Characteristics Of Buddhism As A Religion

Many people are curious as to whether Buddhism is considered a religion or a philosophy, but I believe that it is both. According to http://www.ancient.eu/buddhism/ (2016) Buddhism is a non-theistic religion or philosophy that covers a variety of traditions, beliefs and spiritual practices mostly based on the teachings of the Buddha. Buddhism involves several traits that consider it a religion and a philosophy. There is not a clear difference that categorizes Buddhism as one or the other. Some practices of Buddhism have faith and belief which are qualities of religion and other practices have reality, existence and knowledge which are attributed to philosophy. Buddhism contains many characteristics that religion is composed of. According …show more content…
Buddhism is considered a religion because it involves elements of self-transformation, faith and belief; for example, buddhism teaches that faith leads to salvation. Buddhism also teaches that self-transformation is a fundamental goal of the Buddha 's teaching, an essential part of his program for liberation from suffering. An example of a fundamental belief in Buddhism is reincarnation which is the concept that people are reborn after dying. Buddhism has a mythology, a soteriology, and a eschatology which are all elements of religion. Buddhism has incorporated stories from mythologies of various groups that adopted the religion. Also,
Potts 2 soteriology is the study of religious doctrines of salvation and Buddhism is devoted primarily to liberation from suffering, rebirth and ignorance which defines salvation; the purpose of a persons’s life is to break free from samsara and to achieve nirvana. There are two major points of Buddhist eschatology which are the appearance of Maitreya …show more content…
According to (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/buddha/ (2012) the title “Buddha” means awakened, which is an individual who finds the path to nirvana, the end of suffering, and spreads that knowledge so others may discover the path to nirvana as well. One of Buddhism’s biggest worries was freedom from dukkha (unease) and the path to that final freedom involves an ethical action/karma, meditation and understanding the realm of reality. A repetitive thesis in Buddhist philosophy has been the formation of ideas and reverting back to the Buddhist Middle Way (a term Gautama used to describe the character of the Noble Eightfold Path that he discovered leads to liberation). The goal of Buddhist philosophy was to reach nirvana and to achieve it one must reach the state that is beyond craving and suffering. According to (http://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/5minbud.htm (2015) the Buddha was not considered a God, nor did he claim to be one, he was simply a man who used his own experiences to teach others how to reach the path to enlightenment. Therefore, Buddhism is clearly philosophical when pertaining to certain aspects of