Why are religious tolerance and pluralism so difficult to achieve? Why is the often violent fundamentalist backlash against them so potent? Robert Erlewine looks to a new religion of reason for answers to these questions. Drawing on Enlightenment writers Moses Mendelssohn, Immanuel Kant, and Hermann Cohen, who placed Christianity and Judaism in tension with tolerance and pluralism, Erlewine finds a way to break the impasse, soften hostilities, and establish equal relationships with the Other. Erlewine's recovery of a religion of reason stands in contrast both to secularist critics of religion who reject religion for the sake of reason and to contemporary religious conservatives who eschew reason for the sake of religion. Monotheism and Tolerance suggests a way to deal with the intractable problem of religiously motivated and justified violence.

Monotheism and Tolerance suggests a way to deal with the intractable problem of religiously motivated and justified violence.

Explores the dangers and benefits of monotheistic intolerance, interacting with scholars of monotheism, evolutionary theory, and agonistic pluralism.

Today, and historically, religions often seem to be intolerant, narrow-minded, and zealous. But the record is not so one-sided. In Religious Tolerance in World Religions, numerous scholars offer perspectives on the "what" and "why" traditions of tolerance in world religions, beginning with the pre-Christian West, Greco-Roman paganism, and ancient Israelite Monotheism and moving into modern religions such as Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism. By tolerance the authors mean "the capacity to live with religious difference, and by toleration, the theory that permits a majority religion to accommodate the presence of a minority religion." The volume is introduced with a summary of a recent survey that sought to identify the capacity of religions to tolerate one another in theory and in practice. Eleven religious communities in seven nations were polled on questions that ranged from equality of religious practitioners to consequences of disobedience. The essays frame the provocative analysis of how a religious system in its political statement produces categories of tolerance that can be explained in that system’s logical context. Past and present beliefs, practices, and definitions of social order are examined in terms of how they support tolerance for other religious groups as a matter of public policy. Religious Tolerance in World Religions focuses attention on the attitude "that the ’infidel’ or non-believer may be accorded an honorable position within the social order defined by Islam or Christianity or Judaism or Buddhism or Hinduism, and so on." It is a timely reference for colleges and universities and for makers of public policy.

Concept of Momotheism in Islam & Christianity

Maddie Edwards is a loving mother, and the bond between her and her son Toby is unusually close -- especially after Maddie's beloved husband is murdered, and little Toby vows to take care of his mom. The young widow is desperate to support herself and her child, and is grateful to secure a job with a temp agency. But the work is not what she expects. Neither is the Agency. Maddie discovers she is ideally suited for the assignments she is given, clandestine tasks deep within government and corporate life -- tasks that also give her an outlet for the rage at her husband's murder. Maddie becomes two people, making her an ideal agent for the Agency. But her son grows to become an FBI agent. When he is given the assignment to find the killer of a U.S. senator, Toby and Maddie find themselves on a collision course that threatens to destroy them both. The Agency: When Souls Collide is a fascinating novel of intrigue and romance, and a frightening description of powerful, cynical manipulators of the political world. Yet in the end it is a testament to the strength of love.

The highly regarded author of "King David" and "Moses" explores the roots of religious extremism. Perfectly suited to readers of Bernard Lewis and Karen Armstrong, "God Against the Gods" is a dramatic and eye-opening epic of the final struggle between monotheism and polytheism in the ancient world.

An examination of monotheism and the world-shaping impact of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam discusses major events in their histories, considering such topics as each religion's intolerance of the others, their resistances and compromises, and the comparatively tolerant model presented by American monotheists.

Forgiveness is a hallmark teaching within monotheistic religions. This Element introduces the topic in three ways. First, it considers the extent to which forgiveness is specific to or constituted by monotheistic beliefs, by a comparison with analogous teaching and practice in Buddhism. Second, the most extensive section explores the grammar of forgiveness shared across the Abrahamic traditions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam – elements of repentance, intercession, and eschatological deferral. This section identifies some of the divergent tendencies or emphases on this topic among those traditions. A third section addresses the role of forgiveness and monotheistic religions in human cultural evolution and the emergence of eusociality. The aim is for the reader to gain an introductory view of monotheism and forgiveness from a comparative religious example, from an internal examination of Abrahamic traditions, and from a developmental, secular perspective.