The Ways of Confronting the "Enemy" in the Quran and the Hebrew Bible

For confronting the enemy, Abrahamic religions provide appropriate behavioral strategies which, according to their mission, have certain ethical principles. In order to formulate a peaceful strategy for the followers of the two religions of Islam and Judaism, the present research studies and compares the commonalities and differences between the Holy Quran and the Tanakh in confronting enemies. The term "enemy" refers to those who show enmity to the religious ideology of the religious community of Muslims and Jews. Such enemies are classified by the Qur’an into three groups of "idolaters", "infidels", "hypocrites" and "contesting believers". In Tanakh they are divided into two groups: "atheists" and "Israelites". The attitude of Muslims towards the enemy is, as described in the Qur’an, always based on wisdom and divine help. In the Tanakh, God himself confronts the enemies and man’s wisdom has no important role in this regard. For confronting the enemy, the Holy Quran presents a distinct course ranging from a flexible attitude to a rigid one. In the recent versions of the Hebrew scriptures, there is a reference to the moral-based attitude towards the enemy, but the contradictions in Tanakh makes the idea of the correct behavioral patterns of confronting the enemy open to question. Because of its dominant nationalistic view, the attitude adopted by Tanakh towards the enemy is an absolute rejection of the others and it is mainly defensive, but the Holy Quran, regardless of ethnic differences, offers ethical based behavior that is all inclusive and useful to all races.