Faith matters: 7 things Christians, Jews and Muslims share

When it comes to discussing the world’s major religions, the focus is often on division. For our upcoming episode #forchristssake, we take a look at what the three monotheistic religions have in common.

Deutsche Welle, 15 Dec 2014

Jesus Christ is not just an important figure in Christianity. As a prophet, he also features in the Muslim faith - not to mention that he was Jewish. Here are seven lesser known facts about what unites the three major religions.

1. Abraham: the founding father

Painting of the moment when God promises Abraham many descendants.

Abraham is another important figure uniting the three religions. That’s why Christianity, Judaism and Islam are referred to as the Abrahamic religions. Abraham belongs to the Aramaic people and is believed to be the Patriarch of the Jewish people.

According to the Bible, he and his son are said to be the founding fathers of the Arabic people. But wait, there’s more. The Quran also explains (Quran 2:135) that Islam was not a new religion, but rather to be seen as a continuance of Abraham’s original religion.

2. Jerusalem: common holy city

View over Jerusalem's historic city center: the Western Wall (front) and
the golden cupola of The Dome of the Rock.

The historic center of Jerusalem is home to members of all three religions. The Dome of the Rock is holy for Muslims, who worship it as the place from where Muhammad ascended into heaven to receive revelations from God. Jerusalem is also considered the spiritual and ancestral homeland of the Jews. Christians worship Jerusalem as the place where Jesus was buried and resurrected. Among the most important places of Christian worship there is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

3. Scriptures

Old Lutheran Bible

The scriptures belonging to the three Abrahamic religions have similarities too. The Jewish holy book consists of the Tanakh and the Talmud. Christians adopted the Tanakh for their Bible, but call it Old Testament.

The Quran also tells the story of Jesus’ crucifixion. Muslims believe it represents a spiritual, rather than actual event and that God intervened to save Jesus in what would otherwise have been his final moments (Quran, 4:157).

4. Sing-song

Gospel choir in London

In the past, when churches were teeming with worshippers, a speaking voice alone couldn’t reach those seated in the back pew. The choral tradition of chanting and singing has its roots in the attempt to repair this acoustic deficit. Whether it’s church Gospel music, the chanting tradition in synagogues or the characteristic Muslim call to prayer, all these vocal traditions can be traced back to this primary need to get the message across.

5. Pilgrimage

Muslim people praying at the Mount Arafat near Mecca in October 2014.

Mecca is the famous destination for Muslim pilgrims while Jews journey to Jerusalem and Roman Catholics to Santiago de Compostela, for example.

6. The unspoken name

"Allah" in Arabic lettering in the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque.

In all three religions, there are both common and specific names for “God”. Muslims use the Arabic word “Allah” to refer generally to God, as do Arabic-speaking Christians. But Muslims also use the term to speak specifically about their god. There is also a list with another 99 proper names, each describing one aspect of his nature. A 100th name is also said to exist, but is unspeakable. A popular belief is that Jesus, the Messias (Mehdi), will come and reveal it to the people. Similarly, Christians and Jews also have a specific name for their god - Elohim or Yahweh. However, “ the divine name was increasingly regarded as too sacred to be uttered” and was therefore replaced by referring to him, not with a particular name, but using the general terms “Lord” or “God”.

7. Need for space

In an increasingly secularized world, it can be hard for a religious person on the move to find a place to worship. But many public places, like airports, universities and hospitals now offer dedicated interreligious prayer rooms. These are rooms that were jointly created by people of a number of different faiths and where any believer can enjoy a moment of personal reflection. These spaces are neutral in design and tend to avoid displaying symbols of any kind. There is one exception though: the internationally recognized, and pretty uncontroversial, emergency exit signs which hang on the wall.

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"The End of History" – Nov 20, 2010 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Abraham, Isaac, Ishmael, Muhammad, Jesus, God, Jews, Arabs, EU, US, Israel, Iran, Russia, Africa, South America, Global Unity,..... etc.) (Text version)

" ..... Abraham, Father of the Jews

I want to honor Abraham [Abram], born in Ur, which is now part of modern Iraq, and I want to honor his sons, not all born of Sara. The one I wish to speak of is Ishmael. Abraham is Jewish... the great Jewish prophet. Ishmael is his son. There's no way that you could say Ishmael was not Jewish, and he is even to this day. Ishmael was born in Hebron. So in addition, he is very Israeli. Ishmael is a Jew.

Now some would argue, due to how the Jewish lineage is computed by men [mother's side]. But Spirit looks at the DNA and the Akashic lineage, so spiritually, Ishmael is a Jew. He came in to be part of the lineage of the Jews.

He fell from favor even with the Jewish people early on for political reasons. Then Ishmael went on to become that which is the ancestor of all Arabs... the father of Arabia. Therefore, you could say that the Arabs are with Jewish blood, that of Abraham flowing through them. But early on, the Jews cast Ishmael out. So although you have the one God and monotheism, and you have the principle of the love of God and the unity of God, there was a split. The truth was mixed with untruths and, even to this day, there would be a billion Human Beings who would say it was Ishmael and not Isaac who was almost sacrificed at the Temple Mount. They would also say that he is not a Jew.

So what is the truth here? Human Beings were not built to unify. In an older energy on the planet from those days, and even the days that you were born in, the energy laid upon you is for you to separate, not unify. And that is why we call it the old energy. Oh, they were wise men and women who knew better, but it is the old energy that separates and divides, and it is the old energy that has created the divisions of hatred within millions of those who are actually "all Jews."

Muhammad's Beautiful Message of Unity

Let me tell you about Muhammad, the prophet. Muhammad is of the lineage of Ishmael, who is of the lineage of Abraham. Therefore, Muhammad had Jewish blood, so that was his lineage but not necessarily his culture. But his Akashic lineage was from Abraham. [Abraham is the founder of Islam, according to the Quran.]

Muhammad had a beautiful meeting, more than one, with an angelic presence. The angels talked to humanity back then in basic 3D ways. But how many of you have put together that most of the angels in that time who spoke to Human Beings talked to those of Jewish lineage? Like Muhammad, like Moses, like Jesus, like Abraham. For this was part of a set-up of history, part of what makes the Jewish lineage important to the core Akash of humanity, and we have spoken before, "As go the Jews, go Earth." Indeed, there is something there to look at which is important, and it is going to change soon. For in our eyes, the "Jews" are all those in the Middle East.

Muhammad's information from the angel was this: "Unify the Arabs and give them the God of Israel." And he did! The information he had was beautiful and was written down later for his followers. It was all about the incredible love of God and the unity of man. Muhammad the prophet was a unifier, not a separatist.

Long before Muhammad, there came Jesus - Jesus the Jew. He became responsible for what you would call Christianity today. All of his disciples were Jewish. The Rock, Peter the fisherman, who started the Christian church, was Jewish. And we tell you these things to remind you that there's a unity here. Perhaps there is a reason, dear ones, why the 12 layers of DNA have Hebrew names? Indeed, it's in honor of the masters and the lineage, including that of Muhammad, of Ishmael, of Isaac, of Abraham and of Jesus. All of them, part of the original spiritual language [Hebrew].

"Oh," you might say, "there was Sumerian and before that there was Lemurian. There was Sanskrit and Tamil, and many other older languages." Correct, but we're speaking of a language of today - one that you can relate to, that has power, and that is spoken today by the pure lineage of the masters who walked the planet.

So what did humanity do with all this? What did they do with all this sacred information from these Jewish masters? They went to war, because Humans separate things. They don't put them together. So here we are with one beautiful God, creator of all there is, and millions who believe that very thing, yet they are going to war with each other over ideology about what God said, which prophet was best, and which group is in God's favor. That's ancient history, thousands of years old. But it shows exactly what the old energy is all about. ..."