Monotheism

Monotheism is the view that only one god exists. Monotheism can be either exclusive or inclusive. Exclusive monotheism denies that any other gods exist, while inclusive monotheism takes the view that all the different gods are just different forms of the one god.

Question: Are these personal definitions, or do theology and philosophy texts use these terms? I have not seen these words used this way before.

Well, they are used by Encyclopedia Britannica, for one thing. -- SJK

By definition exclusive monotheism is incompatible with polytheism, the belief that multiple gods exist. Note that the belief in multiple gods does not imply the worship of multiple gods. Many polytheists believe in the existence of many gods, but worship only one. This variant of polytheism is termed henotheism.

Western religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) traditionally held to exclusive monotheism, though an increasing number of adherents of these religions today subscribe to the inclusive monotheist view.

Another question: Christianity (and Islam?) believe in the existence a force that is opposed to God ("the Devil"). Doesn't this mean that these religions believe in "inclusive monotheism"?

I think the belief in two roughly equal but opposing forces is called dualism; this is clearly not what Jews, Christians and Muslims believe, as they generally agree that the Devil is a finite being created by God, not an equal or even near-equal "arch-enemy". But I think that that dualism at least comes close to describing Zoroastrianism?. --Wesley

This is a startling claim. I have never met a Jew, Christian or Muslim with such a belief, nor have I ever read a book written that proposes such beliefs. The number of Jews, Chrisitians or Muslims who have such beliefs is likley very small. The only group I know of that had a widespread adoption of what the writer terms "inclusive monotheism" are Hindus.

A lot of (mostly Christian, though some may be Jewish) liberal theologians and philosphers of religion, especially those who study issues of religious pluralism and interreligious dialogue, support some kind of view similar to inclusive monotheism. It also occurs in some branches of Sufism, I believe. -- SJK

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Merge above with the following:

The belief in one GoD. ChristianIty, JudaIsm? and IsLam are three famous examples of monotheistic religions. Note that the one GoD may have several aspects, such as the concept of the HolyTrinity in ChristianIty. Monotheistic religions have a tendency to have strict sets of moral codes or laws (as they have a DivineLawgiver? to provide them and justify them), often have a bias to one gender (due to the supposed gender of the GoD in question), and appear to have become more prevalent later in civilisations, when order is a GoodThing? and explanations for random natural disasters are beginning to come from other sources than angry GoDs.