Essay on hinduism and buddhism Essay

Hinduism and Buddhism have different similarities and are in some ways connected to each other. Some of the practices of the two religions are similar in many different ways and there are several examples to show this. Hinduism first started in India around 1500 BC. The word Hindu comes from the word â€Å"sindhu† or river. The Hindu community think of themselves as â€Å"those who believe in the Vedas†, or â€Å"those who follow the way or dharma of the four classes and the stages of life. The four classes being the varnas and the stages of life being the ashramas. Like Hinduism, Buddhism also started in India. It is based on the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama, who is called the Buddha. Buddhism started a monastic movement in the Brahman tradition. Another name for buddah is the enlightened one.It is generally agreed that the Buddha was born in 563 BC in Kapilavastu to the ruler of a small kingdom. He grew up as a rich guy and had a splendid life. When he was 29 he came to realize that high life up to this point had been so empty. He let go any earthly things and soon left to find peace and enlightenment trying to stay away from the cycles of rebirths. He started practicing Yoga and â€Å"adopted a life of radical asceticism.† He soon gave up this way of thinking and focused on a middle path between the life of â€Å"indulgence and that of self-denial†. After a while of great â€Å"inner struggle†, he began to wander to different places and preach and organized a community know as the sangha. The Buddha started the movement for all different peoples and denied that a person’s spiritual worth is a matter of birth. The Buddha left no written word. â€Å"The Cannon for the Buddhist religion is known as the Tripitaka† or three Baskets, because is has three writings. These are the Sutra Pitaka which is a collection of â€Å"discourses†, the Vinaya Pitaka, which is the code of the monastic rules, and the Abhidharma Pitaka, which contains all different â€Å"philosophical, psychological, and doctrinal discussions and different classifications.† The Vinaya Pitaka has over 225 rules for the Buddhist monks and nuns, each  which has a story to explain. The Abhidharma Pitaka has seven different works, which include â€Å"detailed classifications of the psychological phenomena, metaphysical analysis, and a thesaurus of technical vocabulary.† Hinduism also has a lot of writings but the most important of all is the Vedas. The oldest is the Rig-Veda, which was made in an ancient form of the Sanskrit language in northeast India. It consists of 1028 hymns to many of the gods.