Selected historical anecdotes on the Muslim and Christian initiatives for promoting peaceful coexistence

This paper aims to overview selected historical anecdotes on Muslim and Christian initiatives on the realization of religious harmony as it crucial for global peace and national stability. The two most popular Abrahamic religions, Islam and Christianity, accounts for more than half of the two world population and the majority of intra and inter faith is traced to the two religions. This signifies the important to explore the initiatives of both religions on promoting peaceful coexistence throughout the history. The role for peace building process had been initiated by Muslims since the caliphate of Umar al-Khattab and this continuously been practiced with the role played by Said Nursi, the most influential Muslim thinkers of the 20th century. The methodology used in this conceptual study is the critical analysis of literature surveyed on the selected history of peaceful coexistence of Muslim and Christian society. There have been numerous initiatives from Muslims and Christians to set examples in the history of fostering peaceful coexistence. Thus, the focal study of discussion of this paper would be on the history of the spirit of La Convivencia in Andalusia of Spain, the spirit of living together in Sicilian Italy, open letter of A Common Word between Us and You as well as Nostra Aetate, the most important turning points in the history of Catholic-Muslim relations. The findings are deemed necessary for the sustainable framework for enhancing inter-religious harmony in the Malaysian context of plural society