Eduqas GCSE Religious Studies key terms

Generosity, morality, patience, energy, meditation and wisdom: virtues cultivated in Mahayana Buddhism to develop compassion and understanding and attain buddhahood.

An aggregate, or constituent, of physical and mental experience. The five skandhas are form, sensation, perception, mental formations and consciousness.

The five changing aggregates that make up a person: form, feeling or sensation, perception, mental formations and consciousness. Also called khandhas.

A Tibetan funeral practice in which the body is offered to vultures, expressing generosity and the impermanence of the body.

Concern for the welfare of others, expressed through actions that address suffering and improve life for people, animals and communities.

Fair treatment within society, including addressing poverty, discrimination and unequal opportunities.

The Quaker religious movement, whose worship in Britain centres on shared silence and contributions offered by anyone who feels moved to speak.

‘Scripture alone’: the Protestant principle that the Bible is the highest authority for Christian faith and teaching.

The spiritual aspect of a human being, created by Allah, which continues to exist after bodily death.

The process of developing morally and spiritually through freely chosen responses to life's challenges, associated with Irenaeus and John Hick.

Speaking in languages or utterances understood by worshippers as a gift of the Holy Spirit; also called glossolalia.

God making himself known in particular ways, such as through Jesus, scripture or a religious experience.

Prejudice that gives the interests of one species greater importance simply because it belongs to that species.

Growth in religious understanding and the qualities needed to live according to one’s faith.

The belief that all living beings have spiritual worth, regardless of differences such as wealth, social position or species.

An understanding of life beyond death in which renewed life is spiritual rather than the restoration of a physical body.

World Jewish Relief’s Specialist Training and Employment Programme, which helps refugees from all backgrounds move into work in the UK.

A generalised assumption about a group that overlooks differences between its individual members.

The responsibility to look after the world on God's behalf.

A Buddhist monument, often dome-shaped, which may contain sacred relics and serve as a focus for devotion.

The experience of physical pain or mental distress.

A temporary shelter used during Sukkot, recalling the Israelites’ shelters in the wilderness.

The Jewish Festival of Booths, remembering the Israelites’ wilderness journey and giving thanks for the harvest.

The example of the Prophet Muhammad’s actions and practices, which Muslims seek to follow.

Emptiness: the teaching that things lack an independent, fixed existence; it does not mean that nothing exists.

Meeting present needs without undermining the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.

Reading a text's images and events as expressions of deeper meaning, rather than necessarily as a factual description of physical events.