The Similarities Between The Torah And The Christian Bible

Moses: The holy book of my faith is the Torah, and contains the Old Testament. The Old Testament is also used in the Christian’s Bible, making the Torah the foundation for the Bible.

The Holy Bible is a book comprised of many parts, chapters, and verses. There are 66 books in the bible; the first 39 books are called the Old Testament. Written in Hebrew, it focuses on the prophecies of the coming savior. The remaining 27 books, the New Testament, are centered on the life of Jesus and his teachings. A similarity in the TaNaKh and the Holy Bible is the presence of the Torah. The Torah, in addition to being the first part of the TaNaKh, is actually the first 5 books of the Bible (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy). Because the Christians, unlike the Jews, had no official language, they wrote and spoke in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, or Latin. These holy books were important to these religions so their beliefs and traditions could be passed down to future generations.

One of the many decisions that has to made in life is what, if any, religion they will practice. Christianity, the belief in God, and Jesus as his son, or Judaism, to follow the direction of the Torah are some of the major religions that a person may choose. This decision may be one of the biggest decisions of a person’s life, and each religion has similarities and differences, and pro’s and cons. Two of the major religions, Judaism and Christianity, are alike in their inspiration of sacred texts, but are different in their identity of Jesus, and practice of worship.

The Old Testament is the largest part of the bible nestled behind the leather binding in the front of the book. Unlike most books, told from one-person or even two this is comprised of multiple, some stories even having two different versions in another point of view; over time it has become a large collection of ancient texts written and re-written by different authors and editors over the many years. The stories show the ancient Israelites, they show the laws, and rituals, which make up their religion and the small embers, which will one day, turn to a flame that is Christianity. The Jewish people view these stories as collected in what they call the Torah, is the collection for what makes up their history and the promise that God gave to them, as well as their laws and what they worship today. For the Christians the Old Testament is still seen as sacred, but most place a stronger importance to the New Testament.

The biggest difference between Judaism and Christianity is their view on God and Jesus. Christianity teaches that Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies of a coming Messiah / Savior. Christians believe that Jesus is the son of God, part of the trinity, and that only through

Since the dawn of man, millions of people around the world coming from all kinds of diverse cultures and different backgrounds have been born into a family where some sort of religion is practiced. Fortunately, in the modern day here in the United States, we are free to worship and practice any religion we please. Two of the main religions in the United States and North America in general is Judaism and Christianity. It goes without saying that these two religions do have a lot in common, which is mostly due to the fact that Judaism was the forefather of Christianity. The main base is the same for both religions, the Old Testament.

Thousands of years ago, it was taught and learned that Moses was the sole author of the Torah, or the Pentateuch; this is known as the Mosaic Authorship. Although this view was proven to possess many flaws, it is still believed by some people today. It is now agreed by most that there cannot be one exclusive author to such an epic document. This is due to the fact that many studies have conducted in order to prove that there is indeed more than one author. It was decided are simply too many discrepancies when it comes to writing styles,

The Documentary Source Theory states the belief that Torah was not written by Moses, but rather, four independent authors. (Ch. 1 Pg. 21 )

There are several key similarities of key circumstances for Christianity and Judaism. They are similar because of their place of origin and their popularity around the world. For example, Christianity originated from the middle east, and Judaism was founded in Ancient Palestine, also considered the middle east. This reveals that both religions originated in the same place which makes them similar. Another example is, Christianity is extremely popular world religion, similarly Judaism is also a popular world religion. Most of the world are either christian or jew, which reveals many do accept the ideas the religions present and that they are very influential.

Although it is argued that rabbis began work on compiling the oral histories prior to the fall of the Second Temple, there was a definite resurgence in documentation of the important history and moral laws of Judaism after the fall. The most important of these written documents in the Jewish faith is the Hebrew Bible. This bible is comprised of the Torah, Nevi’im and Ketuvim, these three components combine to make up the Tanakh. The Torah is the core of the Hebrew Bible and contains the story of creation, as well as directions on daily conduct and religious rituals. The Nevi’im contains the stories of prophets. The prophets were people that spoke on behalf of God to the Jewish people. Lastly, the Ketuvim is comprised of mostly imaginative literature such as psalms, proverbs and poetry (Molloy, 294). Shifting the focus from priests and temple to a written work that is accessible to all regardless of location was the main adaptation of Judaism and certainly saved the faith. Although the historical accuracy of the Hebrew Bible is debatable, as some stories may have morphed from their origination to when they were assembled in writing, the bible still remains at the core of Judaism today.

With the mystical unions in both Christianity and Judaism, there are many similarities. One of these similarities is the celebration of a wedding. In the Christian tradition, the wedding is between Christ and his people. When a person gets ready to take communion, they wear their Sunday best and they have prepared themselves to receive the Lord and be united with Him. In the Jewish tradition, the wedding that is being celebrated is that of the Shekinah and the Tiferet. This union brings the cosmos and the Sefirot in balance, which causes a rejoicing because God becomes one. This is done by the lower worlds are reunited with the upper worlds, which allows God graces to shine down. This wedding also returns the Jews to their homeland and return the Shekinah from exile (Sherwin). The wedding is a big aspect in both Christianity and Judaism.

The Torah tells the story of the foundation of Judaism and how it was built. The second section of the Hebrew bible, Nevi’im also known as the Prophets is considered to have been written by people blessed with the spirit of prophecy. It contains a record of most of the important history in the years after Moses. The third portion of the Hebrew bible, Ketuvim also known as the Writings, is made up of various kinds of writings. The books in the Writings are considered to be less sacred than the books of the Prophets because the books of Prophets are thought to have been written under direct inspiration from God, while the books in the Writings are supposed to be the work of prophets working in a normal manner. Although most Jews lived by the laws of the Torah, the interpretation of the Torah is what caused the Jewish people to divide into three major sections known as the Sadducees, Pharisees, and Essenes. The Sadducees were elitists who wanted to maintain their priestly state. They did this by maintaining rituals with the temple and didn’t allow non-Sadducees in the temple. They were willing to incorporate Hellenism into their lives and they rejected the oral law and instead followed the written law, both of these opposed the Pharisees. The Pharisees were the “spiritual fathers” of modern Judaism. Their main distinguishing difference among the three was that they were blue collared Jews

It has been thought to believe the Quran is influenced by the Hebrew Bible. There are many similarities between the two scriptural texts whom Christian and Jewish readers would find the Quran corresponds with the Hebrew bible. Muslim followers of the Quran first started off by giving oral scriptures around the same time the Israelites were. There is a common conception the two crossed paths and Muslims followers were predisposed to the Israelites biblical scriptures. Although the research conducted by Waldman, Neuwirth, Wheeler, and Reeves give us undoubtedly a better understanding between the two. There still lacks further studies on this matter that would help answer open ended questions. Studies including the Jewish borrowings in the Quran text have brought up questions of Muhummad’s Jewish teachers. Islam is centered on Muslim thought, culture, devotion, and the tales of biblical prophets whom have continuously been reinterpreted for centuries. For many scholars the reinterpretations and oral scriptural stories given of the Quran does not set a solid foundation providing us a skeptical and confusing origin.

The Bible, according to some scholars was written over a span of 1,500 years. It was written by prophets, kings and apostles that were used by God to put His words into writing. Although the Bible was first written in the Greek language, it has been translated to almost all languages present today and has been interpreted in many

The Old Testament is made up of forty six books while the New Testament is made up of twenty seven books, with a total of seventy three books in all. The Bible was written by forty different authors from all walks of life, who wrote this with the inspiration about God and God’s people. Moses and Apostle Paul were the two main contributors in writing the bible. Moses wrote the first five books in the Bible and referred to it as the Pentateuch while Apostle Paul wrote fourteen books in the New Testament.