Extracts from this document...

Introduction

What are different religions views on animal hunting? Hunting has always been the main source of food for most cultures. Man has always been a hunter. But many hunters nowadays don't just kill for food - they kill for profit. That's why so many rare and protected animals are being wiped out. Hunters like these are called poachers. In 1981 there were 15,000 black rhinos in Africa. Today, because of illegal hunting for ivory that number is 4,500. Nowadays however there are strict laws on the hunting of animals especially for sport. That hasn't stopped it happening though. Many animal rights campaigners have approached the government on banning all animal hunting. Just last year a ban was made on fox hunting. Many believe though that hunting and killing animals is something that has been done since the dawn of man and is vital for human survival. This may be true in some cultures in other parts of the world but now in our modern day world animals are specifically bred to be killed. ...read more.

Middle

St Francis of Assisi was one of the main saints who preached to the birds and became the most popular pro-animal Christian figure. So it stands, we have two very different strands of Christian thought. One permits hunting and complete domination of all of God's creatures. The other considers the fact that hunting is unfair to the animals. Of coarse many of the Christians that are for the most part against animal rights when it comes to eating meat are against hunting animals for sport as they feel it is cruel and unfair. Today that is the general feeling among Christians who believe mainly the God created everything including animals and that they should be shown compassion just like humans. Although there is nothing in the bible that say there is anything wrong with animal hunting, it is a moral decision that most Christians decide against. 'Buddhism ought to be an animal rights religion par excellence', says Norm Phelps who is a founding member of the Society of Ethical and Religious Vegetarians. ...read more.

Conclusion

They can only make use of the animal's fur or meat if the animal has died of natural causes. This rule only applies to some Hindus. However in post Vedic India hunting fro for sport was a regular occurrence in which wild animals such as tigers would be hunted and there was absolutely nothing against any form of hunting. Generally today though most Hindus are totally against any kind of hunting especially elephant poaching as one of the Hindu Gods is the Elephant God, Ganesh who is the God of wisdom and success. So in conclusion you can see that most religions are against all forms of animal hunting. More traditional believers of their religion are more likely to be for it. But as times have moved on and many new laws have been put into place, the views on hunting have become a lot more compassionate. So people who were previously for hunting have had to change their opinions as it is less expectable in society today. All the Gods encourage respect for all life, but animals are still seen as been the under dominant being. ...read more.

This student written piece of work is one of many that can be found in our GCSE Religion in the Media section.