon in lieu of dhuhr...
; this custom is related to the biblical story of Genesis, where God created the universe in six days, and rested in the seventh.
Judaism
Orthodox JudaismOrthodox Judaism
Orthodox Judaism , is the approach to Judaism which adheres to the traditional interpretation and application of the laws and ethics of the Torah as legislated in the Talmudic texts by the Sanhedrin and subsequently developed and applied by the later authorities known as the Gaonim, Rishonim, and...
practice is guided by the interpretation of the Torah
Torah
Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
and the Talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
. Before the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem
Temple in Jerusalem
The Temple in Jerusalem or Holy Temple , refers to one of a series of structures which were historically located on the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem, the current site of the Dome of the Rock. Historically, these successive temples stood at this location and functioned as the centre of...
, Jewish priests offered sacrifices
Korban
The term offering as found in the Hebrew Bible in relation to the worship of Ancient Israel is mainly represented by the Hebrew noun korban whether for an animal or other offering...
there two times daily; since then, the practice has been replaced, until the Temple is rebuilt, by Jewish men being required to pray three times daily, including the chanting
Cantillation
Cantillation is the ritual chanting of readings from the Hebrew Bible in synagogue services. The chants are written and notated in accordance with the special signs or marks printed in the Masoretic text of the Hebrew Bible to complement the letters and vowel points...
of the Torah
Torah
Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
, and facing in the direction of Jerusalem's Temple Mount
Temple Mount
The Temple Mount, known in Hebrew as , and in Arabic as the Haram Ash-Sharif , is one of the most important religious sites in the Old City of Jerusalem. It has been used as a religious site for thousands of years...
. Jewish women's prayer obligations vary by denomination; in contemporary orthodox practice, women do not read from the Torah
Torah
Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
and are only required to say certain parts of these daily services. Other practices include circumcision
Brit milah
The brit milah is a Jewish religious circumcision ceremony performed on 8-day old male infants by a mohel. The brit milah is followed by a celebratory meal .-Biblical references:...
, dietary laws
Kashrut
Kashrut is the set of Jewish dietary laws. Food in accord with halakha is termed kosher in English, from the Ashkenazi pronunciation of the Hebrew term kashér , meaning "fit" Kashrut (also kashruth or kashrus) is the set of Jewish dietary laws. Food in accord with halakha (Jewish law) is termed...
, Shabbat
Shabbat
Shabbat is the seventh day of the Jewish week and a day of rest in Judaism. Shabbat is observed from a few minutes before sunset on Friday evening until a few minutes after when one would expect to be able to see three stars in the sky on Saturday night. The exact times, therefore, differ from...
, Passover
Passover Seder
The Passover Seder is a Jewish ritual feast that marks the beginning of the Jewish holiday of Passover. It is conducted on the evenings of the 14th day of Nisan in the Hebrew calendar, and on the 15th by traditionally observant Jews living outside Israel. This corresponds to late March or April in...
, Torah study
Torah study
Torah study is the study by Jewish people of the Torah, Hebrew Bible, Talmud, responsa, rabbinic literature and similar works, all of which are Judaism's religious texts...
, Tefillin
Tefillin
Tefillin also called phylacteries are a set of small black leather boxes containing scrolls of parchment inscribed with verses from the Torah, which are worn by observant Jews during weekday morning prayers. Although "tefillin" is technically the plural form , it is loosely used as a singular as...
, purity
Niddah
Niddah is a Hebrew term describing a woman during menstruation, or a woman who has menstruated and not yet completed the associated requirement of immersion in a mikveh ....
and others
613 mitzvot
The 613 commandments is a numbering of the statements and principles of law, ethics, and spiritual practice contained in the Torah or Five Books of Moses...
. Conservative Judaism
Conservative Judaism
Conservative Judaism is a modern stream of Judaism that arose out of intellectual currents in Germany in the mid-19th century and took institutional form in the United States in the early 1900s.Conservative Judaism has its roots in the school of thought known as Positive-Historical Judaism,...
, Reform Judaism
Reform Judaism
Reform Judaism refers to various beliefs, practices and organizations associated with the Reform Jewish movement in North America, the United Kingdom and elsewhere. In general, it maintains that Judaism and Jewish traditions should be modernized and should be compatible with participation in the...
and the Reconstructionist
Reconstructionist Judaism
Reconstructionist Judaism is a modern American-based Jewish movement based on the ideas of Mordecai Kaplan . The movement views Judaism as a progressively evolving civilization. It originated as a branch of Conservative Judaism, before it splintered...
movement all move away, in different degrees, from the strict tradition of the law.
All versions of Judaism share a common, specialized calendar, containing many festivals. The calendar is lunisolar, with lunar months and a solar year (an extra month is added every second or third year to allow the shorter lunar year to "catch up" to the solar year). All streams observe the same festivals, but some emphasize them differently. As is usual with its extensive law system, the Orthodox have the most complex manner of observing the festivals, while the Reform pay more attention to the simple symbolism of each one.
Christianity
Christian worship varies from denomination to denomination. Individual prayerPrayer in Christianity
Prayer has been an essential part of Christianity since its earliest days. Prayer is an integral element of the Christian faith and permeates all forms of Christian worship...
is usually not ritualised, while group prayer may be ritual or non-ritual according to the occasion. During church services some form of liturgy
Liturgy
Liturgy is either the customary public worship done by a specific religious group, according to its particular traditions or a more precise term that distinguishes between those religious groups who believe their ritual requires the "people" to do the "work" of responding to the priest, and those...
is frequently followed. Rituals are performed during sacraments, which also vary from denomination to denomination and usually include baptism
Baptism
In Christianity, baptism is for the majority the rite of admission , almost invariably with the use of water, into the Christian Church generally and also membership of a particular church tradition...
and communion
Eucharist
The Eucharist , also called Holy Communion, the Sacrament of the Altar, the Blessed Sacrament, the Lord's Supper, and other names, is a Christian sacrament or ordinance...
, and may also include confirmation, confession
Confession
This article is for the religious practice of confessing one's sins.Confession is the acknowledgment of sin or wrongs...
, last rites
Last Rites
The Last Rites are the very last prayers and ministrations given to many Christians before death. The last rites go by various names and include different practices in different Christian traditions...
and holy orders. Catholic worship practice is governed by the Roman Missal
Roman Missal
The Roman Missal is the liturgical book that contains the texts and rubrics for the celebration of the Mass in the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church.-Situation before the Council of Trent:...
and other documents. Individuals, churches and denominations place different emphasis on ritual - some denominations consider most ritual activity optional, see Adiaphora
Adiaphora
Adiaphoron is a concept of Stoic philosophy that indicates things outside of moral law—that is, actions that morality neither mandates nor forbids....
, particularly since the Protestant Reformation
Protestant Reformation
The Protestant Reformation was a 16th-century split within Western Christianity initiated by Martin Luther, John Calvin and other early Protestants. The efforts of the self-described "reformers", who objected to the doctrines, rituals and ecclesiastical structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led...
.
Islam
The followers of Islam (Muslims) are to observe the Five Pillars of IslamFive Pillars of Islam
The Pillars of Islam are basic concepts and duties for accepting the religion for the Muslims.The Shi'i and Sunni both agree on the essential details for the performance of these acts, but the Shi'a do not refer to them by the same name .-Pillars of Shia:According to Shia Islam, the...
. The first pillar is the belief in the oneness of Allah, and in Muhammad as his final and most perfect prophet. The second is to pray five times daily (salat
Salat
Salah is the practice of formal prayer in Islam. Its importance for Muslims is indicated by its status as one of the Five Pillars of Sunni Islam, of the Ten Practices of the Religion of Twelver Islam and of the 7 pillars of Musta'lī Ismailis...
) towards the direction (qibla
Qibla
The Qiblah , also transliterated as Qibla, Kiblah or Kibla, is the direction that should be faced when a Muslim prays during salah...
) of the Kaaba
Kaaba
The Kaaba is a cuboid-shaped building in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, and is the most sacred site in Islam. The Qur'an states that the Kaaba was constructed by Abraham, or Ibraheem, in Arabic, and his son Ishmael, or Ismaeel, as said in Arabic, after he had settled in Arabia. The building has a mosque...
in Mecca
Mecca
Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...
. The third pillar is Zakah, a portion of one's wealth given to the poor or to other specified causes, which means the giving of a specific share of one's wealth and savings to persons or causes, as is commanded in the Qur'an and elucidated as to specific percentages for different kinds of income and wealth in the hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
. The normal share to be paid is two and a half percent of one's earnings: this increases if labour was not required, and increases further if only capital or possessions alone were required (i.e. proceeds from renting space), and increases to 50% on "unearned wealth" such as treasure-finding, and to 100% on wealth that is considered haram
Haram
The Arabic term has a meaning of "sanctuary" or "holy site" in Islam.-Etymology:The Arabic language has two separate words, and , both derived from the same triliteral Semitic root . Both of these words can mean "forbidden" and/or "sacred" in a general way, but each has also developed some...
, as part of attempting to make atonement for the sin, such as that gained through financial interest (riba
Riba
Riba means one of the senses of "usury" . Riba is forbidden in Islamic economic jurisprudence fiqh and considered as a major sin...
). Fasting
Fasting
Fasting is primarily the act of willingly abstaining from some or all food, drink, or both, for a period of time. An absolute fast is normally defined as abstinence from all food and liquid for a defined period, usually a single day , or several days. Other fasts may be only partially restrictive,...
(sawm
Sawm
Sawm is an Arabic word for fasting regulated by Islamic jurisprudence. In the terminology of Islamic law, Sawm means to abstain from eating, drinking , having sex and anything against Islamic law...
) during the ninth month of the Muslim lunar calendar, Ramadan
Ramadan
Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar, which lasts 29 or 30 days. It is the Islamic month of fasting, in which participating Muslims refrain from eating, drinking, smoking and sex during daylight hours and is intended to teach Muslims about patience, spirituality, humility and...
, is the fourth pillar of Islam, to which all Muslims after the age of puberty in good health (as judged by a Muslim doctor to be able fast without incurring grave danger to health: even in seemingly-obvious situations, a "competent and upright Muslim physician" is required to agree), that are not menstruating are bound to observe - missed days of the fast for any reason must be made up, unless there be a permanent illness, such as diabetes, that prevents a person from ever fasting. In such a case, restitution must be made by feeding one poor person for each day missed. Finally, Muslims are also required, if physically able, to undertake a pilgrimage
Hajj
The Hajj is the pilgrimage to Mecca, Saudi Arabia. It is one of the largest pilgrimages in the world, and is the fifth pillar of Islam, a religious duty that must be carried out at least once in their lifetime by every able-bodied Muslim who can afford to do so...
to Mecca
Mecca
Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...
at least once in one's life: it is strongly recommended to do it as often as possible, preferably once a year. Only individuals whose financial position and health are severely insufficient are exempt from making Hajj (e.g. if making Hajj would put stress on one's financial situation, but would not end up in homelessness or starvation, it is still required). During this pilgrimage, the Muslims spend three to seven days in worship, performing several strictly-defined rituals, most notably circumambulating the Kaaba
Kaaba
The Kaaba is a cuboid-shaped building in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, and is the most sacred site in Islam. The Qur'an states that the Kaaba was constructed by Abraham, or Ibraheem, in Arabic, and his son Ishmael, or Ismaeel, as said in Arabic, after he had settled in Arabia. The building has a mosque...
among millions of other Muslims and the "stoning of the devil
Stoning of the Devil
Stoning of the Devil or stoning of the jamarat is part of the annual Islamic Hajj pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia. Muslim pilgrims fling pebbles at three walls called jamarat in the city of Mina just east of Mecca. It is one of a series of ritual acts that must be performed in...
" at Mina
Mina, Saudi Arabia
Mina is a location situated some 5 kilometres to the east of the Islamic holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia. It stands on the road from Mecca's city centre to the Hill of Arafat....
. At the end of the Hajj
Hajj
The Hajj is the pilgrimage to Mecca, Saudi Arabia. It is one of the largest pilgrimages in the world, and is the fifth pillar of Islam, a religious duty that must be carried out at least once in their lifetime by every able-bodied Muslim who can afford to do so...
, the heads of men are shaved, sheep and other halal
Halal
Halal is a term designating any object or an action which is permissible to use or engage in, according to Islamic law. The term is used to designate food seen as permissible according to Islamic law...
animals, notably camel
Camel
A camel is an even-toed ungulate within the genus Camelus, bearing distinctive fatty deposits known as humps on its back. There are two species of camels: the dromedary or Arabian camel has a single hump, and the bactrian has two humps. Dromedaries are native to the dry desert areas of West Asia,...
s, are slaughtered as a ritual sacrifice by bleeding out at the neck according to a strictly-prescribed ritual slaughter method similar to the Jewish kashrut
Kashrut
Kashrut is the set of Jewish dietary laws. Food in accord with halakha is termed kosher in English, from the Ashkenazi pronunciation of the Hebrew term kashér , meaning "fit" Kashrut (also kashruth or kashrus) is the set of Jewish dietary laws. Food in accord with halakha (Jewish law) is termed...
, to commemorate the moment when, according to Islamic tradition, Allah replaced Abraham's son Ishmael
Ishmael
Ishmael is a figure in the Hebrew Bible and the Qur'an, and was Abraham's first born child according to Jews, Christians and Muslims. Ishmael was born of Abraham's marriage to Sarah's handmaiden Hagar...
(contrasted with the Judaeo-Christian tradition that Isaac
Isaac
Isaac as described in the Hebrew Bible, was the only son Abraham had with his wife Sarah, and was the father of Jacob and Esau. Isaac was one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites...
was the intended sacrifice) with a sheep, thereby preventing human sacrifice. The meat from these animals is then distributed locally to needy Muslims, neighbours and relatives. Finally, the hajji puts of ihram and the hajj is complete.
Circumcision
Judaism practices circumcisionBrit milah
The brit milah is a Jewish religious circumcision ceremony performed on 8-day old male infants by a mohel. The brit milah is followed by a celebratory meal .-Biblical references:...
for males as a matter of religious obligation, as does Islam
Khitan (circumcision)
Khitān or Khatna is the term for male circumcision carried out as an Islamic rite, to introduce males into Islam and as a sign of belonging to the wider Islamic community. It is also referred to by the term Taharah, 'purity'....
as part of Sunnah (the practice is not mandated by the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
).
Western Christianity
Western Christianity
Western Christianity is a term used to include the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church and groups historically derivative thereof, including the churches of the Anglican and Protestant traditions, which share common attributes that can be traced back to their medieval heritage...
replaced that custom with a baptism
Baptism
In Christianity, baptism is for the majority the rite of admission , almost invariably with the use of water, into the Christian Church generally and also membership of a particular church tradition...
ceremony varying according to the denomination, but generally including immersion, aspersion
Aspersion
Aspersion , in a religious context, is the act of sprinkling with water, especially holy water. Aspersion is a method used in baptism as an alternative to immersion or affusion...
or anointment with water. The Early Church (Acts 15, the Council of Jerusalem
Council of Jerusalem
The Council of Jerusalem is a name applied by historians and theologians to an Early Christian council that was held in Jerusalem and dated to around the year 50. It is considered by Catholics and Orthodox to be a prototype and forerunner of the later Ecumenical Councils...
) decided that circumcision is not required for Gentile Christians. The Council of Florence
Council of Florence
The Council of Florence was an Ecumenical Council of the Roman Catholic Church. It began in 1431 in Basel, Switzerland, and became known as the Council of Ferrara after its transfer to Ferrara was decreed by Pope Eugene IV, to convene in 1438...
in the 15th century prohibited it. Paragraph #2297 of the Catholic Catechism calls non-medical amputation or mutilation immoral. Many countries with majorities of Christian adherents have low circumcision rates (with the notable exceptions of the United States and the Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...
). Coptic Christianity
Coptic Christianity
The Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria is the official name for the largest Christian church in Egypt and the Middle East. The Church belongs to the Oriental Orthodox family of churches, which has been a distinct church body since the Council of Chalcedon in AD 451, when it took a different...
and Ethiopian Orthodoxy still observe circumcision. See also Aposthia
Aposthia
Aposthia is a rare congenital condition in humans, in which the foreskin of the penis is missing.Toward the end of the nineteenth century, E. S. Talbot claimed in Medicine that aposthia among Jews was evidence for the now-discredited Lamarckian theory of evolution...
.
Male circumcision is among the rites of Islam and is part of the (in Arabic): fitrah, or the innate disposition and natural character and instinct of the human creation.
Food restrictions
Judaism and Islam have strict dietary laws, with permitted food known as kosher in Judaism, and halal
Halal
Halal is a term designating any object or an action which is permissible to use or engage in, according to Islamic law. The term is used to designate food seen as permissible according to Islamic law...
in Islam. These two religions prohibit the consumption of pork
Pork
Pork is the culinary name for meat from the domestic pig , which is eaten in many countries. It is one of the most commonly consumed meats worldwide, with evidence of pig husbandry dating back to 5000 BC....
; Islam prohibits the consumption of alcoholic beverage
Alcoholic beverage
An alcoholic beverage is a drink containing ethanol, commonly known as alcohol. Alcoholic beverages are divided into three general classes: beers, wines, and spirits. They are legally consumed in most countries, and over 100 countries have laws regulating their production, sale, and consumption...
s of any kind. Halal restrictions can be seen as a modification of the kashrut
Kashrut
Kashrut is the set of Jewish dietary laws. Food in accord with halakha is termed kosher in English, from the Ashkenazi pronunciation of the Hebrew term kashér , meaning "fit" Kashrut (also kashruth or kashrus) is the set of Jewish dietary laws. Food in accord with halakha (Jewish law) is termed...
dietary laws, so many kosher foods are considered halal; especially in the case of meat, which Islam prescribes must be slaughtered in the name of God. Hence in Morocco
Morocco
Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...
Muslims used to consume kosher food. Similarly, some foods not considered kosher are considered halal in Islam.
With rare exceptions, Christians do not consider the Old Testament's strict food laws as relevant for today's church; see also Biblical law in Christianity
Biblical law in Christianity
Christian views of the Old Covenant have been central to Christian theology and practice since the circumcision controversy in Early Christianity. There are differing views about the applicability of the Old Covenant among Christian denominations...
. Most Protestants have no set food laws, but there are minority exceptions.
The Roman Catholic Church believes in observing abstinence and penance. For example, all Fridays through the year and the time of Lent are penitential days. The law of abstinence requires a Catholic from 14 years of age until death to abstain from eating meat on Fridays in honor of the Passion of Jesus on Good Friday. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is the episcopal conference of the Catholic Church in the United States. Founded in 1966 as the joint National Conference of Catholic Bishops and United States Catholic Conference, it is composed of all active and retired members of the Catholic...
obtained the permission of the Holy See for Catholics in the U.S. to substitute a penitential, or even a charitable, practice of their own choosing. Eastern Rite Catholics have their own penitential practices as specified by the Code of Canons for the Eastern Churches.
The Seventh-day Adventist Church
Seventh-day Adventist Church
The Seventh-day Adventist Church is a Protestant Christian denomination distinguished by its observance of Saturday, the original seventh day of the Judeo-Christian week, as the Sabbath, and by its emphasis on the imminent second coming of Jesus Christ...
(SDA) embraces numerous Old Testament rules and regulations such as tithing, Sabbath observance, and Jewish Food laws. Therefore, they do not eat pork, shellfish, or other foods considered unclean under the Old Covenant
Old Covenant
The Old Covenant was the name of the agreement which effected the union of Iceland and Norway. It is also known as Gissurarsáttmáli, named after Gissur Þorvaldsson, the Icelandic chieftain who worked to promote it. The name "Old Covenant", however, is probably due to historical confusion...
. The "Fundamental Beliefs" of the SDA state that their members "are to adopt the most healthful diet possible and abstain from the unclean foods identified in the Scriptures." among others
In the Christian Bible, the consumption of strangled animals and of blood was forbidden by Apostolic Decree and are still forbidden in the Greek Orthodox Church, according to German theologican Karl Josef von Hefele
Karl Josef von Hefele
Karl Josef von Hefele was a German theologian. He was born at Unterkochen in Württemberg, and was educated at Tübingen where in 1839 he became professor-ordinary of Church history and patristics in the Roman Catholic faculty of theology.From 1842 to 1845 he sat in the National Assembly of...
, who, in his Commentary on Canon II of the Second Ecumenical Council held in the 4th century at Gangra, notes: "We further see that, at the time of the Synod of Gangra, the rule of the Apostolic Synod [the Council of Jerusalem
Council of Jerusalem
The Council of Jerusalem is a name applied by historians and theologians to an Early Christian council that was held in Jerusalem and dated to around the year 50. It is considered by Catholics and Orthodox to be a prototype and forerunner of the later Ecumenical Councils...
of Acts 15] with regard to blood and things strangled was still in force. With the Greeks, indeed, it continued always in force as their Euchologies still show." He also writes that "as late as the eighth century, Pope Gregory the Third
Pope Gregory III
Pope Saint Gregory III was pope from 731 to 741. A Syrian by birth, he succeeded Gregory II in March 731. His pontificate, like that of his predecessor, was disturbed by the iconoclastic controversy in the Byzantine Empire, in which he vainly invoked the intervention of Charles Martel.Elected by...
, in 731, forbade the eating of blood or things strangled under threat of a penance of forty days."
Jehovah's Witnesses
Jehovah's Witnesses
Jehovah's Witnesses is a millenarian restorationist Christian denomination with nontrinitarian beliefs distinct from mainstream Christianity. The religion reports worldwide membership of over 7 million adherents involved in evangelism, convention attendance of over 12 million, and annual...
abstain from eating blood and from blood transfusions based on .
Sabbath observance
Sabbath in the Bible is a weekly day of restLeisure
Leisure, or free time, is time spent away from business, work, and domestic chores. It is also the periods of time before or after necessary activities such as eating, sleeping and, where it is compulsory, education....
and time of worship
Worship
Worship is an act of religious devotion usually directed towards a deity. The word is derived from the Old English worthscipe, meaning worthiness or worth-ship — to give, at its simplest, worth to something, for example, Christian worship.Evelyn Underhill defines worship thus: "The absolute...
. It is observed differently in Judaism and Christianity and informs a similar occasion in several other Abrahamic faiths. Though many viewpoints and definitions have arisen over the millennia, most originate in the same textual tradition. Though not a day of rest (creation does not make God tired and therefore He did not rest on the 7th day in Muslim belief), Islam holds Friday as a day of special prayer.
Judaism
Judaism accepts converts, but has no explicit missionariesMissionary
A missionary is a member of a religious group sent into an area to do evangelism or ministries of service, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care and economic development. The word "mission" originates from 1598 when the Jesuits sent members abroad, derived from the Latin...
as such since the end of the Second Temple era
Second Temple Judaism
Second Temple Judaism refers to the religion of Judaism during the Second Temple period, between the construction of the second Jewish temple in Jerusalem in 515 BCE, and its destruction by the Romans in 70 CE This period witnessed major historical upheavals and significant religious changes that...
. Judaism states that non-Jews can achieve righteousness by following Noahide Laws
Noahide Laws
The Seven Laws of Noah form the major part of the Noachide Laws, or Noahide Code. This code is a set of moral imperatives that, according to the Talmud, were given by God as a binding set of laws for the "children of Noah" – that is, all of humankind...
, a set of seven universal commandments non-Jews are expected to follow. In this context, the Rambam (Rabbi Moses Maimonides, one of the major Jewish teachers) commented: "Quoting from our sages, the righteous people from other nations have a place in the world to come, if they have acquired what they should learn about the Creator". Because the commandments applicable to the Jews are much more detailed and onerous than Noahide laws, Jewish scholars have traditionally maintained that it is better to be a good non-Jew than a bad Jew, thus discouraging conversion. In the U.S., as of 2003 28% of married Jews were married to non-Jews. See also Conversion to Judaism
Conversion to Judaism
Conversion to Judaism is a formal act undertaken by a non-Jewish person who wishes to be recognised as a full member of the Jewish community. A Jewish conversion is both a religious act and an expression of association with the Jewish people...
.
Christianity
Christianity encourages evangelismEvangelism
Evangelism refers to the practice of relaying information about a particular set of beliefs to others who do not hold those beliefs. The term is often used in reference to Christianity....
. Many Christian organizations, especially Protestant churches, send missionaries
Missionary
A missionary is a member of a religious group sent into an area to do evangelism or ministries of service, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care and economic development. The word "mission" originates from 1598 when the Jesuits sent members abroad, derived from the Latin...
to non-Christian communities throughout the world. See also Great Commission
Great Commission
The Great Commission, in Christian tradition, is the instruction of the resurrected Jesus Christ to his disciples, that they spread his teachings to all the nations of the world. It has become a tenet in Christian theology emphasizing missionary work, evangelism, and baptism...
. Forced conversion
Forced conversion
A forced conversion is the religious conversion or acceptance of a philosophy against the will of the subject, often with the threatened consequence of earthly penalties or harm. These consequences range from job loss and social isolation to incarceration, torture or death...
s to Catholicism have been documented at various points throughout history. The most prominently cited allegations are the conversions of the pagans after Constantine
Constantine I turn against Paganism
Constantine I turn against Paganism evolved during Constantine I's reign, and went from the initial prohibition on the construction of new temples and the toleration of Pagan sacrifices, to orders for the pillaging and the tearing down of pagan temples by the end of his reign.-Conversion to...
; of Muslims, Jews and Eastern Orthodox during the Crusades
Crusades
The Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...
; of Jews and Muslims during the time of the Spanish Inquisition
Spanish Inquisition
The Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition , commonly known as the Spanish Inquisition , was a tribunal established in 1480 by Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. It was intended to maintain Catholic orthodoxy in their kingdoms, and to replace the Medieval...
, where they were offered the choice of exile, conversion or death; and of the Aztecs by Hernan Cortes
Hernán Cortés
Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro, 1st Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca was a Spanish Conquistador who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire and brought large portions of mainland Mexico under the rule of the King of Castile in the early 16th century...
. Forced conversions to Protestantism have occurred as well, notably during the Reformation
Reformation
- Movements :* Protestant Reformation, an attempt by Martin Luther to reform the Roman Catholic Church that resulted in a schism, and grew into a wider movement...
, especially in England and Ireland (see recusancy
Recusancy
In the history of England and Wales, the recusancy was the state of those who refused to attend Anglican services. The individuals were known as "recusants"...
and Popish plot
Popish Plot
The Popish Plot was a fictitious conspiracy concocted by Titus Oates that gripped England, Wales and Scotland in Anti-Catholic hysteria between 1678 and 1681. Oates alleged that there existed an extensive Catholic conspiracy to assassinate Charles II, accusations that led to the execution of at...
).
Forced conversions are condemned as sinful by major denominations such as the Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with over a billion members. Led by the Pope, it defines its mission as spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, administering the sacraments and exercising charity...
, which officially states that forced conversions pollute the Christian religion and offend human dignity, so that past or present offenses are regarded as a scandal (a cause of unbelief). According to Pope Paul VI, "It is one of the major tenets of Catholic doctrine that man's response to God in faith must be free: no one therefore is to be forced to embrace the Christian faith against his own will."
Islam
Muslims are encouraged to proselytize for their religionIslamic Missionary Activity
Dawah, Islamic missionary work, means to "invite" to Islam, which is estimated to be the second largest religion after Christianity. After the death of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad, from the 7th century onwards, Islam spread rapidly from the Arabian Peninsula to the rest of the world, initially...
, which the devout believe is the only path to salvation from hellfire (a view not necessarily substantiated by the Qur'an). Most mainstream Muslim groups say that the verse that reads "Let there be no compulsion in religion" means "the apostate is threatened with punishment in the next world only" and prevents Muslims from using violence to spread the religion. This has been contested by critics such as Bat Ye'or
Bat Ye'or
Bat Ye'or is a pseudonym of Gisèle Littman, née Orebi, an Egyptian-born British writer and political commentator who writes about the history of non-Muslims in the Middle East, and in particular the history of Christian and Jewish dhimmis living under Islamic governments.She is the author of eight...
and Robert Spencer who believe that Muhammad, by his own example, sought forced universal conversion of non-Muslims. For example, in the Sahih al-Bukhari
Sahih al-Bukhari
Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī , as it is commonly referred to, is one of the six canonical hadith collections of Islam. These prophetic traditions, or hadith, were collected by the Persian Muslim scholar Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Bukhari, after being transmitted orally for generations. Muslims view this as one of...
(Volume 1, Book 2, Number 24) Muhammad says, "I have been ordered (by Allah) to struggle against the people until they testify that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah and that Muhammad is Allah's Apostle." The Qu'ran says, "If then, ye (the wrongdoers or mushrikun, commonly translated as "unbelievers") repent, it were best for you; but if ye turn away, know ye that ye cannot frustrate Allah. And proclaim a grievous penalty to those who reject Faith." "...fight and slay the unbelievers
Kafir
Kafir is an Arabic term used in a Islamic doctrinal sense, usually translated as "unbeliever" or "disbeliever"...
wherever ye find them, and seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war)..." "Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth." These verses, being in context of a particular historic war only, thus, do not indicate that Islam permits killing or forcing people in the name of religion. However, it is the ijma
Ijma
Ijmāʿ is an Arabic term referring to the consensus of the Muslim community. Various schools of thought within Islamic jurisprudence may define this consensus as that of the first generation of Muslims only; the consensus of the first three generations of Muslims; the consensus of the jurists...
, or unanimous opinion of Islamic scholars from the 8th century until the present day, that these verses do indeed command the faithful to rule the world under the Shariah: they also are acknowledged as being the final and eternal word of Allah on matters of war and peace, abrogating earlier verses, and apply for all times, not just a specific war of the past.
During the Ummayad dynasty Muslim rulers imposed a Jizya
Jizya
Under Islamic law, jizya or jizyah is a per capita tax levied on a section of an Islamic state's non-Muslim citizens, who meet certain criteria...
(poll tax) on dhimmi
Dhimmi
A , is a non-Muslim subject of a state governed in accordance with sharia law. Linguistically, the word means "one whose responsibility has been taken". This has to be understood in the context of the definition of state in Islam...
s (non-Muslims living under Islamic rule), something that some argue encouraged conversion. However, Muslims refer to the Zakat
Zakat
Zakāt , one of the Five Pillars of Islam, is the giving of a fixed portion of one's wealth to charity, generally to the poor and needy.-History:Zakat, a practice initiated by Muhammed himself, has played an important role throughout Islamic history...
that every Muslim is obliged to pay as an indication that Muslims would still have to pay more tax than a non-Muslim, refuting the claim that the Jizya somehow encouraged conversion. However, the jizya was not a set percentage like the zakat (set at 2.5%), but could be raised arbitrarily, and often was in periods of piety and Islamic fervour. The Jizya also afforded the dhimmis limited protection by the ruler from outside enemies, but not necessarily from the ruler and his subjects, as pogroms were not infreqeunt and exemption form serving in the army at the cost of loss of freedom, franchise, and humiliation.
Islam has missionaries
Islamic Missionary Activity
Dawah, Islamic missionary work, means to "invite" to Islam, which is estimated to be the second largest religion after Christianity. After the death of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad, from the 7th century onwards, Islam spread rapidly from the Arabian Peninsula to the rest of the world, initially...
. They are known as Dawah
Dawah
Da‘wah or Dawah usually denotes the preaching of Islam. Da‘wah literally means "issuing a summons" or "making an invitation", being the active participle of a verb meaning variously "to summon" or "to invite"...
networks and encourage followers to learn about Islam. Since the founding of Islam, Dawah networks and schools have traveled all over the world with the objective of garnering converts to Islam, places such as India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, present day Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...
, Malaysia, Indonesia
Indonesia
Indonesia , officially the Republic of Indonesia , is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 13,000 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an...
, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, Central Asia
Central Asia
Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...
, parts of Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
, the Balkans
Balkans
The Balkans is a geopolitical and cultural region of southeastern Europe...
and Eurasia
Eurasia
Eurasia is a continent or supercontinent comprising the traditional continents of Europe and Asia ; covering about 52,990,000 km2 or about 10.6% of the Earth's surface located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres...
have all successfully garnered converts through these networks and schools. Presently, many Dawah schools aim to gain more followers.
The word "dawah" literally means "invitation", as in an invitation towards a food banquet. Muslims are required to explain and elucidate their beliefs to interested parties who are then free to either accept or reject what they hear. The Prophets, according to the Koran, were commanded to say "We are only conveyors (of the message)." - i.e. whether to accept or not is down to individual choice and discretion and each person is responsible for their own actions and beliefs.
Islam distinguishes between "People of the Book
People of the Book
People of the Book is a term used to designate non-Muslim adherents to faiths which have a revealed scripture called, in Arabic, Al-Kitab . The three types of adherents to faiths that the Qur'an mentions as people of the book are the Jews, Sabians and Christians.In Islam, the Muslim scripture, the...
"—followers of the Abrahamic religions, which include the group referred to as Sabians
Sabians
The Sabians of Middle Eastern tradition were a monotheistic Abrahamic religious group mentioned three times in the Quran: "the Jews, the Sabians, and the Christians." In the Hadith they are nothing but converts to Islam, while their identity in later Islamic literature became a matter of...
—and other religious beliefs. While members of all religions are encouraged to convert, penalties and compulsions on People of the Book are less.
Between Abrahamic religions
- The wars between the emerging Islamic Caliphates and the Christian ByzantineByzantineByzantine usually refers to the Roman Empire during the Middle Ages.Byzantine may also refer to:* A citizen of the Byzantine Empire, or native Greek during the Middle Ages...
or Eastern Roman Empire between the 7th and the 11th centuries CE were a series of military, political and religious conflicts which led to the islamization of large territories in the Near EastNear EastThe Near East is a geographical term that covers different countries for geographers, archeologists, and historians, on the one hand, and for political scientists, economists, and journalists, on the other...
such as EgyptEgyptEgypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
and SyriaSyriaSyria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....
.
- The CrusadesCrusadesThe Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...
(end of 11th - end of 13th century CE) were a series of military expeditions from Western Europe to the Southern and Eastern Mediterranean: a rather unsuccessful attempt by Western (CatholicCatholicThe word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...
) Christians to conquer what was perceived by all Christians as the Holy LandHoly LandThe Holy Land is a term which in Judaism refers to the Kingdom of Israel as defined in the Tanakh. For Jews, the Land's identifiction of being Holy is defined in Judaism by its differentiation from other lands by virtue of the practice of Judaism often possible only in the Land of Israel...
from its Muslim inhabitants. In passing, Crusades were also marked with conflicts between Western and Eastern (OrthodoxEastern Orthodox ChurchThe Orthodox Church, officially called the Orthodox Catholic Church and commonly referred to as the Eastern Orthodox Church, is the second largest Christian denomination in the world, with an estimated 300 million adherents mainly in the countries of Belarus, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Georgia, Greece,...
, Syro-Jacobite and ArmenianArmeniansArmenian people or Armenians are a nation and ethnic group native to the Armenian Highland.The largest concentration is in Armenia having a nearly-homogeneous population with 97.9% or 3,145,354 being ethnic Armenian....
) Christians and unilateral damage inflicted by Western Christians to Jews.
- The conquestUmayyad conquest of HispaniaThe Umayyad conquest of Hispania is the initial Islamic Ummayad Caliphate's conquest, between 711 and 718, of the Christian Visigothic Kingdom of Hispania, centered in the Iberian Peninsula, which was known to them under the Arabic name al-Andalus....
and the following ReconquistaReconquistaThe Reconquista was a period of almost 800 years in the Middle Ages during which several Christian kingdoms succeeded in retaking the Muslim-controlled areas of the Iberian Peninsula broadly known as Al-Andalus...
of SpainSpainSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
(beginning of 8th - end of 15th century CE) were a series of wars between Muslims and Christians in the Iberian peninsulaIberian PeninsulaThe Iberian Peninsula , sometimes called Iberia, is located in the extreme southwest of Europe and includes the modern-day sovereign states of Spain, Portugal and Andorra, as well as the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar...
resulting in the founding of several Muslim and Christian Medieval states and the final victory of the Catholic Crown of CastileCrown of CastileThe Crown of Castile was a medieval and modern state in the Iberian Peninsula that formed in 1230 as a result of the third and definitive union of the crowns and parliaments of the kingdoms of Castile and León upon the accession of the then King Ferdinand III of Castile to the vacant Leonese throne...
and AragonAragonAragon is a modern autonomous community in Spain, coextensive with the medieval Kingdom of Aragon. Located in northeastern Spain, the Aragonese autonomous community comprises three provinces : Huesca, Zaragoza, and Teruel. Its capital is Zaragoza...
against the Muslim Emirate of GranadaGranadaGranada is a city and the capital of the province of Granada, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain. Granada is located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada mountains, at the confluence of three rivers, the Beiro, the Darro and the Genil. It sits at an elevation of 738 metres above sea...
.
- The OttomanOttoman EmpireThe Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
conquest of the Balkan peninsula (mid-14th - end of 15th century CE) followed by a series of wars between the Islamic Ottoman EmpireOttoman EmpireThe Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
and various Christian powers and alliances (end of 14th - beginning of 20th century CE) was an important political, military and cultural process for South-Eastern Europe resulting in the fall of the Eastern Roman (or Byzantine) Empire and its successor states and finally leading to the emerging of several modern nations in that region.
- The Spanish inquisitionSpanish InquisitionThe Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition , commonly known as the Spanish Inquisition , was a tribunal established in 1480 by Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. It was intended to maintain Catholic orthodoxy in their kingdoms, and to replace the Medieval...
was an attempt by the Christian Catholic church in Spain to suppress or expel Jews and Muslims and to prosecute Christian heretics.
Openly Jewish and Muslim people were expelled rather than killed, but many submitted to forced conversion
Forced conversion
A forced conversion is the religious conversion or acceptance of a philosophy against the will of the subject, often with the threatened consequence of earthly penalties or harm. These consequences range from job loss and social isolation to incarceration, torture or death...
to Catholicism to avoid expulsion. The Inquisitors often did not trust the converts, and persecuted them cruelly for being secret adherents of their original religions, which was often true but sometimes fabricated. Jewish forced converts were known as "anusim
Anusim
Anusim is a legal category of Jews in halakha who were forced or coerced to abandon Judaism against their will, typically while forcibly converted to another religion...
," or sometimes by the pejorative "morrano
Morrano
Morrano is a village in the municipality of Bierge, in the northwest comarca of Somontano de Barbastro in province of Huesca, Aragon, Spain. According to the 2010 census , the municipality has a population of 46 inhabitants.- Geography :...
(pig)."
- Pogroms against Jews were not uncommon in Western and Eastern Europe during Christendom's thousand year history, and were also common in many Islamic areas at various times. See blood libelBlood libelBlood libel is a false accusation or claim that religious minorities, usually Jews, murder children to use their blood in certain aspects of their religious rituals and holidays...
.
- The Christian ReformationReformation- Movements :* Protestant Reformation, an attempt by Martin Luther to reform the Roman Catholic Church that resulted in a schism, and grew into a wider movement...
of the 16th century CE was an attempt towards a religious reform in the Western (Catholic) Christian Church which resulted in a series of Religious Wars between Catholic and emerging Reformist/Protestant Christian forces during the 16th and 17th centuries CE throughout Western Europe.
- The Jewish establishment of the State of Israel in the former Muslim land of Palestine in 1948, which led to conflict and increased animosity between Jews and Muslims.
Between branches of the same Abrahamic religion
- The Fourth CrusadeFourth CrusadeThe Fourth Crusade was originally intended to conquer Muslim-controlled Jerusalem by means of an invasion through Egypt. Instead, in April 1204, the Crusaders of Western Europe invaded and conquered the Christian city of Constantinople, capital of the Eastern Roman Empire...
and subsequent wars between Catholic Europeans and the Orthodox Byzantine Greeks following the Great SchismEast–West SchismThe East–West Schism of 1054, sometimes known as the Great Schism, formally divided the State church of the Roman Empire into Eastern and Western branches, which later became known as the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church, respectively...
. - The Anglo-Spanish War (1585–1604) was due to religious conflict between Catholic and Protestant Christians, and economic causes.
- There have been many violent conflicts between the Sunni and Shi'a branches of Islam; see Shi'a–Sunni relations.
- After the 2003 invasion of Iraq2003 invasion of IraqThe 2003 invasion of Iraq , was the start of the conflict known as the Iraq War, or Operation Iraqi Freedom, in which a combined force of troops from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq and toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein in 21 days of major combat operations...
by a western coalitionCoalition of the willingThe term coalition of the willing is a post-1990 political phrase used to collectively describe participants in military or military-humanitarian interventions for which the United Nations Security Council cannot agree to mount a full UN peacekeeping operation...
there was armed conflict between branches of Islam, with fighting and bombings, even of mosqueMosqueA mosque is a place of worship for followers of Islam. The word is likely to have entered the English language through French , from Portuguese , from Spanish , and from Berber , ultimately originating in — . The Arabic word masjid literally means a place of prostration...
s.
- After the 2003 invasion of Iraq
Between Abrahamic religions and non-adherents
- The Catholic InquisitionInquisitionThe Inquisition, Inquisitio Haereticae Pravitatis , was the "fight against heretics" by several institutions within the justice-system of the Roman Catholic Church. It started in the 12th century, with the introduction of torture in the persecution of heresy...
, mentioned above, also targeted non-believers in the orthodox doctrines of Roman Catholicism and many accused of atheism (regardless of what they professed) lost their livelihoods or their lives. - The colonization of North America by the ConquistadorConquistadorConquistadors were Spanish soldiers, explorers, and adventurers who brought much of the Americas under the control of Spain in the 15th to 16th centuries, following Europe's discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus in 1492...
es was done in the name of Catholicism. - Abrahamic religions have had large numbers of their adherents persecuted in the form of loss of life, seizure of property and other forms of persecution due to CommunismCommunismCommunism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
, FascismFascismFascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
and NazismNazismNazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
.
Other Abrahamic religions
Historically, the Abrahamic religions have been considered to be Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Some of this is due to the age and larger size of these three. The other, similar religions were seen as either too new to judge as being truly in the same class, or too small to be of significance to the category.However, some of the restriction of Abrahamic to these three is due only to tradition in historical classification. Therefore, restricting the category to these three religions has come under criticism. The religions listed below here claim Abrahamic classification, either by the religions themselves, or by scholars who study them.
Bahá'í Faith
Recently the Bahá'í Faith, which dates only to the late 19th century, has sometimes been listed as Abrahamic by scholarly sources in various fields.Though smaller and younger than the well known Abrahamic religions, the Bahá'í Faith is significant because of its activities, distribution and numbers. The religion is almost entirely contained in a single, organized, hierarchical community, and is also recognized as the second-most geographically widespread religion after Christianity. The Association of Religion Data Archives
Association of religion data archives
The Association of Religion Data Archives is a free source of online information related to American and international religion. Founded as the American Religion Data Archive in 1997, and online since 1998, the archive was initially targeted at researchers interested in American religion...
estimated some 7.6 million Bahá'ís in 2005.
Bahá'u'lláh
Bahá'u'lláh
Bahá'u'lláh , born ' , was the founder of the Bahá'í Faith. He claimed to be the prophetic fulfilment of Bábism, a 19th-century outgrowth of Shí‘ism, but in a broader sense claimed to be a messenger from God referring to the fulfilment of the eschatological expectations of Islam, Christianity, and...
, the founder, affirms the highest religious station for Abraham and generally for prophets mentioned among the other Abrahamic religions, and has claimed a lineage of descent from Abraham through Keturah
Keturah
According to the Hebrew Bible, Keturah or Ketura was the woman whom Abraham, the patriarch of the Israelites, married after the death of his wife, Sarah. Keturah bore Abraham six sons, Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shuah....
and Sarah
Sarah
Sarah or Sara was the wife of Abraham and the mother of Isaac as described in the Hebrew Bible and the Quran. Her name was originally Sarai...
. Additionally Bahá'u'lláh actually did lose a son, Mírzá Mihdí
Mírzá Mihdí
Mírzá Mihdí , given the title Ghusn-i-Athar . Mírzá Mihdí was born Mihdí Núrí in Tehran, and named after a deceased brother of his father.-Biography:...
. Bahá'u'lláh, then in prison, eulogized his son and connected the subsequent easing of restrictions to his son's dying prayer and compared it to the intended sacrifice of Abraham
Abraham
Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...
’s son.
The religion also shares many of the same commonalities of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The religion emphasizes monotheism and believes in one eternal transcendent God. See God in the Bahá'í Faith. The religion accepts the premise, and is a victim, of the theme of a Prophetic tradition pattern in that it accepts the founders of the previous major Abrahamic religions as Manifestations of God come with revelation
Revelation
In religion and theology, revelation is the revealing or disclosing, through active or passive communication with a supernatural or a divine entity...
under one God and has been persecuted
Persecution of Bahá'ís
The persecution of Bahá'ís is the religious persecution of Bahá'ís in various countries, especially in Iran, where the Bahá'í Faith originated and the location of one of the largest Bahá'í populations in the world...
and rejected as a religion. Bahá'ís believe that Bahá'u'lláh is the latest, though not last, of the series of messengers of God and that this series of interventions by God in human history has been progressive, each revelation from God more complete and based on the teachings of those that preceded it, and each preparing the way for the next.
Ethnographic Abrahamic religions
Sometimes small religions are mentioned as Abrahamic — Samaritanism, YazidiYazidi
The Yazidi are members of a Kurdish religion with ancient Indo-Iranian roots. They are primarily a Kurdish-speaking people living in the Mosul region of northern Iraq, with additional communities in Transcaucasia, Armenia, Turkey, and Syria in decline since the 1990s – their members emigrating to...
, Druzes, Mandeans, and Rastafari movement
Rastafari movement
The Rastafari movement or Rasta is a new religious movement that arose in the 1930s in Jamaica, which at the time was a country with a predominantly Christian culture where 98% of the people were the black descendants of slaves. Its adherents worship Haile Selassie I, Emperor of Ethiopia , as God...
. These religions are regional: Samaritans largely in Israel and the West Bank, Yazidi among the Kurds though there has been some emigration, Druze among the Syrians and Lebanese, Mandean largely in Iraq, Rastafari mostly in Jamaica.
See also
- AbrahamitesAbrahamitesThe Abrahamites were a sect of deists in Bohemia in the 18th century, who professed to be followers of the pre-circumcised Abraham. Believing in one God, they contented themselves with the Decalogue and the Paternoster...
- Ancient Semitic religion
- Center for Muslim-Jewish EngagementCenter for Muslim-Jewish EngagementThe Center for Muslim-Jewish Engagement is a faith-based coalition whose stated mission is to "promote dialogue, understanding and grassroots, congregational and academic partnerships among the oldest and the newest of the Abrahamic faiths while generating a contemporary understanding in this...
- Christian mythologyChristian mythologyChristian mythology is the body of myths associated with Christianity. In the study of mythology, the term "myth" refers to a traditional story, often one which is regarded as sacred and which explains how the world and its inhabitants came to have their present form.Classicist G.S. Kirk defines a...
- Christian philosophyChristian philosophyChristian philosophy may refer to any development in philosophy that is characterised by coming from a Christian tradition.- Origins of Christian philosophy :...
- Christianity and Islam
- Christianity and Judaism
- Comparative religionComparative religionComparative religion is a field of religious studies that analyzes the similarities and differences of themes, myths, rituals and concepts among the world's religions...
- Deconstruction and religion
- Islam and JudaismIslam and JudaismIslamic–Jewish relations started in the 7th century CE with the origin and spread of Islam in the Arabian peninsula. The two religions share similar values, guidelines, and principles. Islam also incorporates Jewish history as a part of its own. Muslims regard the Children of Israel as an important...
- Islamic mythologyIslamic mythologyIslamic mythology is the body of traditional narratives associated with Islam from a mythographical perspective. Many Muslims believe that these narratives are historical and sacred and contain profound truths...
- Islamic philosophyIslamic philosophyIslamic philosophy is a branch of Islamic studies. It is the continuous search for Hekma in the light of Islamic view of life, universe, ethics, society, and so on...
- Jewish mythologyJewish mythologyJewish mythology is generally the sacred and traditional narratives that help explain and symbolize the Jewish religion, whereas Jewish folklore consists of the folk tales and legends that existed in the general Jewish culture. There is very little early folklore distinct from the aggadah literature...
- Jewish philosophyJewish philosophyJewish philosophy , includes all philosophy carried out by Jews, or, in relation to the religion of Judaism. Jewish philosophy, until modern Enlightenment and Emancipation, was pre-occupied with attempts to reconcile coherent new ideas into the tradition of Rabbinic Judaism; thus organizing...
- Judeo-ChristianJudeo-ChristianJudeo-Christian is a term used in the United States since the 1940s to refer to standards of ethics said to be held in common by Judaism and Christianity, for example the Ten Commandments...
- People of the BookPeople of the BookPeople of the Book is a term used to designate non-Muslim adherents to faiths which have a revealed scripture called, in Arabic, Al-Kitab . The three types of adherents to faiths that the Qur'an mentions as people of the book are the Jews, Sabians and Christians.In Islam, the Muslim scripture, the...
- Ten CommandmentsTen CommandmentsThe Ten Commandments, also known as the Decalogue , are a set of biblical principles relating to ethics and worship, which play a fundamental role in Judaism and most forms of Christianity. They include instructions to worship only God and to keep the Sabbath, and prohibitions against idolatry,...
Further reading
- Freedman H. (trans.), and Simon, Maurice (ed.), Genesis RabbaGenesis RabbaGenesis Rabba is a religious text from Judaism's classical period. It is a midrash comprising a collection of ancient rabbinical homiletical interpretations of the Book of Genesis ....
h, Land of Israel, 5th Century. Reprinted in, e.g., Midrash Rabbah: Genesis, Volume II, London: The Soncino Press, 1983. ISBN 0-900689-38-2.
- Guggenheimer, Heinrich W., Seder Olam: The rabbinic view of Biblical chronology, (trans., & ed.), Jason Aronson, Northvale NJ, 1998
- Massignon, Louis, "Les trois prières d'Abraham, père di tuos les croyants", Dieu Vivant, 13, (1949) 20-23.
- Scherman, Nosson, (ed.), Tanakh, Vol.I, The Torah, (Stone edition), Mesorah Publications, Ltd., New York, 2001
External links
- Religious Organizations of Abrahamic Faiths
- Abrahamic Faiths: A Comparison. How do Judaism, Christianity, and Islam differ?
- Why Don’t Jews Believe In Jesus?
- Reconciling the Abrahamic Faiths
- What's Next? Heaven, hell, and salvation in major world religions A side-by-side comparison.