Trinity of Beliefs

We study different religious faiths in order to understand other people. Many people have strong religious convictions, and it would be impossible to understand them without first understanding their faith. Which is why when studying the early Western World the religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, which are all closely related, are examined. All three of these religions are Western, they are monotheistic, and together they form the Abramic religions. Judaism is the oldest, dating from around 2000 BC and the most ancient religion still practiced in today's society; Christianity originates from shortly after the death of Jesus Christ; Islam is the youngest, emerging in the seventh century AD. It would appear, then, that Christianity and Islam are descended from Judaism, as different interpretations of the same beliefs. A possible hypothesis is that Christianity and Islam are adaptations of the old monotheistic religion in accordance with the political and social climates of the times in which they emerged.

All three religions share the same ancient history. The importance of Adam, Abraham, Moses and David and many others detailed in the Old Testament, is agreed on by all three religions; however, their view of Jesus' place in the scheme of things is the first major disagreement. The Christians believe him to be the Messiah, which the Jews had waited for for so long, while the Jews and Muslims believe him to be a great prophet and find the claim that he is the Son of God to be blasphemous. This difference of opinion was the chief reason for the bloody break up of the relationship between the Jews and the Christians.

At their first emergence the Christians were considered a sect of the Jewish faith by both themselves and other Jews. However, the relationship between the different sects and the rest of the Jewish community became increasingly problematic as Jesus' teachings were considered blasphemous by the Romans. Jesus' all embracing theories and disregard for Jewish law made his movement all the more loathsome to the Jews. This is the primary reason for the stormy relationship between the two religions that were once one; the second reason is due to the manner in which the sect broke away and become a religion in it's own right.

This breakaway began with the increasing rejection of Jewish law, for example, of the dietary customs, and when an Emperor demanded that the Jews give up all their practices, the Christians did so immediately, but the rest of the Jewish population rose in rebellion. When the Jewish Temple was sacked and leveled in response to the rebellion, the Jewish "traitors", the Christians who had not fought for their religion caused further animosity to form. From this point forth, the relationship between Judaism and Christianity has been disjointed.

Historically, then, it can be seen that Judaism and Christianity are very closely related. They share the same roots and some of the same religious texts, and for several decades they were the same religion. However, when political pressures demanded that the religion changed or faced the consequences, the Christian sect broke away, distancing themselves from the Jewish faith.

By the time Islam emerged as the third religion of Abraham, a large Jewish population as well as a large Christian population was deeply rooted in Islam, thanks to the Roman Empire there. Roman rule in this area had recently collapsed and the nation no longer observed their state religion, therefore the land was split between Judaism, Christianity and a form of paganism. There had been wars between the Jews and Christians for years but it was quickly shadowed by the birth of Mohammed, the founder of the Islamic faith. He traveled extensively when he was young and had a lot of contact with both Jews and Christians. The fact that he did have this contact appears to have had a profound effect on Mohammed because the Islamic faith is very close in many ways to both Christianity and Judaism. There are two possible reasons why chose to begin his own religion rather than to convert to one of the others. The Islamic reason is that Allah spoke to Mohammed through an angel, appointing him the last prophet and relating to him the scriptures of the Koran and the laws by which Muslims should live. The other, however extremely controversial reason is that Mohammed had seen the way in which religious leaders were treated, for example the Pope, and wished for such power himself as the ambassador of God. He believed he was to become the divinely appointed dictator of his community. He may also have seen this as a way of uniting the people of his homeland because Islamic faith recognizes no separation between the church and the state, therefore the country would have had a national religion. "The contention that Islam was, in its genesis, a 'national' religion of the Arabs, provided a sheet-anchor for their solidarity and expansion"