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Islam and Christianity are the two largest religions in the world.
Although they seem very different, they share many similarities in
their origin and teachings. 33% of the world population believes in
Christianity, and 21% in Islam. Although they are the religions that
emphasize one God and love and peace, the believers in these
religions fought each other a number of times over the history.
Christianity was started based on Jesus, while Islam was started by
Muhammad. Christianity and Islam are similar in many aspects. Both
Muhammad and Jesus taught their people “God is one and only, the
greatest.” Also they both taught to repent because God who punished
the sinners. At the times of both men’s lives, many people believed in
polytheistic religion, but they emphasized to have faith in only one
god. Many followers devoted their lives to Muhammad and Jesus, but
as those men’s power and influence grew large, both men faced
opposition. Both religions had the holy books containing the
teachings of Jesus and Muhammad, which were the Bible and Qur’an.
Qur’an has the messages of Muhammad, who was a “man” who
played a role as the messenger of the god. On the other hand, Bible
contains the teachings of Jesus, the God.
The followers of Muhammad, called Muslims, expanded their territory,
conquering a lot of cities including the holy city of Jerusalem. At that
time the holy city was a part of the Byzantine Empire, which believed
in Christianity. Although Muslims treated their conquered territory with
generosity and religious freedom, Muslims built a new building for
their religion, Dome of the Rock, which meant a big threat to
Christianity. In response, the Pope called for help to fight against
Muslims. That was the beginning of Crusades. A number of
Christians gathered to fight for Muslims, believing that they were
fighting for the God. When the first crusades attacked the Islamic
world, they were described as “real surprise” since Muslims didn’t
know who they were. And since then, there were even 9 times of
Crusades and a lot of people died in order to defend their religion.
Muslims believed that Muhammad is the messenger of God. In the
time of Muhammad, people lived in desert by tribes, which were
basically large families. Without tribal protection, it was hard to
survive in desert and each tribe had its own gods. Different from this
tradition, Muhammad offered the idea of one God, and the followers
of Muhammad made their own tribe without any family relationship.
Muslims respected other religions such as Christianity and Judaism.
They led a life of “simple devotion” and rituals. They believed there
would be the “Day of Judgment.” And Qur’an, which Muhammad
wrote down, is the center source of their belief. It is said that Qur’an
has “no easy description of God” because one “cannot project God in
human terms.” Therefore, Muslims celebrate “beauty of Qur’an itself.”
Christianity and Islam were both started by a strong leader, have a
book of teachings, and are monotheistic religion. Muslims, which
means the followers Muhammad, believe in the message of
Muhammad, the total submission to God. And they showed
generosity and peace to the people they vanquished. However, by
political reasons, they have been fighting against each other, starting
with the first crusade. The wars between them resulted in serious
damage to Christian and Islamic civilization.