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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is about a cultural system of behaviors, practices and ethics. For other uses,
see Religion (disambiguation). "Religious" redirects here. For the term describing a
type of monk or nun, see Religious (Western Christianity). Not to be confused
with Religious denomination.

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Religion is a range of social-cultural systems, including designated behaviors and
practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics,
or organizations, that generally relate humanity to supernatural, transcendental,
and spiritual elements[1]—although there is no scholarly consensus over what precisely
constitutes a religion.[2][3] Different religions may or may not contain various elements
ranging from the divine,[4] sacredness,[5] faith,[6] and a supernatural being or beings.[7]
The origin of religious belief is an open question, with possible explanations including
awareness of individual death, a sense of community, and dreams.[8] Religions
have sacred histories, narratives, and mythologies, preserved in oral traditions, sacred
texts, symbols, and holy places, that may attempt to explain the origin of life,
the universe, and other phenomena.
Religious practices may include rituals, sermons, commemoration or veneration
(of deities or saints), sacrifices, festivals, feasts, trances, initiations, matrimonial and fun
erary services, meditation, prayer, music, art, dance, or public service.
There are an estimated 10,000 distinct religions worldwide,[9] though nearly all of them
have regionally based, relatively small followings. Four religions—
Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism—account for over 77% of the world's
population, and 92% of the world either follows one of those four religions or identifies
as nonreligious,[10] meaning that the remaining 9,000+ faiths account for only 8% of the
population combined. The religiously unaffiliated demographic includes those who do
not identify with any particular religion, atheists, and agnostics, although many in the
demographic still have various religious beliefs.[11]
Many world religions are also organized religions, most definitively including
the Abrahamic religions Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, while others are arguably less
so, in particular folk religions, indigenous religions, and some Eastern religions. A
portion of the world's population are members of new religious movements.[12] Scholars
have indicated that global religiosity may be increasing due to religious countries having
generally higher birth rates.[13]
The study of religion comprises a wide variety of academic disciplines,
including theology, philosophy of religion, comparative religion, and social scientific
studies. Theories of religion offer various explanations for its origins and workings,
including the ontological foundations of religious being and belief.[14]
Etymology and history of concept
 The Buddha, Laozi, and Confucius – founders
of Buddhism, Taoism (Daoism) and Confucianism – in a Ming dynasty painting
Etymology
See also: History of religion
The term religion comes from both Old French and Anglo-Norman (1200s CE) and
means respect for sense of right, moral obligation, sanctity, what is sacred, reverence
for the gods.[15][16] It is ultimately derived from the Latin word religiō. According to Roman
philosopher Cicero, religiō comes from relegere: re (meaning "again") + lego (meaning
"read"), where lego is in the sense of "go over", "choose", or "consider carefully".
Contrarily, some modern scholars such as Tom Harpur and Joseph Campbell have
argued that religiō is derived from religare: re (meaning "again") + ligare ("bind" or
"connect"), which was made prominent by St. Augustine following the interpretation
given by Lactantius in Divinae institutiones, IV, 28.[17][18] The medieval usage alternates
with order in designating bonded communities like those of monastic orders: "we hear of
the 'religion' of the Golden Fleece, of a knight 'of the religion of Avys'".[19]
Religiō
Main article: Religio
In classic antiquity, religiō broadly meant conscientiousness, sense of right,
moral obligation, or duty to anything.[20] In the ancient and medieval world, the
etymological Latin root religiō was understood as an individual virtue of worship in
mundane contexts; never as doctrine, practice, or actual source of knowledge.[21][22] In
general, religiō referred to broad social obligations towards anything including family,
neighbors, rulers, and even towards God.[23] Religiō was most often used by the ancient
Romans not in the context of a relation towards gods, but as a range of general
emotions which arose from heightened attention in any mundane context such
as hesitation, caution, anxiety, or fear, as well as feelings of being bound, restricted, or
inhibited.[24] The term was also closely related to other terms like scrupulus (which meant
"very precisely"), and some Roman authors related the term superstitio (which meant
too much fear or anxiety or shame) to religiō at times.[24] When religiō came
into English around the 1200s as religion, it took the meaning of "life bound by monastic
vows" or monastic orders.[19][23] The compartmentalized concept of religion, where
religious and worldly things were separated, was not used before the 1500s.[23] 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,[23] which has been described by Christian Reus-Smit as "the first step on the
road toward a European system of sovereign states."[25]
Roman general Julius Caesar used religiō to mean "obligation of an oath" when
discussing captured soldiers making an oath to their captors.[26] Roman naturalist Pliny
the Elder used the term religiō to describe the apparent respect given by elephants to
the night sky.[27] Cicero used religiō as being related to cultum deorum (worship of the
gods).[28]
Threskeia
In Ancient Greece, the Greek term threskeia (θρησκεία) was loosely translated into
Latin as religiō in late antiquity. Threskeia was sparsely used in classical Greece but
became more frequently used in the writings of Josephus in the 1st century CE. 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 deisidaimonia, which meant too much fear.[29]
History of the concept of the "religion"
See also: Timeline of religion
Religion is a modern concept.[30] The concept was invented recently in the English
language and is found in texts from the 17th century due to events such as the splitting
of Christendom during the Protestant Reformation and globalization in the Age of
Exploration, which involved contact with numerous foreign cultures with non-European
languages.[21][22][31] Some argue that regardless of its definition, it is not appropriate to
apply the term religion to non-Western cultures,[32][33] while some followers of various
faiths rebuke using the word to describe their own belief system.[34]
The concept of "ancient religion" stems from modern interpretations of a range of
practices that conform to a modern concept of religion, influenced by early modern and
19th century Christian discourse.[35] The concept of religion was formed in the 16th and
17th centuries,[36][37] despite the fact that ancient sacred texts like the Bible, the Quran,
and others did not have a word or even a concept of religion in the original languages
and neither did the people or the cultures in which these sacred texts were written. [38]
[39]
For example, there is no precise equivalent of religion in Hebrew, and Judaism does
not distinguish clearly between religious, national, racial, or ethnic identities. [40][41][42] One of
its central concepts is halakha, meaning the walk or path sometimes translated as law,
which guides religious practice and belief and many aspects of daily life.[43] Even though
the beliefs and traditions of Judaism are found in the ancient world, ancient Jews
saw Jewish identity as being about an ethnic or national identity and did not entail a
compulsory belief system or regulated rituals.[44] In the 1st century CE, Josephus had
used the Greek term ioudaismos (Judaism) as an ethnic term and was not linked to
modern abstract concepts of religion or a set of beliefs.[3] The very concept of "Judaism"
was invented by the Christian Church,[45] and it was in the 19th century that Jews began
to see their ancestral culture as a religion analogous to Christianity.[44] The Greek
word threskeia, which was used by Greek writers such as Herodotus and Josephus, is
found in the New Testament. Threskeia is sometimes translated as "religion" in today's
translations, but the term was understood as generic "worship" well into the medieval
period.[3] In the Quran, the Arabic word din is often translated as religion in modern
translations, but up to the mid-1600s translators expressed din as "law".[3]
The Sanskrit word dharma, sometimes translated as religion,[46] also means law.
Throughout classical South Asia, the study of law consisted of concepts such
as penance through piety and ceremonial as well as practical traditions. Medieval Japan
at first had a similar union between imperial law and universal or Buddha law, but these
later became independent sources of power.[47][48]
Though traditions, sacred texts, and practices have existed throughout time, most
cultures did not align with Western conceptions of religion since they did not separate
everyday life from the sacred. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the terms Buddhism,
Hinduism, Taoism, Confucianism, and world religions first entered the English language.
[49][50][51]
Native Americans were also thought of as not having religions and also had no
word for religion in their languages either.[50][52] No one self-identified as a Hindu or
Buddhist or other similar terms before the 1800s.[53] "Hindu" has historically been used
as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for people indigenous to
the Indian subcontinent.[54][55] Throughout its long history, Japan had no concept of
religion since there was no corresponding Japanese word, nor anything close to its
meaning, but when American warships appeared off the coast of Japan in 1853 and
forced the Japanese government to sign treaties demanding, among other things,
freedom of religion, the country had to contend with this idea.[56][57]
According to the philologist Max Müller in the 19th century, the root of the English word
religion, the Latin religiō, was originally used to mean only reverence for God or the
gods, careful pondering of divine things, piety (which Cicero further derived to mean
diligence).[58][59] Müller characterized many other cultures around the world, including
Egypt, Persia, and India, as having a similar power structure at this point in history.
What is called ancient religion today, they would have only called law.[60]
Definition
Main article: Definition of religion
Scholars have failed to agree on a definition of religion. There are, however, two
general definition systems: the sociological/functional and the
phenomenological/philosophical.[61][62][63][64]
Modern Western
The concept of religion originated in the modern era in the West.[33] Parallel concepts are
not found in many current and past cultures; there is no equivalent term for religion in
many languages.[3][23] Scholars have found it difficult to develop a consistent definition,
with some giving up on the possibility of a definition.[65][66] Others argue that regardless of
its definition, it is not appropriate to apply it to non-Western cultures. [32][33]
An increasing number of scholars have expressed reservations about ever defining the
essence of religion.[67] They observe that the way the concept today is used is a
particularly modern construct that would not have been understood through much of
history and in many cultures outside the West (or even in the West until after the Peace
of Westphalia).[68] The MacMillan Encyclopedia of Religions states:
The very attempt to define religion, to find some distinctive or possibly unique essence
or set of qualities that distinguish the religious from the remainder of human life, is
primarily a Western concern. The attempt is a natural consequence of the Western
speculative, intellectualistic, and scientific disposition. It is also the product of the
dominant Western religious mode, what is called the Judeo-Christian climate or, more
accurately, the theistic inheritance from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The theistic
form of belief in this tradition, even when downgraded culturally, is formative of
the dichotomous Western view of religion. That is, the basic structure of theism is
essentially a distinction between a transcendent deity and all else, between the creator
and his creation, between God and man.[69]
The anthropologist Clifford Geertz defined religion as a:
... system of symbols which acts to establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting
moods and motivations in men by formulating conceptions of a general order of
existence and clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that the moods
and motivations seem uniquely realistic.[70]
Alluding perhaps to Tylor's "deeper motive", Geertz remarked that:
... we have very little idea of how, in empirical terms, this particular miracle is
accomplished. We just know that it is done, annually, weekly, daily, for some people
almost hourly; and we have an enormous ethnographic literature to demonstrate it.[71]
The theologian Antoine Vergote took the term supernatural simply to mean whatever
transcends the powers of nature or human agency. He also emphasized the cultural
reality of religion, which he defined as:
... the entirety of the linguistic expressions, emotions and, actions and signs that refer to
a supernatural being or supernatural beings.[7]
Peter Mandaville and Paul James intended to get away from the modernist dualisms or
dichotomous understandings of immanence/transcendence, spirituality/materialism, and
sacredness/secularity. They define religion as:
... a relatively-bounded system of beliefs, symbols and practices that addresses the
nature of existence, and in which communion with others and Otherness is lived as if it
both takes in and spiritually transcends socially-grounded ontologies of time, space,
embodiment and knowing.[72]
According to the MacMillan Encyclopedia of Religions, there is an experiential aspect to
religion which can be found in almost every culture:
... almost every known culture [has] a depth dimension in cultural experiences ... toward
some sort of ultimacy and transcendence that will provide norms and power for the rest
of life. When more or less distinct patterns of behavior are built around this depth
dimension in a culture, this structure constitutes religion in its historically recognizable
form. Religion is the organization of life around the depth dimensions of experience—
varied in form, completeness, and clarity in accordance with the environing culture.[73]
Anthropologists Lyle Steadman and Craig T. Palmer emphasized the communication of
supernatural beliefs, defining religion as:
... the communicated acceptance by individuals of another individual’s “supernatural”
claim, a claim whose accuracy is not verifiable by the senses.[74]
Classical
Budazhap Shiretorov (Будажап Цыреторов), the head shaman of the religious
community Altan Serge (Алтан Сэргэ) in Buryatia
Friedrich Schleiermacher in the late 18th century defined religion as das
schlechthinnige Abhängigkeitsgefühl, commonly translated as "the feeling of absolute
dependence".[75]
His contemporary Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel disagreed thoroughly, defining religion
as "the Divine Spirit becoming conscious of Himself through the finite spirit." [76][better source needed]
Edward Burnett Tylor defined religion in 1871 as "the belief in spiritual beings".[77] He
argued that narrowing the definition to mean the belief in a supreme deity or judgment
after death or idolatry and so on, would exclude many peoples from the category of
religious, and thus "has the fault of identifying religion rather with particular
developments than with the deeper motive which underlies them". He also argued that
the belief in spiritual beings exists in all known societies.
In his book The Varieties of Religious Experience, the psychologist William
James defined religion as "the feelings, acts, and experiences of individual men in their
solitude, so far as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to whatever they may
consider the divine".[4] By the term divine James meant "any object that is godlike,
whether it be a concrete deity or not"[78] to which the individual feels impelled to respond
with solemnity and gravity.[79]
Sociologist Émile Durkheim, in his seminal book The Elementary Forms of the Religious
Life, defined religion as a "unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred
things".[5] By sacred things he meant things "set apart and forbidden—beliefs and
practices which unite into one single moral community called a Church, all those who
adhere to them". Sacred things are not, however, limited to gods or spirits.[note 1] On the
contrary, a sacred thing can be "a rock, a tree, a spring, a pebble, a piece of wood, a
house, in a word, anything can be sacred".[80] Religious beliefs, myths, dogmas and
legends are the representations that express the nature of these sacred things, and the
virtues and powers which are attributed to them.[81]
Echoes of James' and Durkheim's definitions are to be found in the writings of, for
example, Frederick Ferré who defined religion as "one's way of valuing most
comprehensively and intensively".[82] Similarly, for the theologian Paul Tillich, faith is "the
state of being ultimately concerned",[6] which "is itself religion. Religion is the substance,
the ground, and the depth of man's spiritual life."[83]
When religion is seen in terms of sacred, divine, intensive valuing, or ultimate concern,
then it is possible to understand why scientific findings and philosophical criticisms (e.g.,
those made by Richard Dawkins) do not necessarily disturb its adherents.[84]
Aspects
Beliefs
Main article: Religious beliefs
The origin of religious belief is an open question, with possible explanations including
awareness of individual death, a sense of community, and dreams.[8] Traditionally, faith,
in addition to reason, has been considered a source of religious beliefs. The interplay
between faith and reason, and their use as perceived support for religious beliefs, have
been a subject of interest to philosophers and theologians.[85]
Mythology
Main article: Mythology

A manuscript depicting the climactic Kurukshetra

War in Hindu epic Mahabharata. The Mahabharata is the longest epic poem known and
a key source of Hindu mythology.
The word myth has several meanings:

1. 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;
2. A person or thing having only an imaginary or unverifiable existence; or
3. A metaphor for the spiritual potentiality in the human being.[86]
Ancient polytheistic religions, such as those of Greece, Rome, and Scandinavia, are
usually categorized under the heading of mythology. Religions of pre-industrial peoples,
or cultures in development, are similarly called myths in the anthropology of religion.
The term myth can be used pejoratively by both religious and non-religious people. By
defining another person's religious stories and beliefs as mythology, one implies that
they are less real or true than one's own religious stories and beliefs. Joseph
Campbell remarked, "Mythology is often thought of as other people's religions, and
religion can be defined as misinterpreted mythology."[87]
In sociology, however, the term myth has a non-pejorative meaning. There, myth is
defined as a story that is important for the group, whether or not it is objectively or
provably true.[88] Examples include the resurrection of their real-life founder Jesus, which,
to Christians, explains the means by which they are freed from sin, is symbolic of the
power of life over death, and is also said to be a historical event. But from a
mythological outlook, whether or not the event actually occurred is unimportant. Instead,
the symbolism of the death of an old life and the start of a new life is most significant.
Religious believers may or may not accept such symbolic interpretations.
Practices
Main articles: Religious behaviour and Cult (religious practice)
The practices of a religion may include rituals, sermons, commemoration or veneration
of a deity (god or goddess), sacrifices, festivals, feasts, trances, initiations, funerary
services, matrimonial services, meditation, prayer, religious music, religious art, sacred
dance, public service, or other aspects of human culture.[89]
Social organisation
Religions have a societal basis, either as a living tradition which is carried by lay
participants, or with an organized clergy, and a definition of what constitutes adherence
or membership.
Academic study
Main articles: Religious studies and Classifications of religious movements
A number of disciplines study the phenomenon of religion: theology, comparative
religion, history of religion, evolutionary origin of religions, anthropology of
religion, psychology of religion (including neuroscience of religion and evolutionary
psychology of religion), law and religion, and sociology of religion.
Daniel L. Pals mentions eight classical theories of religion, focusing on various aspects
of religion: animism and magic, by E.B. Tylor and J.G. Frazer; the psycho-
analytic approach of Sigmund Freud; and further Émile Durkheim, Karl Marx, Max
Weber, Mircea Eliade, E.E. Evans-Pritchard, and Clifford Geertz.[90]
Michael Stausberg gives an overview of contemporary theories of religion,
including cognitive and biological approaches.[91]
Theories
Main article: Theories of religion
Sociological and anthropological theories of religion generally attempt to explain
the origin and function of religion.[92] These theories define what they present as
universal characteristics of religious belief and practice.
Origins and development
Main article: History of religion

The Yazılıkaya sanctuary in Turkey, with the twelve

gods of the underworld
The origin of religion is uncertain. There are a number of theories regarding the
subsequent origins of religious practices.
According to anthropologists John Monaghan and Peter Just, "Many of the great world
religions appear to have begun as revitalization movements of some sort, as the vision
of a charismatic prophet fires the imaginations of people seeking a more comprehensive
answer to their problems than they feel is provided by everyday beliefs. Charismatic
individuals have emerged at many times and places in the world. It seems that the key
to long-term success—and many movements come and go with little long-term effect—
has relatively little to do with the prophets, who appear with surprising regularity, but
more to do with the development of a group of supporters who are able to
institutionalize the movement."[93]
The development of religion has taken different forms in different cultures. Some
religions place an emphasis on belief, while others emphasize practice. Some religions
focus on the subjective experience of the religious individual, while others consider the
activities of the religious community to be most important. Some religions claim to be
universal, believing their laws and cosmology to be binding for everyone, while others
are intended to be practiced only by a closely defined or localized group. In many
places, religion has been associated with public institutions such
as education, hospitals, the family, government, and political hierarchies.[94]
Anthropologists John Monoghan and Peter Just state that, "it seems apparent that one
thing religion or belief helps us do is deal with problems of human life that are
significant, persistent, and intolerable. One important way in which religious beliefs
accomplish this is by providing a set of ideas about how and why the world is put
together that allows people to accommodate anxieties and deal with misfortune." [94]