Major Monotheisitic Faiths Urged to Draw on Common Roots

A leading religious scholar warned this week that the world may be headed for a “clash of civilizations” incited by religious differences unless the three great monotheistic faiths--Judaism, Christianity and Islam--step up dialogue.

With the end of the Cold War, world politics is entering a new phase in which the elemental source of conflict will not be primarily ideological or economic, but cultural, said Karl-Josef Kuschel of the Institute of Ecumenical Research in Tubingen, Germany.

Cultural differences are, in turn, greatly shaped by religious beliefs.

“Hundreds of millions of hearts and consciences continue to be shaped by religious standards,” Kuschel told about 60 members of the Academy for Judaic, Christian and Islamic Studies at UCLA.

“Not all violence in this world has a religious basis, but far too much violence takes place in the name of religion,” he said, citing Bosnia and the conflict between Christians and Muslims.

Tensions between Eastern Orthodox churches and Western Protestants and Catholics are signs of cultural as well as religious differences.

The West’s conflict with Iran, Kuschel said, resulted from a failure to appreciate Islam’s capacity for renewal as a religious force.

He said it makes sense that strategic thinkers are now paying serious attention to the possibility of a war of civilizations in the next century. He added the while the West maintains its military might, it must come to “a deeper understanding of fundamental religious assumptions on which other civilizations are based.”

Kuschel cited an article by Harvard University professor Samuel P. Huntington in the summer 1993 issue of Foreign Affairs. Huntington said the world would be shaped by interactions among seven or eight major civilizations and described them as Western, Confucian, Japanese, Islamic, Hindu, Slavic-Orthodox, Latin American and possibly African.

“The people of different civilizations have different views on the relations between God and man, the individual and the group, the citizen and the state, parents and children, husband and wife, as well as differing views of the relative importance of rights and responsibilities, liberty and authority, equality and hierarchy,” Huntington wrote. “They are far more fundamental than differences among political ideologies and political regimes.”

Kuschel said the possibilities of conflict are inherent because differences are “deeply informed by religious convictions.”

But Kuschel and Huntington agreed that war is not inevitable. The task of religion, Kuschel said, is to move beyond differences and look for areas of agreement.

“Judaism, Christianity and Islam have special responsibility for world peace,” Kuschel said, “because they are spiritual world powers.”

The three religions can build on their common claim to Abraham as their spiritual father, said Kuschel, author of “Abraham: Sing of Hope for Jews, Christians and Muslims,” published in 1994.

Religious leaders must move from exclusivism and triumphalism to mutual understanding that takes account of one another and takes responsibility for one another “as children of Abraham,” said Kuschel, a Roman Catholic.

“Abraham is greater than all the Jewish, Christian and Muslim pictures of him,” Kuschel said. “Abraham is a believer in God and thus poses a challenge to all traditions which make use of him to draw their own profiles. Abraham is neither a Jew nor a Christian nor simply an adherent of Islam but a ‘friend of God,’ who can teach friendship with God.”

Such a view of Abraham, Kuschel noted, is upheld in the scriptures of all three faiths--Isaiah 41:8, James 2:23 and Surah 3:125.

“This is not to paste over or level out the differences, but to express them in the right spirit,” he said.

Despite the challenges, Kuschel said progress is being made. The Fraternity of Abraham to promote dialogue between the three faiths has existed since 1967 in France. The Church of Sweden has been active since 1991. The International Council for Christians and Jews in Germany has sponsored “Abrahamic” forums.

He said the UCLA-based Academy for Judaic, Christian and Islamic Studies should become a model for similar organizations in other countries.

“The spirit of Abraham is the spirit of unconditional trust in God, who is able to change things unexpectedly, to create something out of nothing, to make something alive where there is death,” Kuschel said. “To have faith like Abraham means to break open our hearts.”