A History of God in the Abrahamic Religions

Question:

Points to Ponder 4.1: A History of God

In A History of God: The 4000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Karen Armstrong traced the flow of ideas about God in the Abrahamic traditions. She drew upon Jewish, Christian, and Muslim scriptures, as well as the writings of philosophers and mystics from each of these Prophetic traditions. A retrospective view of the history of an idea such as “God” reveals shifts in attitudes, beliefs, and practices over centuries’ time. We must remember, however, that hindsight allows for both insights and distortions.

• List some ways in which reality becomes distorted through a historical glance back at events in hindsight. Explain.
• List some benefits of looking back to analyze historical events through hindsight. Explain.

Some of factors that have influenced the way the divine is understood and worshipped include: climate change, economic pressures, exposure to different cultures, and the presence of charismatic religious figures.

• Name three factors that you would expect to influence the notion of God through the ages. Explain your choices, and give specific examples. Then, keep your eyes open for some of these as you study module 4.

1. The Abrahamic Family Relationship
2. Mesopotamian Gods and the Flood

In 1848 C.E., a British historian and archeologist named Austen Henry Layard (1817–1894 C.E.) found 12 clay tablets in the library of the Assyrian King Ashurbanipal (r. 668–627 B.C.E.) in Nineveh, an ancient city in present-day Iraq. The tablets—written in Akkadian, a language related to Hebrew and Arabic—tell a story about a king named Gilgamesh. Tablet XI of what is now known as the Gilgamesh Epic describes a meeting that the king had with a man named Utnapishtim, who survived a great flood brought on by the gods. This Akkadian flood story is remarkably similar to the story of Noah’s Ark in the Hebrew Bible. Scholars of our day feel that both flood stories either had the same source, or one influenced the other.

The story of Utnapishtim was lost to history for many centuries. By contrast, the story of Noah and the ark was passed down from generation to generation, and is still alive today among Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Through effort, commitment, and single-mindedness, Jews preserved the story about Noah and the flood, along with other ancient teachings. This has been a remarkable achievement and credit to Jewish tradition. A key difference between the flood stories of Noah and Utnapishtim is that a single god is mentioned in the Hebrew account, whereas several gods and goddesses are involved in the Akkadian account (Genesis 1:1-5). [Quote 1] (Gilgamesh Epic, tablet XI). [Quote 2] This indicates that the people of Israel—at least by the time the current version of the Noah story was recorded—were putting one God at the center of their devotion.

Beyond the story of Noah’s ark, the Biblical account of a towering figure known as Abraham also suggests that the Hebrews had connections to ancient Mesopotamian culture. Yet, Abraham’s attitude toward God shows that the Hebrew people modified traditional polytheistic Mesopotamian beliefs to focus on a single deity. This tendency toward monotheism grew deep roots—and in the course of four thousand years it flowered into the Judaic, Christian, and Islamic traditions.

1. Ancestors of the Abrahamic Traditions

The Israelites follow their ancestral lineage through Isaac by way of his mother, Sarah, and his father, Abraham. Isaac’s second son, Jacob, was renamed Israel, meaning to struggle with God (El). This name was given to commemorate a hierophanic event in which Jacob fought with an angel of God (Genesis 35:10). [Quote 3] Biblical tradition says that Israel had 12 sons, each of whom became head of a tribe. Thus, Judaic tradition speaks of the “twelve tribes” of Israel.

Muslims trace their ancestry through Ishmael by way of his mother, Hagar (Sarah’s attendant), and his father, Abraham. According to custom, a man with no son could sleep with another woman to secure his lineage. Abraham’s Hebrew wife, Sarah, had a handmaiden from Egypt named Hagar. Given the advanced culture of Egypt, such women were welcome in Canaan and were brought to serve Hebrews of stature. The Hebrew bible gives an account of how Abraham came to have two sons. The second son was born of his Hebrew wife, Sarah. The first son was born of Hagar, who was bestowed upon Abraham by Sarah for the purpose of having a child. After having her own child with Abraham, Sarah told Abraham to send Hagar and Ishmael away (Genesis 16:1-11). [Quote 4] Abraham escorted mother and son into the desert, and Hagar made her way back to what is now the city of Mecca (Hadith, Sahih Bukhari 4:55:584). [Quote 5] Both Ishmael and his half-brother, Isaac, were together at their father Abraham’s funeral (Genesis 25:9-11). [Quote 6]

Christians accept the Israelite genealogy as presented in the Hebrew Bible. Jesus of Nazareth, whose close disciples founded the Christian tradition, was raised in a Jewish family. The gospels of Matthew and Luke trace Jesus back to ancient Israel’s King David who followed in the line of Abraham’s son Isaac. The Hebrew bible states from the moment he was anointed as king, “the Spirit of the LORD came upon David in power” (1 Samuel 16:13). Christians supposed that the spirit of the Lord similarly came upon Jesus. The New Testament account given by Matthew traces Jesus back to David through his adoptive father, Joseph (Matthew 1:1-16), while the account given by Luke provides a genealogy through his mother, Mary (Luke 3:23-28). David’s divine anointing began a lineage from which all kings of Israel are supposed to come. To raise him to the status of king, David was anointed with oil. This made him into an anointed one, a Messiah. The Jews who were devoted to Jesus expected the Messiah to return, and believed that Jesus was that anointed one.

Muslims refer to descendants of Abraham through Ishmael as hanifas. And though the historical memory of their line has not been preserved, the Qur’an recognizes the connection between Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, Jacob, and the tribes (Qur’an 2:133, 136). [Quote 7]

1. Scriptural Views of Each Other

The Hebrew Bible and Talmuds (Palestinian and Babylonian) do not make reference to Jesus of Nazareth, or to Christians. The time frame covered by the Hebrew Bible well predates Jesus; and scribes (sof’rim) who compiled the Talmuds did not consider beliefs of the contingent of early Christians as relevant to their religious concerns.

The New Testament authors recognize that Jesus was born to a Jewish family, but they were at variance with aspects of Judaic tradition from which Jesus and the early Christians attempted to distinguish themselves.

Muslims refer to members of the three Abrahamic traditions as “people of the book” because the Qur’an states that God’s message was revealed to Jews, Christians, and Muslims through God’s angels. The Qur’an recognizes Abraham, Moses, and Jesus among the many prophets of God, and acknowledges that people of the book have variant paths to God (Qur’an 5:48). [Quote 8]

The Qur’an speaks of the Christian “book” and teaches that Jesus is a prophet of God, but not an incarnation of God. In the Qur’an, Jesus is called the spirit of Allah (ruhallah); but this spiritual force is not counted as a separate person because Allah is always one. There is a story of the birth of Jesus in a sura (a chapter of the Qur’an) called Maryam, after his mother, Mary. Muslims believe that Jesus, son of Mary, announced the coming of Prophet Muhammad:

And when Jesus son of Mary said: O Children of Israel! Lo! I am the messenger of Allah unto you, confirming that which was (revealed) before me in the Torah, and bringing good tidings of a messenger who cometh after me, whose name is the Praised One. Yet when he hath come unto them with clear proofs, they say: This is mere magic (Qur’an 61:6 Pickthall).

Muslims believe that although Jesus might have been hung on the cross to die, he was not actually killed (Qur’an 4:157-158). [Quote 9] Moreover, Jesus was supported with the Holy Spirit. He was raised to be with Allah, and will be present on the Day of Resurrection (Qur’an 2:87). [Quote 10]

2. [Phase 1] God’s People, Land, and Law (1600 B.C.E.–1050 B.C.E.)

Phase 1 of our History of God begins with the migration of Abraham into Canaan around 1600 B.C.E., and ends after the passing of Moses with a Philistine defeat of the Hebrews in Canaan (an event that prompted a unification of twelve tribes). The years between 1600 B.C.E. and 1050 B.C.E. can be characterized as a time of monolatry for the Hebrews who gained identity as a group based on lineage, ritual, and land. Biblical scholars surmise that the figures of Abraham and Moses came from different strands of ancient West Asian tradition. This is because stories about Abraham reflect an attitude of monolatry and refer to God as El Shaddai (among other things), while stories about Moses tend toward monotheism and refer to God as YHVH.

1. The Case of Abraham

Four main events define the God of Abraham according to the Hebrew scriptures: (a) God gave Abraham descendants, (b) God asked Abraham to sacrifice his son, (c) God prescribed ritual circumcision for male members of the community, and (d) God designated holy land for Abraham and his descendants. This God, who is one among many, gains overriding importance to Abraham and his lineage due to these four events.

• Descendants. Obeying a divine command, Abraham went from Ur to Harran (in present-day Iraq) with his father, Terah, his wife, Sarah, and his nephew, Lot. After the move to Harran, Abraham was given the order to travel again, to a new place. Then he was promised a long line of descendants (Genesis 15:4-6). [Quote 11]
• Sacrifice. Worship of the Lord was ordinarily sealed with the ritual of animal sacrifice. However typical a spring sacrifice of the precious first-born animals might have been, Abraham received a command from his deity to make an even greater sacrifice, namely his son (Genesis 22:13). [Quote 12] (Qur’an 37:102). [Quote 13] Jews speak of this son as Isaac, and Muslims speak of him as Ishmael.
• Circumcision. God commanded that, as a sign of his special relationship with Abraham, every male in Abraham’s line should be ritually circumcised. This covenant was sealed with animal sacrifice, and the circumcision of the men in Abraham’s lineage. Both Abraham and Ishmael (his first and only son up to that point) were circumcised (Genesis 17:19-27). [Quote 14]
• Holy Land. On one occasion, God renamed Abraham and Sarah by adding a “ha” sound to each of their names. Abram became Abraham, and Sarai became Sarah. Then he granted Abraham and his descendants a land that they would consider holy (Genesis 15:18-21). [Quote 15]

Figure 4.1
Abraham’s Black Stone

Source: Photo downloaded from Wikimedia (public domain), http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Blackstone.JPG

Abrahamic tradition says that Abraham built several altars, including the original Ka’ba in Mecca. Abraham used a black stone for the original altar. The black stone built into the corner of today’s Ka’ba is said to be that stone. Near it is an area that has been called Abraham’s place at least since the time of Prophet Muhammad, who urges pilgrims to stand on that place while worshipping at the Ka’ba (Hadith, Sahih Bukhari 4:55:587). [Quote 16]

Earlier in his life, when Abraham first arrived at the ancient Canaanite city of Shechem (present-day Nablus), the Lord appeared to him. In response, Abraham built an altar under an oak tree (Genesis 12:6-8). Furthermore, Abraham is said to have purchased the cave of Machpelah to serve as a burial vault for his wife, Sarah. Three generations of Abraham’s family are said to be at this sacred site near Hebron: (1) Sarah and Abraham; (2) Isaac and his wife, Rebekah; and (3) Jacob and his wife, Leah (Genesis 23:9). A mosque now stands above this cave.

 

Points to Ponder 4.2: Debates on Early Israelite Religion

When did the Israelites begin believing in one and only one God? The answer to this question is not clear from the Hebrew scriptures, and modern scholars cannot agree—though they generally concur that sometime after the Babylonian Exile, the Jews became seriously monotheistic.

The Tanakh gives contradictory and puzzling reports on matters such as the patriarchs’ use of the name YHVH:

• Genesis 4:1-5 suggests that Eve knew God by the name YHVH, and that her sons Cain and Abel sacrificed to him.
• Genesis 4:26 says that Adam’s grandson Enosh invoked the deity using the sacred name YHVH.
• Exodus 6:3 says that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob referred to the deity as El Shaddai, and that Moses was the first to hear the sacred name YHVH.

Modern biblical scholars disagree about the use of the term YHVH in the Torah.

• The German scholar Julius Wellhausen (1844–1918) claimed that YHVH was a national god who conformed to the model of the Moabite god Chemosh, and Assyrian god Ashur.
• The American scholar William F. Albright (1891–1971) and the Israeli scholar Yehezkel Kaufmann (1889–1963) claimed that monotheistic beliefs started with the tradition attributed to Moses, and that worship of YHVH was the official religion of Israel.

In an attempt to explain apparent contradictions in the Hebrew Bible, Julius Wellhausen and others clarified a theory known as the “documentary hypothesis.” This theory, which was widely used in Biblical Studies in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, identified four sources of material that went into the Torah. These sources were named after the first letter of their key contribution to the scripture: “J” for Jehovah (i.e., YHVH), “E” for Elohim, “D” for Deuteronomy, and “P” for priestly. J contributed traditions from the Southern Kingdom of Judah (c. 950–850 B.C.E.) using the word YHVH for God. E contributed traditions from the Northern Kingdom of Israel (c. 850–750 B.C.E.) using the word Elohim for God. D lived in Jerusalem during the reign of King Josiah (640–609 B.C.E.) and apparently reformulated Deuteronomy, the fifth book of the Torah, in order to promote monotheism. P, stressing the importance of priests, was the work of priests living in Babylon during the exile in the 500s B.C.E. Around 750 B.C.E., the sources J and E were combined in a new edition (the technical word is redaction) of the Torah. Around 400 B.C.E., another redactor put together the JE text with the contributions of D and P. These efforts resulted in the Torah basically as we have it today.

1. The Case of Moses

Traditionally Jews believed that YHVH revealed the Torah to Moses. These first five books of the Hebrew Bible (called the books of Moses) are the core of Jewish scripture. The core of the core of the Torah is the revelation of the divine name, YHVH. God revealed this sound to Moses as he stood on a mountain.

God said to Moses, “I am who I am. (I will be what I will be). This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ ”

–Exodus 3:14 NIV

The original meaning of YHVH seems to have been forgotten. The vowels attending the letters Y-H-V-H were not preserved, and word YHVH was so holy that only temple priests knew how to say it properly. To this day when Jews encounter the tetragrammaton (four letter symbol) YHVH, they will not utter it, but will say “Adonai” (Lord) instead.

The stories about Moses in the Torah establish his authority as a lawgiver. Jews recognize over six hundred commandments (mitzvoth) revealed by YHVH as the basis of what became the Mosaic Law. Some commandments are positive orders to do something, while others are negative orders to refrain from doing something. Certain verses clearly indicate that the ancient Hebrews recognized the existence of other gods. They are urged to “believe that God exists” (Exodus 20:2), and ordered “not [to] make or worship idols” (Exodus 20:4, 5), and “not [to] turn to or manufacture idols” (Leviticus 19:4). Moses tried to move his people toward monotheism by focusing on YHVH. But they seemed to be in no position to give up the belief that other gods existed and vied for their attention.

Among the many commandments, ten have become most well known. These were revealed to Moses as he fasted on the mountain for forty days and forty nights. Moses came down from the mountain with tablets on which the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments, were inscribed (Exodus 34:28). [Quote 17]. (Notice here the adoption of a modern convention of eliminating the vowel in the words “Lord” and “God.” This follows the idea that the name YHVH has no vowels and is not to be pronounced aloud.)

1. I am the L-rd your G-d – There is only one G-d, The L-rd.
2. You will have no other gods – neither in belief nor through an act of worship.
3. You shall not pronounce the Holy Name of G-d needlessly.
4. Remember the Sabbath day to sanctify it, by ceasing productive labour and dedicating it to spiritual rest.
5. Honour your father and mother.
6. Do not murder.
7. Do not commit any act of adultery.
8. Do not steal.
9. Do not testify as a false witness against your neighbor.
10. Do not covet your neighbor’s possessions.

(Altmann, 1985: 21)

The stone tablets bearing a divine inscription of the Ten Commandments were kept in the Ark of the Covenant and carried into Canaan. The covenant (berit) between YHVH and Moses’ people was intended to make YHVH the sole object of their worship. Thus, the Mosaic Law was based in monotheism. Joshua was the successor to Moses and led the people into Canaan. He insisted that the Hebrews should turn away from worship of any god aside from YHVH. Joshua made a covenant on behalf of his people at Shechem in Canaan (Joshua 24:16-27). [Quote 18]

Figure 4.2
Moses and the Burning Bush

Source: Photo downloaded from Wikimedia (public domain), http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:1_StCatherines_Sinai.jpg

Tradition states that one day alone on a mountain, Moses experienced a divine spectacle. He saw a bush that burned without being consumed by fire. One can imagine that Moses felt both the mysterium tremedum and the mysterium fascinans in this encounter with YHVH. It seems that he was both terrified to place his bare feet upon the holy earth and drawn to the source of power (Exodus 3:1-20). [Quote 19]

The father-in-law of Moses was a priest among the Midianites (Exodus 2:16). The Hebrew Bible records that these people were descended from Midian, the son that Abraham had with Keturah (Genesis 25:1-6). Apparently, the Midianites knew of YHVH, and Moses’s father-in-law is said to have offered sacrifice to the Lord, and gave Moses expert advice (Exodus 18:1-27). [Quote 20]

Here is a photo of Saint Catherine’s monastery on Mount Sinai in Egypt. Moses is thought to have witnessed the Burning Bush and received the Ten Commandments while standing on the rocks you see behind this church. The Byzantine emperor Justinian (527–565 C.E.) ordered Saint Catherine’s monastery to be built on this sacred site. Today it stands as one of the oldest monasteries in the world (see figure 4.4).

3. [Phase 2] God in the First Temple (1050 B.C.E.–586 B.C.E.)

A strong impulse to unify the 12 tribes came with the Philistine defeat of the Hebrews and capture of the Ark of the Covenant in 1050 B.C.E. Phase 2 of our History of God opens with a unification of the tribes under King Saul in 1020 B.C.E. and closes with an exile of people from the tribe of Judah to Babylon in 586 B.C.E. This phase fully coincides with the existence of the First Temple (also called Solomon’s Temple), which was built around 1000 B.C.E. and destroyed around 586 B.C.E. The move from monolatry to monotheism in the Abrahamic traditions was made during these four-plus centuries of bumpy historical adventures among the Hebrew people.

1. Monolatry in the United Monarchy

Groups of seafaring people known collectively as the Philistines (from plesheth, which means “rolling”) had come in waves to settle on the coasts of southern Palestine. The Hebrews who reentered Canaan under the leadership of Joshua fought the Philistines. In 1050 B.C.E. the Philistines defeated the Hebrews, captured the Ark of the Covenant, and destroyed its shrine. (Later they again captured and returned the Ark of the Covenant.) Some 30 years after this defeat, a Hebrew leader named Samuel assembled the tribes identified with the lineage of Jacob (renamed Israel), who was the grandson of Abraham and Sarah. These “12 tribes” of Israel united to establish the first monarchy under the leadership of Saul. The “United Monarchy” lasted from around 1025 B.C.E. to around 930 B.C.E., and the people known until that time as Hebrews became known as Israelites. This Kingdom of Israel eventually split into the Northern Kingdom (called Israel) and the Southern Kingdom (called Judah). Israel and Judah were ruled separately until each, in turn, was overthrown. Israel fell to the Assyrians in 722 B.C.E. and people of the northern tribes were deported and scattered. Judah fell to the Babylonians in 586 B.C.E. and people of the southern tribes were exiled to Babylon and Solomon’s Temple was destroyed.

King David brought the Ark of the Covenant from Shiloh to Jerusalem around 1000 B.C.E. (2 Samuel 6:1-23). [Quote 21] By thus relocating the tablets of Mosaic Law, David established Jerusalem as the political and religious center of the United Monarchy, and ruled for 40 years. David gave his son Solomon plans for a Jerusalem Temple that would house the Ark of the Covenant. Solomon had the temple built, installed the Ark of the Covenant (1-Kings 8:1-21) [Quote 22], and ruled the United Monarchy from Jerusalem for 40 years (c. 970 B.C.E.–c. 930 B.C.E.). Solomon was internationally well-connected and tolerated a spectrum of views about the nature of divinity.

After Solomon died, his son Rehoboam became king of the United Monarchy. He was unable to keep the Israelite tribes united, and they split into political entities called Israel and Judah. Rehoboam and his successors in the line of David ruled over Judah from Jerusalem. Meanwhile, Israel had its own series of rulers up north. People of the Northern Kingdom and Southern Kingdom had different relationships with the divine. The people of Judah had the Jerusalem Temple (the First Temple) in their midst, and their focus of priestly ritual was YHVH.

The tribes living up north relied more heavily on Canaanite gods that seemed relevant to their agrarian lifestyle. Thus it was that the southerners made swifter progress toward monotheism than the northerners. Moreover, after the Assyrians conquered the Northern Kingdom and dispersed the northern tribes, the History of God in the Abrahamic traditions continues as the story of Judah and their march from monolatry to monotheism.

1. Prophets Moving toward Monotheism

After the division of the United Monarchy into two portions, several powerful prophets delivered messages of warning to the Israelites. Amos, Hosea, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and others spoke out against the worship of many gods, and predicted disaster as retribution from YHVH. Whether the prophecies were written down before or after the disasters they “predicted,” the Tanakh indicate that the people of Israel did not adhere to the worship of a single God. The Canaanites believed in gods and goddesses (pl. ba’alim; sing. ba’al) that were supposed to help people with matters of agriculture and fertility. Baal worship was noxious to the Hebrew prophets, and they preached the danger of being disloyal to the God who had given the Israelites a holy land, and sealed a covenant with them.

• Amos and Hosea (eighth century B.C.E.) Amos and Hosea warned people of the tribes of the Northern Kingdom not to worship the ba’alim of Canaan. Hosea spoke of Israel as a wife who was unfaithful to her husband, the Lord. Amos predicted that Israel’s king would die by the sword and his people would be exiled if they did not change their ways (Amos 7:12-17). [Quote 23]
• Isaiah (eighth century B.C.E.) Isaiah prophesied in the Southern Kingdom, as Judah was caught in the power struggle between Assyria and Egypt after the fall of Israel in the north in 732 B.C.E. Isaiah spoke of Solomon’s Temple as a “house for all nations,” but took Assyrian threats to the Southern Kingdom as the work of the Lord. Isaiah predicted that disaster would come to both Judah and Assyria because his people were forsaking God. He despised the worship of other gods (Isaiah 1:11-17). [Quote 24]
• Jeremiah (sixth century B.C.E.) Jeremiah was alive before and after King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon ordered the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple (Solomon’s Temple, the First Temple) in 586 B.C.E. Jeremiah taught that worship should not be cut off from the people, by confining itself to the Jerusalem Temple. Jeremiah had a more universal idea of the God of Israel than the priests in the Temple. Yet he wanted his people to be loyal to YHVH. Jeremiah wore a yoke to symbolize that the Lord willed Jerusalem to come under the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon to ensure that Solomon’s Temple stayed pure. He said the Lord was fighting on the side of Babylon (Jeremiah 27: 4-7), and reviled the Israelites for “burning incense to other gods” (Jeremiah 1: 14-16). [Quote 25]

4. [Phase 3] God in the Second Temple (586 B.C.E. – 70 C.E.)

The powerful Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar conquered the Southern Kingdom of Judah in 586 B.C.E. He destroyed the Jerusalem Temple built by Solomon. Then he murdered King Zedekia’s children, blinded the king, and exiled him and others to Babylon (Jeremiah 52:4-16). [Quote 26] Phase 3 of our History of God begins during the Babylonian Exile and ends with the Diaspora. This phase fully coincides with the functioning of the Second Temple, whose altar was erected on the very spot in Jerusalem that Solomon had chosen. Construction on the new temple began in 535 B.C.E. This Second Temple is often called “Herod’s Temple” because some five hundred years later (in 19 B.C.E.), King Herod the Great expanded it. The magnificently refurbished building complex suffered the same fate as Solomon’s Temple—destruction at the hands of an enemy. The Second Temple stood for fewer than 90 years. The Roman army destroyed it in 70 C.E.

1. Jewish Monotheism

The Babylonian Exile was traumatic for the Jews. Yet the cumulative tragedies of the fall of Israel, the fall of Judah, and the destruction of Solomon’s Temple led them from monolatry to monotheism. The rebuilding of the Jerusalem Temple with its priests reinstated, coupled with fastidious cultural reforms, led the Jews to a renewed and exclusive relationship with YHVH. They abandoned worship of any god but YHVH. Indeed, they abandoned belief in the Canaanite gods and goddesses of the past.

The period between the Roman takeover of Jerusalem and the dispersion of Jews throughout the Roman Empire (that is, 586 B.C.E. to 70 C.E.) turned into a time of restoration for the Jews. While in Babylon, some Jews absorbed new ideas due to Mesopotamian cultural influences, while others anxiously tried to stave off change. The Babylonian Exile ended after a couple of generations, when King Cyrus of Persia (r. 550–530 B.C.E.) conquered Babylon. Cyrus developed a favorable relationship with the Romans who occupied Judea (the old Southern Kingdom of Judah), and allowed the Jews of Babylon to return to Jerusalem to rebuild their Temple. In general, the Jewish community of Judea focused on the worship of one God in their new Second Temple. Yet they developed differences of opinion on religious matters. By the time Jesus of Nazareth was born toward the end of Phase 3 of our History of God, three main groups of Jews were at variance with one another:

• Sadducee The Sadducee high priests mediated between the Jews and YHVH. They did not accept teachings introduced during the Babylon Exile, such as the belief in angels, and the existence of an afterlife. These high priests of the Second Temple were focused on the written Torah as revelation from God that should be mediated and interpreted through the priestly office.
• Pharisee Pharisees were scribes, teachers (rabbis), and the lower orders of priesthood. They opposed the Sadducees and questioned the need for priestly mediation between humans and God. They awaited the end of the world, and the coming of a Messiah. They accepted some ideas taken up during the Babylonian exile under the influence of the Zoroastrians, such as a belief in the existence of angels, resurrection of the body in the afterlife, and the last judgment.
• Essene The Essenes disapproved of the way Sadducee priests were running the Second Temple. They lived outside of Jerusalem, and expected a Messiah from King David’s lineage to arrive soon to end the world’s injustice by annihilating evil. Influenced by Zoroastrian beliefs, they viewed the cosmos as a battlefield between good and evil.

1. Jesus of Nazareth and “Abba”

Toward the end of the restoration period, Jesus of Nazareth was born near Jerusalem into a Jewish community. He was raised studying the Law of Moses (Torah), and began a reform movement that eventually became a full-fledged religion known the world over—the Christian tradition. Jesus used the Aramaic word Abba (father) to address God. For example, he addressed Abba during the night before Roman authorities came to the garden of Gethsemane to arrest him for inciting public unrest (Mark 14:32-42). [Quote 27] Speaking directly to God as “Father,” suggested a new kind of relationship with YHVH that was intensely personal. Jesus spoke of himself as the Son of Man, but the notion of Jesus as the Son of God was circulating. When Roman authorities questioned whether he claimed to be the Son of God, Jesus gave a puzzling response (Matthew 26:57-68). [Quote 28]

The earliest accounts of the life and teachings of Jesus are letters from Paul, written over the course of some 30 years before he was martyred c. 64 C.E. This event occurred around six years before the Second Temple was destroyed. Jesus had predicted the destruction of the Second Temple (Mark 13:1-4) [Quote 29], and spoke of the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven. His words and actions raised many questions for thinkers about the nature of God and God’s work in the world, and the personal impact that Jesus had on his disciples inspired the new Christians to find new ways of talking about God. Perhaps if the tragedy of the destruction of Herod’s Temple had not occurred, and Jews had not dispersed, their experience of Jesus would not have amounted to a new chapter in the History of God. However, that was not the case.

Figure 4.3
Torah Scroll

Source: Downloaded from Wikimedia (public domain), http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:V11p131001_Torah.jpg

According to Near Eastern custom, portions of any written text were identified according to the first word or words of the scroll on which it was written. Librarians in Alexandria, Egypt developed the method of dividing the scrolls’ texts into coherent portions, and assigning an appropriate Greek name for each corresponding to the traditional title or pertaining to the contents. Today, some Bibles use the Hebrew titles based on the early scrolls, while others use the Greek titles. Jews continue to hand copy Torah scrolls for ritual use in the synagogue.

5. [Phase 4] One God with No Temple (70 C.E. – 622 C.E.)

Phase 4 of our History of God begins with the Jewish Diaspora and ends with the establishment of a third Abrahamic religion—Islam—in 622 C.E. After 70 C.E., life was never the same for Jews. They were forced to leave Jerusalem and relocate. Thereafter, both Jews and Christians worked from the monotheistic presumption that God was the unique creator of the world. All other gods had no share in God’s supreme power. They were irrelevant, if not defunct. Yet the Jews who believed in Jesus as the Messiah developed views about God that were quite distinctive. Two groups of texts were appended to the Tanakh: (1) the Jewish Talmuds and, (2) the Christian New Testament. Although the Talmuds stayed close to the heart of Jewish scripture, the New Testament developed the notion of a divine Trinity. By the end of Phase 4 Islam had entered history. Prophet Muhammad and his noble companions had to iron out the lingering monolatry of the Bedouin Arabs, who had hardly been touched by the teachings of Jews and Christians.

Points to Ponder 4.3: The “Time” of History

Often in the ancient world, texts were written down on the basis of long-standing oral traditions. However, when texts were committed to writing, it was not uncommon for writers to slant their work with cultural biases. Editors may want not only to preserve their old oral traditions, but also to make old ideas conform to their own values. In trying to update material, editors sometimes eliminate material that they consider unfit. For example, the Jewish tradition did not include the Book of Maccabees in the Hebrew Bible. Meanwhile, Christians kept Maccabees in their Old Testament; but they rejected all but four gospels. On the “Gnostic gospels” that did not make it into the Christian canon, see Elaine Pagles, The Gnostic Gospels.

A pressing question for students of religion is: How do we know what “time” period is being reflected in a text? To what extent does the text we are reading reflect its “original form,” and to what extent does it reflect biases of the culture of its writers or editors?

• Think of one or two examples of books that have a mixture of material, some of which is old and some of which is contemporaneous with the author or editor.
• How did you decide what portions were “old” and what portions were “new”?

1. God as Logos (the Word)

The impact of Greek philosophy on both the Jewish and the Christian concept of God was tremendous in the centuries following the destruction of the Second Temple. The legacy of ancient Greek thinkers pervaded the Roman Empire, and the philosophical thought of Plato and Aristotle influenced both Jewish and Christian thinkers. One new perspective that entered both Jewish and Christian views of God from Greek thought was the idea of God as Logos (the Word). Two influential writers to take this turn in the History of God were Philo of Alexandria and the author of the New Testament’s gospel of John.

• Philo of Alexandria (c. 20 B.C.E.–50 C.E.) was a Greek-speaking Jewish philosopher from Alexandria, Egypt, who wrote commentaries on the Torah and worked to reconcile teachings of the Hebrew bible with fundamental ideas of Greek philosophy. Philo did not view the Torah literally. Instead, he interpreted such stories as the exodus of Moses from Egypt as allegories for the soul’s journey toward God. Philo viewed God as a transcendent being who is known through the Word (Logos). This meant that human beings had an affinity with God through their intellect and could experience God in contemplation when blessed with the grace of God.
• The Author of John’s Gospel (c. 95 C.E.) The latest of the Christian gospels was written around 45 years after Philo died. The Gospel of John begins: ” In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (see John 1:1-18). [Quote 30] John claimed that Jesus was the Word that became Flesh. The association of the Logos with Jesus put a new twist on the notion of God as a transcendent being. John’s apparent identification of Jesus with God raised questions about the nature of Jesus and the nature of God. To this day, Christians ponder the meaning of the Logos in John’s gospel to explore the relationship between the immanent and the transcendent—among other things.

1. God as a Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

Constantine (c. 274–337 C.E.) wanted to unify the Roman Empire in the name of the Christian religion. For political reasons he felt that Christians must clearly articulate their beliefs. He ordered some 300 Christian bishops to convene a council in Nicea, and charged them to standardize Christian dogma. The First Council of Nicea became a model for other Church councils, which were convened when particular points of doctrine needed clarification. Often these bishops’ councils were convened to root out heresy. The first three councils most impacted the History of God. They were all held in what is now Turkey.

• The First Council: Nicea (325 C.E.)  Some 300 bishops wrote the Nicene Creed, largely to counter the charge that Jesus was not divine. It asserted that Jesus was the Son of God and truly divine (see the Nicene Creed). [Quote 31]
• The Second Council: Constantinople (381 C.E.)  Some 150 bishops added words to the Nicene Creed to decree that the Holy Spirit was divine. This meant that Father-Son-Holy Spirit were a Trinity.
• The Third Council: Ephesus (431 C.E.)  More than 200 bishops declared the unity of the person of Christ who was inseparably divine and human. They also recognized Mary as the mother of God. Theological debate over Christ’s hypostatic union (i.e., his divine-human inseparability) resumed at the next council two decades later.

Figure 4.4
Emperor Justinian

Source: Photo downloaded from Wikimedia (public domain), http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Justinian.jpg

Justinian (527-565) revised and reconstituted the Roman legal code and tried to standardize the laws across the Roman Empire. He rooted out paganism and heresy in the Byzantine Empire and ordered 90 churches to be built, including the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople (Turkey), and Saint Catherine’s monastery on Mount Sinai (Egypt). The Justinian legal code still persists as the legal foundation for most countries in Western Europe even today, and the Hagia Sophia remains one of the world’s most magnificent buildings.

6. [Phase 5] One God in Three Religions (622 C.E.–1238 C.E.)

In the first century C.E., Christians inherited the results of all the Jewish transformations in thought about the nature of the divine. Through the 700 years living in Diaspora without the Jerusalem Temple, both Jews and Christians refined their ideas about God. In the seventh century C.E., Muslims went through their own process of defining monotheism. In the year 610 C.E. Muhammad received the first revelation from God through the Angel Gabriel, while meditating in a cave in Arabia (Hadith, Sahih Bukhari 1:1:3). [Quote 32] Twelve years later he established the first Muslim community after the Hijrah (migration) from Mecca to Medina (then called Yathrib). There followed Phase 5 of our History of God, in which the three Abrahamic religions interacted—but with reserve. For 600 years, each held tight to its own conception of God. Jews awaited the Messiah. Christians upheld the doctrine of the Trinity. Muslims relied on their Qur’an as the final revelation from God. Phase 5 ends in 1238 C.E. with the Reconquest (Reconquista) of Valencia (in present-day Spain) by King Jaime I of Aragon. At that point all but the Emirate of Granada had been recovered by Christians, after more than 500 years of Muslim culture on the Iberian Peninsula (present-day Spain and Portugal).

1. Prophet Muhammad’s Monotheism

There are no historical records that trace the descendants of Ishmael down to the present day. Yet situated in Mecca, Arabia was the Ka’ba, a shrine that Muslims date back to the time of Abraham. Muslim tradition says that Abraham built the Ka’ba with the help of his son Ishmael (Qur’an 2:125-127). [Quote 33] For centuries, Mecca had a great business along a trade route that ran along the Red Sea. Over time, many merchants and pilgrims brought idols to Mecca and set them up in the Ka’ba. The Bedouin tribes of Muhammad’s day revered trees, caves, stones, wells, and springs. They believed in spirits created by Allah from fire (jinn). They also venerated three goddesses named Al-Lat, Manat, and Al-Uzza. These three goddesses are named in the Qur’an (53:19-23). [Quote 34] They are called “the daughters of Allah” who prayed to Allah on behalf of the people. In the early days of Islam, the inclusion of Al-Lat, Manat, and Al-Uzza seemed to make Muhammad’s Bedouin community more receptive to teachings proclaimed in the Qur’an. But the Prophet was disturbed by the verses on these figures. One night as he prayed over it, Angel Gabriel made clear that Lat, Manat, and Al-Uzza were not to be worshipped. Eight years later, after establishing the Muslim faith, Prophet Muhammad sent a man to destroy the sanctuary of Al-Uzza, who was the object of a cult east of Mecca. Thus, although the original verses remain in the Qur’an, subsequent revelations make clear that Islam is devoted to worship of one and only one God.

Points to Ponder 4.4: The Feminine Face of God

Early Israelite religion and Arabian religion in Prophet Muhammad’s day both had feminine deities.

• The mother of Asa, the third king of Judah (r. 908–867 B.C.E.) made an image of Asherah. The name Asherah may mean “consort”; and there are indications that early conceptions of YHVH included a female companion.
• In two passages of the Tanakh, YHVH is described through feminine metaphors (Isaiah 42:14, 66:13).
• Jews at Elephantine (an island in the Nile River, Egypt) in the 400s B.C.E. had a deity called Anatyahu, who may be an androgynous blend of YHVH and the goddess Anat from Canaan.
• The goddess Astarte had a place in early Israelite religion (in two cultural forms) (Jeremiah 7:18, 44:17-23). [Quote 35]
• The goddesses Al-Lat (the morning star, Venus), Manat (fate), and Al-Uzza (the moon) were venerated in an Arabian goddess cult (Qur’an 53:19-23).

Although the feminine seemed to have a place in early Israelite and Muslim tradition, it was eventually downplayed. Nowadays, some people want to reintroduce a sense of the feminine in association with God.

• Do you think that God should be considered in more feminine terms than has been traditional in modern times? Why or why not?
• What changes in the concept of God could you foresee? Explain.

Prophet Muhammad focused in the early days on the concept of a single, unique deity who would be present at the Day of Judgment. This was The God (allah). The Prophet severely criticized the use to which the Ka’ba was put, and eventually sacked it. The resanctification of the Ka’ba was among the last of Prophet Muhammad’s acts. Within the space of 22 years (610-632 C.E.), Prophet Muhammad established a full-fledged monotheistic religion. Some main ideas associated with the monotheism of the Qur’an are:

• God is good, all-powerful, and omniscient.
• God brings the revelations for guidance.
• God is the creator and constant sustainer of the universe, including humans and all other creatures.

The Qur’an counts the Torah of Moses, the Psalms (Zaboor) of David, and the Gospel (Ingil) of Jesus as among God’s revelations. Prophet Muhammad recognized the message of the Qur’an as a revelation from the very God who delivered a message to Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, and Jacob, the tribes, Moses, and Jesus (Qur’an 2:130-140). [Quote 36] Some Meccans accused Muhammad of falsifying the revelation. The Qur’an reports this dispute (Qur’an 25:4-5, 16:103). Whatever resistance he may have encountered, exactly one century after Muhammad passed away, the newly founded religion had spread as far west as France, and its European expansion was “stopped” by the Christian Charles Martel at the battle of Tours in 732 C.E.

1. Muslim Hadith Traditions

An important portion of the Muslim Sunna (body of tradition) is the hadith tradition. Hadiths are sayings, reports, and accounts attributed to Prophet Muhammad’s family, household members, and companions. Islamic tradition preserved a class of hadiths called Sacred Hadith (hadith qudsi).These are said to convey divine messages (some of which came through dreams, for instance) in the Prophet’s own words, as opposed to words of the Qur’an that are the direct words of Allah as spoken by the angel Gabriel in revelation. The subject matter of Sacred Hadiths often includes spiritual advice or theological reflection. It is remarkable that some of the Sacred Hadiths are similar to sayings and parables attributed to Jesus in the Christian New Testament. For example, one Sacred Hadith speaks of what God will say to people on the Day of Resurrection (Hadith Qudsi 18). [Quote 37] This passage is remarkably similar to a passage in the Gospel of Matthew (Matthew 25:31-46). [Quote 38] Whatever is the spiritual or historical connection between such sayings of the Prophet Muhammad and the Christian gospels, such parallels are evidence of commonalities in the Muslim and Christian concept of God. And though Muslims do not accept the idea that Jesus is God incarnate, the Qur’an states that Jesus was filled with the Holy Spirit (Qur’an 2:87). [Quote 39]

1. The Challenge of Iconoclasm

Jews and Muslims do not represent the divine in an anthropomorphic manner. The prohibition is so strong that even the divine name YHWH in Judaic tradition is not spoken aloud. Similarly, to protect the mind from idolatry, Muslims represent neither Allah, nor even the face of any prophet. Muslims portray the divine through artfully calligraphed names that represent qualities of Allah. Such profound iconoclasm does not apply to Christianity. But there were times when the Christian heresy of iconoclasm threatened to revolutionize Christian sacred art and eliminate the use of images for fear of idolatry. Had the iconoclasts succeeded, the History of God might have been quite different, with a de-emphasis on the idea of the Incarnation of God in the divine-human person of Jesus Christ.

The contact between Christians and Muslims, especially in the Byzantine Empire, provoked a Christian discussion of the positive or negative value of depicting God and sacred persons. Soon after Islam penetrated the Christian world, Byzantine Emperor Leo III (717–741 C.E.) began his attack on Christian sacred art. He argued that the use of icons was a major obstacle in the conversion of Jews and Muslims to Christianity. In a decree of 730 C.E., he ordered icons to be destroyed, starting with the statue of Christ above his palace entrance. The iconoclastic controversy occupied the Christian world (especially Byzantium) for over a century. Saints were martyred, Orthodox bishops were exiled, and faithful laypersons were put to death. But in 843 C.E. a church council held in Constantinople officially reestablished the veneration of icons.

Christians who argued in favor of representation emphasized that icons are consistent with the principle of the Incarnation of God in the human form of Jesus. Bishops at the councils of Ephesus (431 C.E.) and Constantinople (451 C.E.) had clarified that Christ’s nature was both divine and human. Proponents of icon argued that as Christ’s hypostatic union was indivisible, so the icon unifies the material and spiritual realms of existence. John of Damascus (675–749 C.E.) said that Christians should use images to represent the Logos (Word).

Figure 4.5
Allah

Source: Downloaded from Wikimedia (public domain), http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dcp7323-Edirne-Eski_Camii_Allah.svg

Allah is The God. The centerpiece of Islam is the assurance that God is One. And though God is One, God’s qualities can be discerned throughout the natural world because God is the Creator. Muslims developed a tradition of reciting ninety-nine “beautiful names” of Allah, such as the Merciful and the Subtle. Here you see the name Allah itself written in Arabic.

1. More Christian Disputes over the Right View of God

Within the Christian Church, disputes over the nature of God did not stop with arguments as to whether or not the human figure of Jesus should be represented in art. One dispute was so serious that in the year 1054 the Christian Church split in two. The massive church schism had political underpinnings, but a technical theological point was at the center of their disagreement. The question had arisen as to whether the Holy Spirit proceeded from the Father only, or from both God the Father (the creator of the world) and God the Son (Jesus Christ). Roman Catholics, under the leadership of the bishop of Rome, accepted the concept of filioque, a Latin phrase meaning “and (from) the Son.” This indicated that Jesus, the Son of God, was of equal divinity with God the Father, because the Holy Spirit emerged from them both. On the other hand, the Eastern Orthodox bishops of the Byzantine Empire rejected the filioque clause of the Nicene Creed, indicating their belief that God the Father is the single cause of the other two persons of the Trinity. Indeed, for nearly a thousand years the two churches found no consensus on this question of the origin of the Holy Spirit. Only in March 1991 were the first steps taken toward consensus between the Roman Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox Churches on the filioque clause.

7. [Phase 6] God of the Head and Heart (1238 C.E.–1837 C.E.)

Phase 6 of our account of the History of God in the Abrahamic religions is focused on two shifts in the concept God—one from the intellectual perspective and one from the mystical perspective. Here we call them head (theology) and heart (mysticism). During phase 6, the idea of God was intensively explored by both theologians and mystics in the thirteenth through nineteenth centuries. Asking theological questions about the nature of God was not new, and neither was finding mystical ways to experience God. Yet a tremendous period of intellectual cross-fertilization among the Abrahamic traditions was in full force. Jews, Christians, and Muslims became known to each other in remarkable new ways. In the course of these many cultural developments, Jews, Christians, and Muslims interacted with each other—sometimes peaceably and sometimes violently. Overall, Christians came to have the upper hand politically and economically.

Phase 6 begins in the year 1238 C.E., when King Jaime I of Aragon retook Valencia (in present-day Spain) from the Muslims. This defeat of the Moors (Muslims in Spain) marked the near-total recovery of the Iberian Peninsula from the Muslims, with only sporadic conflicts to follow until King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella recovered Granada on January 2, 1492. Phase 6 opens just after the Renaissance of the Twelfth Century in Europe, which paved the way for the Italian Renaissance (c. 1300–1600), European Enlightenment (1600s–1800s), Protestant Reformation (1500s–1600s), Age of Exploration (1400s–1600s), and European Colonialism (1500s–1800s). On July 4, 1776, near the end of the phase of God of the Head and Heart, the United States of America was founded and gradually rose to become a dominant world power, and its version of Western culture came to have immense impact on the world stage. Phase 6 ends in the year 1837 C.E., when Charles Darwin (1809–1882) began his first notebook on the biological evolution of species. Darwin’s theory of evolution would have a wide-ranging impact on the view of God the Creator in the Abrahamic traditions as people imbued with a scientific worldview began to question the nature of life on Earth.

1. New Theology after the Twelfth Century Renaissance in Europe

Muslims first conquered European territory in the early 700s C.E. and settled into portions of the Iberian Peninsula (present-day Spain and Portugal) to establish what is known as Moorish culture. In the tenth century C.E., Christian knights launched the Reconquest movement to recapture territory that Muslims were ruling. By 1100 C.E., Toledo and Lisbon, two centers of intellectually advanced Moorish culture, were under Christian control. There, unexpectedly, Christians found magnificent libraries that were filled with Arabic translations and commentaries on scores of ancient Greek texts. More libraries were found as the Spanish Army extended their control over Muslim territory on the Iberian Peninsula, including one in Cordova, a city known as the “jewel of the world,” which was reconquered in 1236 C.E. (Rubenstein, 2003, p. 16). [Quote 40] The exposure of Christians to Arabic translations of ancient Greek works opened up new views of the nature of God during the Twelfth Century Renaissance in Europe (Haskins, 1927, p. 7). [Quote 41]

By the mid-twelfth century, Christian thinkers were already displaying a new interest in natural processes, human reason, and the natural world’s relationship to a supernaturally creative, powerful, just, and omniscient God. That is, they had already begun to ask the questions to which Aristotle and his Arab interpreters offered answers: How does the natural universe work? Did it have a beginning in time, or is it co-eternal with God? Does nature obey certain laws? If so, how can humans exercise free will? What does it mean to say that our individual human souls are immortal? The unexpected, almost miraculous appearance of ancient books and more recent commentaries addressing all these concerns caused an immediate sensation. All that was needed for the West to have access to this vast storehouse of learning was that its contents be translated into Latin (Rubenstein, 2003, p. 17).

On January 2, 1492, the Spanish Army completed the Reconquest as the army of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella recaptured Grenada and unified Spain under their rule. On April 17, 1492, they granted Christopher Columbus permission to sail across the Atlantic Ocean. Within two weeks, these Roman Catholic monarchs issued an edict of expulsion, stating that any Jew who did not convert to Christianity was not allowed to live in their territory. The religious aim of the Reconquest had been to restore the Christian religion to Spain. This meant dealing with the Muslim population as well. Through conversions, emigrations, killings, and deportations, the Christian rulers managed to empty Spain of Muslims within a generation or so after the Jews were expelled in 1492. For years afterwards, the Spanish monarchs were suspicious of people who had newly converted to Christianity. (This problem is discussed further below in section D on “God of the Christian Saints.”)

The completion of the Reconquest in 1492 had reinstated the Roman Catholic Christian tradition in Spain. Yet around that time, elsewhere in Europe the Roman Catholic Church began to splinter from within as Martin Luther (1483–1546), John Calvin (1509–1564), and others presented new ideas on Christian doctrine. These built on questions raised by the scholastic theologians. Due to scientific developments, seafaring discoveries, and new economic models, Western Europe came to influence societies the world over—in the context of its largely Christian culture, which had split into two main groups, Roman Catholics and Protestants. Meanwhile, mystics of all three Abrahamic religions were finding new ways to experience God. Many responded to what they felt was the over-intellectualization of God by their scholastic theologians. Jews, Christians, and Muslims sought to discover the nature of God through direct experience—that is, through the heart and not the head.

1. God of the Jewish Kabbala

The Zohar is a key text of the Kabbala tradition that first appeared in Spain around 1300 C.E. It is mystical commentary on the Torah that introduces the idea of the Tree of Life, whose ten branches constitute a microcosm of the universe that can be realized within the body of a human being. The ten branches of the Tree of Life are known as sefirot (numbers, components). Eyn sof, the Infinite, is the root of the Tree of Life. It is the Godhead of which nothing can be spoken. Each further branch of the Tree of Life is associated with a divine quality named with a term from the Hebrew Bible, such as Wisdom, Understanding, Greatness, Strength, Glory, Victory, Majesty, Foundation, and Sovereignty (Scholem, 1977, p. 54 ). [Quote 42]

Sovereignty is the feminine word Shekina in Hebrew. Shekina means dwell, inhabit, settle, and rest. She is the divine presence, around which one can sense a connection with God. In the days of the Israelite monarchy (c. 1000 B.C.E.), the divine presence in the Temple in Jerusalem was identified as Shekina, and she is said to have inspired King David to compose his Psalms. On the Kabbala’s Tree of Life, Shekina represents the feminine principle into which divine energy from all the other sefirot flow (Scholem, 1977, p. 54). [Quote 43]

Jewish critics of the Kabbala argue that the unity of God is compromised in the splintering of God’s unity into ten components. Yet, proponents of the system point out that the sefirot are emanations from a single source, namely the Infinite(eyn sof), which is colorless light. The mystics say that God wanted to be known:

Hence it was he caused himself to be named El, Elohim, Shaddai, Zevaot and YHVH, each of which was a symbol among men of his several divine attributes… (Scholem, 1977, p. 52).

Contemplation of the numerical value of each Hebrew letter in the names of the sefirot helps the mystic experience the divine quality infused in that name. Torah holds many secrets in its letters, and the Zohar counsels men to “pursue the Torah with all their might, so as to come to be her lovers” (see Scholem, 1977, pp. 63–64). [Quote 44] Jewish mystics view both the divine presence and Torah as feminine. Through the profound explorations of Shekina and Torah in the Kabbala, medieval Jewish mystics reinfused their religious tradition with a profound sense of the divine feminine.

1. God of the Muslim Sufis

The years between 1200 C.E. – 1500 C.E. have been called the Golden Age of Sufism, because around 1200 C.E., Muslim mystics began organizing into Sufi Orders. “[T]he time had come for them to be linked up in a widespread brotherhood of mystics acknowledging a common master and using a common discipline and ritual” (Arberry, 1979, p. 85). Sufis emulated the acts of several prophets of God, including Moses, David, Jesus, and Muhammad. A passage from the Qur’an known as the Light Verse suggested to Sufis that God’s revelation to the prophets is reflected in one’s heart, just as the light of a lamp (a symbol of God’s light) is reflected in a niche (a symbol of the heart). Thus Sufis aimed to discover the light of God within their hearts and realize the truth of God’s revelation to the prophets (Qur’an 24:35). [Quote 45]

Shams of Tabriz (d. 1248) was among the great Sufi masters of the age. Shams taught the tradition of spiritual singing and dance (sama’) to Jalal al-din Rumi (1207–1273), the remarkable Persian poet. The sama’ was a profound means of experiencing union with God from the heart (Schimmel, 1975, p. 184). [Quote 46] Rumi and his followers created the order of Whirling Dervishes while based in Konya (in today’s Turkey). In explaining the value of turning as a spiritual practice, Shams quoted the Persian poet Sana’i (d. 1131?), who said, “Turn away twice and you’ve reached God” (Movahed, 1990, pp. 214, 397). [Quote 47]

The Whirling Dervish dance symbolizes turning away first from this world, and then from the other world. These two turnings are related to the Sufi doctrine of fana and baqa, a two-stage spiritual process of spiritual annihilation and recovery. Fana is realization of the passing away of all things in a transient world, and dying to oneself. Baqa is realization of the eternal continuation of spiritual life in God, and living in God.

The samā’ means to die to this world and to be revived in the eternal dance of the free spirits around a sun that neither rises nor sets. Fanā and baqā, annihilation and eternal life in God, can thus be represented in the movement of the mystical dance as understood by Rūmī and his followers. (Schimmel 1975:184)

The practice of using music and dance as a means of spiritual realization excited much controversy in Islam. Someone critical of the whirling dance once said to Shams of Tabriz, “With this sama’ you turned learned men into infamous people!” But Shams defended the spiritual practice with this observation, “Don’t you know that without this [dance] good and bad, infidel and Muslim among them will not be revealed (Movahed, 1990, p. 214). By this, Shams meant that through the dance it becomes obvious who is sincere and who is not.

1. God of the Christian Saints

In the 1500s, the Protestant Reformation was severely challenging the Roman Catholic institution in northern Europe. Meanwhile, Roman Catholic monarchs in what is now Spain worked hard to prevent any erosion of their religious tradition. Through the Inquisition they aimed to keep the Roman Catholic tradition pure and maintain the power of the church institutions. In this atmosphere two Spanish mystics lived under the watchful eye of the Roman Catholic authorities: Teresa of Avila (1515–1582) and her close friend John of the Cross (1542–1591), who each lead an order of “discalced” (barefoot) Carmelites. Church authorities watched Teresa and John closely to prevent them from speaking heresy.

Figure 4.6
Joan of Arc (painted around 1450 – 1500)

Source: Centre Historique des Archives Nationales in Paris (AE II 2490). Photo downloaded from Wikimedia (public domain), http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Joan_of_arc_miniature_graded.jpg

Archangel Michael with a host of angels first appeared to Joan of Arc (1412–1431) when she was about 13 years old. At Joan’s trial on March 17, 1431, Master Jean de La Fontaine questioned her about the appearance of Michael and the angels with regard to form, size, appearance, and clothing. The trial transcript records Joan’s answer:

He was in the form of a true and honest man, [prud’homme] and as for the clothes and other things, I shall not tell you any more. As for the angels, I saw them with my own eyes and you will get no more out of me about that. I believe as firmly the doings and sayings of St. Michael who appeared to me as I believe that our Lord Jesus Christ suffered death and passion for us (Pernoud, 1966, p. 172).

In the days of Joan of Arc, Teresa of Avila, and John of the Cross, Roman Catholic church authorities were suspicious of mystic visions. Mystics are often misunderstood, and get into trouble for what they say. Joan was burned at the stake on May 30, 1431—less than three months after she gave the above testimony about Michael.

The Spanish Inquisitors were particularly suspicious of newly converted Christians, thinking these so-called conversos might secretly practice Jewish rituals and disbelieve Christian dogma. Teresa’s father’s father was a Jewish convert to Christianity but was accused of being secretly Jewish. He confessed this crime to the Spanish Inquisitors, and then relocated his family to start a new Christian life in Avila, Spain. The authorities ordered Teresa to write down her mystic visions for the Inquisitors, and orally report her experiences to a priest. She eventually went into voluntary retirement. John was from a Jewish family that had converted to Roman Catholicism. Under suspicion of heresy, he was imprisoned in Toledo (in Spain) and confined for nearly 10 months to a cell 6 feet by 10 feet in size. (John, who was less than five feet tall, cleverly escaped.)

Teresa had visions of what she called seven mansions of an Interior Castle. She interpreted each mansion as a stage on the path to attaining a Spiritual Marriage with God. Reptiles and other creatures appeared in the outer court of the first mansion. The visions became progressively sublime. Her visions of the “Humanity of the Lord [Jesus]” involved the “medium of the sense and faculties” (Teresa of Avila 1961, p. 213). [Quote 48] The final interior mansion was a “secret union [that] takes place in the deepest centre of the soul, which must be where God Himself dwells” (Teresa of Avila, 1961, p. 213).

John turned his escape from prison into a religious metaphor. In prison, he composed eight stanzas, and appended a commentary. This book became known as The Dark Night of the Soul. John’s phrase “dark night of the soul” alludes both to experience in a prison cell, and to life without God. John taught that through love a person can escape from the prison of worldly life and find union with God. The spiritual path of love culminates in the experience of union with God, the Beloved (John of the Cross, 1991). [Quote 49]

After their deaths, Roman Catholic authorities canonized both Teresa and John as saints. They had successfully introduced new mystical views of God into Roman Catholic prayer life. In their own ways, Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross spoke of union with God. Certainly as Christians they would have acknowledged Jesus as the Son of God. Yet they both came to a feeling of union with God that transcended all representational form. In this respect, the culminating experience of these two Christian mystics apparently bore some similarity to the experiences of Jewish and Muslim mystics. Yet, it seems safe to say that no religious authority of their days would have been prepared to recognize all these children of Abraham aimed for the “same” experience of mystical union with God.

8. [Phase 7] One God Among Sisters and Brothers (1837 C.E.–Present)

Phase 7 in our History of God begins in 1837 C.E. with Charles Darwin starting his notebook on the biological evolution. Darwin had returned from a five-year voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle, a British survey vessel, with new ideas about the relationship between species of plants or animals that were similar but not identical. His On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection (1859) challenged the Abrahamic view of God as the creator. Phase 7 is in its beginnings, and the impact of Darwin’s theory of evolution is still being felt in the debate between Creationism and Evolution that rages among some Christians today.

The children of Abraham share much in their concept of God. Yet three areas of concern have posed special challenges to the understanding of God for Jews, Christians, and Muslims in Phase 7 of the History of God.

• Holocaust  The Holocaust has made a profound impact on the Jewish understanding of God in the modern world. Elie Wiesel (b. 1928), Nobel Peace Prize author and Holocaust survivor, wrote a memoir of his time in Nazi concentration camps called Night. In it he captures the human quest for understanding God in the modern world (Wiesel, 1982, pp. 72–73). [Quote 50]
• Science  New technologies developed by scientists have thrown Jews, Christians, and Muslims into moral dilemmas. Building on Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution of the species, other scientific discoveries are challenging the Abrahamic concept of God. For example, the issues of abortion and stem cell research have generated heated political debates in the United States of America among people who question the morality of what is perceived as interference with God’s creation of human life.
• Modernity and “Western” Culture  The challenge of “Western” culture confronts Muslims, who are challenged to fashion life according to the Islamic law on the one hand, and the demands of a global economy, communications, and cross-cultural contacts on the other. And while “modernity” poses challenges to traditional Jews, Christians, and Muslims, the combination of Western culture and European colonialism has been particularly disruptive to Muslims.

Perhaps the most significant development of the concept of God in modern times may prove to be a recognition that the God of one member of the Abrahamic family is the God of the other. The concept of God in our world today among Jews, Christians, and Muslims has come very close. And though Christians maintain the concept of the Trinity and generally consider Jesus to be the Son of God, all the children of Abraham seem to agree that God created the world and has a role to play in it.

It is notable that where once sectarian differences among Jews, Catholics, and Protestants created marked discrepancies in their respective translations, the differences have presently narrowed to so few words or passages that it is possible for Jewish and Christian scholars to collaborate on such translation projects as the Anchor Bible (Peters, 1984, p. 6).

Points to Ponder 4.5: All in the Family

Historian F. E. Peters speaks of the family bond among the children of Abraham, with its benefits and challenges. He notes that the God of Jews, Christians, and Muslims is the same divine source—called Elohim in Hebrew, Elah in the Aramaic spoken in the days of Jesus, and Allah in Arabic.

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are all children born of the same Father and reared in the bosom of Abraham. They grew to adulthood in the rich spiritual climate of the Near East, and though they have lived together all of their lives, now in their maturity they stand apart and regard their family resemblances and conditioned differences with astonishment, disbelief, or disdain.

Rich parallels of attitude and institutions exist among these three religions that acknowledge, in varying degrees, their evolution one out of the other. They have all engaged at times in reciprocal polemic of great ferocity, and sometime pursued a more ecumenical course” (Peters, 1984, p. ix).

[T]he same God: the Jews’ Yahweh, the Christians’ God the Father who is in Heaven, and the Muslims’ Allah is one and the same deity, with the same history, the same attributes and, in fact, the same name (Peters, 1984, p. 3).

What is your view of this close family relationship among Jews, Christians, and Muslims? Do you think modern communications technology will bring them closer together? Why or why not?

The understanding of the nature of the God of Abraham changed over time, and Jews, Christians, and Muslims developed perspectives that correlate with their particular scriptures. Nevertheless, in our day, Jews, Christians, and Muslims generally agree that:

• God is unique.
• There is only one God.
• God created the world.
• God conveyed a message through various prophets.
• God’s message is contained in scriptures.
• God should be worshiped by the faithful.

Sometimes people think that the God of Jews, Christians, and Muslims is different because different words are used. However, we have seen that there is a common heritage among the Abrahamic religions. In some respects, the understanding of God among Jews, Christians, and Muslims has never been closer. This is due to the years of cultural interpenetration and the high level of information-sharing and dialoging that comes with today’s media and internet technology. Moreover, there has never been as much reason for cooperation among people of these three religions as there is today. A serious consideration of this may be the foundation for a profound new harmony among the sisters and brothers of Abraham’s family.

We live in a time of intensified interaction among Jews, Christians, and Muslims due to modern technology and economic realities. Phase 7 in our History of God is called “One God Among Sisters and Brothers” because the importance of recognizing the common heritage among the Abrahamic religions has never been greater. With ever more sophisticated tools of communication and the operation of a global economy, people of the world depend upon each other more than ever. The survival of our global environment and inhabitants greatly depends upon peaceable relations among Jews, Christians, Muslims—and others.

References

Altmann, Ruth V. (1985). The Jewish way of life. Jerusalem, Israel: Nezer David.

Arberry, A. J. (1979 [1950]). Sufism: An account of the mystics of Islam. London: Unwin.

Bible. (2009). All translations are from the New International Version (NIV). Retrieved June 11, 2009, from http://www.BibleGateway.com

Gilgamesh Epic (Timothy R. Carnahan and the Academy for Ancient Texts, Trans.). Retrieved June 11, 2009, from http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/mesopotamian/gilgamesh/

Hadith. (2009). Quotes from the Muslim Hadith are taken from the translation of Sahih Bukhari collection. Retrieved June 11, 2009, from http://www.quran.org.uk/

Hadith Qudsi. (2008). Forty Hadith Qudsi. Revival of Islamic Heritage Society, Islamic Translation Center, P.O. Box 38130, Aldahieh, Kuwait. Retrieved January 11, 2008, from http://www.iiu.edu.my/deed/hadith/other.hadithqudsi.html

[Note: Other passages from the Christian New Testament that have parallels in the Muslim hadith include: Matthew 5:3, 6:1-2; 7:5, 7:6, 9: 2-7, 10:16, 13:3-12, 16:24, 17:20, 17:21, 20:1-16, 22:1-10, 22:21, and John 20:29. For an extended discussion of parallels between hadith traditions and Christian gospels, see Guillaume, Alfred. (1924). The traditions of Islam: An introduction to the study of the Hadith literature (pp. 132–149). Oxford: Clarendon Press.]

Haskins, Charles Homer. (1927). The Renaissance of the twelfth century. Boston: Harvard University Press.

John of the Cross. (1991). The collected works of St. John of the Cross (Kieran Kavanaugh and Otilio Rodriguez, Trans.). ICS Publications. Retrieved June 15, 2009, from http://www.karmel.at/ics/john/dn.html

Movahed, Mohammad Ali (Ed.). (1990). Maqâlât Shams Tabrizi (“The Discourses of Shams Tabrizi”), Tehran. (Portions translated by Lida Saeedian in an unpublished manuscript, 2009.) A partial translation is William Chittick’s Me and Rumi (2004). Louisville, KY: Fons Vitae.

Nicene Creed. Translated from Greek by the Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry. Retrieved June 12, 2009, from http://www.carm.org/creeds/nicene.htm

Pernoud, R. (1966). Joan of Arc: By herself and her witnesses (E. Hyams, Trans.). New York: Stein and Day.

Peters, F. E. (1984). Children of Abraham: Judaism, Christianity, Islam. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Pickthall, Mohammed Marmaduke (Trans.). (n.d.). The meaning of the glorious Koran. New York: New American Library.

Rubenstein, Richard E. (2003) Aristotle’s children: How Christians, Muslims, and Jews rediscovered ancient wisdom and illuminated the Middle Ages. Orlando: Harcourt.

Schimmel, Annemarie. (1975). Mystical dimensions of Islam. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press.

Scholem, Gershom (Ed.). (1977 [1949]). Zohar, the book of splendor: Basic readings from the Kabbalah. New York: Schocken Books.

Teresa of Avila. (1961). Interior castle (E. Allison Peers, Ed. and Trans.). Garden City, NY: Doubleday.

Wiesel, Elie. (1982). Night. Translated from French by Stella Rodway. New York: Bantam. (Original work published c. 1958)

Additional Reading

Armstrong, Karen. (1993). A history of God: The 4000-year quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. New York: A.A. Knopf.

Cobb, John. (1987). God: God in post-biblical Christianity. In Lindsay Jones (Ed.), The encyclopedia of religion (2^nd ed.) (pp. 3553–3560). Detroit, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005.

Cornell, Vincent J. (2005). God: God in Islam. In Lindsay Jones (Ed.), The encyclopedia of religion (2^nd ed.) (pp. 3560–3567). Detroit, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005.

Ehrman, Bart D. (Ed.). (2003). Lost scriptures: Books that did not make it into the New Testament. New York: Oxford University Press.

Fuller, Reginald H. (1987, 2005). God: God in the New Testament. In Lindsay Jones (Ed.), The encyclopedia of religion (2^nd ed.) (pp. 3543–3547). Detroit, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005.

Goitein, S. D. (2005). Jews and Arabs: A concise history of their social and cultural relations. Mineola, NY: Dover.

Guillaume, Alfred. (1924). The Traditions of Islam: An introduction to the study of the Hadith literature. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Jacobs, Louis. (1987, 2005). God: God in post-biblical Judaism. In Lindsay Jones (Ed.), The encyclopedia of religion (2^nd ed.) (pp. 3547–3552). Detroit, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005.

Marcus, Jacob R. (1961). The Jew in the medieval world: A sourcebook. Cleveland: Meridian Books. (Original work published c. 1938)

Pagles, Elaine. (1981). The Gnostic gospels. New York: Vintage Books.

Sperling, S. David. (1987, 2005). God in the Hebrew Scriptures. In Lindsay Jones (Ed.), The encyclopedia of religion (2^nd ed.) (pp. 3537–3543). Detroit, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005.

Stillman, N. (1979). The Jews of Arab Lands. New York: Jewish Publication Society.

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Answer:

(Phase 1) God’s People, Land, and Law (1600 B.C.E.-1050 B.C.E.)

This phase starts with Abraham migrating into Canaan around 1600 B.C.E. and is finalized after, the passing of Moses with a Philistine defeat of the Hebrews in Canaan. In this phase, we will focus on the character Abraham who belonged to the religion of Christianity (Altmann, 1985).

The case of Abraham.

There are four key events that define the God of Abraham as recorded in the Hebrew Scriptures. First, God gave descendants to Abraham. Secondly, he told Abraham to offer his son as a sacrifice, third, God he told Abraham to circumcise his male members and finally he promised a holy land for Abraham and his descendants.

In the first case of descendants promised to Abraham, we can find it recorded in Genesis 15:4-6, where he obeyed Gods command to leave Ur and go to Haran. He went with his wife, Sarah, his father Terah and Lot who was his nephew. After he had moved to Haran, God promised his many descendants (Bible, 2009).In the case where Abraham was told to offer a sacrifice, it is recorded in Genesis 22:13. Often worship of God was usually accompanied by offering of sacrifices, but Abraham was requested by God to offer his only son Isaac (Bible, 2009).In Genesis 17:19-27, we see God commanding Abraham to sacrifice every male which was a sign of his special relationship with Abraham. Abraham obeyed, and he circumcised both himself and his son (Bible, 2009).Genesis 15:18-21 records that God gave Abraham land that he and his descendants would consider holy

Abraham Black Stone

Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Blackstone.JPG

The Caption of the Image

Abraham tradition states that several altars were built by Abraham. Abraham used a black stone as the one shown above to build the original altar. The black stone built in the corner of today’s Kaba is said to be that stone from the Islamic community. Near this black stone is an area referred to as Abraham’s place where Muslims stand while worshiping Kaba. What seems interesting, about the picture is that one’s reflection can be seen in it and hence it must have been a precious stone.

(Phase 2) God in the First Temple (1050 B.C.E.-586 B.C.E.).

In 1050 B.C.E., a strong need to unite the 12 tribes of Israel came to the Ark of the Covenant being captured and the Philistine defeat of the Hebrews. Phase 2 of the history of God is started by uniting the tribes of Israel under the kingship of Saul in 1020 B.C.E and ends with the tribe of Judah being exiled in Babylon in 586 B.C.E. This phase is which the first temple existed and which was constructed around 1000 B.C.E. and destroyed around 586 B.C.E. (Arbery, 1979). The Mosaic Law was relocated from Shiloh to Jerusalem by King David where later his son Solomon built the first Temple, and the Ark of Covenant was kept there. The Ark of the Covenant contained the commandments that God had given Moses on Mount Sinai.

Moses and the Burning Bush

Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:1_StCatherines_Sinai.jpg

 

The Caption of the Image

The image shows Mount Sinai where Moses saw the burning bush. Moses had a peculiar experience where he saw the bush burning without being consumed. This mountain is of significance since that is where Moses received the Ten Commandments. What is interesting about the image is that the mountain seems to be very high especially in these building. The building is Saint Catherine’s monastery.

(Phase 3) God in the second temple (586 B.C.E-70 C.E.)

In 586 B .C.E., King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon conquered the southern kingdom of Judah and destroyed the temple built by Solomon in Jerusalem (Jeremiah 52:4 -16). This phase, therefore, begins with the exile in Babylon and ends is finalized by the Diaspora. The second temple was built in this phase, and its altar was erected in the place chosen by Solomon in Jerusalem. Its construction began in 535 B.C.E. It was later destroyed by the Rom an army in 70 C.E (Pernoud, 1966).

Jesus of Nazareth.

In this phase, the focus is on Jesus of Nazareth who was born into a Jewish community in Nazareth towards the restoration period coming to an end. He was raised being taught the Torah (Law of Moses).The history of Jesus is written in the letters of Paul which were written 30 years before he was martyred. This event happened around six years before the destruction of the second temple which Jesus had predicted of its destruction in Mark 13:1-4(Peters, 1984).

Torah Scroll Source:  Source

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:V11p131001_Torah.jpg

The Caption of the Image

According to the custom of Near Eastern, the first words of the scroll helped to identify any written text. Today, Hebrew titles based on early scrolls are used in some Bibles, while Greek titles are used in others. Jews today, use hand copy Torah scrolls for their rituals in synagogues. What is interesting about the Torah scrolls is that it is very large and contains many writings in one scroll.

 

(Phase 4) One God with no temple (70 C.E. – 622 C.E).

This phase starts with the Jewish Diaspora and is finalized with the third religion of Abraham being established; that is Islam in 622 C.E.it was this time that Jews were forced to relocate and leave Jerusalem. Afterward, both Christians and Jews believed God as the creator of the universe who was unique, and no other gods had a share in Gods power which was supreme (Hadith, 2009).

God as a Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

The Roman Empire wanted to be unified by Constantine (c. 274-337 C.E) regarding Christian religion. For reasons to do with politics, he made an order that 300 bishops were to form a council to standardize the Christian beliefs so as to eliminate heresy. There were three councils formed, and the third one declared the unity of the Trinity and said that it was inseparable (Wiesel and Elie, 1982).

Emperor Justinian

Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Justinian.jpg

The Caption of the Image

Justinian (527-565) reconstituted and revised the legal code of the Romans and tried to make the laws across the Roman Empire standard. He rooted out heresy and paganism in the Empire of Byzantine and ordered the construction of 90 churches. What is interesting about the image is that an Emperor was adorned with beautiful artifacts and this shows he was highly valued.

(Phase 5) One God in Three Religions (622 C.E.-1238 C.E.)

After 700 years of living in Diaspora not having the temple in Jerusalem, both Christians and Jews revised their opinions about God. Muslims redefined monotheism in the seventh century. There were huge differences be in use of the Christian faith and the Muslim faith

Especially of icons to represent spiritual facts (Hadith, 2009).

Allah

Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dcp7323-Edirne-Eski_Camii_Allah.svg

The caption of the Image.

This image represents Allah the God of the Muslim people. Muslims have developed a tradition of reciting 99 names of Allah. The most capturing thing about the image is that it is written in Arabic.

(Phase 6) God of the Head and Heart (1238 C.E. – 1837 C.E.)

This phase is focused on two shifts in the concept of God. One from the mystical perspective and the other from an intellectual perspective. Phase 6 starts in the year 1238 C.E. when Kin g Jaime 1 of Aragon retook Valencia from the Muslims (Teresa of Avila, 1961).

God of the Christian Saints.

Roman Catholics believed in saints and tried had to overcome the people who were challenging them especially the Protestant Reformation. The people who had received visions from angels were closely watched to prevent heresy (Pernoud, 1966)

Joan of– 1500) Arc (painted around 1450

 Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Joan_of_arc_miniature_graded.jpg

The Caption of the Image

At 13 years, Joan of Arc (1412-1432) was visited by Michael the Archangel. She was later questioned in the trial about the appearance of the angel where she refused to give full details. What is interesting about the picture is that Joan is holding a scroll with the angels who appeared to hear.

 

References

Altmann, Ruth V. (1985). The Jewish way of life. Jerusalem, Israel: Nezer David.

Arberry, A. J. (1979 [1950]).Sufism: An account of the mystics of Islam. London: Unwin.

Bible. (2009). All translations are from the New International Version (NIV). Retrieved June

11, 2009, from http://www.BibleGateway.com

Hadith. (2009). Quotes from the Muslim Hadith are taken from the translation of Sahih

Bukhari collection. Retrieved June 11, 2009, from http://www.quran.org.uk/

Haskins, Charles Homer. (1927). The Renaissance of the twelfth century. Boston: Harvard

University Press.

John of the Cross. (1991). the collected works of St. John of the Cross (Kieran Kavanaugh

And Otilio Rodriguez, Trans.). ICS Publications. Retrieved June 15, 2009, from http://www.karmel.at/ics/john/dn.html

Pernoud, R. (1966). Joan of Arc: By herself and her witnesses (E. Hyams, Trans.). New

York: Stein and Day.

Peters, F. E. (1984). Children of Abraham: Judaism, Christianity, Islam. Princeton, NJ:

Princeton University Press.

Rubenstein, Richard E. (2003) Aristotle’s children: How Christians, Muslims, and Jews

Rediscovered ancient wisdom and illuminated the Middle Ages. Orlando: Harcourt.

Schimmel, Annemarie. (1975). Mystical Dimensions of Islam. Chapel Hill, NC: The

University of North Carolina Press.

Teresa of Avila. (1961). Interior Castle (E. Allison Peers, Ed. and Trans.). Garden City, NY:

Doubleday.

Wiesel, Elie. (1982). Night. Translated from French by Stella Rodway. New York: