Contrast with the Abrahamisms
- “Holy” books such as Bible, Torah and Quran are the ultimate arbiters of morality and conduct for Christians, Jews and Muslims respectively. In addition to this, Christians and Muslims consider the actions of Jesus and Muhammad respectively to varying degrees. As such, these religions are highly text-centric and rely on exclusive divine revelation - they call themselves “religions of THE book”, and consider themselves to be “true religions”.
If the Abrahamic Holy Book is lost, the corresponding religion and its exclusive claims are lost. This being the case, congruence with the scripture becomes an existential/ identity issue with Abrahamists. Hence, for them, transcending the texts becomes tougher than it is in the case of hindu-s who may blithely switch traditions or abandon beliefs. In the former case, one needs to say “I am not a Christian/ Muslim anymore.” In the case of Hindus and many Jews, one doesn’t need to say that. (And in the case of Jews, the ethnic identity remains despite loss of faith.)
Given the history of conflict that does not tolerate divergent beliefs, traditional/ orthodox versions of these religions are, by default, hostile to other traditions. This is attenuated to some extant by the concept of “secularism” that arose as a result of internal strife in European Christendom, and due to the renaissance.
Unlike Hinduism, it is extremely hard for Christian and Muslim religious leaders to crop up and change the scriptures finalized by Jesus and Mohammed respectively. They just don’t have the theological provision for a pre-apocalyptic personality with authority to match these characters.
Contrast with cultures without holy books.
- Many pagan cultures did not have holy texts, or did not take them that seriously - Eg. various tribal religions, yorUba.
- One hypothesis is that such cultures are less observant, and therefore less resistant to Abrahamistic subversion.