I've been looking into religion a bit more lately. I've noticed one big thing while doing this, and that is that the three major (and oldest) religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) have many things in common:

1. All speak of a great flood, and mention Noah being spared.

2. All mention Satan, Judaism being the only one who doesn't refer to him refusing to bow to man, and being cast from Heaven.

3. All refer to the Binding of Isaac.

4. All refer to the first humans being Adam and Eve.

5. All have their beginnings in the same area (Middle East)

6. Michael is mentioned in all as being a prominent archangel


I'm pressed for time to search for more, but as you can see, they have most of the same stories, told slightly differently. This indicates one of two things. Either they were all created by the same person, or they really did happen and these are actual records of phenomenons.

My personal theory borders on Gnosticism (but not fully). "God" is actually evil, and came as many faces (Allah ,Yahweh, etc.) to deceive man for some reason only he/it seems to know. I may go as far as to even say that Lucifer was the good guy.

I'd appreciate serious thought on this. I'd also rather this thread didn't turn into a debate about the existence of God, since we have enough of those threads.

for christianity, most of those similarities will be found in the old testament...

all three are monotheistic Abrahamic religions.

all three share a name by which god is labeled... the god of abraham

all three have a similar take on creation.

all three believe in communing with god in some form and aspire to achieve paradise, blilss, etc.

all three refer to a collection of scripture inspired by divinity.

all three promote humility, honesty, and moderation.

they all share holy ground.

all three have sought sanctioning by the state.

all three have gone to war over their beliefs.

all three uphold the golden rule.

all three have had internal upheavals resulting in denominational factions.

... i'm sure theres more...

it goes even futher than that angry jerk. All these religions are based of previous polythestic religions that came before them. The origin of religion i believe is with one group of evil deities who have either passed down the duties or continue to live. Maybe satan was the good guy and he was attempting to promote civil disobedience.

They all have the same stories because they are all related to each other.. Christianity grew out of Judaism, Islam out of both. And you can go even further, they share their stories with every other Middle eastern bronze age religion. The geology, geography, etc of the Middle East lends itself towards these type of religions quite well.

But I would strong disagree that these are the "oldest" religions. Hinduism predates Christianity and Islam, Buddhism predates Islam, Taoism predates in a form, all of them, though in more concrete form perhaps just Christianity and Islam. Shintoism predates all of them, or may be contemporary with Judaism.

Abrahamic religions are far from the oldest.

egyptian, mayans, aztecs, and many others had religion before abrahamic ones.

I agree. Vedism (Brahminism) predates the Abrahamic religions and their off-shoots. In fact, Hinduism, which has its origins in the Vedas, is the 3rd largest religion in the world, coming in behind Christianity (1st) and Islam (2nd).