FAQ: Define The Abrahamic God

This is a condensed (quick) study of the how God is viewed by Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam).

Judaism, Christianity and Islam view God as The eternal being who created the universe and all there is. They attribute these properties to God:

• Holiness: separate from sin and incorruptible
• Justice: fair, right, and true in all his judgments
• Sovereignty: unthwartable in his will
• Omnipotence: all-powerful
• Omniscience: all-knowing
• Omni-benevolence: all-loving
• Omnipresence: present everywhere at the same time
• Immortality: eternal and everlasting
• Transcendence: he is outside space and outside time, and therefore eternal and unable to be changed by earthly forces or anything else within his creation

The Bible, Scriptures and Quran (and the followers of all Abrahamic religions) refer to God in personal terms, as in the one who is, who speaks, who sees, hears, acts, and loves.  God has a will and a personality. In other words, an anthropomorphic God. God is an all powerful, divine and benevolent being who is primarily concerned with people.

The Judaeo-Christian (traditional western) God can be described in many ways. You will find definitions such as: “the Supreme Being, understood as Life, Truth, Love, Mind, Soul, Spirit, Principle.”*1  or  “the incorporeal divine Principle ruling over all as eternal Spirit : infinite Mind”*2

Further, the Christian God is expanded and is substantially seen as the trinity, “the father, son and holy spirit.” He is also the:

• one (Deut. 6:4, Romans 3:30, Galatians 3:20, James 2:19)
• holy (Psalm 99:9)
• spirit (John 4:24)
• light (1 John 1:5)
• love (1 John 4:8, 1 John 4:16)

In Islam, God has 99 attributes (or names), the most common ones are:

• The Most High (al-Aziz)
• The Most Great (al-Mutakabbir)
• The Ever Forgiving (al-Jaffar)
• The Ever Providing (al-Muhaymin)
• The Lord and Cherisher of the Worlds (Rabb al-Alameen)
• The Self Subsisting (al-Haqq)
• The Eternal Lord (al-Baqi)
• The Sustainer (al-Muqsith)
• Find the remaining names here

Muslims view God, Allah, as the same Creator God who covenanted with Abraham. The Qur’an insists that the profit Muhammad and his followers (Muslims) worship the same God as the Jews*3.

Francis Edwards Peters states that the Qur’an portrays Allah as both more powerful and more remote than Yahweh, and as a universal deity, unlike Yahweh who closely follows Israelites. *4

According to Encyclopedia Britannica:

God, says the Qur’an, “loves those who do good,” and two passages in the Qur’an express a mutual love between God and man, but the Judeo-Christian precept to “love God with all thy heart” is nowhere formulated in Islam. The emphasis is rather on God’s inscrutable sovereignty, to which one must abandon oneself. In essence, the “surrender to Allah” (Islam) is the religion itself.

Resources:

• 1- “Christian Science”. god. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged. Retrieved December 29, 2009, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/god
• 2- “Christian Science”. “GOD.” Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. 2009.
  Merriam-Webster Online. 29 December 2009
  <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/GOD>
• 3- [Qur'an 29:46]
• 4- Francis Edwards Peters & F.E. Peters, Islam, p.4, Princeton University Press, 2003
• Stagg, Frank. New Testament Theology, Nashville: Broadman, 1962. ISBN 085416137
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_(Christianity)
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_in_Abrahamic_religions
• http://www.verumserum.com/?p=165
• http://www.biblegateway.com
• http://www.biblestudytools.com
• Your Sunday school

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