The Gospel of Barnabas: what Muslims should know
The Gospel of Barnabas echoes the Islamic account of Jesus, but its manuscripts and text are late medieval. Why the Qur’an’s account of Jesus…
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History
The history of Judaism, Christianity, Islam and Mandaeism from antiquity to the present.
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Ishmael in the Abrahamic traditions
Abraham’s firstborn son in Genesis and the Qur’an: the promise to Ishmael, the Kaaba, and why most Muslim scholars hold that he was the…
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Are the Abrahamic religions violent? War and peace in scripture and history
Has religion caused most wars? What the historical record shows, what the scriptures of each tradition command about war and peace, and the verse…
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Judaism vs Christianity: answers for Reddit readers
Are Judaism and Christianity the same religion? What divides them, which Bible each reads, and whether Christians keep the law: short, sourced answers.
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The parting of the ways: how Christianity separated from Judaism
Jesus and his disciples were Jews. How did their movement become a separate religion? From Acts and Paul to the two wars with Rome…
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Where was Abraham from? Ur, Harran and Urfa
Genesis names Ur of the Chaldeans. Archaeologists point to southern Iraq, others to the north, and Urfa claims him by tradition. The evidence, and…
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The symbols of the four traditions
The Star of David, the Mandaean banner, the cross and the crescent: where each came from, how old each is, and why Islam, strictly,…
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What language did Abraham speak?
Akkadian, Aramaic, Hebrew or Arabic? The world of Abraham, the Jewish and Muslim traditions about his language, and the Qur’anic principle that joins them.
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Nicaea, 325: the council, the creed and the church beneath the lake
Archaeologists at Iznik have found the earlier church beneath the lakeside basilica. What the Council of Nicaea decided there, how it ranked the great…
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The five great sees of the early church
How Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem came to head the church of the Roman empire, and what became of the arrangement after the…
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Hagia Sophia: cathedral, mosque, museum and mosque again
Cathedral for nine centuries, the first mosque of the Ottoman state, a museum, and a mosque again: the history of Hagia Sophia and the…
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Ḥirāʾ and Qubāʾ: where the revelation and the first mosque began
Where the revelation began and where the first mosque was built: the cave of Ḥirāʾ above Makkah and the mosque of Qubāʾ at Madinah,…