traNSLatioN aND coNqueSt • 227his presentations of Judaism and Christianity, Malul notes that Islam is
also based on a scripture, namely, “the qurʾan and the Sunna,” and it
“demands complete monotheism [tawḥīd],” a concept he already linked
to Judaism. as he did with Judaism, Malul again cites the medieval
Muslim author ash- Shahrastani as he explains the internal but, in his
view, fairly insignificant sectarian divisions within islam. he then lists
the five pillars of islam and concludes with a demographic estimate of
about three hundred million Muslims worldwide.^162
the precisely parallel form in which Malul presents these three brief
descriptions matches the content of his ultimate claim, namely, that
these religions are, in essence, identical.^163 Judaism, Christianity, and
Islam, he argues, share much common ground, and are in harmony in
the most important respects. “Broadly,” Malul concludes, “the mono-
theistic religions mentioned above declare the unity of the Creator,
that he is the creator of existence and engineer of reality.^164 the people
of these religions and their adherents believe in the afterlife, resurrec-
tion, doomsday, and the Final Day, and that there is punishment for
evil and reward for goodness.”^165 especially in light of our analysis of
al- Khalidi’s manuscript and its understanding of the grave implications
for palestine of the lack of a Jewish belief in the afterlife, Malul’s insis-
tence that Judaism shares these beliefs with Christianity and Islam is
especially significant.
the question necessarily arises: if these religions are so patently in
unison, why is there so much discord between them? It is in anticipa-
tion of this issue that Malul highlights the internal divisions within
each religion:
if you find that members of the same religion divide themselves
due to selfishness, self- love, egotism, and politics (such as the
division of the eastern and western churches in Christianity, and
the divisions that arose since the illness of Islam’s prophet in
Islam, and the divisions of the tribes of the children of Israel in
israelitism [Judaism]), it is no surprise that one finds divisions
between different religions.^166(^162) ibid., 15– 16.
(^163) Compare Malul’s attempt to harmonize Judaism, Christianity, and Islam with Jurji
Zaydan’s contemporaneous attempt, “when dealing with the relationship between Islam
and Christianity,” to “play down any tension between both religions” and, as Umar ryad
puts it, to “show that Christians during most of history lived in harmony with their Mus-
lim compatriots.” ryad, Islamic Reformism and Christianity, 77.
(^164) alternatively: “the universe.”
(^165) Malūl, Kitāb asrār al- yahūd, 16.
(^166) ibid., 16– 17.