Religions

186 entries. Click any to see everything it connects to.

The organised religious traditions of the world, from the largest to those that are historically significant but no longer practised. The non-theistic worldviews are held here too, since atheism, agnosticism, deism and secular humanism answer the same questions and are best read alongside the traditions rather than apart from them. Each entry records what the tradition holds, where and when it arose, and its principal texts, practices and divisions. The Atlas treats religions as subjects of description: the entries set out what adherents hold rather than adjudicating it.

Facts

Overview

Entries in the Atlas: 186
What Defines This Grouping: Whole religious traditions treated as single units, together with the non-theistic worldviews - atheism, agnosticism, deism, secular humanism - which the academic study of religion examines by the same methods and on the same terms. 1

Origins

Origin of the Name: From Latin religio, a scruple or a binding obligation. The ancient sense and the modern one - a bounded system with a name, a founder and a creed - are not the same, and the distance between them is itself a subject of study. 2

Status

Standing as a Comparative Category: Contested: the inventory of discrete, comparable world religions is a nineteenth-century European construction rather than a neutral list of what exists. The atlas uses these families for orientation, not as essences. 3

Sources

The Oxford Handbook of Atheism Stephen Bullivant and Michael Ruse (eds.), 2013
Encyclopedia of Religion Mircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.), 2005, s.v. Religion
The Invention of World Religions: Or, How European Universalism Was Preserved in the Language of Pluralism Tomoko Masuzawa, 2005, ch. 1

Learn More

The Organised Traditions of the World

This category holds the world's organised religious traditions, from the largest to those of historical importance that are no longer practised, together with the non-theistic worldviews (atheism, agnosticism, deism, secular humanism), since these answer the same fundamental questions in their own way and are studied alongside religions in the academic field.

A religion, as used here, is a whole tradition with its own account of the sacred, its scriptures or foundational teachings, its practices and community. The entries describe each in its own terms, note its size and distribution where relevant, and distinguish confessional self-description from the findings of the historical and social study of religion.

Families and Classification

Scholars classify religions in several overlapping ways, by descent (Abrahamic, Dharmic), by structure (monotheistic, polytheistic, non-theistic), by scope (universal, ethnic), and no single scheme is definitive. The atlas records the classifications that are useful for orientation while treating them as maps, not essences, and the religion entries group by such families so a browser can move from all traditions to one family.

Every religion contains internal diversity, and its branches, schools and movements are treated as denominations; the practices, festivals, scriptures and figures of a tradition are found under their own categories throughout the atlas.