Focus on Jewish-Christian-Muslim Commonalities

Today the press and the internet emblazon the differences among Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Sadly, however, such an initial focus on differences produces a gross distortion. At times, even scholars who should know better embark on this wrong-headed path that leads to an Alice-in-Wonderland view of these three intimately related and deeply similar religions. There is vastly more that these three monotheist religions have in common than distinguishes them. In this brief reflection I will leave the differences—important and not-so-important—among them to the popular press and Internet and lift up just a few of the fundamental similarities, including: Abraham, Ethical Monotheism, Historical Religions, Revelation, Prophets, Messiah, and Mother Maria.

Commonality 1: Abraham, the Source of All Three Religions

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all claim Abraham as their spiritual “father.” We learn the following about Abraham from the Bible, according to which in about 1750 b.c.e. he came from the city of Ur in the world’s oldest civilization, Sumer (present-day Iraq), and settled in Hebron (present-day Israel). Because at first his wife Sarah did not bear any children, according to the custom of the time Abraham had a son, Ismail, by her handmaid Hagar. Soon thereafter, however, Sarah also bore a son, Isaac.

Subsequently, Isaac had a son Jacob (also called Israel), who in turn had twelve sons, who fathered what became the Twelve Tribes of Israel. After a centuries-long sojourn in Egypt, where the Tribes of Israel eventually sank into slavery, only to be led to freedom by Moses (known as the “Exodus,” the “going out”), they settled back where they had come from, in “the promised land,” present-day Israel. It was there in the homeland of Abraham where Jesus (Yeshua in Hebrew), a Jew (the name “Jew” comes from the name “Judah,” one of the sons of Israel), the “founder” of Christianity, was born. Further, according to the Muslim tradition, Abraham and his son Ismail built the Kaaba in present-day Mecca as a shrine to the one true God.

Although there are disputes among scholars about the historical basis of all these details, it is obvious that Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all look back to Abraham as their historical source. Remembering the old saying that “blood is thicker than water,” claiming the same “father” necessarily draws these three descendent religions closer together.

Commonality 2: Ethical Monotheism

The Abrahamic religions are all monotheist religions. The term comes from the Greek monos, one, theos, god, and is most often distinguished from polytheism (Greek poly, many). There is a debate among scholars about whether humans started out being polytheists and only slowly over many centuries developed into monotheists (the majority opinion), or they started out as monotheists, sank back into polytheism, and only later returned to monotheism (the minority opinion). Nevertheless, it is clear that all the earliest ancient civilizations (remember, as the word tells us—Latin civis means city—“civilization” means “cityzation”), which started before 3000 b.c.e., were polytheist. We are so used to the concept of monotheism today, however, that we do not realize what an extraordinary breakthrough this insight was in the history of humankind. It had massive immediate implications for how one related to all other human beings and all reality.

For example, if in ancient times I lived in a nation that had its own gods (and they all did), and all other nations also had their own gods, then the ethical rules that were developed by my god’s religion would not necessarily apply to persons and things living under other gods. There did not exist a single ethics, or rules of behavior, that was valid for all human beings and for all the earth—until it was claimed by the Hebrews that there was in fact one creator God, Yahweh, of all human beings and of all reality. For the Hebrews there was, then, both one God of all, and hence one ethics for all. Here is one of the great contributions of the Hebrew people to humanity—ethical monotheism, which in turn was...