Concept and etymology
The term ''religion'' comes from bothIn classic antiquity, broadly meant conscientiousness, sense of right, moral obligation, or duty to anything. In the ancient and medieval world, the etymological Latin root was understood as an individual virtue of worship in mundane contexts; never as doctrine, practice, or actual source of knowledge. In general, referred to broad social obligations towards anything including family, neighbors, rulers, and even towards God. was most often used by the ancient Romans not in the context of a relation towards gods, but as a range of general emotions such as hesitation, caution, anxiety, fear; feelings of being bound, restricted, inhibited; which arose from heightened attention in any mundane context. The term was also closely related to other terms like (which meant "very precisely"), and some Roman authors related the term (which meant too much fear or anxiety or shame) to at times. When came into English around the 1200s as religion, it took the meaning of "life bound by monastic vows" or monastic orders. The compartmentalized concept of religion, where religious things were separated from worldly things, was not used before the 1500s. The concept of religion was first used in the 1500s to distinguish the domain of the church and the domain of civil authorities; the Peace of Augsburg marks such instance, which has been described as "the first step on the road toward a European system of sovereign states." Julius Caesar used to mean "obligation of an oath" when discussing captured soldiers making an oath to their captors. The Roman naturalist
In the ancient Greece, the Greek term () was loosely translated into Latin as in late antiquity. was sparsely used in classical Greece but became more frequently used in the writings of Josephus in the 1st century AD. It was used in mundane contexts and could mean multiple things from respectful fear to excessive or harmfully distracting practices of others; to cultic practices. It was often contrasted with the Greek word , which meant too much fear.
Religion and religions
The modern concept of religion, as an abstraction that entails distinct sets of beliefs or doctrines, is a recent invention in the English language. Such usage began with texts from the 17th century due to events such as the splitting ofDefinition
Scholars have failed to agree on a definition of religion. There are, however, two general definition systems: the sociological/functional and the phenomenological/philosophical.Modern Western
The concept of religion originated in theClassical
Aspects
Beliefs
Traditionally,Mythology
The word ''myth'' has several meanings. # A traditional story of ostensibly historical events that serves to unfold part of the world view of a people or explain a practice, belief, or natural phenomenon; # A person or thing having only an imaginary or unverifiable existence; or # A metaphor for the spiritual potentiality in the human being. AncientPractices
The practices of a religion may includeSocial organisation
Religions have a societal basis, either as a living tradition which is carried by lay participants, or with an organizedAcademic study
A number of disciplines study the phenomenon of religion:Theories
Origins and development
The origin of religion is uncertain. There are a number of theories regarding the subsequent origins of religious practices. According toCultural system
While religion is difficult to define, one standard model of religion, used in religious studies courses, was proposed by Clifford Geertz, who simply called it a "cultural system". A critique of Geertz's model bySocial constructionism
One modern academic theory of religion,Cognitive science
Cognitive science of religion is the study of religious thought and behavior from the perspective of the cognitive and evolutionary sciences. The field employs methods and theories from a very broad range of disciplines, including:Comparativism
Comparative religion is the branch of the study of religions concerned with the systematic comparison of the doctrines and practices of the world's religions. In general, the comparative study of religion yields a deeper understanding of the fundamental philosophical concerns of religion such asClassification
In the 19th and 20th centuries, the academic practice ofMorphological classification
Some scholars classify religions as either '' universal religions'' that seek worldwide acceptance and actively look for new converts, such as Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and Jainism, while ''Demographic classification
The five largest religious groups by world population, estimated to account for 5.8 billion people and 84% of the population, are Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism (with the relative numbers for Buddhism and Hinduism dependent on the extent ofSpecific religions
Abrahamic
Judaism
Christianity
Islam
Other
Whilst Judaism, Christianity and Islam are commonly seen as the only three Abrahamic faiths, there are smaller and newer traditions which lay claim to the designation as well. For example, the Baháʼí Faith is aEast Asian
East Asian religions (also known as Far Eastern religions or Taoic religions) consist of several religions of East Asia which make use of the concept of Tao (in Chinese), Dō (in Japanese or Korean) or Đạo (in Vietnamese). They include:Taoism and Confucianism
* Taoism and Confucianism, as well as Korean, Vietnamese, and Japanese religion influenced by Chinese thought.Folk religions
* Chinese folk religion: the indigenous religions of the Han Chinese, or, by metonymy, of all the populations of the Chinese cultural sphere. It includes the syncretism of Confucianism, Taoism andDharmic religions
Hinduism
*Jainism
* Jainism, taught primarily by Rishabhanatha (the founder of ahimsa) is an ancient Indian religion that prescribes a path of non-violence, truth and anekantavada for all forms of living beings in this universe; which helps them to eliminate all the Karma in Jainism, Karmas, and hence to attain freedom from the cycle of birth and death (Saṃsāra (Jainism), saṃsāra), that is, achieving Moksha (Jainism), nirvana. Jains are found mostly in India. According to Dundas, outside of the Jain tradition, historians date the Mahavira as about contemporaneous with the Buddha in the 5th-century BCE, and accordingly the historical Parshvanatha, based on the c. 250-year gap, is placed in 8th or 7th century BCE. ** Digambara Jainism (or sky-clad) is mainly practiced in South India. Their holy books are Pravachanasara and Samayasara written by their Prophets Kundakunda and Amritchandra as their Jain Agamas (Digambara), original canon is lost. ** Shwetambara Jainism (or white-clad) is mainly practiced in Western India. Their holy books are Jain Agamas (Śvētāmbara), Jain Agamas, written by their Prophet Sthulibhadra.Buddhism
*Sikhism
* Sikhism is a panentheistic religion founded on the teachings of Guru Nanak and ten successive Sikh gurus in 15th-century Punjab region, Punjab. It is the Major religious groups, fifth-largest organized religion in the world, with approximately 30 million Sikhs. Sikhs are expected to embody the qualities of a ''Sant-Sipāhī''—a saint-soldier, have control over one's internal Five Thieves, vices and be able to be constantly immersed in virtues clarified in the Guru Granth Sahib. The principal beliefs of Sikhi are faith in ''Waheguru''—represented by the phrase ''ik Onkar, ik ōaṅkār'', meaning one God, who prevails in everything, along with a praxis (process), praxis in which the Sikh is enjoined to engage in social reform through the pursuit of justice for all human beings.Indigenous and folk
Indigenous religions or ethnic religion, folk religions refers to a broad category of traditional religions that can be characterised by shamanism,Traditional African
Traditional African religion, African traditional religion encompasses the traditional religious beliefs of people in Africa. In West Africa, these religions include the Akan religion, Dahomey mythology, Dahomey (Fon) mythology, Efik mythology, Odinani, Serer religion, Serer religion (A ƭat Roog), and Yoruba religion, while Bushongo mythology, Mbuti mythology, Mbuti (Pygmy) mythology, Lugbara mythology, Dinka religion, and Lotuko mythology come from central Africa. Southern African traditions include Akamba mythology, Masai mythology, Malagasy mythology, San religion, Lozi mythology, Tumbuka mythology, and Zulu mythology. Bantu mythology is found throughout central, southeast, and southern Africa. In north Africa, these traditions include traditional Berber religion, Berber and ancient Egyptian religion, ancient Egyptian. There are also notable African diasporic religions practiced in the Americas, such as Santeria, Candomble, Haitian Vodun, Vodun, Lucumi religion, Lucumi, Umbanda, and Macumba.Iranian
New religious movements
* The Baháʼí Faith teaches the unity of all religious philosophies. * Cao Đài is a Syncretism, syncretistic, Monotheism, monotheistic religion, established in Vietnam in 1926. * Eckankar is a Pantheism, pantheistic religion with the purpose of making God an everyday reality in one's life. * Epicureanism is a Hellenistic philosophy that is considered by many of its practitioners as a type of (sometimes non-theistic) religious identity. It has its own scriptures, a monthly "feast of reason" on the Twentieth, and considers friendship to be holy. * Hindu reform movements, such as Ayyavazhi, Swaminarayan Faith and Ananda Marga, are examples of new religious movements within Indian religions. * Japanese new religions ''(shinshukyo)'' is a general category for a wide variety of religious movements founded in Japan since the 19th century. These movements share almost nothing in common except the place of their founding. The largest religious movements centered in Japan include Soka Gakkai, Tenrikyo, and Seicho-No-Ie among hundreds of smaller groups. * Jehovah's Witnesses, a Nontrinitarianism, non-trinitarian Christians, Christian Reformist movement sometimes described as millenarian. * Neo-Druidism is a religion promoting harmony with nature, and drawing on the practices of the druids. * There are various Modern Pagan movements that attempt to reconstruct or revive ancient pagan practices. These include Heathenry (new religious movement), Heathenry, Hellenism (religion), Hellenism, and Kemeticism. * Noahidism is a monotheistic ideology based on the Seven Laws of Noah, and on their traditional interpretations within Rabbinic Judaism. * Some forms of parody religion or fiction-based religion like Jediism, Pastafarianism, Dudeism, "Tolkien religion", and others often develop their own writings, traditions, and cultural expressions, and end up behaving like traditional religions. * Satanism is a broad category of religions that, for example, worship Satan as a deity (Theistic Satanism) or use Satan as a symbol of carnality and earthly values (LaVeyan Satanism and The Satanic Temple). * Scientology is a religious movement that teaches that people are immortal beings who have forgotten their true nature. Its method of spiritual rehabilitation is a type of counseling known as Auditing (Scientology), auditing, in which practitioners aim to consciously re-experience and understand painful or traumatic events and decisions in their past in order to free themselves of their limiting effects. * UFO Religions in which extraterrestrial entities are an element of belief, such as Raëlism, Aetherius Society, and Marshall Vian Summers's ''New Message from God'' * Unitarian Universalism is a religion characterized by support for a free and responsible search for truth and meaning, and has no accepted creed orRelated aspects
Law
The study of law and religion is a relatively new field, with several thousand scholars involved in law schools, and academic departments including political science, religion, and history since 1980. Scholars in the field are not only focused on strictly legal issues about religious freedom or non-establishment, but also study religions as they are qualified through judicial discourses or legal understanding of religious phenomena. Exponents look at canon law, natural law, and state law, often in a comparative perspective. Specialists have explored themes in Western history regarding Christianity and justice and mercy, rule and equity, and discipline and love. Common topics of interest include marriage and the family and human rights. Outside of Christianity, scholars have looked at law and religion links in the Muslim Middle East and pagan Rome. Studies have focused on secularization. In particular, the issue of wearing religious symbols in public, such as headscarves that are banned in French schools, have received scholarly attention in the context of human rights and feminism.Science
Science acknowledges reason and empirical evidence; and religions include revelation,Morality
Many religions have value frameworks regarding personal behavior meant to guide adherents in determining between right and wrong. These include the Jainism#Core beliefs, Triple Jems of Jainism, Judaism, Judaism's Halacha, Islam, Islam's Sharia, Catholicism, Catholicism's Canon law (Catholic Church), Canon Law, Buddhism, Buddhism's Eightfold Path, and Theological Aspects of the Avesta, Zoroastrianism's good thoughts, good words, and good deeds concept, among others. Religion and morality are not synonymous. While it is "an almost automatic assumption." in Christianity, morality can have a Secular morality, secular basis. The study of religion and morality can be contentious due to ethnocentric views on morality, failure to distinguish between in group and out group altruism, and inconsistent definitions of religiosity.Politics
Impact
Religion has had a significant impact on the political system in many countries. Notably, most Muslim-majority countries adopt various aspects of sharia, the Islamic law. Some countries even define themselves in religious terms, such as Iran, The Islamic Republic of Iran. The sharia thus affects up to 23% of the global population, or 1.57 billion people who are Muslim world, Muslims. However, religion also affects political decisions in many western countries. For instance, in the United States, 51% of voters would be less likely to vote for a presidential candidate who did not believe in God, and only 6% more likely. Christians make up 92% of members of the US Congress, compared with 71% of the general public (as of 2014). At the same time, while 23% of U.S. adults are religiously unaffiliated, only one member of Congress (Kyrsten Sinema, D-Arizona), or 0.2% of that body, claims no religious affiliation. In most European countries, however, religion has a much smaller influence on politics although it used to be much more important. For instance, same-sex marriage and abortion were illegal in many European countries until recently, following Christian (usually Catholicism, Catholic) doctrine. Several List of atheists in politics and law, European leaders are atheists (e.g. France's former president François Hollande, Francois Hollande or Greece's prime minister Alexis Tsipras). In Asia, the role of religion differs widely between countries. For instance, India is still one of the most religious countries and religion still has a strong impact on politics, given that Hindu nationalists have been targeting minorities like the Muslims and the Christians, who historically belonged to the lower castes. By contrast, countries such as Religion in China, China or Religion in Japan, Japan are largely secular and thus religion has a much smaller impact on politics.Secularism
Secularization is the transformation of the politics of a society from close identification with a particular religion's values and institutions toward nonreligious values and secular institutions. The purpose of this is frequently modernization or protection of the populations religious diversity.Economics
One study has found there is a negative correlation between self-defined religiosity and the wealth of nations. In other words, the richer a nation is, the less likely its inhabitants to call themselves religious, whatever this word means to them (Many people identify themselves as part of a religion (not irreligion) but do not self-identify as religious). Sociologist and political economistHealth
Mayo Clinic researchers examined the association between religious involvement and spirituality, and physical health, mental health, health-related quality of life, and other health outcomes. The authors reported that: "Most studies have shown that religious involvement and spirituality are associated with better health outcomes, including greater longevity, coping skills, and health-related quality of life (even during terminal illness) and less anxiety, depression, and suicide." The authors of a subsequent study concluded that the influence of religion on health is largely beneficial, based on a review of related literature. According to academic James W. Jones, several studies have discovered "positive correlations between religious belief and practice and mental and physical health and longevity." An analysis of data from the 1998 US General Social Survey, whilst broadly confirming that religious activity was associated with better health and well-being, also suggested that the role of different dimensions of spirituality/religiosity in health is rather more complicated. The results suggested "that it may not be appropriate to generalize findings about the relationship between spirituality/religiosity and health from one form of spirituality/religiosity to another, across denominations, or to assume effects are uniform for men and women.Violence
Critics like Hector Avalos Regina Schwartz, Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins have argued that religions are inherently violent and harmful to society by using violence to promote their goals, in ways that are endorsed and exploited by their leaders. Anthropologist Jack David Eller asserts that religion is not inherently violent, arguing "religion and violence are clearly compatible, but they are not identical." He asserts that "violence is neither essential to nor exclusive to religion" and that "virtually every form of religious violence has its nonreligious corollary."Animal sacrifice
Some (but not all) religions practise animal sacrifice, theSuperstition
Greek and Roman pagans, who saw their relations with the gods in political and social terms, scorned the man who constantly trembled with fear at the thought of the gods (''deisidaimonia''), as a slave might fear a cruel and capricious master. The Romans called such fear of the gods ''superstitio''. Ancient Greek historian Polybius described superstition in ancient Rome as an ''instrumentum regni'', an instrument of maintaining the cohesion of the Roman Empire, Empire. Superstition has been described as the non-rational establishment of cause and effect. Religion is more complex and is often composed of social institutions and has a moral aspect. Some religions may include superstitions or make use of magical thinking. Adherents of one religion sometimes think of other religions as superstition. Some atheists, deists, and skeptics regard religious belief as superstition. The Roman Catholic Church considers superstition to be sinful in the sense that it denotes a lack of trust in the divine providence of God and, as such, is a violation of the first of the Ten Commandments. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that superstition "in some sense represents a perverse excess of religion" (para. #2110). "Superstition," it says, "is a deviation of religious feeling and of the practices this feeling imposes. It can even affect the worship we offer the true God, e.g., when one attributes an importance in some way magical to certain practices otherwise lawful or necessary. To attribute the efficacy of prayers or of sacramental signs to their mere external performance, apart from the interior dispositions that they demand is to fall into superstition. Cf. Matthew 23:16–22" (para. #2111)Agnosticism and atheism
The terms atheist (lack of belief in any gods) and agnostic (belief in the unknowability of the existence of gods), though specifically contrary to theistic (e.g. Christian, Jewish, and Muslim) religious teachings, do not by definition mean the opposite of religious. There are religions (including Buddhism, Taoism, and Hinduism), in fact, that classify some of their followers as agnostic, atheistic, or nontheism, nontheistic. The true opposite of religious is the word irreligious. Irreligion describes an absence of any religion; antireligion describes an active opposition or aversion toward religions in general.Interfaith cooperation
Because religion continues to be recognized in Western thought as a universal impulse, many religious practitioners have aimed to band together in interfaith dialogue, cooperation, and Religion and peacebuilding, religious peacebuilding. The first major dialogue was the Parliament of the World's Religions at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition, Chicago World's Fair, which affirmed universal values and recognition of the diversity of practices among different cultures. The 20th century has been especially fruitful in use of interfaith dialogue as a means of solving ethnic, political, or even religious conflict, with Christian–Jewish reconciliation representing a complete reverse in the attitudes of many Christian communities towards Jews. Recent interfaith initiatives include A Common Word, launched in 2007 and focused on bringing Muslim and Christian leaders together, the "C1 World Dialogue", the Common Ground initiative between Islam and Buddhism, and a United Nations sponsored "World Interfaith Harmony Week".Culture
Culture and religion have usually been seen as closely related.Religion as ultimate concern is the meaning-giving substance of culture, and culture is the totality of forms in which the basic concern of religion expresses itself. In abbreviation: religion is the substance of culture, culture is the form of religion. Such a consideration definitely prevents the establishment of a dualism of religion and culture. Every religious act, not only in organized religion, but also in the most intimate movement of the soul, is culturally formed.Ernst Troeltsch, similarly, looked at culture as the soil of religion and thought that, therefore, transplanting a religion from its original culture to a foreign culture would actually kill it in the same manner that transplanting a plant from its natural soil to an alien soil would kill it. However, there have been many attempts in the modern pluralistic situation to distinguish culture from religion. Domenic Marbaniang has argued that elements grounded on beliefs of a metaphysical nature (religious) are distinct from elements grounded on nature and the natural (cultural). For instance, language (with its grammar) is a cultural element while sacralization of language in which a particular religious scripture is written is more often a religious practice. The same applies to music and the arts.
Criticism
Criticism of religion is criticism of the ideas, the truth, or the practice of religion, including its political and social implications.See also
* Cosmogony * Index of religion-related articles * Life stance * List of foods with religious symbolism * List of religion-related awards * List of religious texts * Matriarchal religion * Nontheistic religions * Outline of religion * Parody religions * Ethics in religion * Philosophy of religion * Priest * Religion and happiness * Religion and peacebuilding * Religions by country * Religious conversion * Religious discrimination * Social conditioning * Socialization * Temple * Theocracy * Theology of religions * Timeline of religion * Problem of why there is anything at all, Why is there something rather than nothing? * Museum of the History of Religion, The State Museum of the History of ReligionNotes
References
Sources
Primary
* Saint Augustine; ''The Confessions of Saint Augustine'' (John K. Ryan translator); Image (1960), . * Lao Tzu; ''Tao Te Ching'' (Victor H. Mair translator); Bantam (1998). * ''The Holy Bible'', King James Version; New American Library (1974). * ''The Koran''; Penguin (2000), . * ''The Origin of Live & Death'', African Creation Myths; Heinemann (1966). * ''Poems of Heaven and Hell from Ancient Mesopotamia''; Penguin (1971). * ''Selected Work'' Marcus Tullius Cicero * United States ConstitutionSecondary
* Barzilai, Gad; ''Law and Religion''; The International Library of Essays in Law and Society; Ashgate (2007), * * * Yves Coppens, ''Origines de l'homme – De la matière à la conscience'', De Vive Voix, Paris, 2010 * Yves Coppens, ''La preistoria dell'uomo'', Jaca Book, Milano, 2011 * Descartes, René; ''Meditations on First Philosophy''; Bobbs-Merril (1960), . * Dow, James W. (2007),Further reading
* * * Noss, John B.; ''Man's Religions'', 6th ed.; Macmillan Publishing Co. (1980). ''N.B''.: The first ed. appeared in 1949, . . * Ronald F. Inglehart, Inglehart, Ronald F., "Giving Up on God: The Global Decline of Religion", ''Foreign Affairs'', vol. 99, no. 5 (September / October 2020), pp. 110–118. * Lang, AndrewExternal links
*