Today, religious pluralism is a worldwide and globalized reality; there are no longer exotic, foreign or distant religions, despite having roots and demographic majorities; it is increasingly a social and even political factor, even after atheologies, atheisms and secularizations, especially in a West that is as plural as it is heterogeneous.
The current context of relations in multicultural and multireligious societies is plagued by disputes, confrontations and political, economic and academic misunderstandings; in all of them there are multiple obstacles to mutual understanding, and this context has served as a reason, criterion and origin for the legitimization of political and military actions and, only on rare occasions, of dialogue.
It is no longer possible to limit oneself to dichotomies such as East-West, Catholic Church-extra ecclesia, Islam-Christianity, “Axis of evil” and “Axis of good”, even if such intellectual and academic positions are acceptable; it is no longer possible, as a previous proposal, to think that the problems occurring in the unified West are political and those of the delimited East are religious; in fact, religions and their institutions are more than blocks and are better understood as a mosaic.
Therefore, we will seek to present an overview of the crossroads through which the three communities go through as religious experiences and political communities from their Sacred Texts, theologians and traditional and modern thinkers in each tradition, because sometimes researchers of religions are unaware of the languages, history and reasons that have led their communities to shape religion and politics over the centuries.[1]
In the academic field, defense, unsustainable criticism and apology are signs of partiality, but their absence does not necessarily indicate neutrality; opinions, versions and studies of any kind include a tenuous tendency, sometimes very subtle, to judge from acquired, constructed or imposed conceptions; evading them is just a step, since the critical part must come with knowledge from within, without it being a condition to be inside. Thus, it is not necessary to be and belong to be critical or to stop being critical.
In every opinion, version and perspective on the present there is a degree of inherent certainty that exceeds the limits of personal will, intellectual capacity and academia, that is, what is said is very much true, especially when the object of study is distant and foreign; in each case academia and the personal must be combined with coherence in an intellectual effort.
Any generalization of religion is an abuse of the term religion, it is centuries of history, millions of believers in all continents and multiple cultures as dissimilar as unknown to many of us.
This comparative journey does not seek to take up all the biblical, theological and historical considerations of the New Testament, the Holy Fathers of the Church, the Ecumenical Councils, the heretics, the schismatics, the theologians of Scholasticism, the Protestant Reformation, the Catholic Counter-Reformation or the theology of Latin American Liberation, among many others, since each one has its contributions, novelties and divergences; And, in turn, it does not seek to cover the various schools of Islamic law (madhab), political, nationalist or secularist ideologies from the beginnings of Islam to the present, as varied as they are particular.
Religion is not a subject and, therefore, does not act, therefore, religions do not dialogue, do not wage wars, do not kill human beings; but human beings die for their religion, for religion and in the midst of their religion or religious tradition.
The practical and religious foundations, the intricate relations between the so-called monotheistic religions throughout history, as well as the sociological presuppositions for undertaking acts of tolerance and combat by these civilizations can be explained from the foundations, encounters and confrontations of the Jewish, Christian and Islamic communities in their political and religious positions, actions and ambitions.
Therefore, we will seek to present an overview of the crossroads through which the three communities pass as religious experiences and political communities from their sacred texts; for sometimes researchers of religions are unaware of the languages, histories and reasons that have led their communities to shape religion and politics over the centuries.
[1] Before presenting or investigating any aspect of the relationship between religion and politics, religious politics and politicized religion, it is necessary to understand a series of basic terms without which any personal or academic judgment about it becomes insufficient and may fall into the void of ignorance, personal prejudice, or any other epistemological or sociological, if not historical, obstacle.
