Abrahamic religions: A comparison

This is Abraham – or Ibrahim. He is one of the most important characters in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. During his alleged life time most people worshipped several gods – they were polytheists - while Abraham only believed in one - he was a monotheist. According to the sacred texts of the Jews, the Christians and the Muslims, Abraham – or Ibrahim - made a deal with his god and promised that his family from now on would follow and believe only in this single god. God answered this with a promise that Abraham would be the father - patriarch - of a great people.

Abraham fathered two sons: Ishmael and Isaac. Isaac with his wife Sarah. And Ishmael with Sara’s slave Hagar. Isaac is counted as a forefather by many believing Jews and Christians, while believing Muslims count Ishmael as their forefather. So here the two family lines of the religions split.

But since they both lead back to Abraham, Abraham - or Ibrahim - is counted as patriarch by all three religions. And this is why these religions are called Abrahamic. Sometimes the Abrahamic religions are mentioned as sibling-religions since they have the same origin and look a lot like each other. But of course there are also many differences. Judaism is the oldest of these religions, and Islam the youngest.

Muslims acknowledge Jewish prophets, and believe they conveyed the words of God. Though Islam’s most important prophet is of course Muhammad. But after Muhammad, Jesus is the most important prophet. Muslims call him: Isa. Jews though do not acknowledge Jesus as a prophet.

And Christians of course believe Jesus to be something much more than a prophet. He is the son of God as well as “the anointed one”: the Messiah. “Messiah” is a very important concept within Judaism also, though the Jews are still waiting for the Messiah to come. The Muslims are also waiting, not for a Messiah, but for Isa to return, and together with the Mahdi, battle evil at the end of the world. At the end of the world, Muslims believe that everyone is to be judged by God. If you have lived a good life, you will end up in paradise.

And if you’ve led a bad life you will go to Jahannam, a place where you are tormented eternally. This is the same place that the Christians call hell, even though everyone may not believe in it. Within Judaism though, there are no ideas about paradise, nor about hell. Jews don’t speak much about what is going on after death, or at the end of the world. But the most predominant belief is that everyone will wake up from death when the Messiah comes.

The Abrahamic religions all have different types of building to perform their religious services in, and different days of the week for these services. The Muslims’ house of service is called a mosque, and the most important time to gather for prayer here is on Fridays. The Jews’ house of service is called a synagogue, and here Sabbath is celebrated every Saturday. The Christians have churches for gatherings, especially on Sundays. All Muslims turn towards Mecca when they pray, because Mecca was the place of birth for Muhammad.

In the most inner part of a mosque there is a recess or a niche in the wall that shows the direction of Mecca. Synagogues face towards Jerusalem. And since the Christian churches were at first modelled on synagogues, most churches are facing Jerusalem or toward the east. So the three Abrahamic religions are similar to each other in many ways, and at the same time are very different. Just like siblings.

And sometimes they have disagreements, just like siblings.