Religion Studies Grade 12 NSC September 2025 P2 (Eastern Cape) Questions and Answers

Four effects of substance abuse on society are:

1. More crime: the crime rate rises as addicts steal and commit other offences to get money for substances.
2. More abuse: child abuse and the abuse of women increase.
3. Fear: the community lives in fear of addicts and drug-related violence.
4. Moral decay: violence becomes common and the moral fibre of society is eroded.

Five practical steps religious organisations can take to address substance abuse are:

1. Youth programmes: encourage young people to take part in health and sport programmes that keep them occupied.
2. Awareness workshops: hold workshops that explain the dangers of substance abuse to followers.
3. Religious teachings: stress the teachings of the religion that forbid or warn against substance abuse.
4. Work with the police: work with community policing forums and report drug lords operating in the community.
5. Rehabilitation: approach the municipality and health department to set up a rehabilitation centre, and invite former addicts to share their experiences.

The two branches are Catholicism and Protestantism within Christianity. Five differences in their practices are:

1. Sunday worship: attending Holy Mass on Sunday is obligatory for Catholics, while Protestants regularly attend Sunday church services.
2. Sacraments: Catholic children receive sacraments such as First Holy Communion and confirmation at set stages, while Protestant children are formed through Sunday school and youth groups.
3. Confession: Catholics confess their sins to a priest in the sacrament of confession, while Protestants do not use this sacrament.
4. Prayer aids and symbols: Catholics use the rosary and the crucifix, while Protestants do not rely on these objects.
5. Emphasis: Protestants place great emphasis on the scriptures and hold healing services, while Catholic worship centres on the Mass and sacraments.

Using Catholicism and Protestantism in Christianity, five differences in governance are:

1. Head of the church: Catholicism is headed by the Pope, while Protestant churches have no single head.
2. Centre of power: Catholic power is centred in Rome (the Vatican), while Protestant authority lies in synods, assemblies or local congregations.
3. Levels of leadership: Catholics are governed by priests at parish level, deans, bishops and archbishops, while Protestants are led by ordained ministers, bishops or elected elders.
4. Higher authority: Catholic cardinals represent the Pope in different regions, while many Protestant churches answer to a synod or general assembly.
5. Independence: some Protestant churches are independent and answer only to their congregation, and in the Presbyterian system a church council of the minister and elders governs.

Four advantages of internal differences in religions are:

1. Different interpretations: they allow sacred texts to be understood in different ways.
2. Growth: religion can grow through the interaction of its subdivisions.
3. Tolerance: different views are accepted within the same religion, which encourages tolerance and a focus on what members share.
4. Core beliefs stay firm: major beliefs remain unchanged while practices differ, for example the shahadah in Islam is fixed but rituals and jurisprudence vary.

Five points about inspiration in religion are:

1. Inspiration is an important normative source and the true origin of many religions.
2. It is the power of an extraordinary being taking over a chosen person.
3. The founders of many religions felt inspired by a higher power or wisdom and believed they received revelation.
4. Divine inspiration is direct and immediate and inspired the founders of religions, while contemporary inspiration is ongoing and unites worshippers with their Creator.
5. In African Traditional Religion mediums and diviners receive inspiration in a trance, and inspiration strongly motivates followers.

Three hermeneutical principles are:

1. Grammar and historical context: a text must be understood in the time and circumstances in which it was written, using the exact and ordinary meaning of words.
2. Meaning of words: word meanings change over time and place, so the original meaning must be used. For example, "Adam knew Eve" meant he had sexual intercourse with her.
3. Figurative language: some words stand for something else, such as the seed and soil in the parable of the sower. These must be recognised to avoid a literal reading and need to be read with other principles.

Six points on religious cooperation in South Africa before 1994 are:

1. Apartheid dominated all areas of life, including religion.
2. Only Christianity was recognised in public life and taught in schools.
3. Other religions were ignored or misrepresented, so religions lived apart from each other and even within one religion there was racial separation.
4. During the struggle years religion became a powerful force of resistance and unity, and leaders of different religions stood and protested together.
5. Struggle leaders included Desmond Tutu, Frank Chikane, Allan Boesak, Denis Hurley, Imam Haron and Chief Rabbi Cyril Harris.
6. Bodies formed included the SACC (1968), the Call of Islam (1984), the WCRP-SA branch (1984) and Jews for Justice (1985).

Five achievements (and failures) of the NRLF or NICSA are:

1. HIV/AIDS: new infections have decreased and free treatment is available.
2. Religion in education: different religions are given fair opportunities in schools.
3. Preventing conflict: cooperation among religions has helped to prevent inter-religious conflict in South Africa.
4. Failure on abuse: child abuse and gender-based violence are still increasing.
5. Failure on values: fraud and corruption keep increasing, so ethical and moral values are not yet well promoted.

Four purposes of PROCMURA are:

1. To bear witness to the gospel by living a Christian life within an interfaith environment.
2. To promote peaceful co-existence between Christians and Muslims.
3. To promote constructive engagement with Muslims for peace and to empower women and youth through educational programmes.
4. To help reconcile Christians and Muslims.

Six points about humanism in a religious context are:

1. Humanism teaches that human matters take priority over supernatural or divine matters.
2. The term is generally linked to the social and intellectual philosophies of the Renaissance.
3. Enlightenment thinkers such as Hobbes and Hume helped spread humanism through Europe and America.
4. In the age of enlightenment science, reason and intellect advanced, and the human mind, not God, became the starting point for understanding the world.
5. Humanism was originally a religious term and was first used as a concept in the 1950s.
6. In the 19th century its meaning shifted for most English speakers to mean atheism.

Four positive contributions of secularism to religion are:

1. It promotes religious freedom and religious tolerance.
2. No religion is officially favoured by the state, so all religions are equal and live together in peace.
3. All religions may worship in their own ways as long as they do not infringe on the rights of others, and all take part in state functions such as a presidential inauguration.
4. Religion cannot dictate the laws of the state, and secular influence has led to scriptures being re-evaluated and re-interpreted.

Eight points comparing Darwin's theory with the Islamic account of creation are:

1. Islam teaches that Allah is the creator of everything in heaven and on earth, while Darwin's theory has no creator.
2. Islam teaches that the first human, Adam, was made from clay, while Darwin taught that humans gradually evolved from earlier species.
3. Allah breathed His spirit into Adam and he came to life, while in evolution life developed by natural processes.
4. Eve (Hawwa) was created from Adam, while in evolution there are no single first parents.
5. Islam gives humans the highest status in creation, while Darwin gave humans no higher status than other species.
6. In Islam humans were created perfect and first lived in Paradise, while in evolution humans were not created perfect and changed over time.
7. Islam teaches humans were created to worship Allah, while in evolution species survive by adapting in the fight for survival and those that fail become extinct.
8. Both agree that the world and its species exist, but Islam rejects the idea that humans are just another animal that evolved from apes, while evolution says the world and its species change over time.

Seven points explaining the Big Bang theory are:

1. It is not known what existed before the Big Bang.
2. The Big Bang happened about 13,7 billion years ago.
3. It was an enormous explosion in space from which the universe appeared and expanded to an enormous size.
4. The process of creation took a split second.
5. Small temperature differences in the initial explosion led to the formation of matter and energy.
6. The matter condensed into lumps that formed stars, galaxies and planets, and the Earth formed about 4,5 billion years ago.
7. Scientists believe the universe is still expanding, and it is not known whether or how it will end.

Five responses of Christianity to Darwin's theory are:

1. Christians are sure that God created the universe as part of His plan for humanity.
2. Genesis says God created the world in six days and rested on the seventh, so there is no place for evolution.
3. The church regarded Darwin's work as controversial.
4. Critics said there is no evidence of new species developing, or of one species developing from another, and that hybrids cannot breed. They also said some parts of creation are too complex to arise by natural selection.
5. Many Christians resolve the conflict by reading the Bible symbolically rather than literally.

Five reasons why some religions rejected Darwin's theory are:

1. It goes against their basic teachings about the creation of humans and their status in the universe.
2. Evolution does not recognise a Creator.
3. Evolution does not place humans at the centre of creation but treats them as another organism.
4. The Abrahamic religions teach that humans are made in the image of God and are immortal with a soul, while evolution says humans come into being and pass away.
5. Religions teach that God created everything perfect, so humans did not evolve from primates, and they point out that a new species has never been recorded.

Six teachings of Islam on humanity, community and the individual are:

1. Islam balances the rights of the individual with the rights of the community.
2. If the two conflict, the right of the community takes precedence.
3. Individual rights may not harm or violate the rights of the majority.
4. The individual has rights that cannot be denied, but they come with obligations to family, community and state.
5. Muslims must support and help the weak, and the community must create conditions in which all its members can develop their physical and intellectual abilities.
6. The community encourages what is good and forbids what is evil, is run by mutual consultation, and Muslims have social obligations to all humanity.

Six teachings of Islam on the nature of divinity are:

1. Islam believes in one universal God, Allah.
2. Belief in the oneness of Allah is the foundation of Islam.
3. Allah has other titles that show His attributes.
4. He is the Creator (Khaliq) and Originator (Badi) of the universe.
5. He keeps creating new forms of life and sustains all of creation.
6. Humans must acknowledge Allah and live according to His will, and the Qur'an shapes the Muslim understanding of divinity.

Six teachings of Islam on the nature of the world are:

1. The Qur'an teaches that Allah created the universe in six phases.
2. Allah supplies the energy that everything in the universe needs to survive and grow.
3. The universe is not an accident.
4. Life is planned and has a purpose.
5. The universe was created in time, so it is not eternal and has a fixed time span.
6. Only Allah is eternal, so believing the universe is eternal would equate creation with the Creator, which is the major sin of shirk.

Seven points on the advantages and disadvantages of oral tradition are:

1. Oral tradition passes the original message from one generation to the next by word of mouth, storytelling, verbal teaching and rituals.
2. Advantage: it is an effective way of passing on the message in all religions.
3. Advantage: the narrative style can make the message clearer than written text.
4. Advantage: it reflects local dialect and culture, so each culture understands it easily.
5. Advantage: the chain of narrators leads back to the source, and oral tradition runs alongside written texts. It is still important in African Traditional Religion.
6. Disadvantage: the original message may lose its meaning over time.
7. Disadvantage: it can give rise to different and contradictory versions.