Genesis story essay examples

In today’s world, there are a number religions in which people follow. However, it is arguable that Christianity, Buddhism, Judaism, Hinduism and Islam make up five of the most followed religions in the world. This paper seeks to analyze the creation stories of these five main religions of the world in order to come up with an opinion or response about them.

As stated earlier, Buddhism forms one of the main religions of the world. According to the Buddhism, the world’s creation began when a queen from the kingdom of Sakyas had a dream about a silver elephant entering her womb. When the queen recounted her dream to some priests, they predicted that she would have a son. The priests also predicted that the queen’s son would grow up to become a Buddha. The Buddhist’s creation story continues to state that the queen’s son witnessed certain incidents later in his life that resulted in his renunciation of his life as a prince. According to the story, the queen’s son was later referred to as the ‘ enlightened one’.

In my view, the Buddhist story of creation is somehow similar to the Christian story of the birth of Jesus. This is because both in both Buddhism and Christianity, there is the common characteristic of women who conceived through supernatural means. However, it is important to note that the Buddhist story of creation does not talk about the origin of the queen and the priests. This fact, therefore, raises the question of whether the story really explains about the origin of the world and its inhabitants. This is because the story does not explain the origin of people who lived before the birth of Buddha.

However, an analysis of the Christian story of creation seems to explain more about the origin of the world, light, darkness, water etc. The Christian story of creation proposes that it was through the supernatural power of God that everything, as we know it, came into existence. In my view, the Christian’s version of creation, seems to give more detail about the origin of the world and human beings as compared to the Buddhist’s story of creation.

The Hindu religion, however, has a different version concerning the creation of the world when compared to the versions of the Buddhists and Christians. According to the Hindu’s, the world and all its inhabitants originated from a supernatural being known as Purusha. Hindus claim that Purusha had a great number of heads, feet and eyes. According to the Hindus story of creation, the world and human beings came into existence after Purusha’s sacrifice. Hindus explain that the heaves originated from Purusha’s navel while the earth originated from his feet. They also claim that the sky originated from Purusha’s ears.

In my view, I believe that there is some of similarity between the Christian and Hindu’s stories of creation. This is because both stories propose the notion that the world and everything in it originated from some form of supernatural being. However, I find it difficult to believe that that the world and and human beings came into existence as a result of the body parts of some supernatural being.

After my analysis of the Islamic version of creation, I have realized that it is almost exactly similar to the story advanced by the Christian religion. Every detail about creation in both religions is similar. This, therefore, causes me to believe that the Christian and Islam version of the world’s creation has a higher probability of being true as compared to the story proposed by the Hindus and Buddhists. The increased probability of the likelihood that the Christian and Islam version of the story of creation is supported by the fact that both religions explain how more specific creation aspects such as the sun and moon came into existence.

In my view, the Jewish religion is similar or almost the same with Christianity. This notion is further supported by the fact that the stories advanced by the two religions are exactly identical. I, therefore, tend to believe that both Christians and Jews were once members of the same religion who ended splitting up due some unexplained reasons.

After the analysis of the creation stories of all the five religions. I tend to wonder how whether the versions and the details of the stories advanced by all the five religions are really true. The major challenge that faces all the people in current times is how to prove the validity of the creation story advanced by their religion. However, in current times, it is almost impossible to prove the validity of the stories of creation advanced by the five religions. People are, therefore forced to pick a religion and have the belief that its doctrines and principles are true.

Conclusion:

Although it is difficult to prove the validity of the doctrines and religions proposed by the religions of this world, it is becoming evident that almost everyone in the world belongs to some form of religion. People will, therefore, have to pick a religion and abide by it even though they cannot prove the validity of the actions and contributions they make towards the religions they follow.

References:

Lohr, C. (2009). A World Religions Reader. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
Smith, H. (2009). The World’s Religions. California: HarperCollins.
Sobolewski, G. (2009). World Religions: A Voyage of Discovery. London: Saint Mary’s Press.