The Andean/Incan people
The Andean/Incan people lived in the vast majority of the Andean Mountain ranges of Peru. They were mainly polytheistic and believed it was a series of gods who were responsible for providing the rain, maize, sun, etc. that was needed for daily survival.
Viracocha was the main and greatest god. He was held solely responsible for the creation of Earth, animals and man. He made men out of stone, replicated them and destroyed them according to his whim. Viracocha was considered he divine protector of the Incan rulers or “Incani’s”.
Inti, the Sun god was the head of the state cult whose worship was mandatory. Every year a special festival called Inti-Raymi was held in Inti’s and the suns honor. Animal sacrifices and ritual dances marked and were often the highlight of the celebration.
Daily prayers were addressed to Apu Illapu, the rain giver, who was responsible for sustaining the Incans food sources. His temples were set high on a mountain so in case there was a flood, the temple would not be destroyed. A flood signified Apu Illapu’s anger and meant a pilgrimage with human sacrifice was necessary to appease him.
Human sacrifice was not widely practices in the Incan religion as opposed to the Aztec religion where human sacrifices were the norm. Both the Incan and the Aztec believed that human sacrifice was a necessity to appease the gods. They felt there was no greater gift than giving your life to a god. Therefore, the sacrificial person as well as the god was honored. Festivals and daily prayers were often marked with dancing, singing and special prayers to the particular god of what they desired. Both fasting and feasting marked super special festivals.
Penitential rituals must be observed if a particular god is displeased. Murder as an act of war was not a punishable offense whereas murder as an act of vengeance was the gravest sin to be committed.
Birth, puberty, marriage and death were all times for special rituals and sacrifices. Therefore, the Andean people’s lives mainly revolved around their religion as, without the gods, they would have nothing.
The Spaniards
The Spanish conquerors and missionaries arrived upon the New World around 1492 but it took a few years for them to get acclimated to the people and area before they started the conversion of the natives. The Spaniards were staunch Christians and mainly Catholics, under the rule of the Spanish Catholic monarchy.
The Aztec’s and the Inca’s have many similarities such as religious beliefs, and views about gods. Inca’s views about training for war are different, and the Aztec’s artifacts are somewhat different to. The farm land compared to the Inca’s is differs also, because where the Aztec’s lived the land was elevated about ten thousand feet.
-Pascal’s wager was meant to show that while not believing in God will only have loss of some things, believing in God will allow you to gain everything.
The Inca and Aztec were both extremely religious. Their entire lives revolved around religion. They both also had different ways of interpreting their faith. They both believed in gods, festivals, and afterlife. The Aztec had many gods that they believed in, for example, Huitzilopotchli, the war god, and Tlaloc, the rain god. This showed significance in the dualism of belief because one deals with war and the other is with agriculture, two major occupations of the Aztec. Their worshipping is also similar to modern day North American Indians. They worship corn because it was food and was associated with fertility. Similar to the Inca, the Aztec believed in a god that controlled from the heavens. It was a god which beared the characteristics of both males and females and was called Omelecuhtli. His temple was the universe and he sat alone. In his hands, he held a drop of water that contained a green seed and the seed was actually the Earth submerged into the ocean. There were no temples for him because he was so important; he was in the hearth of every family's home.
Of these scholarly articles, Pascal’s Wager: A Critique, by Simon Blackburn, may hold the most weight. Blackburn argues against two critical points of Pascal’s theory: the concepts of metaphysical ignorance and religious pluralism. In Blackburn’s objection from metaphysical ignorance, he argues that a logical person cannot assume that there is an infinite gain or loss for believing or not believing in God, respectively. Pascal assumes a Christian viewpoint of heaven and hell. No human is in the position to declare his or her own destiny after death based on whether or not they believe. For example, God could have motives to punish those who believe in him by subjecting them to eternity in hell and nobody would know until after death. However, a reasonable person can disregard this theory because the prospect of God rewarding those who believe is much more likely than God rewarding those who do not. Also, believing that God would punish someone for believing is still a belief in God, and therefore, if that person truly believes that that is what God wants, then he should be rewarded if he is true. Nevertheless, he still justifiably believes in
Pascal’s Wager is an argument that tries to convince non-theists why they should believe in the existence of the Christian god. Pascal thinks non-theists should believe in God’s existence because if a non-theist is wrong about the existence of God they have much more to lose than if a theist is wrong about the existence of God.
Ancestor worship was common among all classes during the Inca Empire. It was a major part of their religion to connect past and present religions. The way people worshipped depended on who they were honoring. The Inca mummified the dead to preserve them.
A major element of Aztec life was religion, as often is in the case in ancient civilizations. The Aztecs were a polytheistic people, and they often made use of human sacrifice to please their gods. Diaz often makes reference to the blood-stained walls of the Aztec temples in his account of the conquest. In reference to the success of Cortes and his soldiers, an anci...
The religious and spiritual beliefs created by the Inca fit the theory of the Master Narrative very closely. The Inca had a Polytheistic religion, such as ones previous to it, like Sumer. The Inca believed in divine beings, such as a superior creator, named Viracocha. He was the ruler, regarded as the father of the Sun God, Inti, with immense power to create and kill. The Inca feared and honored Viracocha, along with the other gods, thus offering human sacrifices to them. These sacrifices included a “chosen woman,” or a beautiful woman who was sacrificed to the gods to please them. Aside from sacrifices, the Inca threw festivals to honor the gods. These festivals followed the Inca calendar, and though there were many thrown, the most important
Unlike a lot arguments for the existence of God, Pascal’s Wager requires a lot less faith than most of the other ways. You do not have to be born and raised in that religion, follow every custom strictly, or dedicate your life to the church. Pascal’s wager suggests that one needs to believe in God to receive the benefits of afterlife and that belief comes through practice. In response to people who do not believe in God, but want to, Pascal states, “Follow the way by which they [previous non-believers] began; acting as if they believed, taking the holy water, having masses said, etc. Even this will make you naturally believe, and deaden your acuteness” (Pensèes, 2). With many people often fearing deep involvement, this is a less drastic way
...ople to come back to Church and to believe in God but not out of self-interest. In order for the argument to accomplish this it must first be rewritten. It needs to define its terms (i.e. the use of the word God), it should not be based on chance or self-interest but rather to make known to the person that it is quite possible that God exists, and finally, it should include a fifth outcome where a person believes in God out of self-interest and is eternally damned anyway for lack of faith, love and for selfishness. Pascal’s Wager calls to mind a famous quote by Albert Camus: “I would rather live my life as if there is a God and die to find out there isn't, than live my life as if there isn't and die to find out there is.” Until Pascal’s argument is solid and fully developed, one should not adopt the argument as a mean for conversion, evangelization or lifestyle.
The ancient Aztecs had many gods that were associated with lots of different things that were important to their culture and their survival. They also held lots of ceremonies to celebrate and appease the gods, who were temperamental. If you displeased the gods they would make you suffer. Alot of their ceremonies involved sacrifice, they were a gory civilization. A few of their more major gods were: Huitzilopochtli, Quetzalcoatl, Tezcatlipoca, Xipe Totec, Ometecuhtli/Omecihuatl, and a few more minor gods like Tlaloc. (The beginning story and god description paragraphs)
The novel ‘Oliver Twist’, written by Charles Dickens explores eighteenth century Britain and how the divide between classes affected society.
Pascal’s Wager was a major strength of his theory on God and Religion. The argument made in Pascal’s Wager is an example of apologetic philosophy. It was written and published in Pensées by the 17th century French philosopher Blaise Pascal. Pascal’s Wager claims that all humans must bet their lives on whether God exists. He argues that rational people should seek to believe in God. If God does not exist the loss is minimal, but if God does exist there is an infinite gain, eternity in Heaven. It was a ground-breaking theory because it utilized probability theory and formal decision theory. Pascal’s Wager is applicable both to atheists and theists. While other philosophies may
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental illness that develops after exposure to an event that is perceived to be life threatening or pose serious bodily injury to self or others (Sherin & Nemeroff, 2011). According
can be seen in Oliver Twist, a novel about an orphan, brought up in a workhouse and poverty to demonstrate the hypocrisy of the upper class people. Oliver Twist shows Dickens' perspective of society in a realistic, original manner, which hope to change society's views by "combining a survey of the actual social scene with a metaphoric fiction designed to reveal the nature of such a society when exposed to a moral overview" (Gold 26). Dickens uses satire, humorous and biting, through pathos, and stock characters in Oliver Twist to pr...