THE TAWHID POSTULATE: The Theory of Revelation Consistency
There is one simple logic we often miss when talking about religion, which is the logic of source consistency.
*1. Single Source, Therefore Single Message*
The premise is absolute: God is One (Tawhid). The logical consequence is that His teachings must be one, consistent, and non-contradictory from the beginning of creation until today.
If God is Most Perfect, it is impossible for Him to send down life-guidance systems that collide with each other across eras. If differences appear, it is not because the source is different, but because the transmission of the message has been distorted, or because the depth of our interpretation has not yet reached it. Your term is precise: we haven't explored far enough.
*2. Universality of Guidance: No Tribe Without a Messenger*
This is the second postulate based on the Qur'anic evidence: _“And there never was a nation but a warner had passed among them”_ (QS. Fathir: 24).
Therefore logically, all human clusters - on top of mountains, at the poles, in the Amazon jungle, on remote islands - must have received guidance. Hadith mentions the number as 124,000 Prophets and 313 Messengers, 25 of whom we know by name. It means there is no such thing as samawi (heavenly) vs non-samawi religion. All religions in their origin are samawi religions, religions from the sky. The difference is only in the level of integrity and the level of distortion.
Some teachings are still original, most have undergone _information bias_ - bent, added to, reduced by the interests of power and time.
*3. Islam as the Generic Name for That Consistency*
If all those messages are consistent, then the generic name for all those consistent messages is Islam - which means total surrender to that Single Source.
All the teachings of the Prophets are in essence Islam in their respective versions, with different levels of sharia completeness according to the context of their era. Then all those versions were perfected, completed, and finalized in the final version: the Al-Qur'an. _Al-Yauma akmaltu lakum dinakum_ (QS. Al-Maidah: 3) is not the beginning, but the closing.
*4. Intertextuality of the Messengers: Mutually Knowing and Acknowledging*
The characteristic of a consistent system is that its actors are interconnected.
The Messengers know and acknowledge each other, not negate each other. The Gospel mentions Ahmad, the Al-Qur'an mentions Musa, Isa, Sulaiman, Adam in one and the same lineage of revelation. Their positions are equal as a _channel_ or transmitter, not as competitors. The content of the message is the same: Tawhid.
This is what in the sociology of religion is called the _perennial chain_ - the eternal chain of the same truth.
*5. The Al-Qur'an as the Final Book and Preservation*
So that the confusion caused by thousands of years of distortion can be resolved, a book is needed that functions as a _master copy_ - the most complete, structured, and deliberately preserved for eternity.
The Al-Qur'an positions itself as such: _“Indeed, it is We who sent down the Al-Dhikr, and indeed, We will be its guardian”_ (QS. Al-Hijr: 9). The only book whose claim of preservation is that not a single letter has changed, so it becomes the standard to test the consistency of previous teachings.
*6. Epistemological Conclusion*
So if today we have not yet seen that unity, interconnectedness, and consistency, the problem is not with God, nor with His religion.
The problem lies in the limitations of our epistemology. Our task is not to defend the partitions of difference, but to keep learning, digging, until we find the single common thread of true truth.
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