Dekanadze, Lia
(2025)
Covenantal Communities: A Comparative Study of Moses and Muhammad’s Leadership in Exodus and Hijra.
Research master thesis, Master Research Master Theologie en Religiewetenschappen.
Abstract
This thesis compares Moses and Muhammad as covenantal leaders by examining the Exodus and
the Hijra as foundational events in forming Jewish and Muslim communities. Drawing on primary
sources, the Torah, the Qur’an, the Constitution of Medina, and early Islamic biography, it
explores how prophetic authority was legitimised through covenantal frameworks that combined
theological claims with socio-political organisation.
Focusing on the Sinai Covenant and the Constitution of Medina, the study examines how each
figure established a theo-political community grounded in migration, divine law, and collective
identity. The thematic exploration of covenantal leadership and community-building enables an
analysis of how Jewish and Muslim traditions may have intersected or informed one another. It
also allows for their independent development within shared Ancient and Late Antique Semitic
cultural settings.
Rather than asserting direct influence or textual dependence between the Bible and the Qur’an, the
thesis argues for a conceptual equivalence between the Mosaic Covenant and islam understood as
covenantal submission. It identifies parallel leadership structures in Moses and Muhammad,
particularly in their negotiation of authority within tribal societies and their use of covenant to
address internal dissent and external threats. While Muhammad’s leadership in Medina reflects
Mosaic precedents, it also introduces new institutional innovations shaped by the Late Antique
context, particularly the umma community.
By framing covenant as a political-theological grammar shared across both traditions, the thesis
contributes to interreligious and scripture studies as a source of communal and political identity.
| Type: |
Thesis
(Research master)
|
| Supervisors (RUG): |
| Supervisor | E-mail | Tutor organization | Tutor email |
|---|
| Kara, S. | | Faculteit GGW, Jodendom, Christendom en Islam in formatieve fase | s.kara@rug.nl |
|
| Supervisors from outside the RUG: |
|
| Degree programme: |
Master Research Master Theologie en Religiewetenschappen |
| Academic year: |
2024-2025 |
| Date of delivery: |
03 Feb 2026 10:48 |
| Last modified: |
03 Feb 2026 10:48 |
| URI: |
https://rcs.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/id/eprint/866 |
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