JUDAISM, CHRISTIANITY AND ISLAM:

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JUDAISM, CHRISTIANITY AND ISLAM

• THE ABRAHAMIC RELIGIONS
• From Bernard Lewis

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JERUSALEM
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ISLAM

• Closer to Judeo-Christian tradition than to any
  of the great religions of Asia Hinduism,
  Buddhism, Confucianism

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ISLAM and JUDAISM

• Shared belief in a divine law that regulates all
  aspects of human activity.
• That includes food kosher and hillel

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Abraham

• Founder of monotheism
• Had a wife Sarah, God promised them child
• Sarah was too old to have a child so she told him
  to have a child w/ Hagar, their servant
• Abraham had two sons- Ishmael w/ Hagar and Isaac
  w/ Sarah

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Isaac and Ishmael

• God promised Abraham and his family all the land
  between the Nile and the Euphrates Rivers
• Arabs claim their ancestry to Ishmael
• Jews claim their ancestry to Isaac
• This is one of the reasons for the Arab Israeli
  conflict

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Abrahams family tree
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ISLAM and CHRISTIANITY

• Belief that they alone are the custodians of
  Gods final message to humanity
• Their duty is to bring it to the rest of the
  world.
• Shared heritage of Jewish revelation and Greek
  philosophy and science, influence of ancient
  Middle East.
• Belief in prophets, single God
• For most of their history, they have been locked
  in combat.

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DIFFERENCES

• Separation of church and state in West
• Islamic society is both a political state and a
  religious community. God is highest authority
• Mohammad died as a successful leader and
  conqueror Jesus died as an outcast and martyr
  Moses died before reaching the Promised Land.
• No priesthood in Islam.
• Koran is not a collection of books, it is a
  single book by a single author.
• No certainty of personal salvation.

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SUNNIs

• Means path of the Prophet
• Almost 90 of all Muslims
• Believed Mohammads successor should be chosen
  from within community (umma)
• Many sects and divisions.

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SHIA or Shiites

• Believed Mohammads successor should have been
  chosen from among his family.
• Earliest leaders, Hussein and Ali, were murdered
  tradition of martyrdom.
• Big in Iran, southern Iraq, Bahrain, and parts of
  Lebanon and Syria.

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SHIA Practices

• Imams, mullahs and ayatollahs
• Imam is a spiritual leader, a descendant of the
  prophet (or sharif)
• Shiites revere holy figures, allow images of
  martyrs and saints

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THE SHIITE CRESCENT