JUMUAH MUBARAK! SHABBAT SHALOM! HAPPY FRIDAY! While political events tend to emphasize the divisions between Jews and Muslims, for students of the Islamic past it is the uncanny similarities between the two religious traditions that continually arouse ones amazement. The resemblances extend to many areas of ritual and observance. Muhammad, the founder of the Islamic faith, was in close contact with the affluent and influential Jewish tribes of Arabia (among whom were to be found the ancestors of todays Yemenite Jews) who probably accounted for the majority of the population of al-Madinah, the first Islamic community. Much Jewish teaching was incorporated into Muhammads message, and he in turn directed much of his preaching to the Jews, in hope that they would accept him as a true prophet. Almost all of the names used to designate the principal observances of Islam derive from Hebrew or Aramaic terms that were in common use among the Jews.
Posted on: Fri, 03 Oct 2014 00:55:15 +0000
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