Comparison Of Major Religious Traditions: Christianity And Islam

Greek Philosophy in relation to Christianity and Islam

Religious tradition is the structure of symbols that acts to create powerful motivations within human beings through the formulation of conceptions that are for general order of the existence plus clothing (Kadar, Scott, Hipp, Belavich, Butfer, Rye, Zinnbauer, 2015). The conceptions are of factuality in such a way that the moods plus the motivations seem to uniquely realistic. Religion is also categorized as something that anthropological in nature. Most of the religions have the narratives, traditions and the sacred histories which tend to give the meaning of life. They also tend to spring religious laws and morality from their own ideas towards the human nature (Steadman, Palmer, 2015). It is estimated that there are around 4,200 religions within the whole world. There are four main religious traditions within the world. The traditions are; Islam, Judaism, Christianity and Buddhism. Religion has different appeals (Johnstone, 2015). For instance it uses revelation instead of the reason as the source for evidence. It also focuses on sacred distinction that is worldly in nature. Religion also appeals to the emotional feelings. This is achieved through the reenactment of ritual. Another point is that, it is seen to be more of community emphasize rather than the individual thought. Therefore an exploration will be done showing the two major religious traditions within the world and their unique features and how they are different from each other in relation to the philosophical tradition for the Greeks.

Since the time when religion started, Abrahamic faith and the Greek philosophy have always closely intertwined. This is very true even if we refer back to the Greek philosophy, Christianity or Islam. Therefore, the Greek philosophy gives proceeds that are lengthy towards religion. The purpose of the proceedings is to claim how religion and faith cannot be separated. Therefore, the Greek philosophies came up with different teachings and beliefs that are used in both Islam and Christian religion today.

Christianity bases its teachings on Jesus Christ of Nazareth. This is the most dominant religion the world. The religion strongly believes that Jesus is the real Son of God. They also believe he is a savior for humanity whose revelation was on the Messianic coming. This believe is seen in the version of Old Testament Bible (Sanneh, 2015). Christianity started as the Judaic sect through the apostles of Jesus Christ. The apostles spread all over the world as commissioned by the Holy Spirit so as to spread the gospel (Johnson, P. 2012). Christianity holds different beliefs and revelations towards the Bible. This is why within Christianity we have different sub-religions. The sub-religions consists of Orthodox, Catholics and the Protestants. Christians have a strong belief in God as the father. They also belief in the Holy Spirit. The Christians also have a strong believe that there is life after death. This is because Jesus died and resurrected within three days. Therefore, they strongly believe that after the return of Jesus Christ, everybody will resurrect from the death. They also believe in Church plus communion of the saints. They also see the second coming of Jesus Christ will be the day of Judgement. The Bible is their center of guidance. After the death of Jesus Christ, Apostle Paul developed the scriptures known as New Testament. This was accepted by a Roman Empire. It incorporated the Jewish elements with the elements of ritual celebration for the death of Jesus Christ. Therefore, Christians mostly refer everything to these teachings. These leads to having different characteristics of other religion as its going to be explained below.

Christian Religion

Islam is the other religion which is very unique in nature. The religion was started by the Arab merchant who was called Muhammad. Muhammed had the belief that he was the fulfilment of the tradition that ranged from that of Abraham through that of Moses and finally that of Jesus Christ. He believed that he represented the relationship that is between the community and the main God, Allah (Aslan, 2011). The teachings of Islam are recorded in a special document known as the Qur’an. The religion is widely spread in Middle East, Europe and Africa. The word Islam has the meaning of “surrender, submission, commitment and peace.” Therefore, the Muslims believe that through their religion, one can be able to attain the complete peace that will occur through the voluntary submission towards the divine will. The Muslims have six main beliefs. They have a strong believe in Allah. They believe that Allah gives life. They also believe in the Angels. They see the Angels as the helpers of Allah. The Muslims belief in holy books. These holy books were sent to the prophets. This included Torah which is believed to be for Prophet Moses. They have a strong believe that Torah was sent and revealed to them through Moses. According to them, the Bible was revealed through Prophet Jesus. On the other hand, they believe that the Koran was revealed to them by Prophet Muhammad. The other main belief is that there is existence of judgement day. They also say that there is life after death as the Christians also belief. Doing of good deeds makes them come closer to their God. The Muslims also believe in Noah, Jesus, Abraham, Moses, Ishmael, Isaac Muhammed and Jacob. However, despite them having a belief in Jesus, they don’t believe that Jesus is the Son of God above. They also have a belief in the divine decree whereby they see God as the powerful being hence nothing can happen without Him knowing. Despite him being powerful, he has given freedom to all human beings because at the end everybody will be charged according to his or her deeds on earth. The Muslims have five pillars of life which guide them. This is different from Christians because for them they lack those pillars. The first pillar is that of declaration for faith. This helps to bear the witness that truly there is only one God, Allah. The second pillar is that of ritual prayer. The prayers are usually offered while facing Mecca. They are done in Arabic language. The third pillar is that of alms tax. The pillar specifies that 2.5% of the wealth for everyone should be channeled to the poor plus the needy. The fourth one is that of fasting. This is done within the ninth month of Islamic lunar calendar. The period is known as Ramadhan. This period is for one to know his or her goodness and helping of the poor. This time also is dedicated for self-discipline. The last pillar is that of pilgrimage. This is done through making the pilgrimage for Mecca once in life. Mecca is the sacred place for the Muslims (Black, 2011). 

In order to justify how religion came up and spread into the whole world, some questions came up. The questions are as follows;

1. Who began the teachings of dynamic leader? This was done by Moses who came up with Judaism, Siddartha who came up with Buddhism, Jesus who came up with Christianity and Muhammad who came up with Islam as discussed above in length.
2. Which religion includes a single personal deity? This is Christianity, Islam and Judaism. Buddhism does not include the personal deity due to the personal terms.
3. Which religion has strict dietary laws? This is Judaism and Islam due to the presence of limiting factors towards food.
4. Which religion emphasizes on the non-attachment which is of sensual desire. This is Buddhism because of them having crucial escape towards suffering.
5. Which religion came up before Common Era? This is Judaism and Buddhism because both of them started 1300 BCE and 500 BCE respectively.
6. Which religion encourages prayer and meditation? This is both the four religions. They emphasize strongly on the prayers to God and Jesus Christ.
7. Which religion prohibits the usage of images and representations? Both four religions do not allow that because this is a sign of worshipping idols.
8. Which religion traces back to Abraham? Judaism, Islam and Christianity are all traced back to Abraham.
9. Which religion finds the expression in collection of the sacred texts? Despite all the religion beginning with the oral traditions, they eventually came up with the scriptures that could guide them on their day to day activities.
10. Which religion puts more emphasize on resurrection after dieng? Christianity and Islam emphasize on this because Jesus died and resurrected at the end.

Conclusion

It is clear that there is a difference between Christianity and Islamic religion. The religions also have things which are similar. One of the common characteristic is that they worship one God. Through religion, one is able to live a religious life and dedicate his or her life to God. Therefore, religion has played a great role towards sharpening the lives of human beings (Koopmans, 2015).

References

Aslan, R. (2011). No god but God: The origins, evolution, and future of Islam. Random House.

Black, A. (2011). History of Islamic Political Thought: From the Prophet to the Present: From the Prophet to the Present. Edinburgh University Press.

Kadar, J. L., Scott, A. B., Hipp, K., Belavich, T. G., Butfer, E. M., Rye, M. S., … & Zinnbauer, B. J. (2015). Religion and spirituality: Unfuzzying the fuzzy. In Sociology of Religion (pp. 29-34). Routledge.

Johnstone, R. L. (2015). Religion in society: A sociology of religion. Routledge.

Johnson, P. (2012). History of Christianity. Simon and Schuster.

Koopmans, R. (2015). Religious fundamentalism and hostility against out-groups: A comparison of Muslims and Christians in Western Europe. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 41(1), 33-57.

Steadman, L. B., & Palmer, C. T. (2015). Supernatural and natural selection: religion and evolutionary success. Routledge.

Sanneh, L. (2015). West African christianity: the religious impact. Orbis Books.