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Christianity and Judaism are in the minority for supposing the existence of a personal God-- even Islam does not imagine such things.
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The divine in Hinduism
- A certain kind of Agnosticism is the final truth of all knowledge. For when we come to the end of whatever path, the universe appears only as a symbol or an appearance of an unknowable Reality which translates itself here into different systems of values, physical values, vital and sensational values, intellectual, ideal and spiritual values. The more That becomes real to us, the more it is seen to be always beyond defining thought and defining expression. [The Upanishads say] "Mind attains not there, nor speech." And yet as it is possible to exaggerate, with the Illusionists, the unreality of the appearance, so it is possible to exaggerate the unknowableness of the Unknowable. When we speak of It as unknowable, we mean, really, that It escapes the grasp of our thought and speech, instruments which proceed always by the sense of difference and express by the way of definition; but if not knowable by thought, It is attainable by a supreme effort of consciousness. There is even a kind of Knowledge which is one with Identity and by which, in a sense, It can be known.
- Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine
- Do we not seek, though all this confusion, something permanent, something lasting, something which we call real, God, truth, what you like--the name doesn't matter, the word is not the thing, surely.
- Krishnamurti, The First and Last Freedom
The divine in Christianity
If you come from a European background you are probably familiar with the concept of the new covenant. It may surprise you to learn that Jesus had nothing to do with such a concept.
Jesus was honored by his Jewish followers as a messianic rabbi. His death was seen as a straight up martyrdom, through which the ugliness of Roman rule was brought to light. But they did not see him as a scapegoat, and they continued to honor the mitzvot. You can derive most of this from the Didache.
Paul combined this with Neoplatonism, the Greek philosophy of the time. Neoplatonism was rather esoteric so it wasn't catching on very fast. When Paul put his own spin on it, though, he warped the teachings of Judaism to create a mish-mash, New Age kind of movement that took the Roman world by fire. According to Paul, Jesus was a scapegoat who took the place of everyone else's petty offerings and sacrifices. According to the Greek Paul, Jesus was literally God-- a nonsensical teaching that his Jewish followers would never have stood for.
The divine in Judaism
To be continued.