Tuesday 2 October 2012

Religion

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This article is about a general set of beliefs about life, purpose, etc.. For other uses, see Religion (disambiguation).
"Religious" redirects here. For a member of a Catholic religious institute, see Religious (Catholicism).

Symbols representing some world religions, from left to right:
row 1: Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism
row 2: Islam, Buddhism, Shinto
row 3: Sikhism, Bahá'í Faith, Jainism
Religions by country
Religion Portal
Religion is a collection of belief systems, cultural systems, and worldviews that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values.[note 1] Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to explain the origin of life or the universe. They tend to derive morality, ethics, religious laws or a preferred lifestyle from their ideas about the cosmos and human nature. According to some estimates, there are roughly 4,200 religions in the world.[1]
Many religions may have organized behaviors, clergy, a definition of what constitutes adherence or membership, holy places, and scriptures. The practice of a religion may also include rituals, sermons, commemoration or veneration a god or gods, sacrifices, festivals, feasts, trance, initiations, funerary services, matrimonial services, meditation, prayer, music, art, dance, public service or other aspects of human culture. Religions may also contain mythology.[2]
The word religion is sometimes used interchangeably with faith or belief system; however, in the words of Émile Durkheim, religion differs from private belief in that it is "something eminently social".[3] A global 2012 poll reports that 59% of the world's population is religious, 23% are not religious, and 13% are atheists.[4]

Contents

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Etymology

Main article: Glossary_of_ancient_Roman_religion#religio
Religion (from O.Fr. religion "religious community," from L. religionem (nom. religio) "respect for what is sacred, reverence for the gods,"[5] "obligation, the bond between man and the gods"[6]) is derived from the Latin religiō, the ultimate origins of which are obscure. One possibility is derivation from a reduplicated *le-ligare, an interpretation traced to Cicero connecting lego "read", i.e. re (again) + lego in the sense of "choose", "go over again" or "consider carefully". Modern scholars such as Tom Harpur and Joseph Campbell favor the derivation from ligare "bind, connect", probably from a prefixed re-ligare, i.e. re (again) + ligare or "to reconnect," which was made prominent by St. Augustine, following the interpretation of Lactantius.[7][8] 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'".[9]
According to the philologist Max Müller, the root of the English word "religion", the Latin religio, 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").[10][11] Max 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".[12]
Many languages have words that can be translated as "religion", but they may use them in a very different way, and some have no word for religion at all. For example, the Sanskrit word dharma, sometimes translated as "religion", 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.[13][14]
There is no precise equivalent of "religion" in Hebrew, and Judaism does not distinguish clearly between religious, national, racial, or ethnic identities.[15] One of its central concepts is "halakha", sometimes translated as "law"", which guides religious practice and belief and many aspects of daily life.
The use of other terms, such as obedience to God or Islam are likewise grounded in particular histories and vocabularies.[16]

Definitions

There are numerous definitions of religion and only a few are stated here. The typical dictionary definition of religion refers to a "belief in, or the worship of, a god or gods"[17] or the "service and worship of God or the supernatural".[18] However, many writers and scholars[who?] have noted that this basic 'belief in god' definition fails to capture the diversity of religious thought and experience.[citation needed] Edward Burnett Tylor defined religion as simply "the belief in spiritual beings".[19] He argued, back in 1871, 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.
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.[20] 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".[21] The theologian Antoine Vergote 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"; he took the term "supernatural" simply to mean whatever transcends the powers of nature or human agency.[22]
The sociologist 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".[23] 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 2] 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".[24] 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.[25]
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".[26] By the term "divine" James meant "any object that is godlike, whether it be a concrete deity or not"[27] to which the individual feels impelled to respond with solemnity and gravity.[28]
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".[29] Similarly, for the theologian Paul Tillich, faith is "the state of being ultimately concerned",[30] which "is itself religion. Religion is the substance, the ground, and the depth of man's spiritual life."[31]
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. Richard Dawkins) do not necessarily disturb its adherents.[32]

Origins and development

Main article: Theories of religion

The Yazılıkaya sanctuary with the twelve gods of the underworld
There are a number of theories regarding the origins of religion. 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.[33]
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. 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."[34]
One modern academic theory of religion, social constructionism, says that religion is a modern concept that suggests all spiritual practice and worship follows a model similar to the Abrahamic religions as an orientation system that helps to interpret reality and define human beings,[35] and thus religion, as a concept, has been applied inappropriately to non-Western cultures that are not based upon such systems, or in which these systems are a substantially simpler construct.

Types of religion

Further information: History of religions

Major denominations and religions of the world

Categories

Some scholars classify religions as either universal religions that seek worldwide acceptance and actively look for new converts, or ethnic religions that are identified with a particular ethnic group and do not seek converts.[36] Others reject the distinction, pointing out that all religious practices, whatever their philosophical origin, are ethnic because they come from a particular culture.[37][38][39]
In the 19th and 20th centuries, the academic practice of comparative religion divided religious belief into philosophically defined categories called "world religions." However, some recent scholarship has argued that not all types of religion are necessarily separated by mutually exclusive philosophies, and furthermore that the utility of ascribing a practice to a certain philosophy, or even calling a given practice religious, rather than cultural, political, or social in nature, is limited.[40][41][42] The current state of psychological study about the nature of religiousness suggests that it is better to refer to religion as a largely invariant phenomenon that should be distinguished from cultural norms (i.e. "religions").[43]
Some academics studying the subject have divided religions into three broad categories:
  1. world religions, a term which refers to transcultural, international faiths;
  2. indigenous religions, which refers to smaller, culture-specific or nation-specific religious groups; and
  3. new religious movements, which refers to recently developed faiths.[44]

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 religious peacebuilding. The first major dialogue was the Parliament of the World's Religions at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, which remains notable even today both in affirming "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,[45] the "C1 World Dialogue",[46] the "Common Ground" initiative between Islam and Buddhism,[47] and a United Nations sponsored "World Interfaith Harmony Week".[48][49]

Religious movements

Main article: Major religious groups
The list of still-active religious movements given here is an attempt to summarize the most important regional and philosophical influences on local communities, but it is by no means a complete description of every religious community, nor does it explain the most important elements of individual religiousness.
The five largest religious groups by population, estimated to account for between 5 and 7 billion people, are Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism (with the relative numbers for Buddhism and Hinduism dependent on the extent of syncretism) and Chinese folk religion.
Five largest religionsAdherents in 2000[50]% of world population[50]Demographics
Christianity2.0 billion33%Christianity by country
Islam1.2 billion19.6%Islam by country
Hinduism811 million13.4%Hinduism by country
Chinese folk religion385 million6.4%Chinese folk religion
Buddhism360 million5.9%Buddhism by country

Abrahamic religions


The patriarch Abraham (by József Molnár)
Abrahamic religions are monotheistic religions which believe they descend from Abraham.
There are other smaller groups, such as Jehovah's Witnesses and the Latter Day Saint movement, whose inclusion in Christianity is sometimes disputed.

Muslims praying around Kaaba, the most sacred site in Islam

Indian religions


Hindu statue of Rama in Kalaram Temple (India)
Indian religions are practiced or were founded in the Indian subcontinent.

Iranian religions


Zoroastrian Fire Temple
Iranian religions are ancient religions whose roots predate the Islamization of Greater Iran. Nowadays these religions are practiced only by minorities.

Folk religions

Folk religion is a term applied loosely and vaguely to less-organized local practices. It is also called paganism, shamanism, animism, ancestor worship, matriarchal religion, or totemism, although not all of these elements are necessarily present in local belief systems. The category of "folk religion" can generally include anything that is not part of an organization. Modern neopagan movement draws on folk religion for inspiration to varying degrees.

Incense burner in China
  • Chinese folk religion, practiced by Chinese people around the world, is a primarily social practice including popular elements of Confucianism and Taoism, with some remnants of Mahayana Buddhism. Most Chinese do not identify as religious due to the strong Maoist influence on the country in recent history, but adherence to religious ceremonies remains common. New religious movements include Falun Gong and I-Kuan Tao.
  • Traditional Korean religion is a syncretic mixture of Mahayana Buddhism and Korean shamanism. Unlike Japanese Shinto, Korean shamanism was never codified and Buddhism was never made a social necessity. In some areas these traditions remain prevalent, but Korean-influenced Christianity is also influential in society and politics in South Korea.
  • Traditional Japanese religion is a mixture of Mahayana Buddhism and ancient indigenous practices which were codified as Shinto in the 19th century. Japanese people retain nominal attachment to both Buddhism and Shinto through social ceremonies, but irreligion is common.

New religions


A Modern-style Unitarian Universalist sanctuary
New religious movements, which may be novel in origin or part of a wider established religion, include:
  • Shinshūkyō 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.
  • The Bahá'í Faith is an Abrahamic religion founded in 19th century Iran and since then has spread worldwide. It teaches unity of all religious philosophies and accepts all of the prophets of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam as well as additional prophets including its founder Bahá'u'lláh.
  • Cao Đài is a syncretistic, monotheistic religion, established in Vietnam in 1926.
  • Hindu reform movements, such as Ayyavazhi, Swaminarayan Faith and Ananda Marga, are examples of new religious movements within Indian religions.
  • Unitarian Universalism is a religion characterized by support for a "free and responsible search for truth and meaning," and has no accepted creed or theology.
  • Scientology 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, in which practitioners aim to consciously re-experience painful or traumatic events in their past in order to free themselves of their limiting effects.
  • Eckankar is a religion with the purpose of making God an everyday reality in one's life.
  • Spiritualism is a religion in which the adherents communicate with the spirits of people who have died.
Sociological classifications of religious movements suggest that within any given religious group, a community can resemble various types of structures, including "churches", "denominations", "sects", "cults", and "institutions".

Issues in religion

Religion and health

Main article: Impacts of religion on health
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."[55]
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.[56]

Religion and violence

Main article: Religious violence
See also: Christianity and violence, Judaism and violence, and Islam and violence

The Crusades were a series of a military campaigns fought mainly between Christian Europe and Muslims. Shown here is a battle scene from the First Crusade. They were inspired at the jihad of the Islam civilization.
Charles Selengut characterizes the phrase "religion and violence" as "jarring", asserting that "religion is thought to be opposed to violence and a force for peace and reconciliation. He acknowledges, however, that "the history and scriptures of the world's religions tell stories of violence and war as they speak of peace and love."[57]
Hector Avalos argues that, because religions claim divine favor for themselves, over and against other groups, this sense of righteousness leads to violence because conflicting claims to superiority, based on unverifiable appeals to God, cannot be adjudicated objectively.[58]
Critics of religion Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins go further and argue that religions do tremendous harm to society by using violence to promote their goals, in ways that are endorsed and exploited by their leaders.[59][page needed][60][page needed]
Regina Schwartz argues that all monotheistic religions are inherently violent because of an exclusivism that inevitably fosters violence against those that are considered outsiders.[61] Lawrence Wechsler asserts that Schwartz isn't just arguing that Abrahamic religions have a violent legacy, but that the legacy is actually genocidal in nature.[62]
Byron Bland asserts that one of the most prominent reasons for the "rise of the secular in Western thought" was the reaction against the religious violence of the 16th and 17th centuries. He asserts that "(t)he secular was a way of living with the religious differences that had produced so much horror. Under secularity, political entities have a warrant to make decisions independent from the need to enforce particular versions of religious orthodoxy. Indeed, they may run counter to certain strongly held beliefs if made in the interest of common welfare. Thus, one of the important goals of the secular is to limit violence."[63]
Nonetheless, believers have used similar arguments when responding to atheists in these discussions, pointing to the widespread imprisonment and mass murder of individuals under atheist states in the twentieth century:[64][65][66]
And who can deny that Stalin and Mao, not to mention Pol Pot and a host of others, all committed atrocities in the name of a Communist ideology that was explicitly atheistic? Who can dispute that they did their bloody deeds by claiming to be establishing a 'new man' and a religion-free utopia? These were mass murders performed with atheism as a central part of their ideological inspiration, they were not mass murders done by people who simply happened to be atheist.
—Dinesh D'Souza[66]
In response to such a line of argument, however, author Sam Harris writes:
"The problem with fascism and communism, however, is not that they are too critical of religion; the problem is that they are too much like religions. Such regimes are dogmatic to the core and generally give rise to personality cults that are indistinguishable from cults of religious hero worship. Auschwitz, the gulag and the killing fields were not examples of what happens when human beings reject religious dogma; they are examples of political, racial and nationalistic dogma run amok. There is no society in human history that ever suffered because its people became too reasonable."[67]
Richard Dawkins has stated that Stalin's atrocities were influenced not by atheism but by dogmatic Marxism,[68] and concludes that while Stalin and Mao happened to be atheists, they did not do their deeds in the name of atheism.[69] On other occasions, Dawkins has replied to the argument that Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin were antireligious with the response that Hitler and Stalin also grew moustaches, in an effort to show the argument as fallacious.[70] Instead, Dawkins argues in The God Delusion that "What matters is not whether Hitler and Stalin were atheists, but whether atheism systematically influences people to do bad things. There is not the smallest evidence that it does."[71] D'Souza responds that an individual need not explicitly invoke atheism in committing atrocities if it is already implied in his worldview, as is the case in Marxism.[72]

Religion and the law

[icon]This section requires expansion with:
  • Examples
  • International POV
  • Coherent communication. (September 2012)
There are laws and statutes that make reference to religion.[note 4] This has led scholar Winnifred Sullivan to claims that religious freedom is impossible.[73] Others argue that the Western legal principle of separation of church and state tends to engender a new, more inclusive civil religion.[74]

Religion and science

Main articles: Relationship between religion and science and Epistemology
Religious knowledge, according to religious practitioners, may be gained from religious leaders, sacred texts, scriptures, or personal revelation. Some religions view such knowledge as unlimited in scope and suitable to answer any question; others see religious knowledge as playing a more restricted role, often as a complement to knowledge gained through physical observation. Adherents to various religious faiths often maintain that religious knowledge obtained via sacred texts or revelation is absolute and infallible and thereby creates an accompanying religious cosmology, although the proof for such is often tautological and generally limited to the religious texts and revelations that form the foundation of their belief.
In contrast, the scientific method gains knowledge by testing hypotheses to develop theories through elucidation of facts or evaluation by experiments and thus only answers cosmological questions about the universe that can be observed and measured. It develops theories of the world which best fit physically observed evidence. All scientific knowledge is subject to later refinement, or even outright rejection, in the face of additional evidence. Scientific theories that have an overwhelming preponderance of favorable evidence are often treated as de facto verities in general parlance, such as the theories of general relativity and natural selection to explain respectively the mechanisms of gravity and evolution.

Religion and social constructionists

In recent years, some academic writers have described religion according to the theory of social constructionism, which considers how ideas and social phenomena develop in a social context. Among the main proponents of this theory of religion are Timothy Fitzgerald, Daniel Dubuisson and Talal Asad. The social constructionists argue that religion is a modern concept that developed from Christianity and was then applied inappropriately to non-Western cultures.
Dubuisson, a French anthropologist, says that the idea of religion has changed a lot over time and that one cannot fully understand its development by relying on etymology, which "tends to minimize or cancel out the role of history".[75] "What the West and the history of religions in its wake have objectified under the name 'religion'", he says, " is ... something quite unique, which could be appropriate only to itself and its own history."[75] He notes that St. Augustine's definition of religio differed from the way we used the modern word "religion".[75] Dubuisson prefers the term "cosmographic formation" to religion. Dubuisson says that, with the emergence of religion as a category separate from culture and society, there arose religious studies. The initial purpose of religious studies was to demonstrate the superiority of the "living" or "universal" European world view to the "dead" or "ethnic" religions scattered throughout the rest of the world, expanding the teleological project of Schleiermacher and Tiele to a worldwide ideal religiousness.[76] Due to shifting theological currents, this was eventually supplanted by a liberal-ecumenical interest in searching for Western-style universal truths in every cultural tradition.[77] Clifford Geertz's definition of religion as a "cultural system" was proposed in the 20th century and continues to be widely accepted today.
According to Fitzgerald, the history of other cultures' interaction with the religious category is not about a universal constant,[clarification needed] but rather concerns a particular idea that first developed in Europe under the influence of Christianity.[78] Fitzgerald argues that from about the 4th century CE Western Europe and the rest of the world diverged. As Christianity became commonplace, the charismatic authority identified by Augustine, a quality we might today call "religiousness", exerted a commanding influence at the local level. This system persisted in the eastern Byzantine Empire following the East-West Schism, but Western Europe regulated unpredictable expressions of charisma through the Roman Catholic Church. As the Church lost its dominance during the Protestant Reformation and Christianity became closely tied to political structures, religion was recast as the basis of national sovereignty, and religious identity gradually became a less universal sense of spirituality and more divisive, locally defined, and tied to nationality.[79] It was at this point that "religion" was dissociated with universal beliefs and moved closer to dogma in both meaning and practice. However there was not yet the idea of dogma as personal choice, only of established churches. With the Enlightenment religion lost its attachment to nationality, says Fitzgerald, but rather than becoming a universal social attitude, it now became a personal feeling or emotion.[80] Friedrich Schleiermacher in the late 18th century defined religion as das schlechthinnige Abhängigkeitsgefühl, commonly translated as "a feeling of absolute dependence".[81] His contemporary Hegel disagreed thoroughly, defining religion as "the Divine Spirit becoming conscious of Himself through the finite spirit."[82]
Asad argues that before the word "religion" came into common usage, Christianity was a disciplina, a "rule" just like that of the Roman Empire. This idea can be found in the writings of St. Augustine (354–430). Christianity was then a power structure opposing and superseding human institutions, a literal Kingdom of Heaven. It was the discipline taught by one's family, school, church, and city authorities, rather than something calling one to self-discipline through symbols.[83]
These ideas are developed by S. N. Balagangadhara. In the Age of Enlightenment, Balagangadhara says that the idea of Christianity as the purest expression of spirituality was supplanted by the concept of "religion" as a worldwide practice.[84] This caused such ideas as religious freedom, a reexamination of classical philosophy as an alternative to Christian thought, and more radically Deism among intellectuals such as Voltaire. Much like Christianity, the idea of "religious freedom" was exported around the world as a civilizing technique, even to regions such as India that had never treated spirituality as a matter of political identity.[40] In Japan, where Buddhism was still seen as a philosophy of natural law,[85] the concept of "religion" and "religious freedom" as separate from other power structures was unnecessary until Christian missionaries demanded free access to conversion, and when Japanese Christians refused to engage in patriotic events.[86]

Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism are one, a painting in the litang style portraying three men laughing by a river stream, 12th century, Song Dynasty

Other writers

Similar views have been put forward by writers who are not social constructionists. George Lindbeck, a Lutheran and a postliberal theologian, says that religion does not refer to belief in "God" or a transcendent Absolute, but rather to "a kind of cultural and/or linguistic framework or medium that shapes the entirety of life and thought ... it is similar to an idiom that makes possible the description of realities, the formulation of beliefs, and the experiencing of inner attitudes, feelings, and sentiments.”[87] Nicholas de Lange, Professor of Hebrew and Jewish Studies at Cambridge University, says that "The comparative study of religions is an academic discipline which has been developed within Christian theology faculties, and it has a tendency to force widely differing phenomena into a kind of strait-jacket cut to a Christian pattern. The problem is not only that other 'religions' may have little or nothing to say about questions which are of burning importance for Christianity, but that they may not even see themselves as religions in precisely the same way in which Christianity sees itself as a religion."[88]

Related forms of thought

Religion and superstition

Further information: Superstition, Magical thinking, and Magic and religion
Superstition has been described as "the incorrect establishment of cause and effect" or a false conception of causation.[89] Religion is more complex and includes social institutions and morality. But religions may include superstitions or make use of magical thinking. Adherents of one religion sometimes think of other religions as superstition.[90][91] Some atheists, deists, and skeptics regard religious belief as superstition.
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.[92] Early Christianity was outlawed as a superstitio Iudaica, a "Jewish superstition", by Domitian in the 80s AD. In AD 425, when Rome had become Christian, Theodosius II outlawed pagan traditions as superstitious.
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)

Myth

Main article: 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.[93]

Urarina shaman, 1988
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 mis-interpreted mythology."[94]
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. Examples include the death and resurrection of Jesus, which, to Christians, explains the means by which they are freed from sin and is also ostensibly 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 what is most significant. Religious believers may or may not accept such symbolic interpretations.

Secularism and irreligion

Main articles: Secularism and Irreligion
See also: Criticism of religion, Atheism, Agnosticism, and Antireligion
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 and Taoism), in fact, that classify some of their followers as agnostic, atheistic, or 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.
As religion became a more personal matter in Western culture, discussions of society became more focused on political and scientific meaning, and religious attitudes (dominantly Christian) were increasingly seen as irrelevant for the needs of the European world. On the political side, Ludwig Feuerbach recast Christian beliefs in light of humanism, paving the way for Karl Marx's famous characterization of religion as "the opium of the people". Meanwhile, in the scientific community, T.H. Huxley in 1869 coined the term "agnostic," a term—subsequently adopted by such figures as Robert Ingersoll—that, while directly conflicting with and novel to Christian tradition, is accepted and even embraced in some other religions. Later, Bertrand Russell told the world Why I Am Not a Christian, which influenced several later authors to discuss their breakaway from their own religious uprbringings from Islam to Hinduism.

Criticism

Main article: Criticism of religion
Religious criticism has a long history, going back at least as far as the 5th century BCE in ancient Greece with Diagoras "the atheist" of Melos, and 1st century BCE in Rome with Titus Lucretius Carus's De Rerum Natura, and continuing to the present day with the advent of New Atheism, represented by such authors as Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, Richard Dawkins, Victor J. Stenger, and Christopher Hitchens.
Critics consider religion to be outdated, harmful to the individual (e.g. brainwashing of children, faith healing, circumcision), harmful to society (e.g. holy wars, terrorism, wasteful distribution of resources), to impede the progress of science, and to encourage immoral acts (e.g. blood sacrifice, discrimination against homosexuals and women). A major criticism of many religions is that they require beliefs that are irrational, unscientific, or unreasonable, because religious beliefs and traditions lack scientific or rational foundations.
Some modern-day critics, such as Bryan Caplan, hold that religion lacks utility in human society; they may regard religion as irrational.[95] Nobel Peace Laureate Shirin Ebadi has spoken out against undemocratic Islamic countries justifying "oppressive acts" in the name of Islam.[96]

See also

Portal iconReligion portal
Portal iconSpirituality portal
Main articles: Outline of religion and Index of religion-related articles

References

  1. ^ The Everything World's Religions Book: Explore the Beliefs, Traditions and Cultures of Ancient and Modern Religions, page 1 Kenneth Shouler - 2010
  2. ^ Oxford Dictionaries mythology, retrieved 9 September 2012
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  4. ^ "Global Index of Religiosity and Atheism". WIN-Gallup International. 27 July 2012. http://www.wingia.com/web/files/richeditor/filemanager/Global_INDEX_of_Religiosity_and_Atheism_PR__6.pdf. Retrieved 24 August 2012.
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  14. ^ Neil McMullin. Buddhism and the State in Sixteenth-Century Japan. Princeton, N.J. : Princeton University Press, 1984.
  15. ^ Hershel Edelheit, Abraham J. Edelheit, History of Zionism: A Handbook and Dictionary, p.3, citing Solomon Zeitlin, The Jews. Race, Nation, or Religion? ( Philadelphia: Dropsie College Press, 1936).
  16. ^ Colin Turner. Islam without Allah? New York: Routledge, 2000. pp. 11-12.
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  18. ^ Religion. Merriam-Webster Dictionary.
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  20. ^ Geertz, C. (1993) Religion as a cultural system. In: The interpretation of cultures: selected essays, Geertz, Clifford, pp.87-125. Fontana Press.
  21. ^ (ibid, p. 90)
  22. ^ Vergote, A. (1996) Religion, belief and unbelief. A Psychological Study, Leuven University Press. (p. 16)
  23. ^ Durkheim, E. (1915) The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  24. ^ (ibid, p. 37)
  25. ^ (ibid, pp. 40–41)
  26. ^ James, W. (1902) The Varieties of Religious Experience. A Study in Human Nature. Longmans, Green, and Co. (p. 31)
  27. ^ (ibid, p. 34)
  28. ^ (ibid, p. 38)
  29. ^ Frederick Ferré, F. (1967) Basic modern philosophy of religion. Scribner, (p.82).
  30. ^ Tillich, P. (1957) Dynamics of faith. Harper Perennial; (p.1).
  31. ^ Tillich, P. (1959) Theology of Culture. Oxford University Press; (p.8).
  32. ^ Pecorino, P.A. (2001) Philosophy of Religion. Online Textbook. Philip A. Pecorino.
  33. ^ Monaghan, John; Just, Peter (2000). Social & Cultural Anthropology. New York: Oxford University Press. p. 126. ISBN 978-0-19-285346-2.
  34. ^ Monaghan, John; Just, Peter (2000). Social & Cultural Anthropology. New York: Oxford University Press. p. 124. ISBN 978-0-19-285346-2.
  35. ^ Vergote, Antoine, Religion, belief and unbelief: a psychological study, Leuven University Press, 1997, p. 89
  36. ^ Hinnells, John R. (2005). The Routledge companion to the study of religion. Routledge. pp. 439–440. ISBN 0-415-33311-3. http://books.google.com/?id=IGspjXKxIf8C. Retrieved 2009-09-17.
  37. ^ Timothy Fitzgerald. The Ideology of Religious Studies. New York: Oxford University Press USA, 2000.
  38. ^ Craig R. Prentiss. Religion and the Creation of Race and Ethnicity. New York: NYU Press, 2003. ISBN 0-8147-6701-X
  39. ^ Tomoko Masuzawa. The Invention of World Religions, or, How European Universalism Was Preserved in the Language of Pluralism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005. ISBN 0-226-50988-5
  40. ^ a b Brian Kemble Pennington Was Hinduism Invented? New York: Oxford University Press US, 2005. ISBN 0-19-516655-8
  41. ^ Russell T. McCutcheon. Critics Not Caretakers: Redescribing the Public Study of Religion. Albany: SUNY Press, 2001.
  42. ^ Nicholas Lash. The beginning and the end of 'religion'. Cambridge University Press, 1996. ISBN 0-521-56635-5
  43. ^ Joseph Bulbulia. "Are There Any Religions? An Evolutionary Explanation." Method & Theory in the Study of Religion 17.2 (2005), pp.71-100
  44. ^ Harvey, Graham (2000). Indigenous Religions: A Companion. (Ed: Graham Harvey). London and New York: Cassell. Page 06.
  45. ^ A Common Word
  46. ^ C1 World Dialogue
  47. ^ Islam and Buddhism Common Ground
  48. ^ World Interfaith Harmony Week
  49. ^ UN resolution
  50. ^ a b Darrell J. Turner. "Religion: Year In Review 2000". Encyclopedia Britannica. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/715463/Religion-Year-In-Review-2000. Retrieved 16 June 2012.
  51. ^ http://www.cbs.gov.il/shnaton61/st02_27.pdf
  52. ^ P. 484 Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of World Religions By Wendy Doniger, M. Webster, Merriam-Webster, Inc
  53. ^ P. 219 Faith, Religion & Theology By Brennan Hill, Paul F. Knitter, William Madges
  54. ^ P. 6 The World's Great Religions By Yoshiaki Gurney Omura, Selwyn Gurney Champion, Dorothy Short
  55. ^ Paul S. Mueller, MD; David J. Plevak, MD; Teresa A. Rummans, MD. "Religious Involvement, Spirituality, and Medicine: Implications for Clinical Practice". http://download.journals.elsevierhealth.com/pdfs/journals/0025-6196/PIIS0025619611627997.pdf. Retrieved 13 November 2010. "We reviewed published studies, meta-analyses, systematic reviews, and subject reviews that examined the association between religious involvement and spirituality and physical health, mental health, health-related quality of life, and other health outcomes. We also reviewed articles that provided suggestions on how clinicians might assess and support the spiritual needs of patients. 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"
  56. ^ Maselko, J. and Kubzansky, L. D. (2006) Gender differences in religious practices, spiritual experiences and health: Results from the US General Social Survey. Social Science & Medicine, Vol 62(11), June, 2848-2860.
  57. ^ Selengut, Charles (2008-04-28). Sacred fury: understanding religious violence. p. 1. ISBN 978-0-7425-6084-0. http://books.google.com/?id=mOqtEkGlq0cC&pg=PR7&dq=%22sectarian+violence%22+%22religious+violence%22#v=onepage&q=%22sectarian%20violence%22%20%22religious%20violence%22&f=false.
  58. ^ Avalos, Hector (2005). Fighting Words: The Origins of Religious Violence. Amherst, New York: Prometheus Books.
  59. ^ Hitchens, Christopher (2007). God is not Great. Twelve.
  60. ^ Dawkins, Richard (2006). The God Delusion. Bantam Books.
  61. ^ The Curse of Cain: The Violent Legacy of Monotheism By Regina M. Schwartz. University of Chicago Press. 1998.
  62. ^ Wechsler, Lawrence. "Mayhem and Monotheism". http://faculty.plts.edu/gpence/2490/PDF/mayhem.pdf.
  63. ^ Bland, Byron (May 2003). "Evil Enemies: The Convergence of Religion and Politics". p. 4. http://www.law.stanford.edu/program/centers/scicn/papers/religion_and_political_violence.pdf.
  64. ^ John S. Feinberg, Paul D. Feinberg. Ethics for a Brave New World. Crossway Books. http://books.google.com/books?id=Nl-f5SKq9mgC&pg=PA697&dq=Aleksandr+Solzhenitsyn+But+if+I+were+asked+today+to+formulate+as+concisely+as+possible+the+main+cause+of+the+ruinous+revolution+that+swallowed+up+some+60+million+of+our+people,+I+could+not+put+it+more+accurately+than+to+repeat:+'Men+have+forgotten+God;+that's+why#v=onepage&q&f=false. Retrieved 2007–10–18. "Over a half century ago, while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of old people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: 'Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has happened.' Since then I have spend well-nigh 50 years working on the history of our revolution; in the process I have read hundreds of books, collected hundreds of personal testimonies, and have already contributed eight volumes of my own toward the effort of clearing away the rubble left by that upheaval. But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swallowed up some 60 million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: 'Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has happened.'"
  65. ^ Gregory Koukl. "The Real Murderers: Atheism or Christianity?". Stand To Reason. http://www.str.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=5527. Retrieved 2007–10–18.
  66. ^ a b Dinesh D'Souza. "Answering Atheist’s Arguments". Catholic Education Resource Center. http://catholiceducation.org/articles/apologetics/ap0214.htm. Retrieved 2007–10–18.
  67. ^ 10 myths and 10 truths about Atheism Sam Harris
  68. ^ Dawkins, Richard (2006-09-18). The God Delusion. Ch. 7: Houghton Mifflin. ISBN 978-0-618-68000-9. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_God_Delusion.
  69. ^ Interview with Richard Dawkins conducted by Stephen Sackur for BBC News 24’s HardTalk programme, July 24th 2007. [1]
  70. ^ The Video: Bill O'Reilly Interviews Richard Dawkins
  71. ^ Dawkins 2006, p. 309
  72. ^ Answering Atheist’s Arguments Dinesh D'Souza
  73. ^ Winnifred Fallers Sullivan, The Impossibility of Religious Freedom. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005.
  74. ^ Ronald C. Wimberley and James A. Christenson. "Civil Religion and Church and State". The Sociological Quarterly, Vol. 21, No. 1 (Winter, 1980), pp. 35-40
  75. ^ a b c Daniel Dubuisson, The Western Construction of Religion
  76. ^ Daniel Dubuisson. "Exporting the Local: Recent Perspectives on 'Religion' as a Cultural Category", Religion Compass, 1.6 (2007), p.792.
  77. ^ Tomoko Masuzawa, The Invention of World Religions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007.
  78. ^ Fitzgerald, Timothy (2007). Discourse on Civility and Barbarity. Oxford University Press. pp. 45–46.
  79. ^ Fitzgerald 2007, p. 194
  80. ^ Fitzgerald 2007, p. 268
  81. ^ Hueston A. Finlay. "‘Feeling of absolute dependence’ or ‘absolute feeling of dependence’? A question revisited". Religious Studies 41.1 (2005), pp.81-94.
  82. ^ Max Müller. "Lectures on the origin and growth of religion."
  83. ^ Talal Asad, Genealogies of Religion. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 1993 p.34-35.
  84. ^ S. N. Balagangadhara. The Heathen in His Blindness... New York: Brill Academic Publishers, 1994. p.159.
  85. ^ Jason Ānanda Josephson. "When Buddhism Became a 'Religion'". Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 33.1: 143–168.
  86. ^ Isomae Jun’ichi. "Deconstructing 'Japanese Religion'". Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 32.2: 235–248.
  87. ^ George A. Lindbeck, Nature of Doctrine (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1984), 33.
  88. ^ Nicholas de Lange, Judaism, Oxford University Press, 1986
  89. ^ Kevin R. Foster and Hanna Kokko, "The evolution of superstitious and superstition-like behaviour", Proc. R. Soc. B (2009) 276, 31–37[dead link]
  90. ^ Boyer (2001). "Why Belief". Religion Explained. http://books.google.com/books?id=wreF80OHTicC&pg=PA297&lpg=PA297&dq=%22fang+too+were+quite+amazed%22.
  91. ^ Fitzgerald 2007, p. 232
  92. ^ Veyne 1987, p 211[clarification needed]
  93. ^ Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth, p. 22 ISBN 0-385-24774-5
  94. ^ Joseph Campbell, Thou Art That: Transforming Religious Metaphor. Ed. Eugene Kennedy. New World Library ISBN 1-57731-202-3.
  95. ^ Bryan Caplan. "Why Religious Beliefs Are Irrational, and Why Economists Should Care". http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/bcaplan/ldebate.htm. The article about religion and irrationality.
  96. ^ Earth Dialogues 2006 Conference, Brisbane. "In these countries, Islamic rulers want to solve 21st century issues with laws belonging to 14 centuries ago. Their views of human rights are exactly the same as it was 1400 years ago."

Notes

  1. ^ 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" (Clifford Geertz, Religion as a Cultural System, 1973). A critique of Geertz's model by Talal Asad categorized religion as "an anthropological category." (Talal Asad, The Construction of Religion as an Anthropological Category, 1982.)
  2. ^ That is how, according to Durkheim, Buddhism is a religion. "In default of gods, Buddhism admits the existence of sacred things, namely, the four noble truths and the practices derived from them" (ibid, p. 45).
  3. ^ Hinduism is variously defined as a "religion", "set of religious beliefs and practices", "religious tradition" etc. For a discussion on the topic, see: "Establishing the boundaries" in Gavin Flood (2003), pp. 1-17. René Guénon in his Introduction to the Study of the Hindu Doctrines (1921 ed.), Sophia Perennis, ISBN 0-900588-74-8, proposes a definition of the term "religion" and a discussion of its relevance (or lack of) to Hindu doctrines (part II, chapter 4, p. 58).
  4. ^ An example is the Establishment Clause in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. However the US Supreme Court has intentionally not pinned down a precise legal definition to allow for flexibility in preserving rights for what might be regarded as a religion over time. [2]

Bibliography

  • Saint Augustine; The Confessions of Saint Augustine (John K. Ryan translator); Image (1960), ISBN 0-385-02955-1.
  • Descartes, René; Meditations on First Philosophy; Bobbs-Merril (1960), ISBN 0-672-60191-5.
  • Barzilai, Gad; Law and Religion; The International Library of Essays in Law and Society; Ashgate (2007),ISBN 978-0-7546-2494-3
  • Durant, Will (& Ariel (uncredited)); Our Oriental Heritage; MJF Books (1997), ISBN 1-56731-012-5.
  • Durant, Will (& Ariel (uncredited)); Caesar and Christ; MJF Books (1994), ISBN 1-56731-014-1
  • Durant, Will (& Ariel (uncredited)); The Age of Faith; Simon & Schuster (1980), ISBN 0-671-01200-2.
  • Marija Gimbutas 1989. The Language of the Goddess. Thames and Hudson New York
  • Gonick, Larry; The Cartoon History of the Universe; Doubleday, vol. 1 (1978) ISBN 0-385-26520-4, vol. II (1994) ISBN#0-385-42093-5, W. W. Norton, vol. III (2002) ISBN 0-393-05184-6.
  • Haisch, Bernard The God Theory: Universes, Zero-point Fields, and What's Behind It All -- discussion of science vs. religion (Preface[dead link]), Red Wheel/Weiser, 2006, ISBN 1-57863-374-5
  • Lao Tzu; Tao Te Ching (Victor H. Mair translator); Bantam (1998).
  • Marx, Karl; "Introduction to A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right", Deutsch-Französische Jahrbücher, (1844).
  • Saler, Benson; "Conceptualizing Religion: Immanent Anthropologists, Transcendent Natives, and Unbounded Categories" (1990), ISBN 1-57181-219-9
  • The Holy Bible, King James Version; New American Library (1974).
  • The Koran; Penguin (2000), ISBN 0-14-044558-7.
  • The Origin of Live & Death, African Creation Myths; Heinemann (1966).
  • Poems of Heaven and Hell from Ancient Mesopotamia; Penguin (1971).
  • The World Almanac (annual), World Almanac Books, ISBN 0-88687-964-7.
  • The Serotonin System and Spiritual Experiences - American Journal of Psychiatry 160:1965-1969, November 2003.
  • United States Constitution
  • Selected Work Marcus Tullius Cicero
  • The World Almanac (for numbers of adherents of various religions), 2005
  • Religion [First Edition]. Winston King. Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Lindsay Jones. Vol. 11. 2nd ed. Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005. p7692-7701.
  • World Religions and Social Evolution of the Old World Oikumene Civilizations: A Cross-cultural Perspective by Andrey Korotayev, Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2004, ISBN 0-7734-6310-0.
  • Brodd, Jefferey (2003). World Religions. Winona, MN: Saint Mary's Press. ISBN 978-0-88489-725-5.
On religion definition:
Studies of religion in particular geographical areas:
  • A. Khanbaghi. The Fire, the Star and the Cross: Minority Religions in Medieval and Early Modern Iran (IB Tauris; 2006) 268 pages. Social, political and cultural history of religious minorities in Iran, c. 226-1722 AD.

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