Interfaith Dialogue: Ethical Commonalties in Judaism, Christianity and Islam

Abstract

Judaism, Christianity and Islam are three major world religions and are known to be the religions which were given by God to the world through His Prophets. The followers of these three religions are also known as the people of The Book (Ahl-e-Kitab).

The Creator, who is called Jehovah by Jews, God by Christians and Allah by Muslims, has a purpose while revealing these religions to the mankind.  The major objective is to make human beings better humans and improve their morality so that they may live in peace and harmony and refrain from harming one another.  

There are many commonalities among these three religions i.e. Judaism, Christianity and Islam.  All the three religions were given to the world through prophets who were born in Middle East i.e. Palestine and Arabian Peninsula. Prophet Moses A. S. Prophet Jesus Christ and Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) all three came from the family of Abraham A. S.  All three Prophets are revered by people of all three religions. 

Most Prophets mentioned in Torah (the holy book of Jews), The Holy Bible are also mentioned in the Holy Qur’an.  That is why the Muslims say that their faith as Muslims is incomplete unless they have faith and reverence for all they prophets of Jews and Christians. There are many commonalities in the Teachings of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.  Especially the Judaism and Islam are very similar and close to each other. The concepts of good and evil and sin and virtue are also almost the same in all these three religions.  The only major difference among these three religions is that Christianity forbids from taking revenge whereas the Judaism and Islam teach their followers that it is better to forgive but if you cannot forgive then take a revenge which should be equal to the harm done to you by the opponent.

The major sins are also common among the three religions which are being studied in this dissertation.