obsessed with truth

Among the three great religions of the Book - Judaism, Christianism and Islamism - only Christianism was from the begining based on reason. This might explain why modern science was born in Christian Europe and most modern scientists were born and raised in a predominantly Christian environment.

As Dinesh d'Souza (op. cit.) points out, Judaism and Islam are primarily religions of Law. There is a divine lawgiver who issues edicts that are authoritative both for nature and for human beings. In the case of Judaism, those edicts apply mainly to the chosen people, the Jews. In the case of Islam, they apply to everyone. Christianity, by contrast, is not a religion of law but a religion of Creed.

Both Jews and Muslims may engage in extensive debates about the interpretation and application of their written codes. Christians, by contrast, have always been much more concerned with doctrine, which is thought as a set of true beliefs about man´s relationship to God. The highest discipline in Judaism and Islam is jurisprudence. The highest discipline in Christianity is theology which is charged with employing reason to find the true ways of God. The term theology itself was initially applied to Christianity only.

It was the Christian obsession with truth, to be discovered by reason, that created the frame of mind of the modern scientist. Reason is the instrument to solve the mysteries of faith and science becomes a direct descendant of Christian theology. We are back to the thesis of Pope Benedict XVI who has emphasized over and over again that Christianity is the religion of reason (logos), thus, there is no conflict between faith and reason, religion and science.

Truth has thus a mucher higher standing for Christians than for Jews and Muslims. In this light, we can better interpret that harsh judgement which Kant - a polite man obviously concerned, if not obsessed, with truth - produced about the Jews: "Every coward is a liar; Jews, for example, not only in business, but also in common life". It is not that Jews are morally ill; it is that they do not accord to truth the same high standing as we Christians do.