Buddhism as a Major Religious Practice
Buddhism is one of the major religious practices in the world. It is mostly practiced in the Asian countries since it was first introduced 2500 years in India by Siddhartha Gautama who tried to discover how humans could live happily in this world. While still as a child, he experienced the same conflicting imaginations to today’s people have. Since Buddha knew what was troubling the human kind including how to deal with cases such as death, illnesses, old age and also religious believes he tried to enlighten his people on how to live a joyous and stress free life. Therefore Gautama tried to show us that Buddhism is about being concern to our own life and being aware of ourselves rather than merely learning foreign religions.
The Four Sights
As Siddhartha became disappointed with life condition in the palace he decided to gain more experience on what was happening in the outside world. He made several observations outside world and identified several factors which could have rather changed his life. This included faculties such as illnesses, old age, death and also religious believes. According to Buddhism, old age, sickness and death are conditions which are unavoidable. They believe that none of them whom body system can prevent such conditions because those are suffering which originate during birth and no one should expect to avoid them. They also believe that any individual should never interfere with these conditions because if interfered with they might cause both mental and physical pain. They believe that a personal’s body may be sick but when they are not aware that they are sick their body is weak.
Significance of the Four Sights
I was privileged to have an interview with one of the local Buddhist in order to establish believes in some of underlying issues and these were the findings: When they are sick they advise their followers to surrender to sickness because sickness is part of their existence just as death. For the old age faculty, the Buddhist believe that when a person grows old everything in him or her changes and experiences a lot of suffering at this stage of life. Therefore as result of this suffering the Buddhists advocate that the elderly should be respected and cared for most especially by the youth. The Buddhist does not believe in the existence of a personal God because they are much more concerned with what they refer to be real without even mentioning it.
Reflection on the Sights
According to Buddha teaching, all of us will definitely die because is a life process and therefore we should bear into our mind that we are not living this life eternally. To Buddhism death does not symbolize that all is over because to them death is just the loss of body which they gained from this world while their spirits will still remain and reattach to a new body hence assuming a new life. Buddhists emphasize that people should understand how to keep their health status safe and keep off from practices which may expose them to illnesses. Therefore people should not blame themselves for being chronically ill whereas they should adopt measures which limit them to the predisposing factors to illnesses. Buddhism observes life as a precious gift hence advocating for its preservation under all circumstances. They treat the aging with a lot of respect and kindness and ensure that they are well cared hence avoiding their suffering. This aspect of caring for the aged ensures maximum non-violation of the aged rights hence leading to preservation of lives. As a result of Buddhism religion, people became free in making their own decision and became aware of what they wanted therefore becoming free and peaceful. The teachings also made the Asian people believe that they are naturally and truly made. Therefore by believing there is peace they are able to interact with one another to share life experiences.
Siddhartha's Understanding of Death
Since Siddhartha realized that death was inevitable he went further to seek religious answer and realized that death is only separation of the body and the spirit where after death there will be rebirth. Siddhartha came to realize that people should surrender their illnesses since to some extend they are above human’s control. When Siddhartha discovered that whenever people become aged they lose their strength they deserve greater care as a sigh of spiritual kindness. Siddhartha as a Buddhist believed that there is existence of God but they did not mention Him personally.
Personal Thoughts
Since some Buddhism believes match with Christian believes and others differ, the meaningful ones will be necessary to be utilized in Christian teachings for spiritual growth. The meaningful believes which need to be adopted for Christian spiritual growth includes: Buddhist believes that life is a precious gift which should be cared. Since life is important for everyone regardless of their religious believes it should be preserved with maximum kindness by everyone. Buddhist believes that life is impermanent and every individual will one day pass away but the death will only be separation of the spirit from the body. This is a very essential belief each Christian should be aware of in order to have a hope as spiritual believer that there is life after death. Since the Buddhists believe that illness is caused by some avoidable predisposal factors it is also important for Christian to adopt that belief in order to ensure that they are not exposed to those factors leading to illnesses. Buddhist teachings have enabled people to know that they are truly and naturally made a factor which has enabled them to interact with one another. Therefore these should also be absorbed by the Christians to enable them to interact peacefully and share ideals together. However there are believes which I discourage Christians from using such as: A belief that there is not existence of personal God, belief that if someone is ill should surrender to illness and a belief where people occur repeatedly from generation to generation.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Buddhism share some common characteristics with Christianity, therefore whenever Christians intend to conduct missionary visit to the Buddhist community should be aware of those traits. However Buddhism have their unique ways of handling cases such as death, illnesses, old age and religious believes as portrayed by Siddhartha. These four cases signified a specific aspect for the arise of the Buddha’s teaching in later period. Although Siddhartha appeared to be an atheist he even sought religious solution to some of unresolved feelings since Buddhists customs are not only different and but also consist of spiritual meaning.
