Spencer F Feb/2/14 1-2 Belief System Systems are for Believers A belief system is a very good way to keep

the people of a civilization in line. Belief systems uphold moral values and can help people make difficult decisions. Besides guidance for people, belief systems can also give people hope. In times of trouble, people need to do no more than look to their God for answers. This would create a less fearful civilization. The three belief systems that will be studied in the following paragraphs are Buddhism, Confucianism, and Hinduism. All three of these belief systems uphold moral values, but those moral values are very different. In order to better understand the importance of belief systems within a civilization and how they can influence the actions and decisions of people, please consider the following moral dilemma: Obey or Resist Joe is a fourteen-year-old boy who wanted to go to camp very much. His father promised him he could go if he saved up the money for it himself. So Joe worked hard at his paper route and saved up the $40 dollars it cost to go to camp, and a little more besides. But just before camp was going to start, his father changed his mind. Some of his fathers friends decided to go on a special fishing trip, and Joe's father was short of the money it would cost. So he told Joe to give him the money he had saved from the paper route. Joe didn't want to give up going to camp, so he thinks of refusing to give his father the money. Confucians would give the father the money because of their relationships and their high respect for elders. As Frey states, According to Confucius there are five basic relationships: ruler and subject, husband and wife, father and son, older sibling and younger sibling, and friend and friend. This is important because in the belief system of Confucianism, a father is in a position of power over the son. Confucianism is not a religion; however it is still a belief system. It is created around the ideas that everyone has a set role and responsibility and following these roles makes a well functioning civilization very much unlike Buddhism. A Buddhist however, would not give the money because the father is stealing, and it is a core belief of Buddhism not to steal. Buddhism is mainly about enlightenment. Buddhism is mainly created around the idea that suffering is everywhere and to free oneself of suffering one must do numerous things. These numerous things make up the Eightfold Path, the Eightfold Path tells people how to live life in order to stop suffering and reach enlightenment. As The Eightfold Path states, do not kill, steal, or lie (Frey 159). Therefore it would be wrong for the father to ask in the first place and therefore wrong to promote his decision. It can be clearly seen that although both the principals of Confucianism and Buddhism are meant to guide people when making moral decisions, they create opposite reactions

Spencer F Feb/2/14 1-2 Belief System to this moral dilemma. This is very interesting and should be noted by anyone wishing to further understand the effects of a belief system on people because it shows the diversity of moral values that different belief systems uphold. A Hindu would give his father the money because this action would result in good karma. Hinduism is, like Confucianism, mainly about the roles and responsibilities of people. The biggest difference in Hinduism is that it uses a caste system, called Varna in this case, to decide the roles of people. Another very important belief of Hinduism is dharma and karma. Dharma is ones roles and responsibilities and Karma is the effect of following or not following ones dharma. If people were to follow their dharma they would be reborn into a higher class but if they did not they would either be reborn as a lower class or an animal. Bad Karma would happen to the dad anyway because he is in a serious conflict with the laws of Dharma. So because of this, Joe would not need to punish his father by not giving him the money. In fact, not giving the money to his father would give Joe bad karma of his own This also would mean that good things would happen to Joe because he is doing the right thing. This means he has every reason to give the money to his father. As stated in the first paragraph, belief systems uphold moral values and give hope and faith to people in troubled times. The civilization of New Gondors belief system strongly upholds prevention of injury or loss of life, and a reverence for wisdom. The reverence for wisdom is the most important of these to the people of New Gondor. This means that a wise person is able to take any job they wish and has access to the royal library. However, although wisdom is most revered in the belief system of New Gondor, prevention of injury or loss of life can be seen in all three belief systems previously studied. It is a curious thing, how all three-belief systems are created to uphold moral values but, they tell their followers to do different things in a moral dilemma.