The Coming of the Kingdom of God

The Coming of the Kingdom of God

The three major religions of the world are Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Each religion has its own specific characteristics separating them from one another. They also have many similarities and differences in their beliefs and history.

With all three religions being similar, one key point is they all believe in monotheism, this is the belief in only one God. Christians and Jews call to God and Muslims call to Allah, which is the same figure, just a different name. "Like Christians, Muslims believe that human beings possess immortal souls and that they can live eternally in heaven if they surrender to Allah and accept him as the one and only God" (Sayre 339). Each religion also has a place to worship; churches for Christians, mosques for Muslims and synagogues for Jews. This leads to the fact that they all have a book of faith. Christianity has the bible, Judaism has the Torah, and Islam has the Qur'an.

Respectively, the three religions have differences as well. Christians and Jews attend their place of worship only on Sunday, where as Islam are required to attend on Friday. Location wise, Christians are found worldwide, Jews mainly in Israel and the USA, and concentrated on the Middle East is Islam. Naturally, all were originally founded in the Middle East. Although each religion believed in the world ending in an apocalypse, "the coming of God on the Day of Judgment, and that the post-apocalyptic world would be led by a Messiah, or Anointed One, in everlasting peace" (Sayre 281), each had a different perspective. Those of the Islam faith believe that Muhammad was the messenger of Allah, claiming that the Angel Gabriel sent messages to him from God. From there, he memorized and documented the recitations onto scribes, creating the Qur'an. Christianity and Judaism believe that the bible was written by multiple people and that Jesus was their Messiah. They were expecting a savior with qualities of a priest, king, and prophet; Jesus had all of these qualities.

Leading more into the history of Christianity, the assumption that Jesus was the son of God was a major threat to the Jewish and Roman leaders. Since the emperor was supposed to be the only divine human on earth, this was also considered a crime to the Romans. Jesus was later crucified and buried in a tomb. Said by his followers, three days later he resurrected from the tomb, giving people the "promise of resurrection." This now became the foundation of the Christian faith and his crucifixion was believed by an evangelist Paul, to be his salvation of humankind, suffering for the sins of humanity. Paul also believed that redemption was not promised and that sinners had to show their faith in Christ to receive salvation (Sayre 283).

Pedaling back a bit, Christianity was developed as a minor sect of Judaism. "A sect is a small, organized group that separates itself from the larger religious movement because it asserts that it alone understands God's will and therefore it alone embodies the ideals of the religion." Having strong social boundaries between its members and all others, members of a sect view themselves as good and all others as evil (Sayre 281). Christianity can only be understood in respect to Judaism which was created in respect to the principles in the Torah. The Torah is also known as the Hebrew Scriptures, which is part of the Old Testament in the Bible.

As described in the text, Islam spread with a rapidity that was almost unimaginable, from Persia to Jerusalem to Egypt, and by 710, all of North Africa and Spain. Islam was appealing both as a religion and as a form of social organization, contributing to its success. Islam ascended over Judaism and Christianity, but they were not ignored or denied. Islam was open to accepting new comers, as so did Christianity, which was not accepted within Judaism. The Islam mosques had a "sense of community," bringing people together, which later became learning centers also studying the Qur'an,