India and Mesopotamia
Uploaded by anumalefic on Jan 17, 2006
There were many differences between these two countries (India and Mesopotamia). They had very little amount of similarities but they had a very strong equal amount of life format. Mesopotamia believed that there was no afterlife and that it was called the place of no return. They were polytheistic and that meant that they had an intense belief that nature gods are responsible for life. They also had a very different social class order, which was in:
Rulers or lord/Priests
Free commoners: like craftsmen
Dependent clients: no property, taxes, which was food
Slaves: also called POW, criminals, people who owed money that could even buy their freedom back
This place also had a strong male society. The reason for this is because men had to control the sexuality of women and because the son of men had to take over the fathers place once the father died. This was also called Patriarchal. Its geographical location for this place was that it had an irregular flood each year. This was from the Euphrates River and the Tigris River. Because of the floods they had to make irrigation system and the things included were damns, reservoirs, and Canals. This was led to the belief that people from there became more complex and made new solutions to their problems with floods.
India was different because they believed in two religions. One of them was called Hinduism, which dealt with the classes and the use of good and bad karma. It also had to deal with being polytheistic because they believed in not one founder and that was one universal spirit call Braham. They also believed in reincarnation. Their social classes was ordered like this:
Brahmins
Kshatriyas
Vaishyas
Shudras
Untouchables
Animal
Plant
The Brahmin’s are priests, Kshatryas are rulers and warriors, Vaishyas are peasants and traders, and lastly, Shudras are the laborers. They believed that with good karma (doing good) you would go to a better class and go to the universal spirit also known as Mokcsha. If you got bad karma then you would go to a lower class. The caste system enforced a traditional social system and in this way people would know their place in society.
The second religion was Buddhism. This religion came up during time of religious questioning in India (6th century B.C). The teachings of Buddhism were that life is full of misery, desires cause misery, end suffering by ending desires, and follow the eight fold path (to reach Nirvanna). In this religion...