Servant Leadership in Religion

Servant Leadership in Religion

Servant leadership is common in almost all major religions, including Islam, Buddhism, Christianity, and Judaism. However, even though they share this commonality, there are similarities and differences in how they carry out this type of leadership. One similarity is that they all emphasize the service of others. Accordingly, service is central to Islamic leadership and rejects the concept of personal ambition. Buddhism completely rejects the idea of self and instead promotes interconnectedness with all people (Van Dierendonck & Patterson, 2010). This is also evident in Judaism, where Moses is the perfect servant leadership model. Moses served the people of Israel and acted as a role model. In Christianity, particularly in the New Testament, Jesus is the leader who is also a servant to everyone around him and goes as far as washing their feet. A second similarity of servant leadership among the religions mentioned above is self-sacrifice (Van Dierendonck & Patterson, 2010). Various leaders from these religions have been shown to sacrifice themselves for the sake of other people or for divine reasons. A third similarity is that all religions insist that all servant leaders be people of high moral standards; this way, they are role models for everyone else.

Contrastingly, one difference in the concept of servant leadership among the major religions is that Buddhism insists that a servant leader should maintain an impartial stance when there is a conflict between bad and good (Deroche, 2018). However, this is not the case for other religions, as most leaders have been demonstrated to choose a side, mostly the good side; for example, Moses sided with the Israelites against Pharaoh. A second difference is that apart from Christianity, the other three religions provide stages of spiritual development that one must complete to become a servant leader (Van Dierendonck & Patterson, 2010). Lastly, yet importantly, apart from Buddhism, servant leaders in the other three religions are guided by historical texts, for example, the Quran and the Bible.

After analyzing the similarities and differences in servant leadership among the four religions, I now believe that all other religious traditions from the said religions could share many commonalities. Essentially, the said religions are based on the worship of a divided being or enlightened beings. These beings are said to be good; as such, most traditions will aim to do good, where the similarities are evident.

References

Deroche, M. H. (2018). On Being ‘Impartial’(ris med): From Non-Sectarianism to the Great Perfection. Revue d’Etudes Tibétaines, 44, 129-158.

Van Dierendonck, D., & Patterson, K. (2010). Servant leadership: Developments in theory and research. Springer.

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Review the discussion on the concept of service and leadership in the four religious traditions: Judaism, Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam. What similarities and differences do you see across the four religious traditions? How has this shaped your thinking about other religious traditions? Strengthen your claims with supporting citations.