Numinous Religious Experience In Christianity

According to Ninian Smart, the seven dimensions of religion include practical and ritual, emotional and experiential, narrative and mythical, ethical and legal, doctrinal and philosophical, social and institutional, and material. The practical and ritual dimension involves rituals and practices that provide spiritual awareness of adherents. The emotional and experiential dimension includes the life changing experiences that either the leaders or followers of a religion go through. Narrative and mythical dimension are the stories and past records that preserve tradition and culture in the religion. Ethical and legal dimension of the religion are basically the codes of behavior that are followed

“Hinduism is a collection of religious beliefs that developed slowly over a long period of time.” (World History Patterns of Interaction, 2005) Hinduism has been made up of so many different cultures and beliefs that unlike Christianity and Islam it is unable to be traced back. Hindus believe in karma and reincarnation. Karma is good and

free from the cycle of rebirth. However, under this religion moksha can only be attained is one 's

Hindus believe that ones circumstances in life are completely determined by his previous conduct, either in this life or in previous lives. This is called karma. By doing good deeds in this life, therefore, one can improve his circumstances in the future, especially in future reincarnations. (BG, p. 9,10) The final goal is to escape or be released from the cycle of reincarnation. Hindus will seek in life to be set free from birth, death, and rebirth, so that we exist in a state of pure impersonal being without a physical body. Jews, Christians and Muslims believe that man has only one life to live. In contradiction to the doctrine of karma, the Abrahamic religion believe that on earth, men often do not receive fair or just rewards for their lives they get their reward on judgment day. God will judge all men and declare our eternal rewards on the basis of our lives, whether we have lived it good or bad. After judgment, men receive their eternal destinies. The righteous receive eternal life, a state of bliss, in the presence of God. The wicked receive eternal punishment, suffering and sorrow, separated from God. In the Abrahamic religion the gift of life is received after we leave the earth, not on the earth. Finally Hindu’s and Abrahamic religions also differ on their concept of Salvation.

In William James’ 1902 book “The Varieties of Religious Experience” he opens with depicting the approach of his review. He clarifies that it would be of little advantage to construct the examination with respect to regular people who have bound religious encounters and emulate customs which have been passed on to them. Rather, he centers the review around 'religious virtuosos '. In addition, as he clarifies in his second address, the attention must be on individual religious experience instead of corporate, in light of the fact that it is more central. Actually, it is out of the extreme encounters of a little few that most religious developments (or "factions" as he terms them) have created. Part 3 builds up that individuals appear to have the ability to encounter the concealed furthermore an inclination to see it as being more genuine than things seen, listened, touched or tasted.

In Hinduism karma and reincarnation are two meaningful major elements. Karma is a concept that the universe will return your good or bad actions back to you. You will find with certain actions you make, you feel good and others around you feel good. When remembering karma think about mental and physical actions that you would make. In the Hindu religion the soul reincarnates itself over and over until it becomes perfect.

For this paper I decided to sit down with my childhood friend from my St. Thomas More Catholic School days. Katarina and I have known each other since we were 5 years old. I remember attending church with her family on Sunday morning, spending the night at her house, occasionally attending her family's BBQ's on Easter Sunday, and inviting her to all my birthday parties at Chuck E Cheese. Though we lost touch after high school we found each other again thanks to social media. We are both from Hispanic Catholic families so it was always assumed that we would grow up to be Catholic too. To my surprise I found that on Katie's social media page under religious views it did not say Catholic as I expected but rather Wicca. Turns out Katie decided that the Catholic faith wasn't for her and opted instead to convert to Wicca.

Hinduism, Buddhism, and Daoism are all religions that connect in more than one way. One major way that these religions connect is through the afterlife, otherwise known as the unconditioned reality. Hinduism and Buddhism have very similar views on the afterlife while Daoism has a slightly different view. In the end, they all have the same goal which is to achieve the final state that lasts forever. Even though this is true, that does not mean they do not differ in more than one way. Hinduism, Buddhism, and Daoism rely strongly on theoretical, practical, and sociological standpoints. A large part of the theoretical standpoints, are myths about the gods and how things are. A large part of sociological standpoints are festivals, and temples. Lastly, practical is practiced through mediation, yoga, and payers. In Hinduism, there are various sects that worship a total of roughly 360,000,000 different gods. As you could imagine, this would be difficult to generalize in just one essay, so the branch of Hinduism I will go over just includes the basic trinity and Vedic gods. Along with this, this essay will include information on the two major types of Buddhism and how one attains enlightenment. Finally, we will go over how one is to attain immortality through Daoism, along with the beliefs of the traditional Chinese Folk religions.

Two of the most central ideas in Hinduism that are very important to my cultural identity in terms of my outlook on life and other people are reincarnation and karma. I believe that there is a cycle of death and rebirth, and depending on your deeds in your current life, you will be rewarded or punished in your next life. Eventually, every Hindu’s goal is to attain “Moksha” and break the cycle of life and become one with God. My belief in karma and reincarnation affects my everyday life because when I think about my situation or other peoples’ situation, I trace everything back to actions in our previous lives. My religion is the most important part of my life, and the values that it has taught me have stuck with me through times of joy and times of distress. My relationship with God is the most important one in my life, and it is the biggest part of my cultural identity.

Though many have the some of the same teachings, Hinduism, Judaism, and Christianity all have different afterlife's. I will start of first with the afterlife of Hinduism, in the Hindu religion there is a “heavenly paradise enjoyed by the souls of those who died with a ponderance of good karma but who must still undergo at least one more stay on earth” (ABH 456).They are allowed to stay in this heavenly paradise for only a certain amount of time before they have to go back to earth to perform the rest of their duties. After the person has finally achieved perfection back on earth, instead of going back to paradise they become reunited with the the Brahman, also called the soul of the universe.

Also, as mentioned, Hindus believe in the caste system, moksha and Brahman. It is believed that one must work their way up in the caste system to reach the ultimate goal of Moksha, to be one with the energy of Brahman. Since Hindus believe in the caste system they believe that after death they will be incarnated and they will live another life as a different person and they will have a different Dharma to achieve. Everyone starts off at the bottom of the caste and depending on the Dharma, Karma and Yoga one has completed it will determine if the individual will move up in the caste system, if they will stay in the same caste or even if they will drop down to a lower caste. Since Hindus believe that they will have another life they do not care for their bodies, they only care about reaching the goal to be one with the Brahman after achieving Moksha. “For sure is the death of all that comes to birth, sure is the birth of all that dies. So, in a matter that no one can prevent thou hast no cause to grieve” (Bhagavad Gita 2:27) Also, families do not care to grieve and believe it is not necessary to grieve over the loss of a loved one since their death means that they are moving on to a better life, and one day will accomplish the goal of returning to Moksha. Once all the levels of the caste are completed the individual exits the castes also known as the process of samsara

Hinduism believes that realizing the soul is the embodiment of Brahman is essential to being released from the cycle of rebirth, Samsara. Hindus understand that the soul, atman, is permanent and only inhabits a physical shell which dies and passes the soul on to the next mortal shell, which can be better or worse than the previous depending on karma. With that said, Hindus believe in rebirth until one realizes the ultimate divine at which point they would be free from the punarjanma, the transmigration of the soul, liberating their souls to achieve moksha. Buddhism, on the other hand, challenges Atman with the belief in Anatman, which is non-self. Buddhists believe that the world is constantly changing, nullifying the concept of the permanent soul, Atman. There is no reason the soul remains unchanged in a perpetually changing environment.

Hindus believe in an everlasting soul (atman) that is reincarnated almost intact from birth to birth, and through spiritual practice Hindus seek release (moksha, also known as liberation) so that the soul can join with the Divine God, known as Brahmin.

will tell you what you have done as bad things you do in your life

The Hindu religion and culture is a very complex subject. The Hindu religion combines rich ethnical and standard beliefs. We will take a closer look and try to understand the Hindu religion and culture. The Hindu religion is the oldest religion of the five major religions, which are Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, and Hinduism (Major World Religions, 2006). The Hindu religion began to develop about 4.000 years ago in India, but it there was no single founder or system of belief (Major World Religions, 2006). There are many diverse and various Gods in the Hindu religion. One of the most important beliefs is the theory of karma, which holds that all beings, human or animal have karma which determines which soul is for which body and