ident of the dynasty on Olympus, not merely
the Most High, but as the only God. It avoids the two extremes, one of
making the Supreme Being head of a council or synod of deities, and the
other of making him indeed infinite, but an infinite abstraction, or abyss
of darkness. These are the two impure forms of monotheism. The first
prevailed in Greece, Rome, Egypt, Scandinavia. In each of these religions
there was a supreme being,--Zeus, Jupiter, Ammon, Odin,--but this supreme
god was only _primus inter pares_, first among equals. The other impure
form of monotheism prevailed in the East,--in Brahmanism, Buddhism, and
the religion of Zoroaster. In the one Parabrahm, in the other
Zerana-Akerana, in the third Nirvana itself, is the Infinite Being or
substance, wholly separate from all that is finite. It is so wholly
separate as to cease to be an object of adoration and obedience. Not
Parabrahm, but Siva, Vischnu, and Brahma; not Zerana-Akerana, but Ormazd
and the Amschaspands; not the infinite world of Nirvana, nor the mighty
Adi-Buddha, but the Buddhas of Confession, the finite Sakya-Muni, are the
objects of worship in these systems.

Only from the Semitic race have arisen the pure monotheistic religions of
Judaism, Christianity, and Mohammedanism. Each of these proclaims one only
God, and each makes this only God the object of all worship and service.
Judaism says, "Hear! O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord!" (Deut. vi.
4.) Originally among the Jews, God's name as the "Plural of Majesty"
indicated a unity formed from variety; but afterward it became in the word
Jahveh a unity of substance. "By my name Jehovah I was not known to them"
(i.e. to the Patriarchs).[406] That name indicates absolute Being, "I am
the I am."[407]

Ancient Gentile monotheism vibrated between a personal God, the object of
worship, who was limited and finite, and an infinite absolute Being who
was out of sight, "whose veil no one had lifted." The peculiarity of the
Mosaic religion was to make God truly the one alone, and at the same time
truly the object of worship.

In this respect Judaism, Christianity, and Mohammedanism agree, and in
this they differ from all other religions. Individual thinkers, like
Socrates, AEschylus, Cicero, have reached the same conviction; but these
three are the only popular religions, in which God is at once the infinite
and absolute, and the only object of worship.

Now it is a remarkable fact that these three relig