Religious Science and the Challenge of the Comparative Approach : Critical Notes

Several recent publications have offered French readers some practical tools for a global understanding of the monotheistic phenomenon. Two of them are examined in this article. It is clear that the major criterion of success in such matters is the comparative approach. The mere juxtaposition of informative notes is inadequate, but more ambitious syntheses can also fail because of an uneven knowledge of the different cultures and their philological bases. Nothing can be more useful, then, than the work of an experienced historian such as Guy Stroumsa. Using the concept of ``Abrahamic religions'', he truly confronts the challenges of comparative analysis and, through the study of rabbinic Judaism, patristic Christianity and the beginnings of Islam, sheds new light on the religious effervescence of Late Antiquity.