Three Testaments
Torah, Gospel, and Quran
Foreword by Amir Hussain Contributions by Laleh Bakhtiar, Marc Zvi Brettler, David Bruce, Henry Carrigan, Ellen Frankel, Nevin Reda Edited by Brian Arthur Brown
Publication date:
02 January 2014Length of book:
656 pagesPublisher
Rowman & Littlefield PublishersISBN-13: 9781442214934
From disagreement over an Islamic Center in New York to clashes between Christians and Muslims in Egypt, tension between the three Abrahamic faiths often runs high. Yet for all their differences, these three traditions—Judaism, Islam, and Christianity—share much in common. Three Testaments brings together for the first time the text of the Torah, the New Testament, and the Quran, so that readers can explore for themselves the connections, as well as the points of departure, between the three faiths.
Notable religion scholars provide accessible introductions to each tradition, and commentary from editor Brian Arthur Brown explores how the three faiths may draw similarities from the ancient Zoroastrian tradition. This powerful book provides a much-needed interfaith perspective on key sacred texts.
Notable religion scholars provide accessible introductions to each tradition, and commentary from editor Brian Arthur Brown explores how the three faiths may draw similarities from the ancient Zoroastrian tradition. This powerful book provides a much-needed interfaith perspective on key sacred texts.
As no language is pure, having only its own root words or idioms; no gene pool is devoid of influences from foreign genetic lines and no ecological system is without the presence of invasive and adaptive species, so no religious tradition is whole or pure within itself, cut off from historic and interactive encounter with internal heterodox or vital forces from external religious encounters. Having demonstrated the many ways in which Christian and Islamic sacred texts manifest such influences and parallels in a seminal previous work, Brian Arthur Brown and his associates here turn to a deeper investigation of the common as well as the distinctive features of the monotheistic world faiths present in the Torah, the Gospel and the Quran, including some possible influence in each by Zoroastrianism. Well aware that the evidence is not conclusive in many cases, he courageously and suggestively charts out the dots that can be, or perhaps can become, connected as further research dictates, thereby setting forth a possible map of the partially hidden root system that feeds the major branches of the flourishing world religions. If this map is followed and fleshed out it should lead us to discover how much the heirs or this cluster of faiths share and open the doors to a deeper, wider dialogue.