EWRT273Z De Anza College Syncretism the Greatest Religion Paper

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EWRT273Z

De Anza College

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This is a book based essay, based on the book A brief History of Humankind. If you choose religion, you need to defend or critique Harari's claim on page 223. If you wish to go to tthe history route, your task is to choose one of the three approaches to history that Harari explains on page 242-243.

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Ewrt 2-73Z, Fall 2019 Essay 2 Instructions Assignment Overview: Your first essay will be a five-page essay that tackles one of two issues, religion or history. If you choose religion, your task is to defend or critique Harari’s claim on page 223 that “Syncretism might, in fact, be the single great world religion. To do this essay, if you choose to critique his claim, you would have to first carefully explain syncretism, and then either give an example of a religion as Harari defines it that is not syncretistic in practice, or you may agree with his assertion in which case you still need to carefully define syncretism and offer additional evidence that it is a facet of other religions beyond Christianity—which Harari has already suggested is a good example of a faith marked by syncretism. If you wish to go the history route, your task is to choose one of the three approaches to history that Harari explains on pages 242 and 243, and then explain why one is a better approach than the other two. Here too, your starting point would be a careful explanation of each—without merely regurgitating Harari—a brief critique of the two you do not feel offer a good approach, and then explain why your chosen approach is a better one. Required Readings: Depending on your choice of essay topic, a through reading of Chapter 12 or 13 is critical. General Guidelines: A paper of this kind should not—however intuitive it seems— begin with Harari, but instead with a general discussion of the issue to be discussed, history or religion and its place or importance in one’s life. Only after the issue is introduced and explained would one then introduce Harari’s claim or explanation—by book title, Chapter, Section—and end your introduction with a clear, affirmative thesis. For example: of the three most common approaches to history, the one that seems most reasonable and fits best with what we know is X—where x is the approach you will defend. Alternatively: If you are going to deal with the syncretism in religion issue, your thesis may look something like this: Though the major western faiths (to keep it simple) all espouse a monotheistic starting point, an examination of any particular faith finds that one cannot maintain faith without resorting to syncretism. Specifics: A five-page paper does not give one much room to work, so you will want your thesis to be as narrowly focused as possible so that you can deal with it effectively in the few pages allotted to you. (While it is fine to turn in a paper longer than five pages, you may want to look at the Essay Grading Criteria in the Getting Started module to see what happens to papers that fall short of the five-page requirement.) Suggestions: Admittedly, you are given only two options, neither of which you are particularly invested in; nonetheless, as religion has driven much of human history, and human history is always being reexamined and reified through the lens of religious belief or practice, this essay seems germane to the text and certainly to the critical thinking requirement of the class. Since it unlikely that many of you are history or religious studies majors, I would suggest that a good place to look for supporting ideas or broader explanations of the key term(s) your essay will be focused on would be in Harari’s own notes at the back of the book. Works Cited: Your works cited page will not count toward the five-page paper requirement, and it will have at least three sources listed, Harari and two other sources you use to support the case you wish to make. Your works cited page should follow the MLA conventions governing them, and your in-text citations should also conform to MLA norms. There is a help file with a link to the most recent, 8th Edition of the MLA guidelines in the week two module. Process: The most difficult component to writing a paper is getting started writing the paper. This is the reason the first step in writing this essay is to submit the introduction to the essay you plan to write, homework two which is due October 27th. Finally: It bears repeating that I am not a mind reader. If there is any part of these instructions that are unclear, you need to ask for clarification. All essays should conform to the following guidelines. Your introduction, thesis, conclusion, and each body paragraph will conform to the rule of three. That is: A.) Your Introduction will • • • begin with a sentence that is entirely in your own words which introduces the topic to be discussed provide enough subsequent sentences that enough background information has been given to make the importance and timeliness of the topic clear (using outside sources only to provide a crucial fact) end with a thesis claim that emerges organically from the preceding sentences and states your argument in a single sentence. B.) Your thesis will • • • be the last sentence in your introduction it will neither be a question nor an announcement it will clearly state the version of the paper you will write—the body of the paper develops and proves this statement true. C.) Each body paragraph will • • • have a first sentence that serves as both transition and topic sentence and does so without use of source material, and the first and last sentence in any body paragraph will not contain any reference to a source offer a well-developed discussion of a single idea using one specific, concrete example, which will be clearly supportive of your thesis. D.) Your conclusion will • • • remind the audience what has been learned restate your thesis as proven rather than as promise offer a closing insight or suggest an idea for further consideration Additionally, your paper will end with a correctly formatted works cited page. Please refer to the MLA8 help file for explanations of how to correctly incorporate your source information and construct your works cited page.
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Surname 1
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Professor
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Syncretism the Greatest Religion
Syncretism entails the unification of two or more religious beliefs from unrelated
traditions. Religious syncretism occurs in places where several religious traditions coexist and
play significant roles in the culture. It can also occur when the conquerors impose their religious
beliefs on their new territories but do not succeed to outdo the traditional beliefs and practices. In
religious syncretism, when two cultures interact, there are likely to interchange religious ideas
(Harari 210). During the interaction, the dominant culture tends to prevalent in the exchange.
The newly established heterogeneous religion is often unique. The impact on syncretism can be
understood through the analysis of religious faiths such as Christianity, Hinduism, and
Buddhism. For instance, it is difficult to identify most Christian sects in Korea due to the
dominant syncretic impact of Buddhism and the traditional Korean belief. These religious faiths
continue to integrate various belief systems (Singh, 21). The religions also continue to evolve as
the philosophies of humankind increase and decline in popularity. Although the majority of
Asian religious faiths embrace a monotheistic origin, analysis of all religions reveals that it is
challenging to sustain religious practices without incorporating syncretism.
The analysis of Buddhism can support the assertion that syncretism is the greatest
religion as one of the religions that have been impacted by syncretism. Initially, the majority of
the merchant class practiced the Buddhist faith. In the course of their merchant activities, they
interacted with people from different cultural backgrounds (Harari 213). As such, Buddhism

Surname 2
managed to move along the Silk Road to other regions such as China and Central Asia. As
Buddhism continued to spread, those who embraced did so based on the settings of their
respective cultures. For instance, Mahayana Buddhism became more prevailing in China than in
India. Unlike in India, the Chinese version of Buddhism did not place great emphasis on strict
practices or meditation. Mahayana Buddhism was more accessible to ordinary people because
they could get involved in acts of devotion to receive salvation. The more approachable version
of religion spread by the missionaries, together with merchants, enabled Buddhism to gain a
significant portion in Asian regions such as China (Vuong 2). Moreove...


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