History+Thingy

There are many different religions in this world. Each religion has gender roles. The religions this essay will be focusing on are Islam, Christianity, and Hinduism. What are the differences between the gender roles in these three religions? In Christianity, some Christians are stricter with women, some believe that the man is the center of the house and some just believe that men are more valuable than women. “Worldwide, women are more likely to be illiterate, malnourished, and poorer than their male counterparts. Even today, in countries like China and India, infanticide of females’ babies is routinely practiced.” (Terwilliger) This is basically saying that men are treated better than women because on the website that this quote was found, it said nothing about men being illiterate, malnourished, and poorer than their female counterparts. “The [|Bible] and [|Christianity] historically have been interpreted as placing women in submissive roles in marriage and almost completely excluding women from church leadership, especially from positions requiring any form of ordination.” (Wikipedia) This quote is saying that the Bible and Christianity have been thought of as putting women under men, kind of like sidekicks. “ Male leadership has been assumed in the church and within marriage, society and government.” (Wikipedia) This quote is showing how some Christians believe that the man is the center of the house. There really aren’t any explanations as to why they think this way but that is just what they think. To some people it seems as though Christians do not treat women well, but this is not true. “Jesus was an advocate for women's freedom and equality.” (Terwilliger) Women in Christianity are treated equally, however people are stricter with them than men.

In Hinduism, all Hindu’s are equal. Married couples work as one and sometimes they even switch roles where the husband becomes the wife and the wife becomes the husband. “The wife is half the man. The best of friends, The root of the three ends of life, And of all that will help him in the other world” “With a wife a man does mighty deeds With a wife a man finds courage. A wife is the safest refuge….” A man aflame with sorrow in his soul, Or sick with disease, finds comfort in his wife, As a man parched with heat Finds relief in water” “Even a man in the grip of rage Will not be harsh to a woman, Remembering that on her depend The joys of love, happiness, and virtue For woman is the everlasting field, In which the Self is born.” (english.vishwahindusamaj.com) This poem in my words is saying that one is always incomplete without the other. There is no full man without a woman and there is no full woman without a man. They work hand in hand at all times. It also says that men should not harm their wives because joys of love, happiness, and virtues all depend on them. Another quote talks about the equal amount of freedom both genders have. “’May women be united with handsome husbands. They should never be widows and never be in tears. May they be very prosperous and rich! May they wear pretty garments and beautiful ornaments and may they wish to take rebirth in human yoni (form) to maintain perpetuity of humanity (12-2-31).’”( english.vishwahindusamaj.com) This is saying that women should always be happy and they can have whatever they desire, meaning they have lots of freedom. The gender roles in Islam are a bit complicated. They’ve changed over the centuries from women not being considered human beings and denying them any rights, to the complete opposite. “Islam presents the roles of men and women as complementary roles and not contradictory or conflicting roles; the roles of partners with a common set of goals and objectives and not roles that conflict with each other, with each of them having the objective of the civilizations and societies that for centuries refused to consider women as human beings, or to give them any rights, have now gone from one extreme to another.”(Rahman) This quote is saying that the roles of a man do not disagree with the roles of a woman. They work hand in hand. Islam also believes that both men and women are equal. “Both men and women are equal in their humanity and in their dignity; in their accountability to perform their assigned tasks and be judged according to their performance.”(Rahman) This is saying that they both have tasks they will be judged on, not just the men will be judged, or not just the women will be judged. All three religions have one thing in common. All men from these religions must treat their wives with respect and not conflict with them. They should work hand in hand and not abuse or mistreat their wives in any way. The difference between these three religions, however, is that Christianity sort of makes the man higher than the woman. The woman is more like a sidekick to the man. In Islam and Hinduism, the man and the woman work side by side as partners, not as one main leader and one sidekick. Another difference is that Christianity has more roles for each gender than Islam and Hinduism. I think that all of these religions are interesting to me because they are different religions with very similar gender roles. I learned that even though there are different religions, they all believe in a God. I thought that since there are different religions, they were totally different and had no connection within each other. The connections I made were the amount of freedom the women from each religion had. All of this is important in today’s world because there are a lot of stereotypes that exist in this world today about these religions and without the proper research they will continue to spread everywhere around the world even more than it already has.