Pictured: Durkheim’s Collective Effervescence
Key Terms for this Section
Ritual · Proselytize · Mythos · Fides Proto-Indo-European
Religio · Threskia · No True Scotsman Fallacy
2.1 | Ritual Before Religion
Ritual & the Power of Setting Apart
A ritual (from the Latin ritus, meaning “custom”) is a formal series of actions guided by a group’s traditions. Such rituals can include words, gestures, or symbolic items that connect participants to a totem or taboo of their culture. The American Pledge of Allegiance is a clear example of ritual. The pledge is a sequence of actions and words focused on the US flag. The flag is a totem of American identity insofar as it represents our peoplehood and our loyalty to our nation.
While rituals often appear in religious contexts, they can also be entirely social or cultural in nature — think of the carving of the turkey on Thanksgiving Day, a ritual imbued with meaning for those who gather to watch it performed. In this way, rituals hold communities together through shared memories, symbols, and expectations. Religious adherents see rituals like baptism or daily prayer as ways of connecting with the sacred. Others not in religious communities often view communal feasts or national pledges in a similar vein. In each case, the community sets these activities apart from daily routines and says, “This deserves special recognition.” Through these practices, we find a sense of belonging, continuity, and collective identity.
So far, we have learned that communities pass knowledge down through generations while assigning symbolic significance to special objects and behaviors. As we learned in Section 1, scholars refer to helpful, honored items or symbols as totems, while actions or objects that carry a negative or forbidden quality are called taboo. Totems and taboos exist in many contexts. They do not always belong to what people traditionally think of as a “religion.”
Optional Video: Religious Scholar explains what ritual means (auto-generated CC).
Go, Team, Go!
Consider the example of American football.
Friends and family often develop special activities around the football season, the pre-season, the playoffs, the bowl games. There are special colors for your team (my alma mater is garnet and gold). There’s a special place where it happens (the stadium). There’s a special meal (the tailgate). There are special songs for football teams (and in baseball — the seventh inning has its own song). There are special movements for the crowd (the wave) and special dances performed by cheerleaders. There is a special group of interpreters (the referees) who wear special garments (uniforms) and read a special text (the rulebook), and they alone have the special authority to interpret the sacred text and the actions in the stadium — despite what your uncle yells from his armchair.
Even the athletes often have special rituals of their own in the locker room or on the field to ensure victory (rabbit’s foot, lucky socks, don’t step on the line, etc.).
If you stop and compare these customs to what ancient communities did with their honored objects or communal identities, the similarities are intriguing. When we stand for the national anthem in a stadium, we are acting out a powerful communal ritual with profound cultural importance. People do not randomly decide to hold a football tailgating party in the middle of an ordinary day. They do not wear a referee’s uniform at the grocery store and blow a whistle at the cashier. Instead, these actions happen in the correct setting, following the proper steps, which generates a powerful sense of shared identity for our community. It is helpful to remember these parallels when we think about earlier societies.
In short, our societies are still held together by sacred rituals — as they were long ago, before the advent of religion.
The scholar who saw this most clearly was the French sociologist Émile Durkheim (d. 1917), one of the founders of the academic study of religion. Durkheim argued that ritual is, at bottom, how a community celebrates itself: when people gather around their totems — a flag, a team, an ancestral symbol — and move, sing, and act as one, they generate a heightened shared feeling (he called this feeling collective effervescence) that binds the group together more powerfully than any argument could. The stadium wave, the anthem before kickoff, the roar of thousands of voices in unison — for Durkheim, these are not distractions from the serious business of social life. They are the serious business of social life: the community assembling itself, in real time, around the things it holds sacred.
Optional Video: Religious Scholar explains why baseball players are superstitious (auto-generated CC).
No Early Concept of Religion
Before Ancient Rome, societies like the ancient Greeks had no concept of “religion” as we understand it. Religion is a Latinate concept (cf. 2.3), and Latin language and culture come after the Greeks. Yet the Greeks had items and behaviors that many today would label “religious.” The ancient Greeks wore special colors into battle, set aside special foods for ceremonies, and reserved special arenas for ritualistic contests like the Olympics (named for Mount Olympus, the sacred home of the gods). There were sacred foods, sacred songs, and sacred dances uniting the Greeks, just as American football unites us today.
And yes, there were sacred people who read sacred texts with sacred authority. But, just like American football, ancient Greek culture had no “religion” as we use the term. For the Greeks, honoring a community tradition (like the Fourth of July), singing a particular song (like America the Beautiful), or pouring out a libation to a god (like when we raise a toast to our favorite team) was simply what one was expected to do in Greece. These practices were simply woven into the fabric of everyday Greek living.
The same held true elsewhere. As we will see later in this section, the ancient Jews of the Hebrew Bible had a word for the holy and set-apart (kadosh) and a word for law (daht), but no distinct concept of “religion.” Instead, the Hebrew daht described how a Jew was supposed to behave, not what a Jew believes. Notice, too, that Jewish priests never set out to convert non-Jews to Jewish “religion.” There are no stories like this in the Hebrew Bible. Even today, Jews do not proselytize (ie. actively seek converts), because Jewish identity comes from having a Jewish parent, not because one holds Jewish beliefs.
Ancient India tells the same story: the closest word to “religion” in the Vedas (the world’s oldest scripture still in continuous use, cf. Sec. 4) is dharma, which also translates as “law” or “duty.” From India to Israel, these ancient cultures had guidelines, rituals, and stories that shaped their lives, but did not share in our modern conception of religion. The ancient priesthood was an arbiter of special laws that held their communities together. What we think of today as personal religious belief would come much later.
Key Terms for this Lesson: Ritual · Proselytize
2.2 | Gods, Cities, & the Other
A Shared Mythos
Today, the word myth has a bad connotation. When websites declare “five myths about your diet,” we understand these myths to be falsehoods. But before the 20th century, the myth didn’t have this negative meaning. Historically, a was a community’s meaning-bearing narrative — a story a group tells and retells to explain who it is, where it came from, and how the world holds together. A collection of these sacred narratives is referred to as a mythos.
In Sec. 1.3, we introduced the idea of prehistoric society. These were our forebearers, who survived before the invention of writing.
Archaeologists have traced the evidence of split in prehistoric society that happened about 3,600 years ago. Around 1600 BCE, a prehistoric, proto-Indo-European population began to split off, with some groups going east toward India and Iran, some heading west into Northern Europe, and others going south into the Hittite (today: Türkiye) and Mycenaean Greek regions along the Mediterranean Sea. Amazingly, although these groups became geographically dispersed, they continued to share linguistic echoes of their prehistoric origins, including a deeply shared prehistoric mythos.
We can trace back common concepts of the proto-Indo-Europeans through shared words like “father,” which became pater in ancient Rome, athair among the Celts, is pitr in India, and padar in Persia. Other shared concepts are numbers like “two” (duo in Greek, da in Gaelic, dva in Sanskrit, and do in Persian), and heavenly objects like the “moon” (mes, mis, mas, mah).
As there were many shared linguistic concepts between India, Scotland, and Greece, there was also a shared mythos.
The proto-Indo-Europeans carried a rich mythological framework wherever they settled — east, west, and south of their origin. Chief among their gods was the “Sky-Father,” called Dyeus. To the south, in ancient Greece, the Sky-Father Dyeus became Zdeús. In Greek, Zdeús is the root of Theos (the Greek name for God in the New Testament) and Zeus (which actually has two syllables in Greek: ZAY-oos). Further west in Spain, we recognize Zdeús in the Spanish Dios. In Rome, Zdeús the Father (Zdeús-Pater) became Jupiter. Back east, in India, Zdeús the Father remained Dyaus-Pitr in the Hindu Rig Veda (though Brahman, a more abstract concept, predominates in later Hindu thought).
Optional Video: Religious Scholar explains the Indo-European Skyfather (auto-generated CC).
Faithfulness to Rome
This is how the Greeks (and later Romans) end up with Zeus (ZAY-oos).
Beneath Zeus, Greek culture and mythos gravitated toward lower gods who served as totems for specific city-states. The city of Athens, for example, was linked to Athena, and Corinth to Poseidon. The people of Athens might hold festivals to honor Athena and wear her symbols in battle, just as sports teams today rally around their mascots. However, no Athenian traveled to Corinth to “convert” the Corinthians to worship Athena. Additionally, some Greek cities developed oracles and a priesthood to interpret signs and prophecies, but they were nothing like today’s pastors and missionaries. When Athenians traveled to Corinth, they took part in the local customs of that region. The Greeks had no concept that one must remain “faithful” to Athena at all times. When an Athenian traveled to Corinth, he poured a libation for Poseidon — their patron god — not Athena. They would even do so in neighboring empires like Egypt, always honoring the local gods.
When in Rome, you do as the Romans do.
Also, the Greeks did have stories and rituals pertaining to gods. But talk of gods and sacred heroes does not alone constitute a religion. Today, we have texts in bookstores depicting the Elder Gods of Lovecraftian horror, of Thor fighting alongside the Avengers, and the Jedi using the Force. But clearly, we don’t typically think of these things as religions. Similarly, when the ancient Greeks told stories of the gods, it was for the moral rectitude of their city-state, not an inerrant, zero-sum truth to be shared with the rest of the world for the sake of their salvation. Egypt, India, and Asia Minor had their own stories of gods — and the Greeks saw no contradiction in that.
Simply put, the pre-Christian Greeks had no special institutions that were set aside from daily life to promote ‘religious’ objectives. There was no “church” as opposed to the “state” in ancient Greece. Greek people didn’t “go to church” on Sunday or any other day. They had no Bible of Greek Culture, and when they travelled they honored the local gods of where they visited.
But when the Romans started taking over in the first century BCE, they understood things differently.
Central to Roman cultural life was the mos maiorum — the “way of the ancestors.” This term was not written in scripture. Instead, it refers to the values and traditions that each Roman generation inherited from those who came before. With the rise of the Roman Empire, it became crucial to remain faithful to these ancestral norms, and to Rome itself — a commitment Romans referred to as fides (Latin for “faithfulness”). We see echoes of this today in the U.S. Marine Corps motto, “Semper Fidelis,” meaning “Always Faithful.” That is, an American Marine is always faithful to the Constitution and the American people.
Showing fides in ancient Rome meant honoring your father’s name, upholding the status of the family, and maintaining practices that bound the honor of the household to its sacred lineage. This is sense of faithfulness was centered on loyalty. It had nothing to do with private “religious belief” as we think of it today.
The Other as Enemy
As ancient societies grew and divided, their stories would often evolve to show the division.
Early on, the Indo-Iranians were one society. Their shared mythos contained the twin concepts of deva and asura. The word deva, in fact, draws on the proto-Indo-European name for the Sky-Father (Dyeus). The word asura means “prince” or “lord.” As the sacred stories of the asuras spread across Europe, they became the aesir you’ve seen in Marvel movies — Nordic gods like Odin, Thor, and Loki. Well, back at the origin, among the Indo-Iranians themselves, the story evolved differently.
As “India” and “Persia/Iran” became distinct societies, their devas and asuras also evolved with the division.
In eastern India, the asura became agents of evil, while the enlightened devas played a positive role. In contrast, in Persia (today: Iran) the ahura (Persian form of asura) were the enlightened beings and the deva were the evildoers! In fact, in neighboring Greece, we get the word demon from the Persian deva.
In this way, rival ancient communities would reverse sacred categories to draw boundaries around their enemies.
Another example of this reversal is found further south, where New Kingdom Egyptians and ancient Israelites developed a similar contrast. From the Israelite standpoint, the marauding Egyptian empire represented darkness and evil. Ra was a chief Egyptian god, so in Hebrew the word “ra” came to mean “evil.” Ra (רע) still means evil in Hebrew today.
Key Terms for this Lesson: Mythos · Fides · Proto-Indo-European
2.3 | A Brief History of “Religion”
Sacred Devotion & Social Obligation
The first organized study of international history was written in the 400s BCE by the ancient Greek Herodotus. Known today as the ‘Father of History,’ Herodotus wanted, in his words, “to prevent the traces of human events from being erased by time and to preserve the fame of the important and remarkable achievements produced by both Greeks and non-Greeks” (Herodotus, Historia).
Herodotus needed a Greek word to describe the priestly rituals and duties he studied from abroad and settled on threskeia (taking the adjectival Greek root thresk, meaning “devoted,” and adding the suffix -eia), meaning the state of being devoted. Over the next 500 years, Greeks used this word to describe a Greek citizen’s devotion to sacred behaviors — like an Athenian pouring wine in honor of Athena (cf. Sec. 2.2).
Meanwhile, in first century Rome, Roman politicians are using a Latin word religio in their correspondence — it’s some of the earliest uses of the word.
In this correspondence, the word religio means a set of social rules and obligations that connect citizens back to the Roman state. For Cicero, a statesman and philosopher, religio is about maintaining courteous and proper relations in public life. For Julius Caesar, religio is used to instruct Roman soldiers in the proper fulfillment of their duties toward one another. Courtesy. Duty. Rome. This was the Latin word religio.
Linguistically, religio arose from the Latin verb ligare (“to connect”). By adding “re” in front, the concept becomes “re-connect.” For Cicero, a proper Roman must remain connected to the larger social fabric of the Republic, treating peers and elders in a way that upholds Roman dignity. For Caesar, discipline in the army hinges on obligations that keep soldiers connected to their unit. In both cases, religio highlights a code of conduct and communal respect.Culture & Meaning Making
One of our most helpful concepts for understanding these communities is Culture. For scholars, culture is social information that is transmitted from one generation to the next. Think of it as everything from how people cook their food to the stories they tell around the campfire — any knowledge, practice, or custom that can be passed down within a society is part of its culture.
For prehistoric people, culture developed alongside practical survival skills. Early humans needed effective hunting strategies, which were learned collaboratively and taught to future generations. Hunting in groups made it easier for us to bring down large animals while reducing the risk of injury. Similarly, the invention of sharper spears or more durable tools meant taking down larger game, whose hides kept us warm and dry. The ability to start and control fires was an especially powerful advancement, offering warmth, protection from wild animals, and a means to cook food so it could be eaten and stored more safely.
Over time, these advances became cultural milestones.
The engaging, instructive, even humorous stories that hunter-gatherers would tell around the fire — about close calls with predators, or legends of how they discovered certain edible plants — gradually shaped each group’s identity. In this sense, culture was not limited to practical know-how. It also framed how we came to see the world — values that created group cohesion, and even early attempts to cope with life’s profound mysteries, like birth, death, and the sublime forces of nature.
By the time writing systems emerged (around 5,000 years ago) in places like ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, and China, much of humanity’s cultural foundations were already in place. With the advent of written records, societies could preserve more detailed laws, myths, genealogies, and rituals. Yet the building blocks of these later civilizations still rested on thousands of years of oral traditions, trial-and-error learning, and accumulated cultural memory.
The Impact of St. Jerome
Over the next 400 years, Christianity goes from being a small Jewish sect in Israel to the most popular social movement in the Roman Empire.
In 405, St. Jerome accomplishes the incredible task of translating the New Testament (originally in Greek) into Latin. The result is the Vulgate Bible. As with all Bible translation efforts, St. Jerome’s choices had a great theological impact. For example, in Luke 1, Jerome renders kecharitōmenē (favored) as “full of grace.” In Mark 1, he rendered metanoeite (change your heart) to “do penance.” And, in Hebrews 9, he rendered diathekē (covenant) as “testament,” thereafter representing the Hebrew and Greek biblical texts as separate testamentary frameworks (ie. the Old and New Testaments). These choices shaped Roman Catholic doctrine for millennia.
But perhaps his most important choice was how he translated the word threskeiaLinks to an external site., that old Greek concept that Herodotus came up with.
Threskeia doesn’t seem to be a very important word for the New Testament authors. It is not found in the four Gospels. Jesus is never quoted as saying threskeia. But the word does show up three times, in passing, in later New Testament books. Writing in Greek, the Apostle Paul uses threskeia to point out his devotion to Jewish customsLinks to an external site.. Later, Paul uses it to warn against excessive devotion to angelsLinks to an external site.. Finally, the Epistle of James uses threskeia to explain the devotion a Christian ought to show widowsLinks to an external site.. In effect, the word threskeia is used in the New Testament to explain behaviors, not belief systems. Why is that distinction important? Because when St. Jerome has to choose a Latin word to translate the Greek threskeia, he chooses Cicero’s and Caesar’s word religio — forever altering world history.
By choosing to translate threskeia as religion, St. Jerome carries over all the Roman connotations of obligation, social conduct, and state allegiance into the Christian text. This had a massive impact on how subsequent generations of Christians understood the New Testament scripture. After Jerome’s Vulgate, the word “religion” commonly appears in most translations of the New Testament. Over time, the early Medieval European understanding of “religion” as a civic code (cf. mos maiorum) expands to include the entire sphere of Christian doctrine, worship, and fidelity. Many readers then assumed that other ancient peoples had also practiced “religion” in the same fashion — even when their cultures did not align with the Greco-Roman understanding of sacred behavior and loyalty to the state.
The eventual spread of the Roman Catholic religion and scripture engendered the idea in Europe that “religion” was a universal category of sacred belief and practice. The original sense of social etiquette and ancestral fides fell into the background, while the theological sense became the primary understanding of the word.
Optional Video: Scholar of Religion explains what religion is (auto-generated CC).
Roman Universal Religion
One of the earliest theologians to shape our understanding of the word “religion” was St. Augustine (d. 430 CE), for whom “entering religion” (as he put it) meant a structured, disciplined lifestyle — obedience, communal living, renunciation of wealth — with faithfulness to the Roman Church as evidence of genuine devotion. His theology shaped the monastic Rule of St. Benedict, whose missionaries carried dozens of Christian words into Old English that we still use today. Another word evolved on that same journey north: the Latin libet (love) was rendered leof and lief in Northern Europe; leof became “beleof” (beloved), while lief became “believe.” In this way, belief, as it first appeared in English, implied a feeling of loving commitment rather than intellectual agreement with dogma. (The use of belief to express intellectual conviction wasn’t commonplace until after the Scientific Revolution of the 1500s.)
Once the Middle Ages were in full swing, religion had acquired a sweeping scope. For Medieval Europe, religion was universal. To the medieval European mind there was only one religion in the world — the Roman Catholic Church (”catholic” means universal in Greek), and any other choice (Greek: hairesis) was a “heresy,” generally met with severe punishment. Religion was also public. There was no practical division between church and state, and rulers only governed with the Church’s blessing. And religion was an enforced obligation. Conformity to Church doctrine was mandated by law, and private worship that diverged from official doctrine was a form of criminal civil disobedience.
Key Terms for this Lesson: Religio · Threskia
2.4 | Religion Goes Global
World Religions
By the early 1500s (a thousand years after Sts. Augustine & Jerome), the cracks in the unity of the Medieval Roman Church had grown irreparable.
Calls for reform, spurred in part by the writings of Martin Luther, ushered in the Protestant ReformationLinks to an external site., and religion in Europe was no longer an unquestioned monolith. The disruption set the stage for the Enlightenment, when thinkers like John Locke and Voltaire argued that people should be free to choose their own religion — including no religion at all — without government persecution. Today, Americans generally see religion as a private matter, protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
In sum, where medieval religion was public, universal, and obligatory, modern religion is now framed as a private, local, and a voluntary choice. Many modern readers wrongly assume it was always thus. But as we’ve seen, religion transformed in the early modern era to be the opposite of what it had been just a few centuries before.
But what else beyond Catholic and Protestant religion counted as religion?
With the rise of HumanismLinks to an external site. in the Renaissance, some Christians began to investigate humanity across socio-political boundaries in bold new ways. By the end of the 14th century, the first Christian Humanists were now considering Jews and Muslims as co-religionists. The old talk of Christian versus Infidel had waned in the face of Renaissance thinking. Nicolas de Cusa’s On the Peace of Faith (1453) imagines a meeting in Heaven, wherein Jews, Muslims, and non-Catholic Christians are shown to have elements of truth. The following century would see a surge of similar Humanist interest in the topic (cf. AlciatoLinks to an external site., AshleyLinks to an external site., PostelLinks to an external site., and el PincianoLinks to an external site.).
The first notable Arabic text to arrive in England was Thomas Erpenius’ 1616 Latin translation of the Qur’an. One of the Arabic words that needed to be translated was the Arabic din (from Old Iranian daena, meaning “eternal law” — possibly a cognate of Indian dharma). In seventy-nine places, the Qur’an uses this word. Arabic speakers of all religions use it. From antiquity, din had been translated as “law” in accordance with its ancient Persian roots. However, in 1734, in the first English translation of the Qur’an, din is translated as “religion.” Thereafter, “religion” became the preferred translation of din in the West, and Islam came to be described as a co-religion next to Christianity — a shift that had been building since the Renaissance.
The story for Jews as religion was less about translation (Europeans had long ago translated Hebrew), and more about nationality and modern rights.
Historically, European Jews lived on the margins of Christian society — in shtetls (small villages), or restricted to segregated urban districts (the Italian word “ghetto” originally referred to these quarters). According to Jewish tradition, a person is Jewish if they are born to a Jewish mother. Jews do not decide to be Jewish any more than Americans decide on their American citizenship. Nationalism is itself a modern phenomenon. In the 18th century, Jews had few rights in Europe. The thinking at the time was that if someone was Jewish (a tribe all its own), then that person could not also be part of the German nation. It was Moses Mendelssohn who first argued that a person could authentically identify as both German AND Jewish. In his 1769 text, Jerusalem, Mendelssohn defined himself as a German by nationality and Jewish in matters of “religion.” This positioning was strategic: by classifying Judaism as a religion, Mendelssohn sought the same civil rights already extended to Catholic and Protestant Germans. Of course, some political elements in Germany resisted, arguing that Jews were not a separate “religion” but rather an inferior “race” (which laid the foundations for 20th-century antisemitism, culminating in the Holocaust). Nonetheless, Mendelssohn’s work was a milestone in the struggle for Jewish rights and equality in Europe.
In Asia, by the late 1700s, the Sanskrit word dharma (which also means “law”) was translated by enterprising Europeans as “religion.” Early modern European explorers collectively referred to the locals of India as “Hindus,” named after the Indus River. By the 1780s, Sir William Jones of the Royal Asiatic Society began describing “Hinduism” as a distinct religion next to Islam. His colleague, Henry Thomas Colebrooke, similarly labeled “Buddhism” a religion in the early 1800s. This was followed by the missionary Jean-François Noël describing “Daoism” as a religion in 1838, and Confucianism followed a similar path in 1877.
This process reflects a long pattern of Western observers encountering foreign languages and customs and adapting them to fit their own paradigms. When this happens, the process of translation often recasts indigenous words like “law,” “duty,” “custom,” or “teaching” to fit a European theoretical framework. Din becomes “religion.” Daht becomes “religion.” And dharma becomes “religion.” While this practice allows for broader recognition of otherwise little-known traditions, it can force people to understand their own cultures through a limited foreign lens. Today, the label “religion” often carries connotations of belief, certitude, divinity, universalism, institutionalism, and proselytizing efforts that are generally not shared by all the social phenomena heretofore labeled “religions.”
Jewish and Hindu identities are based on familial belonging rather than belief. Daoists offer little certainty in their teachings. Buddhism is nontheistic (ie. it makes no claims about a god either way). The Navajo seek personal rather than institutional allegiance. And few of these traditions proselytize or preach a universal salvation. When labeled as “co-religions,” the assumptions made by outsiders can sometimes prove difficult to overcome.
Beware the No True Scotsman Fallacy
One last point I should make before introducing our list of world religions.
As we’re talking about different religions, we want to be sure not to commit the fallacy known as “No True Scotsman.” The No True Scotsman Fallacy occurs when someone protects a generalization about a religion by redefining that religion to exclude contradictory examples. That’s a mouthful, so let’s look at an example.
If someone claims that “All Scotsmen are honest” and then discovers a dishonest person who is Scottish, they might respond, “Well, no true Scotsman would be dishonest.” In doing so, they dodge evidence that challenges their claim by changing the definition of who counts as a ‘real’ Scotsman.
In the academic study of religion, we confront this problem when we dismiss certain adherents or practices as ‘not really’ belonging to a tradition because they do not reflect well on that tradition. The hate-spewing priest. The well-dressed charlatan. The violent terrorist. But here’s the thing: if ascholar insists on one particular view of a tradition, then they are doing theology, not scholarship.
Remember, scholars describe what people do, not what they should do. This is a key difference between scholarship and theology.
Optional Video: Scholar of Religion explains the No True Scotsman Fallacy (auto-generated CC).
Each Religion Answers Different Questions
Finally, please take a look at the list below, built from Stephen Prothero’s textbook Religion Matters.
Think about how these religions work as systems of thought that communicate with each other but also talk past each other. Take the Hindu concern with samsara: what might be said if a Hindu were to ask a Muslim, “How does Islam end the cycle of reincarnation?” What kind of response is possible? This is like asking a baseball player, “How many touchdowns have you made this season?” It doesn’t make sense. It’s not the same rules, the same referees, or even the same game.
In this way, Prothero points out that the world’s religions are not all headed up the same mountain. To suggest that Jews are doing what Muslims are doing negates the unique beauty of both these amazing traditions. We modern scholars are absolutely capable of studying how a religion functions on its own terms. So take a look and see the sheer astonishing diversity of the world’s great religious traditions.
For the Navajo...
• The problem the world faces is disharmony, which is at the root of all evil
• The solution is to return balance, beauty, and harmony to the world
• This is done through prayer, offerings to the Holy People, and sacred ceremonies
For Hindus...
• The problem the world faces is samsara, the endless cycle of reincarnation
• The solution is to attain moksha, the release from the prison of maya
• This is done through various ancient yogic disciplines
For Buddhists...
• The problem the world faces is the suffering brought on by desire
• The solution is nirvana — the end of ignorance, attachment, and aversion
• This is done through the Eightfold Path, including right meditation and devotion
For Daoists...
• The problem the world faces is lifelessness due to our convoluted actions
• The solution is to flourish in the here and now, unconstrained by unnecessary norms and structures
• This is done through proper meditation, embracing change, and going with the flow
For Confucianists...
• The problem the world faces is social chaos, as we’ve forgotten our social roles
• The solution is social harmony — the rectification of our proper social roles
• This is done by being humane, acting with propriety, and by cultivating your moral virtue
For Observant Jews...
• The problem the world faces is exile from the path of righteousness
• The solution is to return to the path of Torah, rabbinic guidance, and tradition
• This is done through study, repentance, prayer, and charity
For Christians...
• The problem the world faces is the sin that we are born into
• The solution is salvation from our sinful nature through Jesus Christ
• This is done by faith (and good works according to Catholic Christians)
For Muslims...
• The problem the world faces is pride, caused by forgetting that God is greater
• The solution is submitting to God & recognizing Muhammad as His messenger
• This is done through prayer, alms, pilgrimage, monotheistic faith, and the Shahadah
Notice the list’s very first entry. In Section 3, we begin our case studies with the sacred traditions of the Navajo Nation — a tradition that will challenge nearly every assumption the word “religion” carries. Keep this list handy all semester; we will return to it again and again.
That’s the toolkit — and the history, and the list. Nonsectarian, not theological. Knowledge, not belief. Description, not prescription.
In the next session, everything these first two sections have built goes to work. We enter the course’s first full sacred world — Diné Bikéyah, the homeland of the Navajo people — where sacred mountains, honored objects, formal ceremonies, and meaning-bearing stories live in a single tradition.
Key Terms for this Lesson: No True Scotsman fallacy · Monolatry
Recommended Sources
Émile Durkheim, The Elementary Forms of Religious Life (1912)
Max Weber, The Sociology of Religion (1963)
Russell McCutcheon, The Discipline of Religion (2003)
Jonathan Z. Smith, Relating Religion (2004)
Bruce Lincoln, Gods and Demons, Priests and Scholars (2012)
Last Section: Religion in a Public College
This Section: What is Religion?
Next Section: Diné • The Navajo Tradition