Religion and Civil Rights - Research Paper Example

Religion and Civil Rights Religions have a prominent place in human life. It asks or guides people to live in a particular way whichmay bring salvation at the end of life. Most of the religions teach its believers that this earthly life is a temporary one and a human will get a permanent life after death if he performs good activities in his earthly life. “Jains believe that the universe and everything in it is eternal. Nothing that exists now was ever created, nor will it be destroyed”1. On the other hand, Confucianism gives more importance to ethical practices in human life even though it keeps silence about life after death or God. “Each day I examine myself on three counts: whether or not I am loyal to those in whose behalf I act; whether or not I am trustworthy in my dealings with friends; whether or not I practice what is imparted”2. Different religions have different beliefs, customs, rituals and Gods. Based on this diverse belief system, religions control the civil rights of people. The rights of one religion need not be the rights of other religion. Same way the wrongs of one religion need not be the wrongs of another religion. This paper analyses the civil rights based on the belief system in different religions. Hindu Religion and civil rights “According to historians, the origin of Hinduism dates back to 5,000 or more years. The word "Hindu" is derived from the name of River Indus, which flows through northern India”3 “The foundations of this oldest surviving religion were laid by ancient rishis (sages), who taught their disciples the eternal principles of life they had discovered through their meditations”4. Hindu religion is often referred as the religion of Vedas and Dharma. (Dharma is the code of conduct of life principles). Anyone who practices Dharma can be considered as a Hindu. Different class system is prevailing in Hindu religion like Brahman, Kshathriya, Vaisya and Shudra etc. Brahman people got the rights to do the rituals in the temple whereas Kshathriya got the right to rule the country. Vaisya and Shudra belong to the working class. In short, civil rights of people in Hindu religion were not even earlier even though at present such classifications are meaningless. The greatest strength of Hindu religion is its respect to other religions. It believes in the doctrine of, “Sanatana Dharma” or Universal Truth. India is a secular democratic country even though of majority of the people in India is Hindus, because of the above Hindu doctrine. No religion is prohibited in India and people have the right to believe and spread their own religion. Buddhism and civil rights “The religion of Buddha began in 563 B.C. Buddhists believe in karma and rebirth. Karma determines in which form a person is reborn and rebirth is a second birth”5. The beliefs of Buddhism are slightly different from that of other religions. Most of the other religions believe in single God or multi God theory whereas Buddhists are more interested in karma and rebirth. According to their belief, human life consists of so many rebirths which will be ended once a person attains Nirvana. Karma or the activities of a person in his present life will determine the nature of his rebirth. Buddhists do not have belief in soul. For them, soul will be changing from one form to another based on the rebirths. “They called soul as "self” which is just a bunch of changing characteristics”6 . The belief of Buddhism is based on the four noble truths; “Life means suffering, the origin of suffering is attachment, the cessation of suffering is attainable and the path to the cessation of suffering”7. According to Buddhism, “If there were a creator of the world, he would be regarded as responsible for the suffering8. In other words, Buddhists see no chances of happiness in earthly life. All the human activities in this material world will ultimately end up in sufferings. Even if a person did nothing wrong in his present life, his activities in previous life may affect him in his present life also and the cycle will continue till the person attains Nirvana. Buddhists believe that desire is the cause of misery. The only way to avoid misery is refraining from desire which is difficult for an average human being. In other words, Buddhists are not much particular about the civil rights. Desire is a civil right approved by all the religions. However, Buddhists advocate that human should destroy the desire to get Nirvana which is similar to the concept of heaven proposed by other religions. Buddhists advocate people to follow the noble eight fold path of life which are; Right view, Right intension, Right speech, Right action, Right livelihood, Right effort, Right mindfulness and Right concentration9 Christianity and civil rights Christians believe in the trinity concept of God; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. “The Creed has an overall form based on the Trinity. It deals first with the Father, then the Son, and finally the Holy Spirit”10 (What are Major Christian Beliefs?).They believe that the entire human in this earth are sinners because of the sin committed by Adam. They also believe that Father send his son Jesus to the world in order to save the human from the punishments of the sins. Those who believe in son Jesus will get salvation at the end of their life. Christians have certain specified norms, which is often referred as Ten Commandments, to observe in their life to get salvation. Ten Commandments prohibit killing, robbery, lying, adultery etc and ask people to love and help their neighbours. Christians believe that only those who believe in Jesus and do things as per the doctrines of Jesus Christ will get salvation since Jesus earned the authority over this world from his Father because of his crucifixion. Sin entered this world through Adam and the entire world is now filled with sins because of the gene transfer from Adam. According to Father’s rule, death is the ultimate punishment for sin. However, Father realized that death of the entire generation cannot be justified since the sin of a single human being is responsible for the entire sins in this world. As per God’s plan, a sinless person must sacrifice his life in order to remove the dark spots caused by the sins of Adam. However, there were no sacred persons on earth because of Adam’s sins. So, God decided to send his sinless son, Jesus to earth to save the world. This is the core of Christian belief. Christianity put value on actions rather than customs or beliefs. For them, belief can be justified only through actions. It restricts people from committing sins. It prevents people from leading a crazy life. Christians realised that human have the tendency to dominate others. This dominating mentality often result in civil right violations of the under privileged or less influential people. Many of the Christian beliefs and principles were aimed to distribute equal justice to all. Jesus asked the believers to help the poor people. He once asked the rich people to distribute their wealth to poor people and follow him for getting salvation. In other words, Jesus is the first person who educates the people about the rights of poor in getting wealth. Judaism and civil rights Judaism does not believe in Jesus. They never accept Jesus as the son of God or Messiah. For them, Jesus was a person who tried to ridicule Judaism. According to Jew’s belief, “Jesus did not fulfill the messianic prophecies, Jesus did not embody the personal qualifications of the Messiah and the Biblical verses "referring" to Jesus are mistranslations and Jewish belief is based on national revelation”11. Jews believe that the coming Messiah will build the Third Temple (The Good News Bible, Ezekiel 37:26-28), Gather all Jews back to the Land of Israel (The Good News Bible, Isaiah 43:5-6)12. Jews always believe in traditions, rituals and customs. They often ask people to follow Moses’ teachings for getting salvation. Jews still believe that the God has given them an offer earlier and hence all the Jews will attain salvation irrespective of their actions. In other words, they argue that Jews have the right to get salvation because of God’s promise. The salvation of the individual Jew was connected to the salvation of the entire people. “This belief stemmed directly from the teachings of the Torah. The idea of corporate salvation of Israel is reflected in Paul's letter to the Romans, particularly in chapters 9-11”13. They believe that they can attain salvation by uniting the whole Jews people together in Israel. The massacres of Israel committed upon other people, especially on Palestine people can be understood with the help of the above belief. Jews believe that God has given some special civil rights to Jews community and they have the right to protect their civil rights even if it causes problems to other religions or beliefs. Islam and civil rights Islam is one of the heavily criticised religions in the world at present for its reluctance in accepting the civil rights and beliefs of other religions. Islam is adamant on its beliefs and is not ready to make any changes or dilute any of their religious principles in accordance with the changing needs of the advancing societies. Some of the fundamentalists in Islam believe that jihad or war should be conducted against the non-believers of Islam. Islamic societies are mostly male dominated and females have limited freedom in such fundamental societies. For example, in Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia, females cannot go out without covering their entire body using burkha. “They shall not strike their feet when they walk in order to shake and reveal certain details of their bodies. All of you shall repent to GOD, O you believers that you may succeed." 24:31”14(Dress code for women according to Quran). “Islam does not confront the problem of the freedom of expression in a purely pragmatic spirit”15. “The main goal of God's message to humankind is the attainment of justice in all of its fairness. This justice, the foundation of Islam, cannot be achieved unless human rights are secured for every individual and group in a Muslim state”16. “Woman is recognized by Islam as a full and equal partner of man in the procreation of humankind. He is the father; she is the mother, and both are essential for life. Her role is not less vital than his”17. Moreover, Prophet Muhammad has discouraged the wife beating measure.  "Do not beat the female servants of Allah”18. “Muhammad’s viewpoint of women was that they "lack self-control" and thus for their own good, and societies’ good, they must be subordinate to and managed by their husbands” 19(Silas). However, the above teachings are not visible min practice in most of the Muslim countries. It should be noted that one of the young lady from Afghanistan lost her nose and ears recently when the Taliban administration administered a ruling against that lady for running away from her husband’s house. Science and civil rights The association of religion and science started from the biblical period itself. “In Genesis 1:28, God commands his creation to "Go forth and multiply"20.Many of the earlier prominent scientists were highly religious people. “Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo and Newton, were all deeply religious Christians who in many ways saw their scientific work as a religious undertaking”21. However, most of the current scientists are atheists. Science always has contrasting views about civil rights when we compare it with the beliefs of religion. Science never believes in the concept of God. It argues that human life starts and ends in this world itself. The future life concept is a myth for science. Based on the above belief, science is focussed more on developing norms for civil rights in this world. It believes that the religions threatening the people in the name of future life and hence they are unable to lead a life of their own freedom. The threats about punishment force people to sacrifice many of their wishes in human life. For example, most of the people like to have more than one wife. However, apart from Islam, no other religion advocates that. Science argues that if two parties have willingness to live together, neither, cast, religion, race, or even gender should prevent them from doing so. In other words, any action which may not harm the interests of other people can be justified according to the views of science. To conclude, religions and science have entirely different beliefs with respect to civil rights, life in this world and life after death. Works Cited 1. “Book of Romans Study, Background - Part 2 Jewish Views of Salvation, Faith and Freedom”. 2000. Web. 04 May 2011. 2. “Chapter 1, Verse 4”. Confucianism. Web. 04 May 2011. 3. “Dress Code for Women According to Quran”. Web. 04 May 2011. 4. Dr. Osman, Fathi. “Freedom Of Expression”. Web. 04 May 2011. 5. Dr. Badawi, Jamal. “Is wife beating allowed in Islam?”. Web. 04 May 2011. 6. Devshoppe, “Details About Hinduism”. 2008. Web. 04 May 2011. 7. Das, Subhamoy. “Theories About the Origin of Hinduism”. Web. 04 May 2011. 8. “Good News Bible”. 2003. Published by The Bible Society of India. Bangalore. 9. Harvey, Peter, “An Introduction to Buddhism: Teachings, History and Practices (Introduction to Religion)” Cambridge University Press (25 May 1990) 10. “Histories of Mathematics & Christianity”. 2009. Web. 04 May 2011. 11. “Jain Beliefs”. Religion Facts. 2010. Web. 04 May 2011. 12. Manzoor, S. Parvez. “Freedom of Expression and Islam”. 2009. Web. 04 May 2011. 13. Michaela, “Buddhism”. Web. 04 May 2011. 14. O'Connor J. J. and Robertson E F. “Christianity and the Mathematical Sciences - the Heliocentric Hypothesis”. Web. 04 May 2011. 15. Rabbi Simmons, Shraga. “For 2,000 years Jews have rejected the Christian idea of Jesus as Messiah. Why?”. Web. 04 May 2011. 16. Silas. “WIFE BEATING IN ISLAM”. Web. 04 May 2011. 17. “The Four Noble Truths”. Web. 04 May 2011. 18. “THE KORAN & WOMEN”. Web. 04 May 2011. 19. “The Noble Eightfold Path”. Web. 04 May 2011. 20. “What are Major Christian Beliefs?”. Web. 04 May 2011. Read More