User:Theyshallsee God

The Sermon on the Mount by Carl Heinrich Bloch.

[edit] Saint Peter

Saint Peter
St. Peter, by Francesco Cossa.
Cephas (the Rock)
Born (traditionally)	Bethsaida
Died (traditionally)	crucified upside down ~64 in Rome during Nero's Persecution
Recognised in	All Christianity
Major shrine	St. Peter's Basilica
Feasts	February 22, June 29, November 18
Attributes	bald man, often with a fringe of hair on the sides and a tuft on top; book; rooster; keys; man crucified head downwards; man holding a key or keys; man robed as a pope and bearing keys and a double-barred cross; reversed cross
Patronage	See St. Peter's Patronage
Sample prayer O God, who hast given unto Thy blessed Apostle Peter the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and the power to bind and loose: grant that we may be delivered, through the help of this intercession, from the slavery of all our sins: Who livest and reignest world without end. Amen.[1]

Saint Peter, also known as Peter, Simon ben Jonah/BarJonah, Simon Peter, Cephas and Kepha—original name Simon or Simeon (Acts 15:14)—was one of the twelve original disciples or apostles of Jesus. His life is prominently featured in the New Testament Gospels.

A Galilean fisherman, he (with his brother Andrew) was literally "called" by Jesus to be an apostle. Above all the other disciples, Peter was assigned a leadership role by Jesus (Matt 16:18; John 21:15–16); and indeed, his supremacy within the early Church is recognized by many.

Simon Peter is considered a saint by many Christians, and the first Pope by the Roman Catholic Church and its Eastern Rites. Other Christian denominations recognize his office as Bishop of Antioch and later Bishop of Rome, but do not hold the belief that his episcopacy had primacy over other episcopates elsewhere in the world. Still others do not view Peter as having held the office of bishop or overseer, holding the view that the office of bishop was a development of later Christianity. Furthermore, many Protestants do not use the title of "saint" in reference to Peter.

The Liturgy of the Hours records June 29, AD 69 as his date of death. However, the date is uncertain. Some scholars believe that he died on October 13, AD 64. He is traditionally believed to have been sentenced to death by crucifixion by the Roman authorities. According to a tradition, thought by scholars to derive from the apocryphal Acts of Peter, Simon Peter was crucified upside down. Tradition also argues that he is buried in the grottoes underneath the Basilica of Saint Peter in Vatican City. He is often depicted in art as holding the keys to the kingdom of heaven (the sign of his primacy over the Church), as described in the Gospel of Matthew.

[edit] The tenets of Islam

Main articles: Five Pillars of Islam, Branches of Religion, and Roots of Religion

Muslims performing salat (prayer)

The Pilgrimage (Hajj) to Kaaba, Masjid al Haram, Mecca, is one of the five pillars of Islam or one of the roots of religion (for the Shi'a).

The two largest subgroups of the Muslims are the Sunni and the Shi'a. Sunni Muslims make up the largest percentage of the Muslim world, although large majorities of Shi'a Muslims are found in Middle Eastern countries such as Iran and Iraq. However, in countries such as Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Bangladesh, and Pakistan, Sunni Muslims are the majority.

My attempts at creating articles

Behold the lilies of the field

[edit] Gautama the Buddha

A stone image of the Buddha.

Main article: Gautama Buddha

According to all Buddhist traditions, the Buddha of the present age, called Siddhārtha (Sanskrit) or Siddhattha (Pāli) of the Gautama (Pāli: Gotama) gotra or clan, was born in the grove of Lumbinī near the town of Kapilavastu (Pāli: Kapilavatthu), the capital of the kingdom (mahājanapada) of the Śākyas (Pāli: Sakyas). Lumbinī and the Śākya realm were known to have been in the north, adjacent to the kingdom of Kośala and the republic of the Koliyas along the Ganges, separated from Koliya by the river Rohiṇī. The exact location of Lumbinī is fixed in what is now south central Nepal by a pillar inscription of King Aśoka from the 3rd century BCE commemorating the Buddha's birth. Despite weighty evidence for this location, Mr. Chandrabhanu Patel of the Orissa Museum has claimed that the birthplace was actually in Orissa state, hundreds of miles to the southeast.

Siddhārtha's father was Śuddhodana (Pāli: Suddhodana), then the chieftain (rājā) of the Śākyas. Traditions state that the Buddha's mother died at his birth or a few days later. The legend says that the seer Asita predicted shortly after his birth that Siddhārtha would become either a great king or a great holy man; because of this, the king tried to make sure that Siddhārtha never had any cause for dissatisfaction with his life, as such dissatisfaction might lead him to follow a spiritual path. Nevertheless, at the age of 29, he came across what has become known as the Four Passing Sights: an old crippled man, a sick man, a decaying corpse, and finally a wandering holy man. These four sights led him to the realization that birth, old age, sickness and death come to everyone. He decided to abandon his worldly life, leaving behind his privileges, rank, caste, and his wife and child, to take up the life of a wandering holy man in search of the answer to the problems of birth, old age, pain, sickness, and death.