Argumentative Paper

Allison Jenkins

Ms. McKoy

English II

10 May 2012

Coexist With the World

            With hundreds of religions in the world, we must learn to Coexist with other religions and people in the world.  This is very hard for us to do because everyone thinks that they are right in a way, but in reality, we do not know the right way, we just know that we could be wrong in the back of our heads.  “Arguing with a religion is like arguing with your imaginary friend” (Beaudry).  This shows that you should not judge a religion just because you think you are right.  There are many religions in the world, and the only way to know them is to explore.  We are still trying to find all of the religions in the world, and many of them are connected, but those that branch off of the original, they are the ones that have more to say.

            An example of a religion that branches off is Christianity.  The biggest religions that branch off are Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Anglicans.  These are important because they decided to have different rules, but keep the religion.  All of the other religions that other people think branch off of Christianity do not because they branch off of the Roman Catholic.  Roman Catholic has adopted every other religion such as Catholic, Methodist, and Baptist.

            One of the religious holidays that impact people every day is Hanukkah.  Hanukkah has many similar traits to many of the other religions with holidays.  Many people think that this is a holiday where they get presents for 8 days, but it is not.  Instead, it is a holiday that celebrates the rebuilding of an altar.  For the history of the religion, it is important to the people because they erected a new temple for their god Zeus.  After this, some of the Jewish people started a rebellion.  “Led by the Jewish priest Mattathais and his five sons, a large-scale rebellion broke out against Antiochus and the Seleucid monarchy” (History Channel).  This shows that many of the people that were Jewish did not agree with the new religion that tried to take over them.  This is why they decided to form a rebellion, and they did not want to be influenced by another.  When they won the war, and they returned back to their original religion, they went to celebrate.  They lit eight candles.  “Even though there was only enough untainted olive oil to keep the menarch’s candles burning for a single day, the flames continued flickering for eight nights, leaving them time to find a fresh supply” (History Channel).  This is why they have the Hanukkah, or eight days or celebration dedicated to their religion.

One of the religions that have faded out due to the rapid increase of Christianity is the Egyptian religion.  This religion was based on mummifying their king, believing he could go into the afterlife with all of his possessions, servants, wives, and be promoted a god.  “Their rick spiritual world included complex beliefs about the afterlife and multiple deities with specific associations, such as the sun god, Ra, and Osiris, ruler of the underworld” (Baines).  They were very devoted to their gods, and believed that the Pharaoh was the only connection that they had.  They would refer themselves are “The son of Ra” because they were affiliated with the gods (Baines).  “Egyptian gods are renowned for their wide variety of forms, including animal forms and mixed forms with an animal head on a human body” (Baines).  This is because they also have monuments built for the main gods in their honor.  One last thing that this religion is widely known for is their rituals on the Pharaohs after death.  They must put a mask of the underworld god, Osiris, for respect, and preserve all of the body parts that are important to the Pharaoh in the afterlife such as their heart, stomach, and their eyes.  When they get to the underworld, the way they will be let in is if their heart is as light as a feather.  If it is, they will be let in to live in paradise, if not, they will serve as a slave forever.

Roman Catholic is one of the three branches that are connected to Christianity.  It is one of the most highly sophisticated and one of the most organized.  In this category, Roman Catholic is one of the biggest branches, which is why it helps keep Christianity at number two in the world.  The one way the Catholics decided if a church was a real church was based on three rules of conduct: The Church is recognized as a society of fellowship with God, the sacrament of salvation, “The people of God established as the body of Christ and the temple of the Holy Spirit” (Cunningham).  Back when the church had major power, it was over the king, and they told him what to do.  After 800 years of ruling, the Catholic Church gave the rights back to the king.  Today, the Catholic Church still has some say in what some of the things the king does, but they do not rule over top of him, and he must respect them. 

In the Aztec history, they received a sign, the eagle on a cactus, and they decided to build their settlement there.  They settled in Tenochtitlan, what is known today as Mexico City.  For the next several years, they built up the land so that they could live on it, and they thrived.  “The Aztec language, Nahuatl, was the dominant language in central Mexico by the mid-1350s” (History Chanel).  After the original leader died, with the start of a new one, they expanded and had over 150 colonies throughout Mexico.  “By the early 16th century, the Aztecs had come to rule over up to 500 small states, and some 5 to 6 million people, either by conquest or commerce” (History Channel).  About 300 years later, they started to pan off, and they developed a new language call Spanish.  This is the language that we know today, but when the Spanish started to come from over seas, they decided they wanted to take Mexico from the Aztecs, and they kill all of them that lived in the small estates.  Throughout all the years, they found the last Aztecs and killed them off by the 1800’s.

When someone is thinking of a religion, they do not think about how many connection they have with another, they are thinking of what differences they have to there is.  Sometimes, when someone is thinking of a religion, they will think that it is their own religion and it does not connect to another.  Most of the religions in the worlds branch off from another.  Many of them are made from many religions combined into one, but in the end, only one will prevail.