Back to results

Virginia Tech

A House for the Families of Abraham: A Multi-Faith Community Center for Interfaith Dialogue

Abstract

dc:description.abstract

Religion has the ability to bring a diversity of people together in a way that crosses political, social, and economic boundaries, but divides them through conflicting worship practices, rituals, and teachings. This is especially true with the three Abrahamic religions – Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The unique aspect to the Abrahamic religions is that they all claim Abraham as a common ancestor. Unfortunately, over the two millennia since the founding of these religions, interpretations of each religious text has drastically divided the three religions. Guy Stroumsa, Professor Emeritus of the Study of Abrahamic Religions at the University of Oxford, states that after such a long time the "Jewish Avraham is no more the Christian Abraham than the latter is the Islamic Ibrahim… and there is more than one Jewish (or Christian, or Muslim) Abraham." This project is designed to create a multi-faith building that crosses the religious divides in the Abrahamic faiths and encourages inter-faith dialogue by looking at commonly used ritualistic items. Three basic items - water, a meal, and the scripture – all hold reverence in all three religions, but each religion has its own unique rituals and traditions surrounding them. This building attempts to express the similarities and differences through the built environment in a way that increases communication and understanding between the religions and the surrounding community.

Degree

thesis:*
Name thesis:degree_name
Master of Architecture
Level thesis:degree_level
masters
Discipline thesis:degree_discipline
Architecture
Department dc:contributor.department
Architecture
Grantor dc:publisher
Virginia Tech
Year dc:date.issued
2020

Author and committee

dc:creator, dc:contributor.*
Author dc:creator
  • Rumage, Luke Thomas
Chair dc:contributor.committeechair
  • La Coe, Jodi Lynn
Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember
  • Feuerstein, Marcia F.
  • Mars, Randall A.

Subjects

dc:subject × 7

Rights

dc:rights
Statement dc:rights
  • In Copyright

Identifiers

dc:identifier.*
Dc Identifier Other
vt_gsexam:26555
OAI identifier oai:identifier
oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/99630

Chain of custody

source
Harvested from
Virginia Tech
Base URL
vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/oai/request
Last updated
2026-07-22
Source record
OAI-PMH GetRecord
citation

Rumage, Luke Thomas. A House for the Families of Abraham: A Multi-Faith Community Center for Interfaith Dialogue. masters thesis, Virginia Tech, 2020. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/99630