Monotheism

Monotheism itself means the belief in one God. According to the Hebrews, not only was there only one god which should be worshiped but that there was only one God is existence at all. Many of his characteristics were established in the Old Testament, Hebrew part of the Bible.

The first is that God is supernatural; he is something that no one can understand and sometimes do things which do not make sense to those who follow him but that are part of his supernatural nature. This is shown in the very beginning of Genesis where God created the heavens and the earth. This was significant at the time of the Hebrews because many of the people of other cultures at the time worshiped nature. Therefore, the Hebrews were telling these people with the opening of Genesis that God is the ultimate creator because he created what these people worshiped The Hebrews tried to get across the idea that God was above nature and not part of it.

There were two reasons why God could not be part of nature. The first was that nature has limits and a supernatural God does not. Nature is also amoral. It does not differentiate between good and evil. The Hebrews God did just the opposite and made sure that the people understood that there was good and evil in the world and therefore, they were supposed to do only good. Nature has no moral restraints but God does have and does not allow his followers to work outside those restraints.

God is personal. The Hebrews believed that God interacted with specific people and instead of being an entity like the Gods of Greece who did not care about the people, the Hebrew God does care. By putting forth the idea that God cares about his creations, it lets the people care about their God. Humans were created in God's image, therefore, if the God who created humans were not personal then what would that say about the people who lived on the earth. Without being able to care for the creator, the Hebrew writers understood that human nature would cause the followers to turn from their God. This philosophy helps the followers to understand the significance in how they treat one another and their relationship with God.

Ethical monotheism is the idea which was developed by the Hebrews in the Old Testament. There are two things that set ethical monotheism apart from other forms of religion. The first is that there is one God whom decided the morality and ethics of all humanity. The other idea is that God's primary demand for his followers is that they act ethically when dealing with one another. There are many different components which make up the ethical monotheistic beliefs.