Why “Monotheism” is the Wrong Question

Modern religious discussions often begin with a numerical question: how many gods do you believe in? One, many, or none. From this framing then emerges the familiar binaries of monotheism, polytheism, and atheism. Yet this entire conceptual map is foreign to the covenantal tradition. It's a very modern way of approaching questions of the divine, but so pervasive today that we've come to believe that it is the major way in which humanity has always discussed this topic. The problem is not that the Abrahamic tradition answers the question differently, but that it is not asking the question at all.

“Monotheism” is a modern, largely Western abstraction, presuming that "religion" is primarily a metaphysical claim about the quantity of divine mystical beings and as long as you have the correct number, you are saved. As such, theology becomes a maths exam. The covenantal tradition is doing something far more concrete, it is making a claim about sovereignty, authority, and law.

In the covenantal tradition, the Arabic term tawḥīd finds its closest Hebrew equivalent in Yichud Hashem, famously articulated in the Shema: “Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.” This is not a numerical assertion in the modern sense. It is not saying “one god rather than two.” It is saying something qualitatively different.

Tawḥīd and Yichud are claims about uniqueness, not countability, and that uniqueness is in the context of the Creator's sovereignty:

Unique in His authority (sultān).

Say: My Lord has forbidden indecencies, whether open or hidden, irrational offence, violence without right, that you associate sovereignty with God for which He has sent down no authority, and that you say about God what you do not know.” (Q 7:33)

Unique in His right to command (al-amr). 

Surely your Lord is God, who created the heavens and the earth in six phases, then established Himself upon the Throne. He covers the night with the day, chasing it swiftly. The sun, the moon, and the stars are subjected by His command. His is the creation and the command. Blessed is God, Lord of all realms.” (Q 7:54)

Unique in His status as lawgiver (al-hukm):

“Governance belongs to none but God. He has commanded that you serve none but Him. That is the upright code, but most people do not know.” (Q 12:40). 

The point is that no other entity possesses existential authority and the right of existential subservience. This is why translating tawhīd (uniqueness) as “monotheism” is problematic and can be misleading. Monotheism reduces the doctrine to arithmetic. The covenantal tradition asserts exclusivity of sovereignty.

Atheism Was Not the Problem

An anachronism imposed on the ancient world is the assumption that atheism was a meaningful or widespread position. It wasn't. In the ancient Near East, virtually everyone accepted the existence of gods, spirits, forces, or cosmic intelligences. The debate was never about whether the divine existed, but about which power ruled, which authority bound, and which law governed. As such, the covenantal messages from God do not respond to atheists. They respond to rival claims of sovereignty. Pharaoh does not deny God’s existence, he claims divine authority himself. Babylon does not deny the divine realm, it absolutises empire, power, and hierarchy. Idolatry and paganism in the covenantal sense is not just primitive superstition. It is emotional and psychological manipulation to misplace allegiance. To serve another god is to take a false sovereign (tāghūt) and submit to another law.

The Core Claim: Sovereignty and Law

At the heart of the covenantal tradition is a single, uncompromising claim: only the Creator possesses ultimate sovereignty, and therefore only He has the authority to legislate existential law. Law here does not mean merely ritual or morality. It means the ordering of life, society, justice, economics, power, and responsibility. This is why the covenantal tradition is relentlessly political and social. To tawḥīd God (the correct way to use the term) is to deny the absolute authority of kings, priests, markets, tribes, and empires. It is to say that no human institution may claim final authority over conscience, life, or meaning.

So it is important to note that the Proclamation (al-Qur'ān) does not argue philosophically for God’s existence. It assumes it. What it dismantles is false sovereignty. “There is none to serve but God (لا إله إلا الله)” is not a metaphysical syllogism but a declaration of allegiance and a rebellion against illegitimate authority.

Why the Modern Debate Misses the Point

When modern critics or defenders argue about monotheism versus atheism, they are shadowboxing with concepts that the covenantal tradition never prioritised. The tradition is not trying to prove that God exists. It is asserting that God alone rules. This is why the covenantal message has always been threatening to power. Empires tolerate private belief but do not tolerate rival sovereignty. The insistence that law, justice, and moral order come from beyond human authority undermines every totalising system, whether religious, political, or economic.

So the real divide, then, is not between the religious and non-religious, but between those who accept God's existential order and those who absolutise human constructs.

The covenantal tradition speaks into a world crowded with powers, claims, and authorities, and declares that only the Creator possesses ultimate sovereignty. Everything else flows from that single and very disruptive truth.