Conceptual Comparison Of Hinduism And Buddhism For Rituals

Buddhism and its teachings

Discuss about the Conceptual Comparison of Hinduism and Buddhism for Rituals.
 

The sense of religion is significantly influential for the people in the way of living for the majority of the people in this world. The rituals, culture, belief of any group of people are believed to be highly influenced by the concerned religions (Oppong). The Indian subcontinent has two major religions influencing the majority of the people residing in that region which are Hinduism and Buddhism. Hinduism is an Indian religion which connects the Indian religious traditions in a less compact manner than that of the Buddhism. Hinduism connects the broader range of philosophies with the linking between the rituals, concerned cosmology and shared textual resources (Klostermaier). Whereas Buddhism comprises of the variation of the traditions, religious beliefs, spiritual practices primarily based on the precious teachings of Gautama Buddha. The paper conceptually compares both the religions with some specific focusing on the points like the concept of rebirth in the respective religions of the Hinduism and Buddhism.

As mentioned above, Buddhism is generally recognized as the teachings of Gautama Buddha also known as the "Tathagata". However the findings regarding the textual description of Buddha is not sufficient and not clear enough, still the limited resources confirm that Buddha found his learning of conceptual briefing regarding the "Nothingness" or "Emptiness" and "What is neither seen nor unseen" from his Vedic teachers, insufficient in attaining his goals(Kelen). The list also included the practice of "asceticism" and then he returned to the practice of "Dhyana" or meditation where he achieved knowledge regarding the workings of "Karma" and his previous lives and gained exactness about the "Middle way" to be the correct spiritual practice to end one of the claimed problems of life known as "Dukkha". With the inclusion of "Bodhi", the enlightened Buddha constructed "Sangha" and taught them "Dharma" or religion. The teaching followed a detailed explanation on the mentioned problems of life which are Dukkha and its ending, the cycle of rebirth, Karma and Liberation(Thera). The teachings of Buddha are converted into 18 Buddhist sub-schools of thoughts containing different perceptions. These emerged as many widespread traditions like Theravada, Mahanaya and Vajrayana Buddhism in the modern era.

The rebirth in the Buddhism relates to one aspect of the teachings that are discussed above. The rebirth is the realization of the fact that the actions of one takes him or her to a new existence after the death in a never-ending manner or cycle termed as Samsara(Sarao). The cycle is stated to be Dukkha which is a Buddhist concept of painful suffering. The cycle stops when one gets the Moksha which is known be the liberation. The Moksha is achieved by the Bodhi. The term Bodhi has a meaning similar to enlightenment. Rebirth is considered to be one crucial primary beliefs of Buddhism along with Karma, Nirvana and Moksha. The concept of rebirth in Buddhism does not emphasize on the point that the rebirth will take place as a human being only but it informs that the rebirth will take place in one of the six conceptual ways known as Gati. The six Gati or realms are Tiryak, Preta, Deva, Asura, Manusya, and Naraka. This is known as Bhavachakra where Deva means angelic, Asura means demon, Manusya is humanistic and Tiryak is animal, Preta is devil and Naraka is dweller of hell. The Karma plays an important role in the determination of the Gati(Appleton). A good realm is always associated with Kushala whereas an evil realm is a result of Akushala or bad Karma. The escape from this endless rebirth and reappearing and death is called Nirvana or Nibbana(Duoc). In Buddhism, achieving Nirvana is the eventually the prime objective of Buddhist teaching. However, the majority of the Buddhist traditional practices is centred on achieving the merit and merit transfer but it is believed that an individual gains rebirth for himself or herself or his or her closed ones in good realms and ignores the rebirth in the bad realms. 

The concept of rebirth in Buddhism

All the Buddhist ethics excluding Navayana acknowledges the approach of rebirth. They have differences in the discussion regarding the operations of rebirth or specifically how the events take place just after the death (Keown). The ancient Buddhist scriptures state that Buddha was exposed to considerable difficulty while briefing the concept of reborn and how it takes place, after he established the conception of  "no self"( Zimmer). Buddhist scholars such as Buddhaghosa stated that the absence of self or soul does not mean shortage of constancy. And the concept of rebirth throughout the different realms of birth such as  human, heavenly, animal, and infernal takes place in the exact way in which a flame is transferred from one burning candle to another. The concerned sub-school of Saravastivada Buddhist belief proposed the idea of "transmigrating substratum of consciousness" which states that each deeds of a human enriches that individual in a unique way and can be termed as something that has a good or bad consequence. According to Sutta Pitaka, the stream-enterers are subjected to seven rebirths in human or good realms. Once-returners returns once more like human. The non-returners returns once more in a heavenly realm and arahant has no birth.

According to Hinduism when a person dies, the soul will proceed in any of the concerned three paths that are recommended in the Vedas. The soul will travel to the interstellar space known as Antariksham and the body will be subjected to the final sacrifice of life known as Antima Kriya. The concept of Karma or the cumulative result of past actions comes from here. The liberated souls are sent along the northern path known as Uttarayana to the timeless immortal zone and from there, they will be sent to the eternal heaven of Brahman known as Vaikuntha, Kailasa or Parandhama. Those souls which are not discharged but lived an honest and respectful life will be sent along the path following south known as Dakshinayana to the ancestral world in the circle of the moon until the karmas are finished. Then they are believed to come down to earth through rains and enter in the food and from food to semen and from semen to wombs where they will reborn again according to their deeds in the previous life. The third path is for those souls who committed severe crimes and devilish actions and the path is towards the hell in the subterranean world (Adhogati). After their Karmas get exhausted, they will be appear as worms or insects.

Hinduism and its teachings

In Hinduism the soul's future and subsequent liberty or the superiority of the rebirth and the further proceedings towards ‘salvation' entirely depends on the quality of deeds conducted on earth. Rendering the rules of “Karma” (actions) it is supposed that every action has a cause and effect (Hunt). Hinduism says that man is not a puppet at the hands of fate or destiny. Unlike the fatalists who resign completely to the inevitability of Fate, Hindu people believe in the creation of one's own destiny by the activities done in this life. They focus more on the accumulation of “Punya” (pure deeds) which can bring them better rebirth (Dhakal). The convention says that the quality of rebirth is measured by the level of devotion towards God and not towards materialistic objects. According to the principles of “Manu” Hinduism discriminates between the ways one has died.  It differs from person to person taking their way of death into considerations.

Hinduism is one of the most ancient religion and is considered as the "Sanatana Dharma" which is created by no human force and cannot be demolished by anyone. It is the primitive source of faith.  The various scriptures that are followed by the Hindu people such as “Bhagwat Gita”, “Vedas”, “Ramayana” are the foundations of Hinduism and “Upanishads” are the refined doctrines of the scriptures (Herman). All of these doctrines agree with the concept that the human body is only the outer cage inside which the “Atman” (soul) resides. “Atman” is indestructible, immortal, and ceaseless and it only transfers from one mortal body to another after the final liberation or death.

A soul can move towards enlightenment, progression and can get purified through the cycles of rebirth- a process of reincarnation. The “Atman” holds the ability to go through various birth cycles, permutation before merging with the divine. Death separates the body and the soul and the soul is bound to descend to earth through undergoing several lives until it is connected with the supreme power. The last moment of one's life is highly important to finalize the features of rebirth. During the moment of death a person is asked to have a last sight of his or her family and chant a mantra such as “Om Namah Shivaya” which is the “Mahamrityunjaya” mantra that leads one to have the last journey through the path of enlightenment.

The rebirth concept in Hinduism significantly depends on the primary assumption that the soul or Atman exists (Knott). Whereas the Buddhist assumption regarding the same is that there is no presence of soul (Tongprasert). Hindu beliefs admit the soul to be the stable eternal attribute of a living being and in many of its theological and non-theological traditions, the soul claimed to be exact with the ultimate reality termed as Brahman. So, even if both Buddhism and Hinduism welcome the karma and rebirth concept and both primarily focuses on ethical interpretation of life as well as liberation from rebirth and suffering as the optimum sacred pursuit, they have a completely different perspective on whether a soul exists which has significant impacts on the details of their respective rebirth concepts. 

From the above discussion, it can be concluded that there are some visionary differences between the concepts of various aspects of the two most practiced religion, Hinduism and Buddhism. But both the religion has almost the same inner meaning which is serving the people. Both the religions had significant differences in the approach of practicing the religion. The concept of afterlife and rebirth is stated in the paper to be almost the same but the situational differences along with the changes in the characters are visible. The theoretical discussion on the existence of the soul after the death and the sufferings through which it goes to the next life is described with a prime focus on the determination of it by Karma. The influence of the deeds that the person committed in the human life is observed to be incredibly affecting the fate of one regarding the rebirth and the form of appearance in the next life. The categorical changes in both the religions regarding the presence of deity in the rebirth concept are visible. 

References:

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