ght seem to suggest they be. They have summed up as follows:Man can, therefore, unaided, achieve his own redemption by penitence. Prayer having replaced the sacrifices of the Temple, no extra substitute for them is needed The world is not regarded as inherently bad and Judaism consequently repudiates those Gospel sayings and teachings which, inspired by the conviction that the end of the world was at hand, maintained that the pious should abandon the ordinary conditions of settled social life and concentrate on the approaching change in the order of things. (Encyclopedia Britannica, p.166)Rabbis, for example, can marry and have children, and Judaism in general accepts the world as it is. This is because the end of the world and the coming of the Messiah to reveal the Kingdom of God to man is looked forward to; in other words, Judaism places the Messianic age in the future, some authorities holding that this consummation will be non-catastrophic, but the outcome of the gradual development of the human race, Judaism believing essentially in progressive evolution, while others hold that a personal messiah, sent by God, will bring the Golden Age to pass (Encyclopedia Britannica, p.166)More than Judaism, the Islamic religion is the product of the genius of one man, Mohammed, regarded by the Islamic peoples as the true prophet God. Mohammed was born approximately 570 years after the birth of Jesus, at Mecca on the Arabian Peninsula. With the general collapse of the Roman Empire, paganism had overtaken much of the Middle East, and the peoples of Arabia were largely dissatisfied with the teachings of Judaism and Christianity. The inclination to monotheism was well founded in the region, and the people of Mecca already recognized Allah as the one God. It was in this atmosphere that we are told Mohammed received direct inspiration from God:He was almost forty years old when he received his call. We are told that a voice called to him, Rec...
