... Satya is truthfulness and honesty at all costs. Brahmacharya is often translated incorrectly as sexual continence, but actually means the state of incessant search for the truth; the truth being Brahman. Notice that Brahman is not called God, merely "The Truth" whatever it may be. Maitri is the guidelines for friendship which is the principal relationship in Hindu society. Dharma is translated as "Fulfilling one's duty". Duty is the commitment to Society, Temple, and Family. Viirya is fortitude and includes the ability to understand the strains of a Hindu in society. Dama is self-restraint and is involved with chastity. Shaucha means purity and is ...
... ambitions, along with the want to “save” other less civilized cultures it is shown that Islam, Christianity, and of Hinduism have spread through conquest. Islam has, throughout the centuries, been somewhat a victim of circumstance - indeed it has been perceived by many as oppressive and cruel. This belief originated over a thousand years ago, when Islamic peoples first threatened the western world. As they slowly undermined Byzantine authority, Christians became terrified of their presence, resulting in widespread animosity and aversion. Mohammed, the prophet of Islam, was a great warrior. This invariably lead defeated peoples to believe that he begot a cu ...
... practices and beliefs of Hinduism cannot be understood without knowing the background. Hinduism is the worlds oldest religion, it dates back more than 3,000 years. Hinduism is unique in the fact that it has no founder. Its origins are lost in a very distant past. In 1500 BC the Indo-Aryan tribes invaded India and took over the Mahenjo-daro. From the combination of these two tribes came the worship of goddesses. The Hindus started practices such as bathing in temple tanks and the postures of yoga. Soon gods of war started being created and worshipped. Sakas then began invading the Hindus and made a large impact on the religion. The sacred temples started to ...
... with impermanence. Dissatisfaction is a larger concept entir ely- it involves the acknowledgment that suffering exists. The world is founded on suffering, (DeSilva, 1991:p 21) and once anything becomes a problem there is bound to be suffering, unsatisfactoriness, or conflict- conflict between our desires and the state of reality. Dissatisfaction is the most difficult characteristic of existence to apply to one's life, as it involves not only the acceptance of this state, but also outlines one on how to treat and cure this state. The notion that the world is an ever-changing environment on all levels of existence is not a radical idea. In fact, those that have ...
... in 1945 little was known of and the Gnostics except from the writings of their adversaries. One of the main things which separated the Gnostics from orthodox Christians was the mysticism of their beliefs. It began with their views of God and creation. They viewed the One which they called the true God as having a feminine part which was the Spirit. In accord, they also held that Jesus came from God and the Spirit to form the Trinity. In the Gnostic version of creation of the world the Spirit of God is referred to as the Wisdom of God or Sophia who is also a feminine creative force. It seems she wished to give birth to a creature like herself. She did so witho ...
... and an ending of our personal existence. Different types of religions, beliefs and gods evolved, along with prayer. There are different types of prayer. From quiet contemplation to complete ectasy or chaos in my opinion. Religious orders, specifically, differentiate from contemplative cloistered to active, or a little of both. Once I visited a different church with a friend and I found it incredibly hard to accept the way born again christians prayed so freely and openly compared to quiet contemplation, in a contemplative cloistered monastery with Benedictine Nuns. I questioned how one could really pray with so much yelling, crying and loud music, especially ...
... bit misleading because it is made up of two Chinese words meaning “the way of the gods”(Shen : “ spiritual power, divinity”; Tao : “the way or path”). The word for this in Japanese is kannagara : "the way of the kami ." Many things can be said about Shinto. First, it was a tribal religion, not a state one. However, even when the tribes were organized into coherent states, they still retained their Shinto beliefs. Second, all Shinto cults believe in Kami (“the divine”) Individual clans worshipped a single Kami which was regarded as the principal ancestor of the clan. As the clan spread, it still worshipped it's Kami, but when one clan conquered ...
... groups around the world. It is this upon which George Weckman focuses his article. The author defines the characteristics of a community in a number of ways. For one, he claims that some sort of initiation or "entrance ritual" needs to occur in order to mark the acceptance of an individual into the community as a whole. In addition to these entrance rituals, the individual will, most likely, participate in other types of rituals throughout his life. This may include his eventual departure from the community, such as death. Secondly, the author emphasizes the fact that communities often possess clearly defined ritual activities that are unique to their ow ...
... day to day. The difference pertaining to this, is the reason the flood was sent. Noah’s story rules that the flood was sent because the earth had become corrupt and filled with violence, (Genisis, 6). The only way to destroy this violence was to drown everyone but the chosen few. These chosen few were hand-picked by God as good people to start a new, more wholesome and obedient civilization. Gilgamesh’s story says the reason for the flood was the volume the people created. The noise was intolerable and the gods insisted on ending the racket at once, (Duiker, 20). The singular reason Gilgamesh was spared is that he was informed of the flood by Ea, the wa ...
... of this creation. So, God created man in the image of himself. Man was created from the dust of the ground. God gave him the breath of life and the man became a living soul (Moses 1:1-2:7). With the background of that story, one should look at the Egyptian interpretation of the beginning. At first there was nothing but chaos that contained the seed of everything to come. In this confusion the sun god dwelled. By an effort of his will he emerged from chaos as Ra and gave birth to Shu, the god of air, and Tefnut, the goddess moisture. Shu and Tefnut gave birth to Geb and Nut, the earth god and sky goddess. Thus the physical universe was created. People we ...
