Preview

Compare and Contrast: Islamic and Christian Creation Myths

Better Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1537 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Compare and Contrast: Islamic and Christian Creation Myths
Joseph Nicolosi
Linda Mallen
English Composition
10/10/14
Compare and Contrast Essay
Similarities Between Islamic And Christian Creation Myths The religions Christianity and Islam have many comparisons in their creation myths and stories. Both myths were passed down from generation to generation and are believed to be true by both Islamic people and Christians. Both of the religions share strong similarities like the creation of Adam and the exile he faced due to his disobedience. The Islamic creation myth starts with the deity they call “Allah.” He was simply able to create everything with no effort. So Allah created the physical world: land, sea, and the heavens. He made all the living creatures and gave them the ability to walk, swim, or fly. He made the sun, moon, and the stars to give light. The Quran mentions that Allah made it rain and soon thereafter rose vegetation as sustenance to feed the living creatures on the earth. Allah created angels to help the development of life in its infantile stages. Allah sent his angels to seven areas of the earth to gather different kinds of earth material so he may form the first man from the dirt and mud of every corner of the earth. This man was called Adam. Allah brought Adam to “paradise” where he was to live with Hawwa, the first woman. Hawwa was created from the flesh and bone that was part of Adam. Allah taught Adam the names of the animals that roam the earth, and commanded the angels to bow down before him. But, Iblees, one of the angels disobeyed Allah’s orders and refused to serve Adam. “And when your Lord said to the angels: ‘I am going to create a human from sounding clay of altered black smooth mud. So when I have fashioned him and breathed into him soul created by me, then you fall down prostrate to him.’ (Quran 38:71-72) ‘...Prostrate to Adam and they prostrated except Iblees....’ (Quran 7:11)” (1) Allah placed the couple in a vast garden in paradise and told them they could eat whatever



Cited: (1) Stacey, Aisha. “The Story of Adam: The First Man” The Religion of Islam. 16 Oct. 2011. Web. 8 Oct. 2014.<http://www.islamreligion.com/articles/1190/> (2) Holy Bible. New International Version. Colorado Springs. Biblica, 2011.

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Hum/130 Jesus and Mohammad

    • 1058 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Muhammad was said to have received revelations or secrets from God, who Muhammad refers to as Allah in Islam, and Muhammad and Allah were recorded in the Qur’an. The Qur’an is basically the Bible of the Islamic religion. Abraham had an illegitimate son by an Egyptian slave named Hagar. The son was named Ishmael. Abraham took Ishmael to Mecca to protect him from the jealousy of his wife. There they built the holiest sanctuary in Islam the Ka’bah; this is believed to be the Adam’s original place of worship (Fisher, 2005). Adam is said to be the first man created by God. Muhammad…

    • 1058 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    A similarity of Islam and Christianity is that they both believe in one God (Christianity Jesus) (Islam Allah). A difference is that both religions have different countries of origin. Islam originated from Makkah and Madina which is situated in Saudi Arabia and Christianity originated from Jerusalem in Israel. Islam began in the 7th century, God sent his message through the prophet Mohammed showing how to worship…

    • 1073 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    He created the sun, moon, stars, heaven, and hell. In the Genesis creation we are faced with a divine drama of the beginning that can only be understood through faith. How long did it really take? Are Gods days the same as ours or are they longer? These questions may never be answered in this life time, and are not the focus of the Genesis creation. It is more about the spiritual and moral revelations. Genesis 1:26, God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness..." In the creation of the world, this is the only time God refers to himself in the plural form. Then God took the man Adam, and the woman Eve, and placed them in the Garden of Eden to take care of it, and he told them to be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth (Genesis 1: 28). Then God commanded Adam and Eve saying, "Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die" (Genesis 2:16-17). The story continues with the devil, also known as the serpent, tricking Eve into eating from the forbidden tree and convincing her to get Adam to eat also. The result of them going against Gods commandment was being expelled from the Garden of Eden, and being forced to labor over the earth. Humans will experience pain and suffering, weeds, thorns, and…

    • 1837 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    There is no right or wrong creation myth because these myths were written from people who have diverse culture and different beliefs. Everyone should be open minded and accept other peoples background. Varieties of people have different opinions and beliefs about how earth and humans came to be. In these creation myths, they have their similarities and differences. The three creation myths that will be compared are the Modoc creation myth, the Maidu creation myth, and the creation myth that comes from the first book of Moses called Genesis.…

    • 1014 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    i)The Question of Origin-- Islams believe that man came into being through a long process of evolution. They believe the evolutionary process which produced man in its form today took millions of years, and man evolved from lower forms of animal life. In their belief,it was only small types of animals in the beginning, and in the course of time animals got larger and eventually one of these animals developed into man. This animal is believed to have become extinct, but is believed to have been represented by the monkey. The basis of argument is certain kind of monkeys have a strong resemblance to man.…

    • 924 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Islam and Christianity share a lot of similarities and differences. One of the most important similarities that they share is that they are both universal religions. Both Islam and Christianity are monotheistic religions, believing in only one god, which is also believed by some religions researchers to be the same god, but referred with different nominatives. In the Christian religion it is referred to as "Christ" and in the Islam religion it is referred to as "Allah". They do not only share these little similarities, but much more: like the beginning of the religions. In both holy books: the Bible for Christians and the Qur'an for Muslims, it is described the creation of the earth in the very first's chapters. The Bible, as the Qur'an states that Christ created the world in six days; in the other hand the Qur'an states the same thing, but using the nominative of Allah instead than Christ. As time advanced many differences born between Christianity and Islam.…

    • 1308 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In Christian mythology, the earth and the heavens were created by God. He started with making with the sun which was day, and the moon which was night, then to making the waters separated by land, then the plants and trees. He made seasons, days, and years. He then made animals in the water and land. Lastly, he made a man a women so the can reproduce.…

    • 388 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Immanent and Transcendent

    • 406 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Both were born in a miraculous way, both astonish their teachers through the knowledge they possess, though still in their early childhood, both are tempted by the devil, both walk over the water, both feed a large amount of people, the parables they taught were very similar. Both religions teach the ultimate rule, do unto others what you wished to be done to you. Both religions also started from a country of origin and slowly spread onto other countries all over the world. These similarities exists because religions need to have a basis and set of beliefs to live by and ultimately all religions’ goals are peace and harmony.…

    • 406 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Bless Me Ultima

    • 641 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Islam and Christianity share similar ideas as the abstract religion in the coming of age novel “Bless Me, Ultima” by Rudolfo Anaya. Islam and magic each have stigmas connected to them from personal assumptions. Pagan beliefs in the novel and Christianity share the same concept of afterlife and symbolism.…

    • 641 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Creation Myths All cultures have tried to answer the famous question “where did I come from” and “how was the world created”. This is why every culture has creation myths. Although there are many similarities between cultures that were centuries and continents apart there are still many differences. These questions are still being debated by scientists and scholars in our technologically advanced society today. There are many patterns among creation myths. In many creation myths the first men were divine or descendents of gods. Many are linked by having the sun as the creator of the earth. There are many myths where humans are formed from clay or dirt. Often the earth is dark and without sunlight, the moon and stars and maybe even without…

    • 419 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Creation Myth Essay

    • 712 Words
    • 3 Pages

    There are many different creation myths from different religions and different cultures. Two of the many creation myths are the creation myth of Genesis and the creation myth of India. Although these are both creation myths there are still some similarities and some differences between the two. The similarities between the Genesis and India creation myths are that both of the creators are benign and both of the Gods are supreme while the differences between them are that the reasons why man was created were different and the creations are accomplished in different ways.…

    • 712 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Faith Religious Theology

    • 923 Words
    • 4 Pages

    One of the reasons that Judaism and Christianity are so similar is that Christianity began in the first few decades of the first century AD as a type of Judaism (Deming, 58). All religions seem to have similarities because it seems that they took some ideas from another religion and built it into their religion back when they started out. We can always compare and contrast the different world religions, some will be more comparable than others as is anything in life. People are changing with the world and with them the religions change a little bit too, the foundations and believes stay the same but they change to better fit the…

    • 923 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    All around people use myths to describe how the world and life came to be. But some of these myths use information that is used in other myths, we call these motifs. Why do you think so many cultures have so many similarities? Did anyone of you ever think why so many myths use similar information even when they were seas away? Scientists have asked themselves this question of so many years, why do cultures that were seas away have these similarities? There are some motifs that people see more important than others, for example, the flood motif or the chaos motif. But for me, the 3 most important motifs are the humans made out of organic material motif, the flood motif, and the family tree motif.…

    • 795 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Creation Stories

    • 2720 Words
    • 11 Pages

    creation stories- comparing the Eskimo creation story, the Genesis creation story, and the evolution creation theory.…

    • 2720 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    After reading the Iroquois Creation story, and although it is very different from the Christianity Creation story, I found them to be very similar in several ways. When diving into religions other than Christianity I often find myself most of the time extremely intrigued, and it is usually difficult to wrap the mind around the fact that people really do believe some of these things and base their lives around it. Reading the Iroquois Creation Story was no different, but it also lead me to the question, “If I grew up in these cultures, is this something I would believe?” Being a strong Christian believer and at times being more of a “western thinker” when it comes to religion, sometimes thinking that the only thing that is correct is what I believe in, has sometimes hampered my ability to be open to new beliefs that may be different.…

    • 899 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays