Christianity Judaism and Islam

Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

Conservative or Progressive

Liberal left or Facist right

Religion, Culture, Ethnicity.

When secular humanism rejected religion it cannibalised it for concepts on which to base a broad moral consensus. Wishing to be free of meaningless rituals and degrading superstitions while acknowledging the need for key restrictions on the freedoms of the individual and the community. This was an experiment that sadly failed because, with no higher authority than his fellow man, humans show even less respect for each other's well-being than they do under the threat of divine discipline, sad.

So the concept of religion has persisted into the "modern" world much to the irritation of progressive thinkers. Who, contemplating the rags and tatters of the failed doctrine of political correctness, struggle to rebrand in the shadow of a populist resurgence. But religion has persisted, not as protection for humanity but as protection for entrenched communities, exploitative institutions and the polarisation of cultures. Adapting to a changing reality by digging deeper into its iniquity. Also sad.

Christianity and Islam are both religions with significant identity problems. A close study of the Bible leads me to the belief that, in the case of Christianity this is because of a divergence from its origins. With the introduction of a polytheistic concept "the Holy Trinity" around the 3c ad, and a host of other concessions and inclusions to and from paganism the enhanced Judaic Monotheism that was the original Christianity disappeared in a cloud of mystical ritual and degrading superstition (ring any bells ?).

Ironically, in the long-term at least, this may have helped Judeo-Christian relations because Christianity strayed so far from its parent faith that it no longer constituted a threat to its identity. Christ set parameters for a community founded on commitment to two simple principles, love of God and love of neighbour, to exist within secular society but distinct from it. This was a progression from the prescriptive Theocracy of Judaism and was outlined in the Hebrew prophets. So Jesus established a concept for worship that expanded on what his audience already understood. The trinity pretty much undoes what Christ was trying to do. 

Also, around the same period, Emperor Constantine chose to make Christianity the state religion of the Roman Empire, blowing forever Jesus injunction that his followers were to be no part of "the world" that is, the secular, temporal and political establishment. As a set of ideas Christianity was not designed to function politically and, I suspect you might agree, the efforts of "Christianity" to control and influence policy in modern democracies has been worse than problematic, and in its current manifestation utterly self-defeating. 

All that said , the sensibilities that are making the west vulnerable to hostile elements of what is ironically, a younger faith-identified culture are rooted in the enlightened tenets of original Christianity, compassion equality love of neighbour etc etc.. 

The crisis of identity in Islam is different.The narrative of the Koran runs the reader into a maze of contradictory, contextually unsupported digressions. To be honest I stopped reading the Koran after Sura 1 because the narrative structure suggested an inceptive manipulation and tho I was curious as to what the idea was I cannot stomach that kind of writing, probably inspired just not by a source with good intentions. I did eventually discover the principle idea that the Koran was designed to carry and if you compare the Genesis account of events in Eden with the account in Sura 7 of the Koran you can find it to..

The Koran claims to be the "seal" or the closing chapter of the divinely inspired writings comprising the Hebrew Scriptures and the Christian gospel. And yet the Christian concept of reducing law to two central principles that individuals would subscribe to voluntarily (the law written on hearts) was, 8 centuries later, regressed back to a prescriptive, highly ritualistic patriarchy?!. Was Mohammed able to pull this off because of "Christianity's " disastrous digression into pagan polytheism with the adoption of the trinity? It probably helped, but in this case the regression was destined to produce no better outcome than the digression, hence the grotesque, civilisation jeopardising conflict which even the best efforts of enlightened liberalism have not been able to contain or reduce.