In my last post, I asked the question ‘So if….God is communicative, how does he communicate with us? Is it through the Bible, the Qur’an, Bhagavad Gita or the Vedas or does he not communicate with us at all?’. Well before I try and answer this question, I though I would give you some facts about some of the holy books. I have taken this information from the BBC’s Religion website
Islam
The Qu’ran
The Qur’an is the holy book for Muslims, revealed in stages to the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) over 23 years.
Qur’anic revelations are regarded by Muslims as the sacred word of God, intended to correct any errors in previous holy books such as the Old and New Testaments.
Origin
The Qur’an was revealed to the Prophet Muhammad by God in Arabic.
Some Qur’anic fragments have been dated as far back as the eighth, and possibly even the seventh, century. The oldest existing copy of the full text is from the ninth century.
Although early variants of the Qur’an are known to have existed, Muslims believe that the text we have today was established shortly after the death of the Prophet by the Caliph Uthman.
Contents
There are 114 chapters in the Qur’an, which is written in the old Arabic dialect.
All the chapters except one begin with the sentence Bismillahir rahmanir raheem, ‘In the name of Allah the most merciful and the most kind’. This is the thought with which Muslims should start every action.
The longest chapter of the Qur’an is Surah Baqarah (The Cow) with 286 verses and the shortest is Surah Al-Kawther (abundance) which has 3 verses.
The arrangement of surahs does not correspond to the chronological order in which they were revealed.
The Qur’an is sometimes divided into 30 roughly equal parts, known as juz’. These divisions make it easier for Muslims to read the Qur’an during the course of a month and many will read one juz’ each day, particularly during the month of Ramadan.
For more info, click here
Hinduism
The Vedas
These are the most ancient religious texts which define truth for Hindus.
They got their present form between 1200-200 BCE and were introduced to India by the Aryans.
Hindus believe that the texts were received by scholars direct from God and passed on to the next generations by word of mouth.
Vedic texts are sometimes called shruti, which means hearing. For hundreds, maybe even thousands of years, the texts were passed on orally.
Bhagavad Gita
The Bhagavad Gita, or “Song of the Lord” is part of the sixth book of the Mahabharata, the world’s longest poem.
Composed between 500 BCE and 100 CE, the Mahabharata is an account of the wars of the house of Bharata.
It is one of the most popular Hindu texts and is known as a smriti text (the remembered tradition). This is considered by some to be of less importance than shruti (the heard text, such as the Vedas). It has, nevertheless, an important place within the Hindu tradition.
The Bhagavad Gita takes the form of a dialogue between prince Arjuna and Krishna, his charioteer.
Arjuna is a warrior, about to join his brothers in a war between two branches of a royal family which would involve killing many of his friends and relatives.
He wants to withdraw from the battle but Krishna teaches him that he, Arjuna, must do his duty in accordance with his class and he argues that death does not destroy the soul.
Krishna points out that knowledge, work and devotion are all paths to salvation and that the central value in life is that of loyalty to God.
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From What i understand, Buddhists do not have a text as such (someone please correct me if I am wrong
Buddhism
The Teachings
These are the basic teachings and concepts in Buddhism.
Karma
Actions have consequences; so our lives are conditioned by our past actions.
There is no belief in a personal God. It is not centred on the relationship between humanity and GodRebirth
Consciousness continues after death, and finds expression in a future life.
Liberation from karma
By following the Buddha’s path one escapes the cycle of craving and suffering.
The Four Noble Truths
These are the essentials of Buddhism.
Enlightenment
The highest goal of life is to reach Enlightenment; a state of being that goes beyond suffering.
Dharma
The teachings and hence the way to nirvana.
The core of Buddhist teaching
At the heart of the Buddha’s teaching lie The Four Noble Truths and The Eightfold Path which lead the Buddhist towards the path of Enlightenment.
Facing the truth
The Buddha taught that the human tendency is to avoid the difficult truths of life and this in turn leads to suffering. By enabling the mind to be at peace through meditation a human being can confront reality and overcome hatred and craving.
For more info, click here
Other Religions
Click here to see a list of other religions and their belief system
So what sets Christianity apart from the rest? You will see that all the other religions basically rely on man trying to reach out to God by various religious acts to obtain some kind of favor or salvation. Christianity says, you can do NOTHING and it relies on the act of God reaching out to man.
To be Continued……
Related Posts
Is Christianity True? - An Introduction
Is Christianity True - Part 1: Does God exist?
Is Christianity True - Part 2: What can we know about this God?
