In section 1 of chapter 4 and throughout a packet titled, “Ancient Religions”, I have read about multiple religions and their cultures, beliefs, and origins. Religions are separated into two categories; Monotheism and Polytheism. Monotheism is the belief…
Islam and Hinduism Before we start with the description of Islam and Hinduism we need to understand what its religion, or at least try to comprehend the meaning of religion. The definition of religion is very difficult, many have try but they focus on only the few aspects of religion, some will exclude beliefs, practices and those religions that will not fit well. As Kile Jones once he wrote trying to define religion “It is apparent that religion can be seen as a theological, philosophical, anthropological, sociological, and psychological phenomenon of human kind. To limit religion to only one of these categories is to miss its multifaceted nature and lose out on the complete definition.” The two religion that I choose to investigate are the Hinduism and Islam because Hinduism and Islam are the third and second most popular religion around the world.…
Question 1: Hinduism 1) The image shows a skull, becoming a baby, a boy, a teenager, a man, elderly, then a skull again and then it repeats into the distance. This depicts the Hindu belief of reincarnation because it is saying that after someone dies, they go through life again and start their new form after their death. The objects the boy stages, teen stages, and man stages are holding depict the different lessons you learn in life. The almost white line going through the bodies of all the different reincarnations almost is representative of their soul passing throughout the person life and death and through to each new reincarnation.…
Judaism, Christianity and Islam, the three noteworthy monotheistic religions, all began in what is referred to today as the Arab World. Monotheism truly signifies "the faith in stand out God". Judaism is an old monotheistic religion, with the Torah as its foundational content, and supplemental oral custom spoke to by later messages, for example, the Midrash and the…
The Triad Hindu Temple is a community of like-minded Hindu believers seeking to achieve their life in a spiritual manner. The appearance on the outside may not coincide with other Hindu temples as it looks more like a regular building with little decoration on the walls but the interior contains many statues of the different gods and goddesses they worship. In the center of room contains a big altar which are used for offerings and worship and allows a large number of people to come and pray. Visitors are led directly to the main room to observe the service and celebration. The majority of the people in the group if not all are of Indian ethnicity.…
Every indiviual follows thier own relgion and tranditions that affect their daily lives and beliefs. The experiences potrayed to them as sacred and/or holy become a guide to sort out human experience. Through the stories presented to us, whether it may be during childhood or adulthood, we start to imagine our lives revolving around those and start to view the world through lenses of the stories. Every individual has beliefs according to their religious. Born and raised in India, I practiced Hinduism.…
Judaism is the oldest monotheistic religion. Although it really never achieved dominant numbers, the faith of the Hebrews just one of many ancient Middle Eastern tribes continues to exert a profound influence in the modern western world. Judaism is an ancient monotheistic religion, with the Torah as its foundational text and supplemental oral tradition represented by later texts such as the Midrash and the Talmud. Although the word "Torah" is sometimes used to refer to the entire Tanakh or even the whole body of Jewish writings, it technically means the first five books of the Tanakh. These books are also known as the Five Books of Moses or the Pentateuch.…
Many experts on religion have been debating and still continue to debate on the issue of Hinduism vs. Buddhism. While certain schools of thought believe that Buddhism is an offshoot of Hinduism and that the Buddha was essentially part of the Hindu pantheon, this view is not quite acceptable to Buddhists. Of course, it is widely understood and acknowledged that Buddhism as a religion became popular in India during a revolutionary movement that took place to abolish oppression and extreme orthodoxy prevalent in the then Indian milieu. In this article, we discuss the topic of Hinduism and Buddhism as two of India's most ancient and most popular religions, also going in-depth into their similarities and their…
I think I've learned many different things from the readings and the power points that differ from what I initially thought about each of the three monotheistic religions we talked about, and some that remain in line with what I believed or had heard about each of these three religions. I would like to first talk about christianity, I learned a lot about christianity in these last few weeks, things that I,ve never heard of even though I am a christian my self, I am a devoted roman catholic and I myself had a lot of misconceptions about my own religion, just imagine how it went with the other two of the monotheistic religions we talked about in class. For example I had no clue that in the begining of christianity christian had been persecuted, I had no idea I guess I had the common misconseption that most christians have that christianity emerged as apopular religion that grew fast and strong without any oposition.…
The final part of the Hinduism chapter discussed the topics about gender roles, health etiquettes, path to salvation, religious living, and the afterlife. The discussion on gender roles was most intriguing to me and it provided some insight about how women were treated in the ancient world. According to Bilhartz, Hinduism emphasizes a nondualistic reality, where "opposites are mere illusions; true reality is indivisible; ultimately everything ( male/female, creator/creature; human/divine) is One" (2006, p. 186). Within Hinduism exists multiple gods that may take masculine or feminine forms, but beyond these gods is the Absolute Reality that has a male-female transcendent quality. Although the central idea of Hinduism is nonduality, the Hindu scriptures did not build upon this theological insight and…
Buddhism and Hinduism are the two main religions in India. They are two of the world’s most influential religions that arose in South Asia. Buddhism is practiced in two forms, Theravada, the ancient form of Buddhism, and Mahayana, the developed form of Buddhism. Hinduism and Buddhism share many similarities as well as differences in various different aspects, like the beliefs, gods and goddesses worshipped, the place of worship, and the founder of the religion. They both have many similar philosophies and share some aspects of the culture.…
Pluralism is a state where persons of diverse social setting, race and religion are united in the world. Nevertheless, they continue to have their diverse customs and benefits. It also means the belief that persons of diverse social setting, race and religion ought to live in harmony and together in the world. In this paper, I am going to discuss pluralism in religion and religious oppression and their effect in the current world. Pluralism is the active rendezvous with diversity.…
Monotheism is a belief that there is only one god while polytheism…
Hinduism is most likely the oldest and most complex religion in the entire world. Traces of the religion go back as far as the third millennium B.C.E. The possible religious views of Hinduism are effectively infinite due to the number of gods both major and minor, priests and temples. Nearly 80 percent of the India population consider themselves Hindu and there are at least 30 million practitioners outside of India making this religion the third largest after Christianity and Islam. The word “Hinduism” is a collection of various traditions that are closely related and share common themes yet they do not constitute an integrated set of beliefs or practices.…
The essential thing I learned in this class is that religion is complicated and cannot be completely understood in a one semester class, not even if it is a fictional religion in a book series. This class has certainly acted as an overview of several religions and how they can be used as inspiration for fictional world building. One of the most complicated topics we covered seemed to be the explanation for the Christian trilogy and whether or not something was dualistic or monotheistic. The idea that multiple beings are just part of a singular being yet still distinct entities in and of themselves is both confusing and complicated. Before this class, I did not know a lot about the apocalyptic traditions in many religions.…