I have been thinking a lot about religion lately. Writing while traveling by bus and before I go to bed has resulted in what’s written here. Enjoy and comment.
Powerful is the one with knowledge
Ferdousi (940-1040)
There is only one God- That’s one thing the three religions agree upon. It’s the same God Christians, Muslims ad Jews believe in and turn to in their prayers. All consider him to be the creator, who always has existed. God created all but no one created God. God elicited the world, life and man.
No one knows where God came from. God is greater then human sense and therefore one can’t answer those kinds of questions. Muslims says Allah-u-Akbar. It means God is greater and means just that. Some important qualities God possesses are that he’s good, helpful, loving and forgiving. This can all be concluded with the adjectives merciful and compassionate. Compassion is Gods foremost quality.
God can also be called wise and almighty. He did create the world and inserted human as his co-worker on earth. God’s wisdom can be seen in creation. It has been done so that we all can live in symbiosis and work depending on each other. That’s a sign of a creator who gave us life. Life is not perfect but if we use the recourses the right way the earth can be useful for us all.
What is Gods name, or what should we call him? It’s not an easy question. Christians says God if they speak English and something else in other languages. Arabic speaking Christians says Allah, meaning The God. Many Muslims says Allah even in English because it’s meaning of The God and not just any God. Jews don’t call him God like Muslims and Christians does to show that he’s over all humanity.
Man and Evil
Evil on earth came because of man. Here one can find great differences between the three religions. The Bible tells us about Paradise where they could eat all but from the tree of knowledge (It probably has a proper name but I read about this in Swedish...) Man broke the trust. A snake enticed woman to eat its fruit and then offer it to her man. The punishment was that they had to leave Paradise and were bound to work hard, suffer and then die. The bible also tells us about Cain who got envious and killed his brother Abel. One can find similar stories in the Quran about human insubordination, God forgives them but still they have to leave life in Paradise. Jews interpret this as human can be tempted to do evil even if they’re originally good. Christians however argue that human is evil by nature. They can call insubordination in Paradise for a case of sin, which means that human after that is sinful forever after, also called the original sin. Muslims consider human not to be evil because of the fact that man and woman realized right after that they had done wrong and apologized directly and therefore they’re not evil. Sinning and original sin is not accepted by Muslims or Jews.
Christians has a darker view on human then the other two mentioned religions. This has great significance on their view on many questions. The most obvious differences between the religions are found in what I now will discuss;
The Jews regard that God entered an agreement with the people of Israel to make his will known on earth. Israel has been called Gods Pilot Project. God gave Moshe the law in Sinai Mountain and wanted Israel to be his mouthpiece on earth. They should proclaim to all that there is only one God who gave us life. The Jews has always waited for God to send a helper to create peace and justice.
Christians regard that the evil has been defeated trough Jesus, who according to Christianity was the Messiah whom the Jews were waiting for. The Christians call Jesus for Christos which means Messiahs. They say that God is three, The father, The son and the wholly spirit. The son has become human; Jesus Christos. He dies because of the human sin but defeated death by his reincarnation. Its trough him man can be freed from evil powers.
Muslims regards that God wanted to save man from evil trough prophets, who will show us the way to a life based on the will of God. Prophets has regarding Islam existed in all times. Jesus is seen as a great prophet. The last Prophet is Mohammed. The revelations he heard from Angel Gabriel are all collected in the Quran. The life of Mohammed can also give us guidance but he’s not a savior but a man who can help us to a better life by his revelations and example.
Before I go to sleep I just want to mention one last thing that is often forgotten when talking about religion. Oppression. In the western world we have a nasty habit to accuse Islam as a religion oppressing women I’ll just show you some quotes from Moses book (I hope you’ll understand me even if I don’t use the right terminology) For example If the woman can’t prove that she was a virgin before her wedding by showing blood on the sheet”the woman should be taken out from her fathers house, and outside the door the men of the village shall stone her until dead” 5 Mos 22:21. In the Jewish bible woman is described as something ”more acrimonious then death” Pred 7:27.
Christian’s reed the new testament to understand the old one. What’s written in the New Testament could have been re-written to modernize the view of women expressed in the Old Testament. But also in the New Testament one can find pieces directly offending women. Apostle Paulus consider it to be shameful for a woman to be shown without covering her head. Men don’t need to cover their heads because they’re”represents Gods luster. But woman is a depictured man.” 1 Kor 11:5-7.
There’s not a huge difference between the religions three different holly texts considering the way of living, equality and respect for dissidence. They all reflect an old and extremely patriarch society.
I think I have to say stop for tonight. I hope you enjoyed. I’ll end this with a quote I heard the other day.
”Imagine, we borrowed the word Alcohol from the Muslims, but they didn’t want it back”
