Religion

Chapter 14
Religion

 Religion
is a unified system of beliefs and
practices concerned with sacred things.
Sacred vs. Profane

 EmileDurkheim found that every society has

things that are sacred and things that are
profane.
Sacred

 Sacredthings and ideas are set apart and given

a special meaning that goes beyond immediate
existence.
 Buddha statues, bibles, crosses, star of David, etc.
are all examples.
Profane

 Profane means the non-sacred aspects of

life. This doesn't necessarily mean they are
unholy, it just means they are commonplace in
our society and don't involve the supernatural.
 Another word for profane is secular.
Legitimation

 According to sociologists one function of religion

is that it gives formal approval to existing social
arrangements. In other words, it justifies our
society's norms and customs.
 For example, why some people are poor and
some people are rich, why we have certain laws,
etc.
 Many social customs and rituals are based on
religion. This idea is called legitimation.
Functions of Religion
1.Provides explanation about the unknown
2.Gives meaning and purpose to certain beliefs
3.Integrates and maintains the fundamental and
ultimate values of the supreme being
4.Allays the fears and anxieties of individuals
5.Has an integrative function and is a means of
group solidarity
6.Performs welfare, education and recreation
functions
7.Serves as a means of social control
Religions of the World
Numbers
 Christianity: 1.9 billion people
 Islam: 1.1 billion
 Hinduism: 800 million
 Buddhism: 325 million
 Judaism: 13 million
Christianity
 Based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ
 Originated in Palestine in the 1st century AD
 Believe that Jesus was the son of God who
came and died for people’s sins and then rose
so that all people could be saved
 Believe in one God(monotheistic) who created
the universe and all things in it
 Christianity originally developed as a part of
Judaism
Christian Way of Life

 Fellowship with God

 Our relationships with others
 Obedience to God's commands
 Discipline
Important Days
 Ash Wednesday-Lent
 Palm Sunday
 Maundy Thursday
 Good Friday
 Easter
 Ascension
 Pentecost
 Advent
 Christmas
 Judaism
 Is a monotheistic religion
 Judaism is the oldest and smallest of the world's five great
religions
 Being a part of a Jewish community and living one's life
according to Jewish law and traditions is very important.
 The fundamental beliefs of Judaism are:

-There is a single, all-powerful God, who created the

universe and everything in it.
-God has a special relationship with the Jewish people due to
covenant that God made with Moses on Mount Sinai, 3500
years ago.
 The Jewish place of worship is called a
Synagogue

 The religious leader of a Jewish community

is called a Rabbi

 Unlike leaders in many other faiths, a rabbi is

not a priest and has no special religious
status

 The Jewish holy day, or Sabbath(Shabbat),

starts at sunset on Friday and continues until
sunset on Saturday

 During the Sabbath, Jews do not work(drive,

cook, etc)
7 Holy Days
 Rosh Hashanah-Jewish New Year
 Yom Kippur-A day of fasting and
praying which occurs 10 days after the
first day of Rosh Hashanah. The holiest
day in the year
 Sukkot-8 day festival of thanksgiving
 Hanukkah-The Feast of Lights is an 8
day Feast of Dedication. It recalls the
war fought by the Maccabees in the
cause of religious freedom
 Purim-The Feast of Lots recalls the defeat by
Queen Esther of the plan to slaughter all of the
Persian Jews, circa 400 BC
 Pesa(Passover)-The 8 day festival recalls the
exodus of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt
circa 1300 BCE. A holiday meal, the Seder, is
held at home
 Shavouth-Pentecost recalls God's revelation of
the Torah to the Jewish people
 Menorah-It is a symbol of
the nation of Israel and a
mission to be "a light unto
the nations.
 A Yarmulke is worn
during prayer to shoe
respect to G_d
 The Star of David is the
international symbol of
Judaism
 Flag of Israel has it
Kosher Foods

 Foods are kosher when they meet all

criteria that Jewish law applies to food
 Characteristics that make a food non-
kosher:
the mixture of meat and milk
theuse of cooking utensils which had
previously been used for non-kosher food
The type of animal it is
 Leviticus 11:3 says that Jews may eat all animals
that have cloven hooves and chew their cud
 Leviticus 11:4 explicitly prohibited the
consumption of animals that do not have these
characteristics designating them "unclean to
you."
 Six mammals are specifically not allowed:
 The camel
 The hyrax
 The hare
 The pig
 Whales and dolphins
 Kosher animals are as follows:
 Cows, goats, sheep, antelope, deer, giraffes, okapis
and pronghorns
 Most fish(excluding shellfish, sharks, octupus, eels and
squid)
 Chicken, duck, turkey
 Milk and cheese are kosher but cannot be eaten with
meat or mixed with meat.

 Preparation
 the slaughter of animals is designed to minimize the
pain—usually done by a slice across the throat
 this eliminates the practice of hunting for food unless it
can be captured alive and ritually slaughtered.
 All blood and veins must be removed from meat(salting
and broiling are common methods)
 Islam
 Islam is the world's second most followed religion
 It began around 1400 years ago in Arabia, but swiftly become a
world faith, and now has around 1.2 billion people
 "Islam" is an Arabic word which means “surrendering oneself to
the will of God”
 One will achieve peace and security by doing so

 A person surrenders to the will of Allah by living and thinking in

the way Allah has instructed.

 Islam is more than a system of beliefs. The faith provides a social

and legal system and governs things like family life, law and
order, ethics, dress, and cleanliness, as well as religious ritual and
Where is Islam practiced?

 The countries with the largest Islamic

populations are not in the Middle East as
most would think
 The largest are Indonesia (170 million),
Pakistan (136 million), Bangladesh (105
million), and India (103 million)
 Islam's three holiest places, the cities of
Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem, are all in
the Middle East
 The present form of Islam began in Arabia in 622
AD
 It is based on the ministry of a man named
Muhammad and on the words that Allah gave
to the world through him
 Muhammad did not found Islam. Islam was
created by Allah at the beginning of time, and
in fact Muslims regard Adam as the first Muslim
 Muhammad was the final messenger through
whom Allah revealed the faith to the world
 There had been earlier messengers, among
them Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses and Jesus.
5 Pillars of Islam
1. Shahada(witness) is the Muslim
profession of faith
- "I witness that there is no god but
Allah, and that Muhammad is the
prophet of Allah"
 Muslims say this when they wake up
in the morning and just before they
go to sleep at night
 2. Salat(daily prayer) is a prayer ritual
performed 5 times a day by all Muslims
over the age of 10
 Between first light and sunrise
 After the sun has passed the middle of the
sky
 Between mid-afternoon and sunset
 Between sunset and the last light of the
day
 Between darkness and dawn
3. Sawm(fasting) is abstaining each day
during Ramadan
 Sawm helps Muslims develop self-control,
gain a better understanding of God's gifts
and greater compassion towards the
deprived.
 Ramadan is the holiest day for Islam. It
marks when Muhammad had the Qur-an
revealed to him
 Sawm is usually described as fasting, but it
actually involves abstaining from all bodily
pleasures between dawn and sunset
 Not only is food forbidden, but also things
like smoking, chewing gum, negative
thoughts and sexual activity
4. Zakat(almsgiving) is giving alms to the
poor
 This is a compulsory gift of 2.5 % of
one's savings each year
 Giving in this way is intended to free
Muslims from the love of money
 It reminds them that everything they
have really belongs to God.
5. Hajj is the pilgrimage to Mecca that all
physically/financially able Muslims should
make at least once in their life
 Mecca is the most holy place for Muslims
 Takes place during days 8-13 of the 12th
month of the Islamic Lunar calendar
 They circle the Kaaba seven times on three
occasions, say prayers, drink from a holy
spring, walk to Mount Arafat to pray, feast,
cast stones at three pillars(to fight Satan’s
temptations), shave hair, run seven times
between some hills
Other Info
The Qur’an is the Islamic holy book
 The Qur'an is the actual word of God, and
contains the fundamental beliefs of Islam
 Mecca, Medina and Jerusulem are holy
cities
 According to tradition, the Qur'an was
dictated to Muhammad
 Two major sects
 Sunni-920 million people(everywhere else)
 Shiite-120 million people(Iran)
 Comparing the Sunni and Shiite branches of
Islam
Islamic Law

 The Sharia outlines all of the laws(comes

from the Koran)
 5 Major Crimes:
 theft,
highway robbery, intoxication, adultery
and falsely accusing another of adultery
Food Laws
 Very
similar laws to the Jewish kosher
foods
 Noalcohol, pork, blood, no pork fat
products, scavenger animals
 Food must be prepared similarly to the
Jews
 Slice to the jugular
 Drain blood
Hinduism
 Hinduism includes a very wide range of
beliefs and practices, so there aren't many
things that are common to all Hindu groups
 Hinduism has no founder, no single book of
faith, no creed, and no single source of
authority(such as Jesus)
 Hinduism is very individualistic but a big part
of a person’s everyday life
 There are 750 million Hindus in the world,
mostly in India
 For many Hindus, religion is a matter of practice
rather than of beliefs. It's more what you do than
what you believe.

 Behind Hindu practice is the belief that every soul

is trapped in a cycle of birth-death-
rebirth(reincarnation). Every Hindu wants to
escape from this cycle.

 Hindus aim to live in a way that will cause each of

their lives to be better than the life before.

 Whether one is reborn into a better life, a worse

life, or even to live as an animal, depends on
Karma, which is the value of a soul's good and
bad deeds.
HinduBeliefs
All good things in life are gifts from God
 Finding out what your life’s calling is as
Dharma suggest/requires is a very important
goal
 Being a fair and decent person is very
important
 Wealth, power and material belongings are
good goals as long as they don’t become
all important
 Moksha is the ultimate goal
Four Stages of Life
1. Ages 12-24 you get educated and trained
2. Ages 24-48 you get married, raise a family,
make money, get involved in many things
3. Ages 48-72 you become a mentor to a
young person and start isolating
themselves from the outside world
4. At age 72 you end ties to the outside world
and get rid of your worldly possessions.
Prayer and devotion become very
important.
 Mostly aimed at men and is not followed
as much as it used to be
HinduGods
One would think Hinduism is polytheistic.
Most Hindus would say they worship one
God.
 There is only one ultimate God, Brahman,
but shows itself in many forms
 The gods Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva, for
example, are different aspects of Brahman:
 Brahma reflects God's divine work of
creating the universe
 Vishnu reflects God's work in keeping the
universe in existence
 Shiva reflects God's work in destroying it
Buddhism
 Founded in India around 500 BC by
Siddhartha Guatama
 Became Buddha, the Enlightened One,
when he was 29
 He was trying to find the true meaning of life
and eventually, through four trance-like
stages of meditation, he was enlightened to
the Buddhist was of life
 His main teachings was to eliminate human
wants as they are the cause of suffering in
the world
 Buddhism has no unique creed, no single
authority and no single sacred book
 Buddhism focuses on each individual seeking to
attain enlightenment
 Key beliefs and values are contained in "The
Four Noble Truths“
 1. Life means suffering
 2. The origin of suffering is attachment to
worldly things
 3. The end to suffering is attainable through
eliminating physical wants/needs
 Eventually
can achieve Nirvana(no wind)
 Nirvana means freedom from all worries and troubles
 4. The path to the end suffering and achieve
Nirvana is to follow the Eight Fold Path
Eight Fold Path
 1. Right View
 To see and view things as they really are
 Attained true wisdom
 2. Right Intention
 Think and do the right things at all times
 3. Right Speech
 Do not lie, curse, slander, or gossip
 4. Right Action
 Do not harm yourself or others, do not steal, and
no sexual misconduct
 5. Right Livelihood
 No jobs dealing in weapons, in living beings
(including raising animals for slaughter as well as
slave trade and prostitution), working in meat
production and butchery, and selling alcohol
and drugs
 6. Right Effort
 Give 100% effort in what you do
 7. Right Mindfulness
 Having the power to control our thought process
and see the truth behind things
 8. Right Concentration
 Ability
to have deep concentration and ability to
focus on wholesome thoughts and actions