I'm not sure where you would classify Israel as a part of the Jewish religion, or Judeo-Christian religion, but Israel is an Asian country, so it would be an Asian religion as well.
and since that area of the world gave birth to Islam and Christianity.... i'm not geographisterciser...but.. (and, no, that's not a word)
Max is exactly right. Where ever religion and political power are combined, you have much more abuse of the religious teachings. Seperation of religion and State is absoluately necessary.
That's part of it. I also think Buddhist Monks, Yogis are usually very calm, peaceful people. They are very different from the fiery preachers etc. There is an serene ease about them that isn't common here. Their practice of meditation makes them different, and it is telling.
the caste system and sati are not part of the hindu religion. they may be associated with it, but theres nothing in any religious scripture that sanctions these things as practiced.
but it's karma...if your life sucks right now, you earned it in the last life. that's Hinduism. and those people at the bottom rungs of society are treated like dog mess.
It all depends on what they are meditating. Have you not seen any Shaolin kung fu movie? Actually the very first Shaolin movie portraited the monks in a very positive way and I really enjoyed it. Monks can be very physically violent, for good or bad causes. Historically in China, there were plenty of examples in which monks of various temples got involved in imperial power struggles, unwillingly or otherwise. To say Buddhist monks are calm and peaceful because they practise meditation is much like saying priests and Christians are peaceful because they pray a lot - a fairly weak argument IMO.
It does exists. Look at the drama that can involved in preaching. But it wasn't there that much in the Catholic Churches I grew up attending. Serenity is important to Catholics, and that was something I liked. Still, meditation has them beat. I'm not saying that they aren't very good, peaceful people etc. I just think the Buddhist monks I have witnessed are on another level of understanding. To me it's very evident.
All I can compare is the ones I have come in contact with, my experience. Meditation is the practice of being calm and peaceful. It is training your mind to be that way. How can that be weak idea? That is exactly what it is.
I think your subject, as expressed so far, is too big for 20 pages. I'd recommend you narrow your focus a bit to something more manageable. I think as you get into it, you'll find there is a very mixed historical record regarding tolerance on both sides (and the record is thousands of years long) that will need to be accounted for, plus differences between the religions within your 2 camps (and differences between denominations of those religions, and differences from one place and another within a denomination) plus many spheres of life into which this tolerance and intolerance will reach, plus a host of possible contributing cultural factors that may or may not have to do with the religion itself. Sounds too big and too complicated to give satisfactory coverage in 20 pages -- plus you'll drive yourself crazy trying to contain it all.
if the people are being treated like "dog mess", it has nothing to do with religion. to paraphrase what you wrote, people who were brahmins (hindu priests) became a political entity at some point and because of that the message of Hinduism carries with it baggage that has nothing to do with what the message is. nothing in hinduism states that one caste is better/higher than the other. no where is it written that caste is something thats hereditary. and no where is it written that you cant improve your life/caste at present. just because your life sucks now, doesnt mean you cant make it better in this life. Your fate is the resultant of the past exercises of your free-will. By exercising your free-will in the past, you brought on the resultant fate. Fate is the sum total of the results of your past actions. While fate is past karma, free-will is present karma. The present is before you, and by the exercise of free-will, you can attempt to shape it. By exercising your free-will in the present, you can wipe out your past record if it hurts you, or to add to it if you find it enjoyable.
If I may add that many of the things we are ascribing to Buddhism and Hinduism are also in Christianity. From what I know there is a meditative tradition in Christianity particularly practiced by some monastic Catholic sects. There also is the concept of predestination in Calvinism that like Karmic reincarnation sets out that already at birth one's place in life is already set out. In this case not according to past actions but according to God's plan. From what I recall too in Medieval Europe wasn't there something like a caste system that was sanctioned by the Church.
On a related note it seems like a lot of moderate Muslims have said the same thing about things like the wearing of the hajab. I think for those of us not part of a religion its difficult to distinguish particular cultural practices from religious doctrine.
From what I have read there is a caste system described in the scriptures (I haven't read the scriptures), but it was not intended to subjugate people. It was designed to allow society to operate more efficiently. The more I think and read, the more it seems that all religons have been used to "hold people down." Perhaps not due to the original teachings but the way people have applied the text. Again, I haven't read all the scriptures but rather what people have written about them.
