"Christians and Jews." The motivation for writing this column with such a peculiar title stems from three strong senses of discomfort within myself. One is my discomfort with the phrase "rule of law" that a certain country's prime minister gleefully repeats. Another is my discomfort regarding the "mysterious coexistence of religion and science" that I felt in Israel. The third is my discomfort with the fact that while people who believe in Judaism are called "Jews," people who believe in Christianity are not called "Christians." This time, I will write about the first source of discomfort.

■ I cannot understand the meaning of the phrase "rule of law" used by a certain country's prime minister.

“"Prime Minister Fumio Kishida participated online on the evening of the 29th in the 'Democracy Summit' hosted by the United States and other countries. With Russia's invasion of Ukraine and China's military buildup in mind, he delivered a speech stating that 'the rule of law is the minimum basic principle that the international community must uphold.'" (March 29, 2023, Nikkei Electronic Edition)”

This is part of an article reporting on a statement by Japan's prime minister. I cannot quite understand the meaning of his words. Is he trying to say that the United States and Japan have laws while Russia and China do not? If so, anyone can see that this is incorrect. Russia has Russian laws, and China has Chinese laws. Iran has Iranian laws. Even North Korea surely has laws. Russia's aggressive actions against Ukraine are naturally all "legal" under Russian law.

■ From ancient times to the present, what has given power to law is "violence"
The problem is not "rule of law." The issue is by whom and through what process the laws (social rules) that people should follow are established and given power (enforcement). This is a matter of agency and process. In countries that advocate democracy, laws are decided by politicians who have gained trust through votes from citizens who are said to hold sovereignty, through majority vote in parliament. However, China and Russia are different. In Russia, Putin makes the laws, and in China, Xi Jinping makes the laws. Of course, they have their own detailed processes, but what these two dictators aim for is essentially that.

I am not a specialist in world history, but there has probably never been an era in any society throughout history, East and West, ancient and modern, where rules (laws) did not exist. In every era, human social groups have had rules (laws). And in most cases, these were established by rulers (mostly dictators) who held power backed by violence (military force). The enforcement power of law depended on the strength of that ruler's power. Rulers who lost military force and credibility and could no longer give enforcement power to law faced challenges from those who had newly gained power. And when they were defeated in war, the loser's laws were overwritten by the victors. Among the victors, some appeared who succeeded in forcing their own laws upon the defeated by achieving victory through humanity's worst weapons of mass destruction and indiscriminate slaughter of civilians. The defeated populace became completely dumbed down after three generations, creating the strange phenomenon of a vassal state where "useful idiots" emerge like insects, mindlessly repeating incomprehensible phrases like "rule of law" without much deep consideration, even when no one asked them to.

On the other hand, human history is also a history of trial and error in how to give power to law through means other than violence, or how to place that violence under the governance of law. The people who probably first systematically considered giving power to law through means other than military force (violence) in recorded history were the people called Jews who arose in the Middle East. This was probably around 3000-1000 BCE. This time, I will write about the process by which these people constructed the concept of "God." Of course, this is merely my personal interpretation. I should state this in advance.

■ The existence of "absolute power" that no dictator can control
In ancient societies, rulers had given power to their own laws through violence. However, even powerful rulers like Egyptian kings faced absolute forces they could not control. These were the forces of nature. No ruler could make rain fall. They could not create seas. They could not quell the earth's anger (eruptions or earthquakes), nor could they float the sun in the night sky. An absolute existence that no arrogant ruler could control. That was nature. And it had been an object of people's awe from ancient times, functioning loosely as a non-military social governance system. This was animism and shamanism. These are primitive religions called spirit worship and nature worship.

■ Nature, which has power beyond any ruler's reach. The logic of an "almighty God" who created that nature
I believe that Judaism derived from these concepts of animism and shamanism. The Tanakh, the scripture of Judaism (what Christians call the Old Testament), begins with God creating all of nature. Their God created all of nature during the seven days of creation: light and darkness, heaven and earth, moon and stars, and on the sixth day created humans. On the seventh day, God rested. (Genesis Chapter 1, verses 26-31)

Nature, which no ruler (controller of law) can control. If there is something that created this absolute entity, it must be a transcendent existence beyond everything. An absolute being before whom all the gods that people had worshipped—mountain gods, sea gods, sun gods—should bow down. I believe that the story of creation in the Tanakh is logic that the religion of Judaism carefully conceived to give power to the concept of "God."

■ God made a covenant with humans
Another logic that Judaism's founders conceived to apply the concept of God to human governance was the concept of "covenant." God created Adam from clay on the sixth day of creation and created Eve from his rib. And God gave truly generous treatment to them as representatives of humanity.
The Garden of Eden that God gave them was a perfect environment for Adam and Eve. All their needs were met. There was no labor and no suffering of death. They could live in heaven-like peace and tranquility. However, to fully enjoy these benefits, the two needed to keep just one covenant with God.

"You must not eat from the tree of knowledge" (Genesis 1:28/3:16-19)

This was the only promise (covenant) that God imposed on the two. However, the two easily violated the covenant and ate from the tree of knowledge. And they were expelled from paradise. In my interpretation, the story of the Tanakh that begins here is a "story of covenant violation" where God and humans make a covenant, and eventually humans violate it. And as both parties repeatedly revised the covenant, the contract between God and humans became thicker and thicker. No matter how many times humans violated the covenant, God, while angry, would appropriately revise, add to, and strengthen the covenant, trying somehow to make humans follow the covenant (God's rules). Let us examine this further.

■ The conclusion of the Noahic Covenant
After the expulsion of Adam and Eve, God, unable to bear the sight of people who were lazy and foolish at every turn, once attempted to exterminate humanity through flood. However, unable to abandon a glimmer of hope for humanity, God chose "righteous and blameless" Noah (Genesis 6:9), saved him on the ark, and made a memorandum (Noahic Covenant) with him. This time it was not a verbal promise. However, it was not yet systematized enough to be called a covenant. So in my interpretation, this was a memorandum. God placed a rainbow in the sky as the sign of this memorandum. (Genesis 9:12-17)

■ The conclusion of the Abrahamic Covenant
However, humans could not keep this Noahic Covenant (memorandum) either. So God was compelled to further strengthen the covenant. God chose Abraham. The reason God chose Abraham is not explicitly stated in the Tanakh, but like Noah, he was probably deemed to have the qualities (honesty, seriousness) to keep a covenant with God. Below, I quote the passage from the Tanakh regarding the conclusion of the Abrahamic Covenant.

“"I am God Almighty; walk before me faithfully and be blameless. Then I will make my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers." "This is my covenant with you: You will be the father of many nations. No longer will you be called Abram; your name will be Abraham, for I have made you a father of many nations. I will make you very fruitful; I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you. I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you. The whole land of Canaan, where you now reside as a foreigner, I will give as an everlasting possession to you and your descendants after you; and I will be their God." (Genesis Chapter 17)

What are the differences between this Abrahamic Covenant and the aforementioned Noahic Covenant? In my interpretation, there are three important differences.

■ Difference 1 between both covenants: "Scope of covenant parties"
While Noah made a covenant with God as a representative of all humanity, the Abrahamic Covenant was a covenant between Abraham and his descendants. In other words, the scope of the contracting parties on the human side differs. In the Tanakh narrative, in the Abrahamic Covenant, God chose to make a covenant not with all humanity but with Abraham's clan. Why?

In my interpretation, it was to show people through Abraham's clan's prosperity a concrete successful example that if humans keep their covenant with God, they will receive certain benefits. "Become a model for everyone and keep the law. If you do, there will be great benefits." This is how I understand God's rationale for choosing Abraham.

■ Difference 2 between both covenants: "Specificity of covenant obligations"
There are still other differences between the Noahic and Abrahamic Covenants. This concerns the scope of the human side's obligations as contracting parties. In the Noahic Covenant, God vowed to humans never again to attempt to destroy people with flood. Moreover, God imposed several specific contractual obligations on humans: "increase offspring (be fruitful and multiply)," "prohibition of murder," "prohibition of consuming blood," etc. (Genesis Chapter 9)

On the other hand, in the Abrahamic Covenant, while God gave Abraham and his clan/descendants benefits such as "prosperity of descendants," "many leaders (kings) to emerge from the clan," and above all "territorial rights to Canaan (the eastern Mediterranean coastal region including present-day Israel)," God does not appear to have imposed particularly specific obligations (laws). Compared to the Noahic Covenant, the Abrahamic Covenant has abstract content of "observe the covenant with God."

■ Difference 3 between both covenants: "Means of proving covenant conclusion"
However, instead, the Abrahamic Covenant has characteristics in covenant procedure that the Noahic Covenant lacks. This is in some ways more essential than specific laws and is an important duty that has been passed down to Jews until modern times. That is "circumcision." Abraham and his clan were obligated to mark circumcision on their bodies as a sign of the covenant they made with God. The sign of the Noahic Covenant was the "rainbow." However, Abraham's clan was obligated to engrave the sign of the covenant on their bodies. Of course, this was so they would never forget their covenant with God.

■ The establishment of the Ten Commandments and the birth of Judaism
As time passed further from the Abrahamic Covenant, God chose one of Abraham's descendants, "Moses," and led the clan out of Egypt. Then, at Mount Sinai, God showed him even more specific covenant content. The "Ten Commandments." At this timing, God's covenant came to be expressed as clear written law. People who engraved the sign of the covenant on their bodies through circumcision and vowed to keep the Ten Commandments. Here, the people called Jews (those who practice Judaism) were born.

■ Humanity's first attempt to justify territorial legitimacy through the concept of "covenant with God"
In these Ten Commandments, the clan's territorial rights to Canaan established in the Abrahamic Covenant were again shown more specifically.

“I will establish your borders from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea, and from the desert to the Euphrates River. I will give into your hands the people who live in the land, and you will drive them out before you.” (Exodus Chapter 23, verse 31)

The attempt by a people or group to justify the legitimacy of their territory through logic other than military force, namely "covenant with God," was probably the first and almost only attempt by the people who created Judaism.

It goes without saying that the ancient Mediterranean region was one of the areas where commercial trade developed earliest in the world. There, multiple hegemonic states competed for military supremacy to force their own laws upon others. The rise of ancient Egypt, which worshipped the sun god. In the inland areas of the eastern Mediterranean, the Achaemenid and Sassanid dynasties would eventually emerge. Meanwhile, in Greece, poleis based on polytheism developed. And the Roman Empire rose. In this context, it was impossible for the constantly overwhelmingly minority Jewish people to oppose them with military force. So they created their own unique God.

Yahweh, the one and only God before whom Egypt's sun god, Greece's gods, and Rome's gods should all bow down. The consideration that Yahweh gave to the Jewish people through concluding a covenant was the territorial rights to ancient Israel.

And the people who believe that this covenant with God is eternal and that the covenant remains valid even in the 21st century are the ultra-conservative Jewish people. This is the driving force behind expelling Palestinians from the Golan Heights, advancing settlement and effective control in the West Bank, and building walls at the border with Gaza.

In contrast, the view that Israel's legitimacy as a state is based on UN General Assembly Resolution 181 of November 1947 is held by liberal Israelis who value democracy and probably the general position of the international community, including Japan. If the Abrahamic Covenant and the Ten Commandments are covenants with God, then the 1947 UN resolution is a "covenant with humans."

Israel is currently experiencing great turmoil over judicial reform. Many of the people who participate in demonstrations in Tel Aviv and call for protecting Israeli democracy to oppose judicial reform probably believe that while respecting covenants with God, they should first keep covenants with humans. Which is more important: covenants with God or covenants with humans? People in the monotheistic world have been fighting over this theme for 2,000 years, from ancient times to the present.

In this column, I would like to explore the history of monotheism from the perspective of a Japanese person who lives without connection to any of the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam). People who believe in Abrahamic religions comprise more than half of the world's population. Understanding monotheism is an effective means for understanding half the world.