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Christian values

Christian values historically refers to values derived from the teachings of Jesus Christ. The term has various applications and meanings, and specific definitions can vary widely between denominations, geographical locations, historical contexts, and different schools of thought. Christian values also relate to the Christian identity in identity politics. Modern use in worldwide conservative or right-wing politics In the 21st-century United States, Australia, United Kingdom and other countries, the phrases Christian values and family values are used by Christian right and conservative parties to describe some or all of the following political stances: Modern interpretations of Christian values may include: Censorship of sexual content, especially in films and on television. Sexual abstinence outside marriage and abstinence-only sex education. The promotion of intelligent design to be taught in public schools and colleges as an alternative to evolution. The desirability of laws against same-sex marriage. Support for laws against the acceptance of homosexuality into mainstream society. The desirability of organized school prayer in public schools. See also Biblical law in Christianity Brotherly love (philosophy) Christian ethics Family values Jesusism Judeo-Christian values Red-Letter Christians Morality and religion References Values Christian terminology Political terminology Value (ethics) Religious philosophical concepts

Religion

Religion is a range of social-cultural systems, including designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relate humanity to supernatural, transcendental, and spiritual elements—although there is no scholarly consensus over what precisely constitutes a religion. Different religions may or may not contain various elements ranging from the divine, sacredness, faith, and a supernatural being or beings. The origin of religious belief is an open question, with possible explanations including awareness of individual death, a sense of community, and dreams. Religions have sacred histories, narratives, and mythologies, preserved in oral traditions, sacred texts, symbols, and holy places, that may attempt to explain the origin of life, the universe, and other phenomena. Religious practices may include rituals, sermons, commemoration or veneration (of deities or saints), sacrifices, festivals, feasts, trances, initiations, matrimonial and funerary services, meditation, prayer, music, art, dance, or public service. There are an estimated 10,000 distinct religions worldwide, though nearly all of them have regionally based, relatively small followings. Four religions—Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism—account for over 77% of the world's population, and 92% of the world either follows one of those four religions or identifies as nonreligious, meaning that the remaining 9,000+ faiths account for only 8% of the population combined. The religiously unaffiliated demographic includes those who do not identify with any particular religion, atheists, and agnostics, although many in the demographic still have various religious beliefs. Many world religions are also organized religions, most definitively including the Abrahamic religions Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, while others are arguably less so, in particular folk religions, indigenous religions, and some Eastern religions. A portion of the world's population are members of new religious movements. Scholars have indicated that global religiosity may be increasing due to religious countries having generally higher birth rates. The study of religion comprises a wide variety of academic disciplines, including theology, philosophy of religion, comparative religion, and social scientific studies. Theories of religion offer various explanations for its origins and workings, including the ontological foundations of religious being and belief. Etymology and history of concept Etymology The term religion comes from both Old French and Anglo-Norman (1200s CE) and means respect for sense of right, moral obligation, sanctity, what is sacred, reverence for the gods. It is ultimately derived from the Latin word . According to Roman philosopher Cicero, comes from : (meaning "again") + (meaning "read"), where is in the sense of "go over", "choose", or "consider carefully". Contrarily, some modern scholars such as Tom Harpur and Joseph Campbell have argued that is derived from : (meaning "again") + ("bind" or "connect"), which was made prominent by St. Augustine following the interpretation given by Lactantius in , IV, 28. 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'". In classic antiquity, broadly meant conscientiousness, sense of right, moral obligation, or duty to anything. In the ancient and medieval world, the etymological Latin root was understood as an individual virtue of worship in mundane contexts; never as doctrine, practice, or actual source of knowledge. In general, referred to broad social obligations towards anything including family, neighbors, rulers, and even towards God. was most often used by the ancient Romans not in the context of a relation towards gods, but as a range of general emotions which arose from heightened attention in any mundane context such as hesitation, caution, anxiety, or fear, as well as feelings of being bound, restricted, or inhibited. The term was also closely related to other terms like (which meant "very precisely"), and some Roman authors related the term (which meant too much fear or anxiety or shame) to at times. When came into English around the 1200s as religion, it took the meaning of "life bound by monastic vows" or monastic orders. The compartmentalized concept of religion, where religious and worldly things were separated, was not used before the 1500s. The concept of religion was first used in the 1500s to distinguish the domain of the church and the domain of civil authorities; the Peace of Augsburg marks such instance, which has been described by Christian Reus-Smit as "the first step on the road toward a European system of sovereign states." Roman general Julius Caesar used to mean "obligation of an oath" when discussing captured soldiers making an oath to their captors. Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder used the term to describe the apparent respect given by elephants to the night sky. Cicero used as being related to (worship of the gods). In Ancient Greece, the Greek term was loosely translated into Latin as in late antiquity. was sparsely used in classical Greece but became more frequently used in the writings of Josephus in the 1st century CE. It was used in mundane contexts and could mean multiple things from respectful fear to excessive or harmfully distracting practices of others, to cultic practices. It was often contrasted with the Greek word , which meant too much fear. History of the concept of the "religion" Religion is a modern concept. The concept was invented recently in the English language and is found in texts from the 17th century due to events such as the splitting of Christendom during the Protestant Reformation and globalization in the Age of Exploration, which involved contact with numerous foreign cultures with non-European languages. Some argue that regardless of its definition, it is not appropriate to apply the term religion to non-Western cultures, while some followers of various faiths rebuke using the word to describe their own belief system. The concept of "ancient religion" stems from modern interpretations of a range of practices that conform to a modern concept of religion, influenced by early modern and 19th century Christian discourse. The concept of religion was formed in the 16th and 17th centuries, despite the fact that ancient sacred texts like the Bible, the Quran, and others did not have a word or even a concept of religion in the original languages and neither did the people or the cultures in which these sacred texts were written. For example, there is no precise equivalent of religion in Hebrew, and Judaism does not distinguish clearly between religious, national, racial, or ethnic identities. One of its central concepts is , meaning the walk or path sometimes translated as law, which guides religious practice and belief and many aspects of daily life. Even though the beliefs and traditions of Judaism are found in the ancient world, ancient Jews saw Jewish identity as being about an ethnic or national identity and did not entail a compulsory belief system or regulated rituals. In the 1st century CE, Josephus had used the Greek term (Judaism) as an ethnic term and was not linked to modern abstract concepts of religion or a set of beliefs. The very concept of "Judaism" was invented by the Christian Church, and it was in the 19th century that Jews began to see their ancestral culture as a religion analogous to Christianity. The Greek word , which was used by Greek writers such as Herodotus and Josephus, is found in the New Testament. is sometimes translated as "religion" in today's translations, but the term was understood as generic "worship" well into the medieval period. In the Quran, the Arabic word is often translated as religion in modern translations, but up to the mid-1600s translators expressed as "law". 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. Though traditions, sacred texts, and practices have existed throughout time, most cultures did not align with Western conceptions of religion since they did not separate everyday life from the sacred. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the terms Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Confucianism, and world religions first entered the English language. Native Americans were also thought of as not having religions and also had no word for religion in their languages either. No one self-identified as a Hindu or Buddhist or other similar terms before the 1800s. "Hindu" has historically been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for people indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. Throughout its long history, Japan had no concept of religion since there was no corresponding Japanese word, nor anything close to its meaning, but when American warships appeared off the coast of Japan in 1853 and forced the Japanese government to sign treaties demanding, among other things, freedom of religion, the country had to contend with this idea. According to the philologist Max Müller in the 19th century, the root of the English word religion, the Latin , 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). 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. Definition Scholars have failed to agree on a definition of religion. There are, however, two general definition systems: the sociological/functional and the phenomenological/philosophical. Modern Western The concept of religion originated in the modern era in the West. Parallel concepts are not found in many current and past cultures; there is no equivalent term for religion in many languages. Scholars have found it difficult to develop a consistent definition, with some giving up on the possibility of a definition. Others argue that regardless of its definition, it is not appropriate to apply it to non-Western cultures. An increasing number of scholars have expressed reservations about ever defining the essence of religion. They observe that the way the concept today is used is a particularly modern construct that would not have been understood through much of history and in many cultures outside the West (or even in the West until after the Peace of Westphalia). The MacMillan Encyclopedia of Religions states: The anthropologist Clifford Geertz defined religion as a: Alluding perhaps to Tylor's "deeper motive", Geertz remarked that: The theologian Antoine Vergote took the term supernatural simply to mean whatever transcends the powers of nature or human agency. He also emphasized the cultural reality of religion, which he defined as: Peter Mandaville and Paul James intended to get away from the modernist dualisms or dichotomous understandings of immanence/transcendence, spirituality/materialism, and sacredness/secularity. They define religion as: According to the MacMillan Encyclopedia of Religions, there is an experiential aspect to religion which can be found in almost every culture: Anthropologists Lyle Steadman and Craig T. Palmer emphasized the communication of supernatural beliefs, defining religion as: Classical Friedrich Schleiermacher in the late 18th century defined religion as das schlechthinnige Abhängigkeitsgefühl, commonly translated as "the feeling of absolute dependence". His contemporary Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel disagreed thoroughly, defining religion as "the Divine Spirit becoming conscious of Himself through the finite spirit." Edward Burnett Tylor defined religion in 1871 as "the belief in spiritual beings". He argued that narrowing the definition to mean the belief in a supreme deity or judgment after death or idolatry and so on, would exclude many peoples from the category of religious, and thus "has the fault of identifying religion rather with particular developments than with the deeper motive which underlies them". He also argued that the belief in spiritual beings exists in all known societies. In his book The Varieties of Religious Experience, the psychologist William James defined religion as "the feelings, acts, and experiences of individual men in their solitude, so far as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to whatever they may consider the divine". By the term divine James meant "any object that is godlike, whether it be a concrete deity or not" to which the individual feels impelled to respond with solemnity and gravity. Sociologist Émile Durkheim, in his seminal book The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, defined religion as a "unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things". 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. 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". 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. 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". Similarly, for the theologian Paul Tillich, faith is "the state of being ultimately concerned", which "is itself religion. Religion is the substance, the ground, and the depth of man's spiritual life." When religion is seen in terms of sacred, divine, intensive valuing, or ultimate concern, then it is possible to understand why scientific findings and philosophical criticisms (e.g., those made by Richard Dawkins) do not necessarily disturb its adherents. Aspects Beliefs The origin of religious belief is an open question, with possible explanations including awareness of individual death, a sense of community, and dreams. Traditionally, faith, in addition to reason, has been considered a source of religious beliefs. The interplay between faith and reason, and their use as perceived support for religious beliefs, have been a subject of interest to philosophers and theologians. Mythology The word myth has several meanings: A traditional story of ostensibly historical events that serves to unfold part of the world view of a people or explain a practice, belief, or natural phenomenon; A person or thing having only an imaginary or unverifiable existence; or A metaphor for the spiritual potentiality in the human being. Ancient polytheistic religions, such as those of Greece, Rome, and Scandinavia, are usually categorized under the heading of mythology. Religions of pre-industrial peoples, or cultures in development, are similarly called myths in the anthropology of religion. The term myth can be used pejoratively by both religious and non-religious people. By defining another person's religious stories and beliefs as mythology, one implies that they are less real or true than one's own religious stories and beliefs. Joseph Campbell remarked, "Mythology is often thought of as other people's religions, and religion can be defined as misinterpreted mythology." 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 resurrection of their real-life founder Jesus, which, to Christians, explains the means by which they are freed from sin, is symbolic of the power of life over death, and is also said to be a historical event. But from a mythological outlook, whether or not the event actually occurred is unimportant. Instead, the symbolism of the death of an old life and the start of a new life is most significant. Religious believers may or may not accept such symbolic interpretations. Practices The practices of a religion may include rituals, sermons, commemoration or veneration of a deity (god or goddess), sacrifices, festivals, feasts, trances, initiations, funerary services, matrimonial services, meditation, prayer, religious music, religious art, sacred dance, public service, or other aspects of human culture. Social organisation Religions have a societal basis, either as a living tradition which is carried by lay participants, or with an organized clergy, and a definition of what constitutes adherence or membership. Academic study A number of disciplines study the phenomenon of religion: theology, comparative religion, history of religion, evolutionary origin of religions, anthropology of religion, psychology of religion (including neuroscience of religion and evolutionary psychology of religion), law and religion, and sociology of religion. Daniel L. Pals mentions eight classical theories of religion, focusing on various aspects of religion: animism and magic, by E.B. Tylor and J.G. Frazer; the psycho-analytic approach of Sigmund Freud; and further Émile Durkheim, Karl Marx, Max Weber, Mircea Eliade, E.E. Evans-Pritchard, and Clifford Geertz. Michael Stausberg gives an overview of contemporary theories of religion, including cognitive and biological approaches. Theories Sociological and anthropological theories of religion generally attempt to explain the origin and function of religion. These theories define what they present as universal characteristics of religious belief and practice. Origins and development The origin of religion is uncertain. There are a number of theories regarding the subsequent origins of religious practices. According to anthropologists John Monaghan and Peter Just, "Many of the great world religions appear to have begun as revitalization movements of some sort, as the vision of a charismatic prophet fires the imaginations of people seeking a more comprehensive answer to their problems than they feel is provided by everyday beliefs. Charismatic individuals have emerged at many times and places in the world. It seems that the key to long-term success—and many movements come and go with little long-term effect—has relatively little to do with the prophets, who appear with surprising regularity, but more to do with the development of a group of supporters who are able to institutionalize the movement." 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." Cultural system While religion is difficult to define, one standard model of religion, used in religious studies courses, was proposed by Clifford Geertz, who simply called it a "cultural system". A critique of Geertz's model by Talal Asad categorized religion as "an anthropological category". Richard Niebuhr's (1894–1962) five-fold classification of the relationship between Christ and culture, however, indicates that religion and culture can be seen as two separate systems, though with some interplay. Social constructionism 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. Among the main proponents of this theory of religion are Daniel Dubuisson, Timothy Fitzgerald, Talal Asad, and Jason Ānanda Josephson. The social constructionists argue that religion is a modern concept that developed from Christianity and was then applied inappropriately to non-Western cultures. Cognitive science Cognitive science of religion is the study of religious thought and behavior from the perspective of the cognitive and evolutionary sciences. The field employs methods and theories from a very broad range of disciplines, including: cognitive psychology, evolutionary psychology, cognitive anthropology, artificial intelligence, cognitive neuroscience, neurobiology, zoology, and ethology. Scholars in this field seek to explain how human minds acquire, generate, and transmit religious thoughts, practices, and schemas by means of ordinary cognitive capacities. Hallucinations and delusions related to religious content occurs in about 60% of people with schizophrenia. While this number varies across cultures, this had led to theories about a number of influential religious phenomena and possible relation to psychotic disorders. A number of prophetic experiences are consistent with psychotic symptoms, although retrospective diagnoses are practically impossible. Schizophrenic episodes are also experienced by people who do not have belief in gods. Religious content is also common in temporal lobe epilepsy, and obsessive–compulsive disorder. Atheistic content is also found to be common with temporal lobe epilepsy. Comparativism Comparative religion is the branch of the study of religions concerned with the systematic comparison of the doctrines and practices of the world's religions. In general, the comparative study of religion yields a deeper understanding of the fundamental philosophical concerns of religion such as ethics, metaphysics, and the nature and form of salvation. Studying such material is meant to give one a richer and more sophisticated understanding of human beliefs and practices regarding the sacred, numinous, spiritual and divine. In the field of comparative religion, a common geographical classification of the main world religions includes Middle Eastern religions (including Zoroastrianism and Iranian religions), Indian religions, East Asian religions, African religions, American religions, Oceanic religions, and classical Hellenistic religions. Classification In the 19th and 20th centuries, the academic practice of comparative religion divided religious belief into philosophically defined categories called world religions. Some academics studying the subject have divided religions into three broad categories: World religions, a term which refers to transcultural, international religions; Indigenous religions, which refers to smaller, culture-specific or nation-specific religious groups; and New religious movements, which refers to recently developed religions. 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. 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). Morphological classification Some religion scholars classify religions as either universal religions that seek worldwide acceptance and actively look for new converts, such as the Baháʼí Faith, Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, and Jainism, while ethnic religions are identified with a particular ethnic group and do not seek converts. Others reject the distinction, pointing out that all religious practices, whatever their philosophical origin, are ethnic because they come from a particular culture. Demographic classification The five largest religious groups by world population, estimated to account for 5.8 billion people and 84% of the population, are Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism (with the relative numbers for Buddhism and Hinduism dependent on the extent of syncretism), and traditional folk religions. A global poll in 2012 surveyed 57 countries and reported that 59% of the world's population identified as religious, 23% as not religious, 13% as convinced atheists, and also a 9% decrease in identification as religious when compared to the 2005 average from 39 countries. A follow-up poll in 2015 found that 63% of the globe identified as religious, 22% as not religious, and 11% as convinced atheists. On average, women are more religious than men. Some people follow multiple religions or multiple religious principles at the same time, regardless of whether or not the religious principles they follow traditionally allow for syncretism. Unaffiliated populations are projected to drop, even when taking disaffiliation rates into account, due to differences in birth rates. Scholars have indicated that global religiosity may be increasing due to religious countries having higher birth rates in general. Specific religions Abrahamic Abrahamic religions are monotheistic religions which believe they descend from Abraham. Judaism Judaism is the oldest Abrahamic religion, originating in the people of ancient Israel and Judah. The Torah is its foundational text, and is part of the larger text known as the Tanakh or Hebrew Bible. It is supplemented by oral tradition, set down in written form in later texts such as the Midrash and the Talmud. Judaism includes a wide corpus of texts, practices, theological positions, and forms of organization. Within Judaism there are a variety of movements, most of which emerged from Rabbinic Judaism, which holds that God revealed his laws and commandments to Moses on Mount Sinai in the form of both the Written and Oral Torah; historically, this assertion was challenged by various groups. The Jewish people were scattered after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE. Today there are about 13 million Jews, about 40 per cent living in Israel and 40 per cent in the United States. The largest Jewish religious movements are Orthodox Judaism (Haredi Judaism and Modern Orthodox Judaism), Conservative Judaism and Reform Judaism. Christianity Christianity is based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth (1st century) as presented in the New Testament. The Christian faith is essentially faith in Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God, and as Savior and Lord. Almost all Christians believe in the Trinity, which teaches the unity of Father, Son (Jesus Christ), and Holy Spirit as three persons in one Godhead. Most Christians can describe their faith with the Nicene Creed. As the religion of Byzantine Empire in the first millennium and of Western Europe during the time of colonization, Christianity has been propagated throughout the world via missionary work. It is the world's largest religion, with about 2.3 billion followers as of 2015. The main divisions of Christianity are, according to the number of adherents: The Catholic Church, led by the Bishop of Rome and the bishops worldwide in communion with him, is a communion of 24 Churches sui iuris, including the Latin Church and 23 Eastern Catholic churches, such as the Maronite Catholic Church. Eastern Christianity, which include Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, and the Church of the East. Protestantism, separated from the Catholic Church in the 16th-century Protestant Reformation and is split into thousands of denominations. Major branches of Protestantism include Anglicanism, Baptists, Calvinism, Lutheranism, and Methodism, though each of these contain many different denominations or groups. There are also smaller groups, including: Restorationism, the belief that Christianity should be restored (as opposed to reformed) along the lines of what is known about the apostolic early church. Latter-day Saint movement, founded by Joseph Smith in the late 1820s. Jehovah's Witnesses, founded in the late 1870s by Charles Taze Russell. Christian Existentialist Islam Islam is a monotheistic religion based on the Quran, one of the holy books considered by Muslims to be revealed by God, and on the teachings (hadith) of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, a major political and religious figure of the 7th century CE. Islam is based on the unity of all religious philosophies and accepts all of the Abrahamic prophets of Judaism, Christianity and other Abrahamic religions before Muhammad. It is the most widely practiced religion of Southeast Asia, North Africa, Western Asia, and Central Asia, while Muslim-majority countries also exist in parts of South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Southeast Europe. There are also several Islamic republics, including Iran, Pakistan, Mauritania, and Afghanistan. With about 1.8 billion followers (2015), almost a quarter of earth's population are Muslims. Sunni Islam is the largest denomination within Islam and follows the Qur'an, the ahadith (plural of Hadith) which record the sunnah, whilst placing emphasis on the sahabah. Shia Islam is the second largest denomination of Islam and its adherents believe that Ali succeeded Muhammad and further places emphasis on Muhammad's family. There are also Muslim revivalist movements such as Muwahhidism and Salafism. Other denominations of Islam include Nation of Islam, Ibadi, Sufism, Quranism, Mahdavia, Ahmadiyya and non-denominational Muslims. Wahhabism is the dominant Muslim schools of thought in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Other Whilst Judaism, Christianity and Islam are commonly seen as the only three Abrahamic faiths, there are smaller and newer traditions which lay claim to the designation as well. For example, the Baháʼí Faith is a new religious movement that has links to the major Abrahamic religions as well as other religions (e.g., of Eastern philosophy). Founded in 19th-century Iran, it teaches the unity of all religious philosophies and accepts all of the prophets of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam as well as additional prophets (Buddha, Mahavira), including its founder Bahá'u'lláh. It is an offshoot of Bábism. One of its divisions is the Orthodox Baháʼí Faith. Even smaller regional Abrahamic groups also exist, including Samaritanism (primarily in Israel and the State of Palestine), the Rastafari movement (primarily in Jamaica), and Druze (primarily in Syria, Lebanon, and Israel). The Druze faith originally developed out of Isma'ilism, and it has sometimes been considered an Islamic school by some Islamic authorities, but Druze themselves do not identify as Muslims. Scholars classify the Druze faith as an independent Abrahamic religion because it developed its own unique doctrines and eventually separated from both Isma'ilism and Islam altogether. One of these doctrines includes the belief that Al-Ḥākim bi-Amr Allāh was an incarnation of God. Mandaeism, sometimes also known as Sabianism (after the mysterious Sabians mentioned in the Quran, a name historically claimed by several religious groups), is a Gnostic, monotheistic and ethnic religion. Its adherents, the Mandaeans, consider John the Baptist to be their chief prophet. Mandaeans are the last surviving Gnostics from antiquity. East Asian East Asian religions (also known as Far Eastern religions or Taoic religions) consist of several religions of East Asia which make use of the concept of Tao (in Chinese), Dō (in Japanese or Korean) or Đạo (in Vietnamese). They include: Taoism and Confucianism Taoism and Confucianism, as well as Korean, Vietnamese, and Japanese religion influenced by Chinese thought. Folk religions Chinese folk religion: the indigenous religions of the Han Chinese, or, by metonymy, of all the populations of the Chinese cultural sphere. It includes the syncretism of Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism, Wuism, as well as many new religious movements such as Chen Tao, Falun Gong and Yiguandao. Other folk and new religions of East Asia and Southeast Asia such as Korean shamanism, Chondogyo, and Jeung San Do in Korea; indigenous Philippine folk religions in the Philippines; Shinto, Shugendo, Ryukyuan religion, and Japanese new religions in Japan; Satsana Phi in Laos; Vietnamese folk religion, and Cao Đài, Hòa Hảo in Vietnam. Indian religions Indian religions are practiced or were founded in the Indian subcontinent. They are sometimes classified as the dharmic religions, as they all feature dharma, the specific law of reality and duties expected according to the religion. Hinduism Hinduism is also called Vaidika Dharma, the dharma of the Vedas, although many practitioners refer to their religion as Sanātana Dharma ("the Eternal Dharma") which refers to the idea that its origins lie beyond human history. Vaidika Dharma is a synecdoche describing the similar philosophies of Vaishnavism, Shaivism, and related groups practiced or founded in the Indian subcontinent. Concepts most of them share in common include karma, caste, reincarnation, mantras, yantras, and darśana. Deities in Hinduism are referred to as Deva (masculine) and Devi (feminine). Major deities include Vishnu, Lakshmi, Shiva, Parvati, Brahma and Saraswati. These deities have distinct and complex personalities yet are often viewed as aspects of the same Ultimate Reality called Brahman. Hinduism is one of the most ancient of still-active religious belief systems, with origins perhaps as far back as prehistoric times. Therefore, Hinduism has been called the oldest religion in the world. Jainism Jainism, taught primarily by Rishabhanatha (the founder of ahimsa) is an ancient Indian religion that prescribes a path of non-violence, truth and anekantavada for all forms of living beings in this universe; which helps them to eliminate all the Karmas, and hence to attain freedom from the cycle of birth and death (saṃsāra), that is, achieving nirvana. Jains are found mostly in India. According to Dundas, outside of the Jain tradition, historians date the Mahavira as about contemporaneous with the Buddha in the 5th-century BCE, and accordingly the historical Parshvanatha, based on the c. 250-year gap, is placed in 8th or 7th century BCE. Digambara Jainism (or sky-clad) is mainly practiced in South India. Their holy books are Pravachanasara and Samayasara written by their Prophets Kundakunda and Amritchandra as their original canon is lost. Shwetambara Jainism (or white-clad) is mainly practiced in Western India. Their holy books are Jain Agamas, written by their Prophet Sthulibhadra. Buddhism Buddhism was founded by Siddhartha Gautama in the 5th century BCE. Buddhists generally agree that Gotama aimed to help sentient beings end their suffering (dukkha) by understanding the true nature of phenomena, thereby escaping the cycle of suffering and rebirth (saṃsāra), that is, achieving nirvana. Theravada Buddhism, which is practiced mainly in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia alongside folk religion, shares some characteristics of Indian religions. It is based in a large collection of texts called the Pali Canon. Mahayana Buddhism (or the Great Vehicle) under which are a multitude of doctrines that became prominent in China and are still relevant in Vietnam, Korea, Japan and to a lesser extent in Europe and the United States. Mahayana Buddhism includes such disparate teachings as Zen, Pure Land, and Soka Gakkai. Vajrayana Buddhism first appeared in India in the 3rd century CE. It is currently most prominent in the Himalaya regions and extends across all of Asia (cf. Mikkyō). Two notable new Buddhist sects are Hòa Hảo and the Navayana (Dalit Buddhist movement), which were developed separately in the 20th century. Sikhism Sikhism is a panentheistic religion founded on the teachings of Guru Nanak and ten successive Sikh gurus in 15th-century Punjab. It is the fifth-largest organized religion in the world, with approximately 30 million Sikhs. Sikhs are expected to embody the qualities of a Sant-Sipāhī—a saint-soldier, have control over one's internal vices and be able to be constantly immersed in virtues clarified in the Guru Granth Sahib. The principal beliefs of Sikhi are faith in Waheguru—represented by the phrase ik ōaṅkār, one cosmic divine actioner (God), who prevails in everything, along with a praxis in which the Sikh is enjoined to engage in social reform through the pursuit of justice for all human beings. Indigenous and folk Indigenous religions or folk religions refers to a broad category of traditional religions that can be characterised by shamanism, animism and ancestor worship, where traditional means "indigenous, that which is aboriginal or foundational, handed down from generation to generation…". These are religions that are closely associated with a particular group of people, ethnicity or tribe; they often have no formal creeds or sacred texts. Some faiths are syncretic, fusing diverse religious beliefs and practices. Australian Aboriginal religions. Folk religions of the Americas: Native American religions Folk religions are often omitted as a category in surveys even in countries where they are widely practiced, e.g., in China. Traditional African African traditional religion encompasses the traditional religious beliefs of people in Africa. In West Africa, these religions include the Akan religion, Dahomey (Fon) mythology, Efik mythology, Odinani, Serer religion (A ƭat Roog), and Yoruba religion, while Bushongo mythology, Mbuti (Pygmy) mythology, Lugbara mythology, Dinka religion, and Lotuko mythology come from central Africa. Southern African traditions include Akamba mythology, Masai mythology, Malagasy mythology, San religion, Lozi mythology, Tumbuka mythology, and Zulu mythology. Bantu mythology is found throughout central, southeast, and southern Africa. In north Africa, these traditions include Berber and ancient Egyptian. There are also notable African diasporic religions practiced in the Americas, such as Santeria, Candomble, Vodun, Lucumi, Umbanda, and Macumba. Iranian Iranian religions are ancient religions whose roots predate the Islamization of Greater Iran. Nowadays these religions are practiced only by minorities. Zoroastrianism is based on the teachings of prophet Zoroaster in the 6th century BCE. Zoroastrians worship the creator Ahura Mazda. In Zoroastrianism, good and evil have distinct sources, with evil trying to destroy the creation of Mazda, and good trying to sustain it. Kurdish religions include the traditional beliefs of the Yazidi, Alevi, and Ahl-e Haqq. Sometimes these are labeled Yazdânism. New religious movements The Baháʼí Faith teaches the unity of all religious philosophies. Cao Đài is a syncretistic, monotheistic religion, established in Vietnam in 1926. Eckankar is a pantheistic religion with the purpose of making God an everyday reality in one's life. Epicureanism is a Hellenistic philosophy that is considered by many of its practitioners as a type of (sometimes non-theistic) religious identity. It has its own scriptures, a monthly "feast of reason" on the Twentieth and considers friendship to be holy. Hindu reform movements, such as Ayyavazhi, Swaminarayan Faith and Ananda Marga, are examples of new religious movements within Indian religions. Japanese new religions (shinshukyo) is a general category for a wide variety of religious movements founded in Japan since the 19th century. These movements share almost nothing in common except the place of their founding. The largest religious movements centered in Japan include Soka Gakkai, Tenrikyo, and Seicho-No-Ie among hundreds of smaller groups. Jehovah's Witnesses, a non-trinitarian Christian Reformist movement sometimes described as millenarian. Neo-Druidism is a religion promoting harmony with nature, named after but not necessarily connected to the Iron Age druids. Modern pagan movements attempting to reconstruct or revive ancient pagan practices, such as Heathenry, Hellenism, and Kemeticism. Noahidism is a monotheistic ideology based on the Seven Laws of Noah, and on their traditional interpretations within Rabbinic Judaism. Some forms of parody religion or fiction-based religion like Jediism, Pastafarianism, Dudeism, "Tolkien religion", and others often develop their own writings, traditions, and cultural expressions, and end up behaving like traditional religions. Satanism is a broad category of religions that, for example, worship Satan as a deity (Theistic Satanism) or use Satan as a symbol of carnality and earthly values (LaVeyan Satanism and The Satanic Temple). Scientology is defined as a cult, a scam, a commercial business, or a new religious movement. Its mythological framework is similar to a UFO cult and includes references to aliens, but it is kept secret from most followers. It charges a fee for its central activity, on the basis of which it has been characterised as a commercial enterprise. UFO Religions in which extraterrestrial entities are an element of belief, such as Raëlism, Aetherius Society, and Marshall Vian Summers's New Message from God. Unitarian Universalism is a religion characterized by support for a free and responsible search for truth and meaning, and has no accepted creed or theology. Wicca is a neo-pagan religion first popularised in 1954 by British civil servant Gerald Gardner, involving the worship of a God and Goddess. Related aspects Law The study of law and religion is a relatively new field, with several thousand scholars involved in law schools, and academic departments including political science, religion, and history since 1980. Scholars in the field are not only focused on strictly legal issues about religious freedom or non-establishment, but also study religions as they are qualified through judicial discourses or legal understanding of religious phenomena. Exponents look at canon law, natural law, and state law, often in a comparative perspective. Specialists have explored themes in Western history regarding Christianity and justice and mercy, rule and equity, and discipline and love. Common topics of interest include marriage and the family and human rights. Outside of Christianity, scholars have looked at law and religion links in the Muslim Middle East and pagan Rome. Studies have focused on secularization. In particular, the issue of wearing religious symbols in public, such as headscarves that are banned in French schools, have received scholarly attention in the context of human rights and feminism. Science Science acknowledges reason and empirical evidence; and religions include revelation, faith and sacredness whilst also acknowledging philosophical and metaphysical explanations with regard to the study of the universe. Both science and religion are not monolithic, timeless, or static because both are complex social and cultural endeavors that have changed through time across languages and cultures. The concepts of science and religion are a recent invention: the term religion emerged in the 17th century in the midst of colonization and globalization and the Protestant Reformation. The term science emerged in the 19th century out of natural philosophy in the midst of attempts to narrowly define those who studied nature (natural science), and the phrase religion and science emerged in the 19th century due to the reification of both concepts. It was in the 19th century that the terms Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, and Confucianism first emerged. In the ancient and medieval world, the etymological Latin roots of both science (scientia) and religion (religio) were understood as inner qualities of the individual or virtues, never as doctrines, practices, or actual sources of knowledge. In general, 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 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 does not have a method per se partly because religions emerge through time from diverse cultures and it is an attempt to find meaning in the world, and to explain humanity's place in it and relationship to it and to any posited entities. In terms of Christian theology and ultimate truths, people rely on reason, experience, scripture, and tradition to test and gauge what they experience and what they should believe. Furthermore, religious models, understanding, and metaphors are also revisable, as are scientific models. Regarding religion and science, Albert Einstein states (1940): "For science can only ascertain what is, but not what should be, and outside of its domain value judgments of all kinds remain necessary. Religion, on the other hand, deals only with evaluations of human thought and action; it cannot justifiably speak of facts and relationships between facts…Now, even though the realms of religion and science in themselves are clearly marked off from each other, nevertheless there exist between the two strong reciprocal relationships and dependencies. Though religion may be that which determine the goals, it has, nevertheless, learned from science, in the broadest sense, what means will contribute to the attainment of the goals it has set up." Morality Many religions have value frameworks regarding personal behavior meant to guide adherents in determining between right and wrong. These include the Five Vows of Jainism, Judaism's halakha, Islam's sharia, Catholicism's canon law, Buddhism's Noble Eightfold Path, and Zoroastrianism's good thoughts, good words, and good deeds concept, among others. Religion and morality are not synonymous. While it is often assumed in Christian thought that morality is ultimately based in religion, it can also have a secular basis. The study of religion and morality can be contentious due to ethnocentric views on morality, failure to distinguish between in group and out group altruism, and inconsistent definitions of religiosity. Politics Impact Religion has had a significant impact on the political system in many countries. Notably, most Muslim-majority countries adopt various aspects of sharia, the Islamic law. Some countries even define themselves in religious terms, such as The Islamic Republic of Iran. The sharia thus affects up to 23% of the global population, or 1.57 billion people who are Muslims. However, religion also affects political decisions in many western countries. For instance, in the United States, 51% of voters would be less likely to vote for a presidential candidate who did not believe in God, and only 6% more likely. Christians make up 92% of members of the US Congress, compared with 71% of the general public (as of 2014). At the same time, while 23% of U.S. adults are religiously unaffiliated, only one member of Congress (Kyrsten Sinema, D-Arizona), or 0.2% of that body, claims no religious affiliation. In most European countries, however, religion has a much smaller influence on politics although it used to be much more important. For instance, same-sex marriage and abortion were illegal in many European countries until recently, following Christian (usually Catholic) doctrine. Several European leaders are atheists (e.g., France's former president Francois Hollande or Greece's prime minister Alexis Tsipras). In Asia, the role of religion differs widely between countries. For instance, India is still one of the most religious countries and religion still has a strong impact on politics, given that Hindu nationalists have been targeting minorities like the Muslims and the Christians, who historically belonged to the lower castes. By contrast, countries such as China or Japan are largely secular and thus religion has a much smaller impact on politics. Secularism Secularization is the transformation of the politics of a society from close identification with a particular religion's values and institutions toward nonreligious values and secular institutions. The purpose of this is frequently modernization or protection of the population's religious diversity. Economics One study has found there is a negative correlation between self-defined religiosity and the wealth of nations. In other words, the richer a nation is, the less likely its inhabitants to call themselves religious, whatever this word means to them (Many people identify themselves as part of a religion (not irreligion) but do not self-identify as religious). Sociologist and political economist Max Weber has argued that Protestant Christian countries are wealthier because of their Protestant work ethic. According to a study from 2015, Christians hold the largest amount of wealth (55% of the total world wealth), followed by Muslims (5.8%), Hindus (3.3%) and Jews (1.1%). According to the same study it was found that adherents under the classification Irreligion or other religions hold about 34.8% of the total global wealth (while making up only about 20% of the world population, see section on classification). 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." The authors of a subsequent study concluded that the influence of religion on health is largely beneficial, based on a review of related literature. According to academic James W. Jones, several studies have discovered "positive correlations between religious belief and practice and mental and physical health and longevity." An analysis of data from the 1998 US General Social Survey, whilst broadly confirming that religious activity was associated with better health and well-being, also suggested that the role of different dimensions of spirituality/religiosity in health is rather more complicated. The results suggested "that it may not be appropriate to generalize findings about the relationship between spirituality/religiosity and health from one form of spirituality/religiosity to another, across denominations, or to assume effects are uniform for men and women. Violence Critics such as Hector Avalos, Regina Schwartz, Christopher Hitchens, and Richard Dawkins have argued that religions are inherently violent and harmful to society by using violence to promote their goals, in ways that are endorsed and exploited by their leaders. Anthropologist Jack David Eller asserts that religion is not inherently violent, arguing "religion and violence are clearly compatible, but they are not identical." He asserts that "violence is neither essential to nor exclusive to religion" and that "virtually every form of religious violence has its nonreligious corollary." Animal sacrifice Some (but not all) religions practise animal sacrifice, the ritual killing and offering of an animal to appease or maintain favour with a deity. It has been banned in India. 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. Ancient Greek historian Polybius described superstition in ancient Rome as an instrumentum regni, an instrument of maintaining the cohesion of the Empire. Superstition has been described as the non-rational establishment of cause and effect. Religion is more complex and is often composed of social institutions and has a moral aspect. Some religions may include superstitions or make use of magical thinking. Adherents of one religion sometimes think of other religions as superstition. Some atheists, deists, and skeptics regard religious belief as superstition. The Roman Catholic Church considers superstition to be sinful in the sense that it denotes a lack of trust in the divine providence of God and, as such, is a violation of the first of the Ten Commandments. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that superstition "in some sense represents a perverse excess of religion" (para. #2110). "Superstition," it says, "is a deviation of religious feeling and of the practices this feeling imposes. It can even affect the worship we offer the true God, e.g., when one attributes an importance in some way magical to certain practices otherwise lawful or necessary. To attribute the efficacy of prayers or of sacramental signs to their mere external performance, apart from the interior dispositions that they demand is to fall into superstition. Cf. Matthew 23:16–22" (para. #2111) Agnosticism and atheism The terms atheist (lack of belief in 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. 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. There are religions (including Buddhism and Taoism) that classify some of their followers as agnostic, atheistic, or nontheistic. For example, in ancient India, there were large atheistic movements and traditions (Nirīśvaravāda) that rejected the Vedas, such as the atheistic Ājīvika and the Ajñana which taught agnosticism. 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 affirmed universal values and recognition of the diversity of practices among different cultures. The 20th century has been especially fruitful in use of interfaith dialogue as a means of solving ethnic, political, or even religious conflict, with Christian–Jewish reconciliation representing a complete reverse in the attitudes of many Christian communities towards Jews. Recent interfaith initiatives include A Common Word, launched in 2007 and focused on bringing Muslim and Christian leaders together, the "C1 World Dialogue", the Common Ground initiative between Islam and Buddhism, and a United Nations sponsored "World Interfaith Harmony Week". Culture Culture and religion have usually been seen as closely related. Paul Tillich looked at religion as the soul of culture and culture as the form or framework of religion. In his own words: Religion as ultimate concern is the meaning-giving substance of culture, and culture is the totality of forms in which the basic concern of religion expresses itself. In abbreviation: religion is the substance of culture, culture is the form of religion. Such a consideration definitely prevents the establishment of a dualism of religion and culture. Every religious act, not only in organized religion, but also in the most intimate movement of the soul, is culturally formed. Ernst Troeltsch, similarly, looked at culture as the soil of religion and thought that, therefore, transplanting a religion from its original culture to a foreign culture would actually kill it in the same manner that transplanting a plant from its natural soil to an alien soil would kill it. However, there have been many attempts in the modern pluralistic situation to distinguish culture from religion. Domenic Marbaniang has argued that elements grounded on beliefs of a metaphysical nature (religious) are distinct from elements grounded on nature and the natural (cultural). For instance, language (with its grammar) is a cultural element while sacralization of language in which a particular religious scripture is written is more often a religious practice. The same applies to music and the arts. Criticism Criticism of religion is criticism of the ideas, the truth, or the practice of religion, including its political and social implications. See also Cosmogony Cult Index of religion-related articles Life stance List of foods with religious symbolism List of religion-related awards List of religious texts Matriarchal religion Museum of the History of Religion Nontheistic religions Outline of religion Priest Religion and happiness Religious conversion Religious discrimination Social conditioning Socialization Theocracy Theology of religions Why there is anything at all Notes References Sources Primary Lao Tzu; Tao Te Ching (Victor H. Mair translator); Bantam (1998). The Holy Bible, King James Version; New American Library (1974). The Koran; Penguin (2000), . The Origin of Live & Death, African Creation Myths; Heinemann (1966). Poems of Heaven and Hell from Ancient Mesopotamia; Penguin (1971). Selected Work Marcus Tullius Cicero Secondary Yves Coppens, Origines de l'homme – De la matière à la conscience, De Vive Voix, Paris, 2010 Yves Coppens, La preistoria dell'uomo, Jaca Book, Milano, 2011 Descartes, René; Meditations on First Philosophy; Bobbs-Merrill (1960), . Dow, James W. (2007), A Scientific Definition of Religion Durant, Will (& Ariel (uncredited)); Our Oriental Heritage; MJF Books (1997), . Durant, Will (& Ariel (uncredited)); Caesar and Christ; MJF Books (1994), Durant, Will (& Ariel (uncredited)); The Age of Faith; Simon & Schuster (1980), . 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) , vol. II (1994) , W.W. Norton, vol. III (2002) . Haisch, Bernard The God Theory: Universes, Zero-point Fields, and What's Behind It All—discussion of science vs. religion (Preface), Red Wheel/Weiser, 2006, Khanbaghi, A., 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. King, Winston, Religion [First Edition]. In: Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Lindsay Jones. Vol. 11. 2nd ed. Detroit: Macmillan Reference US, 2005. pp. 7692–7701. Korotayev, Andrey, World Religions and Social Evolution of the Old World Oikumene Civilizations: A Cross-cultural Perspective, Lewiston, New York: Edwin Mellen Press, 2004, . McKinnon, Andrew M. (2002), "Sociological Definitions, Language Games and the 'Essence' of Religion" . Method & theory in the study of religion, vol 14, no. 1, pp. 61–83. Palmer, Spencer J., et al. Religions of the World: a Latter-day Saint [Mormon] View. 2nd general ed., tev. and enl. Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University, 1997. xv, 294 p., ill. Ramsay, Michael, Abp. Beyond Religion? Cincinnati, Ohio: Forward Movement Publications, (cop. 1964). Saler, Benson; Conceptualizing Religion: Immanent Anthropologists, Transcendent Natives, and Unbounded Categories (1990), Schuon, Frithjof. The Transcendent Unity of Religions, in series, Quest Books. 2nd Quest ... rev. ed. Wheaton, Ill.: Theosophical Publishing House, 1993, cop. 1984. xxxiv, 173 p. Wallace, Anthony F.C. 1966. Religion: An Anthropological View. New York: Random House. (pp. 62–66) The World Almanac (annual), World Almanac Books, . The World Almanac (for numbers of adherents of various religions), 2005 Further reading Encyclopedias Monographs Barzilai, Gad (2007). Law and Religion; The International Library of Essays in Law and Society; Ashgate. Inglehart, Ronald F., "Giving Up on God: The Global Decline of Religion", Foreign Affairs, vol. 99, no. 5 (September / October 2020), pp. 110–118. Lang, Andrew (1909). The Making of Religion. 3rd ed. Longmans, Green, and Co. Marx, Karl (1844). "Introduction to A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right", Deutsch-Französische Jahrbücher. Noss, John B. (1980). Man's Religions, 6th ed.; New York: Macmillan. N.B.: The first ed. appeared in 1949, . . External links Religion Statistics from UCB Libraries GovPubs by Adherents.com August 2005 IACSR – International Association for the Cognitive Science of Religion Studying Religion – Introduction to the methods and scholars of the academic study of religion A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right – Marx's original reference to religion as the opium of the people. The Complexity of Religion and the Definition of "Religion" in International Law – Harvard Human Rights Journal article from the President and Fellows of Harvard College (2003) Sociology of Religion Resources Video: 5 Religions spreading across the world Main topic articles

Theology

Theology is the study of religious belief from a religious perspective, with a focus on the nature of divinity. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the supernatural, but also deals with religious epistemology, asks and seeks to answer the question of revelation. Revelation pertains to the acceptance of God, gods, or deities, as not only transcendent or above the natural world, but also willing and able to interact with the natural world and to reveal themselves to humankind. Theologians use various forms of analysis and argument (experiential, philosophical, ethnographic, historical, and others) to help understand, explain, test, critique, defend or promote any myriad of religious topics. As in philosophy of ethics and case law, arguments often assume the existence of previously resolved questions, and develop by making analogies from them to draw new inferences in new situations. The study of theology may help a theologian more deeply understand their own religious tradition, another religious tradition, or it may enable them to explore the nature of divinity without reference to any specific tradition. Theology may be used to propagate, reform, or justify a religious tradition; or it may be used to compare, challenge (e.g. biblical criticism), or oppose (e.g. irreligion) a religious tradition or worldview. Theology might also help a theologian address some present situation or need through a religious tradition, or to explore possible ways of interpreting the world. Etymology The term "theology" derives from the Greek theologia (θεολογία), a combination of theos (Θεός, 'god') and logia (λογία, 'utterances, sayings, oracles')—the latter word relating to Greek logos (λόγος, 'word, discourse, account, reasoning'). The term would pass on to Latin as , then French as , eventually becoming the English theology. Through several variants (e.g., theologie, teologye), the English theology had evolved into its current form by 1362. The sense that the word has in English depends in large part on the sense that the Latin and Greek equivalents had acquired in patristic and medieval Christian usage although the English term has now spread beyond Christian contexts. Classical philosophy Greek theologia (θεολογία) was used with the meaning 'discourse on God' around 380 BC by Plato in The Republic. Aristotle divided theoretical philosophy into mathematike, physike, and theologike, with the latter corresponding roughly to metaphysics, which, for Aristotle, included discourse on the nature of the divine. Drawing on Greek Stoic sources, the Latin writer Varro distinguished three forms of such discourse: mythical, concerning the myths of the Greek gods; rational, philosophical analysis of the gods and of cosmology; and civil, concerning the rites and duties of public religious observance. Later usage Some Latin Christian authors, such as Tertullian and Augustine, followed Varro's threefold usage. However, Augustine also defined theologia as "reasoning or discussion concerning the Deity". The Latin author Boethius, writing in the early 6th century, used theologia to denote a subdivision of philosophy as a subject of academic study, dealing with the motionless, incorporeal reality; as opposed to physica, which deals with corporeal, moving realities. Boethius' definition influenced medieval Latin usage. In patristic Greek Christian sources, theologia could refer narrowly to devout and/or inspired knowledge of and teaching about the essential nature of God. In scholastic Latin sources, the term came to denote the rational study of the doctrines of the Christian religion, or (more precisely) the academic discipline that investigated the coherence and implications of the language and claims of the Bible and of the theological tradition (the latter often as represented in Peter Lombard's Sentences, a book of extracts from the Church Fathers). In the Renaissance, especially with Florentine Platonist apologists of Dante's poetics, the distinction between 'poetic theology' (theologia poetica) and 'revealed' or Biblical theology serves as stepping stone for a revival of philosophy as independent of theological authority. It is in the last sense, theology as an academic discipline involving rational study of Christian teaching, that the term passed into English in the 14th century, although it could also be used in the narrower sense found in Boethius and the Greek patristic authors, to mean rational study of the essential nature of God, a discourse now sometimes called theology proper. From the 17th century onwards, the term theology began to be used to refer to the study of religious ideas and teachings that are not specifically Christian or correlated with Christianity (e.g., in the term natural theology, which denoted theology based on reasoning from natural facts independent of specifically Christian revelation) or that are specific to another religion (such as below). Theology can also be used in a derived sense to mean "a system of theoretical principles; an (impractical or rigid) ideology". In religion The term theology has been deemed by some as only appropriate to the study of religions that worship a supposed deity (a theos), i.e. more widely than monotheism; and presuppose a belief in the ability to speak and reason about this deity (in logia). They suggest the term is less appropriate in religious contexts that are organized differently (i.e., religions without a single deity, or that deny that such subjects can be studied logically). Hierology has been proposed, by such people as Eugène Goblet d'Alviella (1908), as an alternative, more generic term. Abrahamic religions Christianity As defined by Thomas Aquinas, theology is constituted by a triple aspect: what is taught by God, teaches of God, and leads to God. This indicates the three distinct areas of God as theophanic revelation, the systematic study of the nature of divine and, more generally, of religious belief, and the spiritual path. Christian theology as the study of Christian belief and practice concentrates primarily upon the texts of the Old Testament and the New Testament as well as on Christian tradition. Christian theologians use biblical exegesis, rational analysis and argument. Theology might be undertaken to help the theologian better understand Christian tenets, to make comparisons between Christianity and other traditions, to defend Christianity against objections and criticism, to facilitate reforms in the Christian church, to assist in the propagation of Christianity, to draw on the resources of the Christian tradition to address some present situation or need, or for a variety of other reasons. Islam Islamic theological discussion that parallels Christian theological discussion is called Kalam; the Islamic analogue of Christian theological discussion would more properly be the investigation and elaboration of Sharia or Fiqh. Some Universities in Germany established departments of islamic theology. (i.e.) Judaism In Jewish theology, the historical absence of political authority has meant that most theological reflection has happened within the context of the Jewish community and synagogue, including through rabbinical discussion of Jewish law and Midrash (rabbinic biblical commentaries). Jewish theology is also linked to ethics, as it is the case with theology in other religions, and therefore has implications for how one behaves. Indian religions Buddhism Some academic inquiries within Buddhism, dedicated to the investigation of a Buddhist understanding of the world, prefer the designation Buddhist philosophy to the term Buddhist theology, since Buddhism lacks the same conception of a theos or a Creator God. Jose Ignacio Cabezon, who argues that the use of theology is in fact appropriate, can only do so, he says, because "I take theology not to be restricted to discourse on God.... I take 'theology' not to be restricted to its etymological meaning. In that latter sense, Buddhism is of course atheological, rejecting as it does the notion of God." Whatever the case, there are various Buddhist theories and discussions on the nature of Buddhahood and the ultimate reality / highest form of divinity, which has been termed "buddhology" by some scholars like Louis de La Vallée-Poussin. This is a different usage of the term than when it is taken to mean the academic study of Buddhism, and here would refer to the study of the nature of what a Buddha is. In Mahayana Buddhism, a central concept in its buddhology is the doctrine of the three Buddha bodies (Sanskrit: Trikāya). This doctrine is shared by all Mahayana Buddhist traditions. Hinduism Within Hindu philosophy, there are numerous traditions of philosophical speculation on the nature of the universe, of God (termed Brahman, Paramatma, Ishvara, and/or Bhagavan in some schools of Hindu thought) and of the ātman (soul). The Sanskrit word for the various schools of Hindu philosophy is darśana ('view, viewpoint'), the most influential one in terms of modern Hindu religion is Vedanta and its various sub-schools, each of which presents a different theory of Ishvara (the Supreme lord, God). Vaishnava theology has been a subject of study for many devotees, philosophers and scholars in India for centuries. A large part of its study lies in classifying and organizing the manifestations of thousands of gods and their aspects. In recent decades the study of Hinduism has also been taken up by a number of academic institutions in Europe, such as the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies and Bhaktivedanta College. There are also other traditions of Hindu theology, including the various theologies of Shaivism (which include dualistic and non-dualistic strands) as well as the theologies of the Goddess centered Shakta traditions which posit a feminine deity as the ultimate. Other religions Shinto In Japan, the term theology has been ascribed to Shinto since the Edo period with the publication of Mano Tokitsuna's . In modern times, other terms are used to denote studies in Shinto—as well as Buddhist—belief, such as and . Modern Paganism English academic Graham Harvey has commented that Pagans "rarely indulge in theology". Nevertheless, theology has been applied in some sectors across contemporary Pagan communities, including Wicca, Heathenry, Druidry and Kemetism. As these religions have given precedence to orthopraxy, theological views often vary among adherents. The term is used by Christine Kraemer in her book Seeking The Mystery: An Introduction to Pagan Theologies and by Michael York in Pagan Theology: Paganism as a World Religion. Topics Richard Hooker defines theology as "the science of things divine". The term can, however, be used for a variety of disciplines or fields of study. Theology considers whether the divine exists in some form, such as in physical, supernatural, mental, or social realities, and what evidence for and about it may be found via personal spiritual experiences or historical records of such experiences as documented by others. The study of these assumptions is not part of theology proper, but is found in the philosophy of religion, and increasingly through the psychology of religion and neurotheology. Theology's aim, then, is to record, structure and understand these experiences and concepts; and to use them to derive normative prescriptions for how to live our lives. History of academic discipline The history of the study of theology in institutions of higher education is as old as the history of such institutions themselves. For instance: Taxila was an early centre of Vedic learning, possible from the 6th-century BC or earlier;Scharfe, Hartmut. 2002. Education in Ancient India. Leiden: Brill. the Platonic Academy founded in Athens in the 4th-century BC seems to have included theological themes in its subject matter; the Chinese Taixue delivered Confucian teaching from the 2nd century BC; the School of Nisibis was a centre of Christian learning from the 4th century AD; Nalanda in India was a site of Buddhist higher learning from at least the 5th or 6th century AD; and the Moroccan University of Al-Karaouine was a centre of Islamic learning from the 10th century, as was Al-Azhar University in Cairo. The earliest universities were developed under the aegis of the Latin Church by papal bull as studia generalia and perhaps from cathedral schools. It is possible, however, that the development of cathedral schools into universities was quite rare, with the University of Paris being an exception. Later they were also founded by kings (University of Naples Federico II, Charles University in Prague, Jagiellonian University in Kraków) or by municipal administrations (University of Cologne, University of Erfurt). In the early medieval period, most new universities were founded from pre-existing schools, usually when these schools were deemed to have become primarily sites of higher education. Many historians state that universities and cathedral schools were a continuation of the interest in learning promoted by monasteries. Christian theological learning was, therefore, a component in these institutions, as was the study of church or canon law: universities played an important role in training people for ecclesiastical offices, in helping the church pursue the clarification and defence of its teaching, and in supporting the legal rights of the church over against secular rulers. At such universities, theological study was initially closely tied to the life of faith and of the church: it fed, and was fed by, practices of preaching, prayer and celebration of the Mass. During the High Middle Ages, theology was the ultimate subject at universities, being named "The Queen of the Sciences". It served as the capstone to the Trivium and Quadrivium that young men were expected to study. This meant that the other subjects (including philosophy) existed primarily to help with theological thought. In this context, medieval theology in the Christian West could subsume fields of study which would later become more self-sufficient, such as metaphysics (Aristotle's "first philosophy",Ontology - "In the 13th century, appropriating Aristotle's threefold division of the speculative sciences (physics, mathematics, and what Aquinas variously calls 'first philosophy' or 'metaphysics' or 'theology'), Aquinas argues that primary being and being in general are the subject of the same science (eadem enim est scientia primi entis et entis communis ) inasmuch as primary being (s) are principles of the others (nam prima entia sunt principia aliorum; cf. Aquinas' In Boeth. de Trin. 5.1, In 10 meta. 6 and 11, and the Proemium to the latter)." or ontology (the science of being).Ontology – "In the sixth book [of the Metaphysics] (1026a16–32), Aristotle refers to a first philosophy that is concerned with being as being, but in contrast to physics and mathematics, precisely as the speculative science of what is separate from matter and motion. First philosophy in this context is labeled 'theology' inasmuch as the divine would only be present in something of this nature, i.e., some immutable being (ousia akinetos)." Christian theology's preeminent place in the university started to come under challenge during the European Enlightenment, especially in Germany. Other subjects gained in independence and prestige, and questions were raised about the place of a discipline that seemed to involve a commitment to the authority of particular religious traditions in institutions that were increasingly understood to be devoted to independent reason. Since the early 19th century, various different approaches have emerged in the West to theology as an academic discipline. Much of the debate concerning theology's place in the university or within a general higher education curriculum centres on whether theology's methods are appropriately theoretical and (broadly speaking) scientific or, on the other hand, whether theology requires a pre-commitment of faith by its practitioners, and whether such a commitment conflicts with academic freedom.Frei, Hans W. 1992. Types of Christian Theology, edited by W. C. Placher and G. Hunsinger. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.McClendon, James W. 2000. "Theology and the University." Ch. 10 in Systematic Theology 3: Witness. Nashville, TN: Abingdon. Ministerial training In some contexts, theology has been held to belong in institutions of higher education primarily as a form of professional training for Christian ministry. This was the basis on which Friedrich Schleiermacher, a liberal theologian, argued for the inclusion of theology in the new University of Berlin in 1810. For instance, in Germany, theological faculties at state universities are typically tied to particular denominations, Protestant or Roman Catholic, and those faculties will offer denominationally-bound (konfessionsgebunden) degrees, and have denominationally bound public posts amongst their faculty; as well as contributing "to the development and growth of Christian knowledge" they "provide the academic training for the future clergy and teachers of religious instruction at German schools." In the United States, several prominent colleges and universities were started in order to train Christian ministers. Harvard, Georgetown, Boston University, Yale, Duke University, and Princeton all had the theological training of clergy as a primary purpose at their foundation. Seminaries and bible colleges have continued this alliance between the academic study of theology and training for Christian ministry. There are, for instance, numerous prominent examples in the United States, including Phoenix Seminary, Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, The Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, Criswell College in Dallas, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois, Dallas Theological Seminary, North Texas Collegiate Institute in Farmers Branch, Texas, and the Assemblies of God Theological Seminary in Springfield, Missouri. The only Judeo-Christian seminary for theology is the 'Idaho Messianic Bible Seminary' which is part of the Jewish University of Colorado in Denver. As an academic discipline in its own right In some contexts, scholars pursue theology as an academic discipline without formal affiliation to any particular church (though members of staff may well have affiliations to churches), and without focussing on ministerial training. This applies, for instance, to the Department of Theological Studies at Concordia University in Canada, and to many university departments in the United Kingdom, including the Faculty of Divinity at the University of Cambridge, the Department of Theology and Religion at the University of Exeter, and the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of Leeds. Traditional academic prizes, such as the University of Aberdeen's Lumsden and Sachs Fellowship, tend to acknowledge performance in theology (or divinity as it is known at Aberdeen) and in religious studies. Religious studies In some contemporary contexts, a distinction is made between theology, which is seen as involving some level of commitment to the claims of the religious tradition being studied, and religious studies, which by contrast is normally seen as requiring that the question of the truth or falsehood of the religious traditions studied be kept outside its field. Religious studies involves the study of historical or contemporary practices or of those traditions' ideas using intellectual tools and frameworks that are not themselves specifically tied to any religious tradition and that are normally understood to be neutral or secular. In contexts where 'religious studies' in this sense is the focus, the primary forms of study are likely to include: Anthropology of religion Comparative religion History of religions Philosophy of religion Psychology of religion Sociology of religion Sometimes, theology and religious studies are seen as being in tension, and at other times, they are held to coexist without serious tension. Occasionally it is denied that there is as clear a boundary between them. Criticism Pre-20th century Whether or not reasoned discussion about the divine is possible has long been a point of contention. Protagoras, as early as the fifth century BC, who is reputed to have been exiled from Athens because of his agnosticism about the existence of the gods, said that "Concerning the gods I cannot know either that they exist or that they do not exist, or what form they might have, for there is much to prevent one's knowing: the obscurity of the subject and the shortness of man's life."Poster, Carol. "Protagoras (fl. 5th C. BCE) ." Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved 6 October 2008. Since at least the eighteenth century, various authors have criticized the suitability of theology as an academic discipline. In 1772, Baron d'Holbach labeled theology "a continual insult to human reason" in Le Bon sens. Lord Bolingbroke, an English politician and political philosopher, wrote in Section IV of his Essays on Human Knowledge, "Theology is in fault not religion. Theology is a science that may justly be compared to the Box of Pandora. Many good things lie uppermost in it; but many evil lie under them, and scatter plagues and desolation throughout the world." Thomas Paine, a Deistic American political theorist and pamphleteer, wrote in his three-part work The Age of Reason (1794, 1795, 1807):The study of theology, as it stands in Christian churches, is the study of nothing; it is founded on nothing; it rests on no principles; it proceeds by no authorities; it has no data; it can demonstrate nothing; and it admits of no conclusion. Not anything can be studied as a science, without our being in possession of the principles upon which it is founded; and as this is the case with Christian theology, it is therefore the study of nothing.The German atheist philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach sought to dissolve theology in his work Principles of the Philosophy of the Future: "The task of the modern era was the realization and humanization of God – the transformation and dissolution of theology into anthropology." This mirrored his earlier work The Essence of Christianity (1841), for which he was banned from teaching in Germany, in which he had said that theology was a "web of contradictions and delusions". The American satirist Mark Twain remarked in his essay "The Lowest Animal", originally written in around 1896, but not published until after Twain's death in 1910, that:[Man] is the only animal that loves his neighbor as himself and cuts his throat if his theology isn't straight. He has made a graveyard of the globe in trying his honest best to smooth his brother's path to happiness and heaven.... The higher animals have no religion. And we are told that they are going to be left out in the Hereafter. I wonder why? It seems questionable taste. 20th and 21st centuries A. J. Ayer, a British former logical-positivist, sought to show in his essay "Critique of Ethics and Theology" that all statements about the divine are nonsensical and any divine-attribute is unprovable. He wrote: "It is now generally admitted, at any rate by philosophers, that the existence of a being having the attributes which define the god of any non-animistic religion cannot be demonstratively proved.... [A]ll utterances about the nature of God are nonsensical." Jewish atheist philosopher Walter Kaufmann, in his essay "Against Theology", sought to differentiate theology from religion in general:Theology, of course, is not religion; and a great deal of religion is emphatically anti-theological.... An attack on theology, therefore, should not be taken as necessarily involving an attack on religion. Religion can be, and often has been, untheological or even anti-theological. However, Kaufmann found that "Christianity is inescapably a theological religion." English atheist Charles Bradlaugh believed theology prevented human beings from achieving liberty, although he also noted that many theologians of his time held that, because modern scientific research sometimes contradicts sacred scriptures, the scriptures must therefore be wrong. Robert G. Ingersoll, an American agnostic lawyer, stated that, when theologians had power, the majority of people lived in hovels, while a privileged few had palaces and cathedrals. In Ingersoll's opinion, it was science that improved people's lives, not theology. Ingersoll further maintained that trained theologians reason no better than a person who assumes the devil must exist because pictures resemble the devil so exactly. The British evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins has been an outspoken critic of theology. In an article published in The Independent in 1993, he severely criticizes theology as entirely useless, declaring that it has completely and repeatedly failed to answer any questions about the nature of reality or the human condition. He states, "I have never heard any of them [i.e. theologians] ever say anything of the smallest use, anything that was not either platitudinously obvious or downright false." He then states that, if all theology were completely eradicated from the earth, no one would notice or even care. He concludes:The achievements of theologians don't do anything, don't affect anything, don't achieve anything, don't even mean anything. What makes you think that 'theology' is a subject at all? See also Thealogy References External links "Theology" on Encyclopædia Britannica'' Chattopadhyay, Subhasis. "Reflections on Hindu Theology" in Prabuddha Bharata or Awakened India 120(12): 664–672 (2014). . Edited by Swami Narasimhananda.

Religion and sexuality

The views of the various different religions and religious believers regarding human sexuality range widely among and within them, from giving sex and sexuality a rather negative connotation to believing that sex is the highest expression of the divine. Some religions distinguish between human sexual activities that are practised for biological reproduction (sometimes allowed only when in formal marital status and at a certain age) and those practised only for sexual pleasure in evaluating relative morality. Overview Sexual morality has varied greatly over time and between cultures. A society's sexual norms—standards of sexual conduct—can be linked to religious beliefs, or social and environmental conditions, or all of these. Sexuality and reproduction are fundamental elements in human interaction and societies worldwide. Furthermore, "sexual restriction" is one of the universals of culture peculiar to all human societies. Accordingly, most religions have seen a need to address the question of a "proper" role for sexuality. Religions have differing codes of sexual morality, which regulate sexual activity or assign normative values to certain sexually charged actions or ideas. Each major religion has developed a moral code covering issues of human sexuality, morality, ethics, etc. These moral codes seek to regulate the situations that can give rise to sexual interest and to influence people's sexual activities and practices. Abrahamic religions Abrahamic religions (namely Judaism, Samaritanism, Christianity, the Baháʼí Faith, and Islam) have traditionally affirmed and endorsed a patriarchal and heteronormative approach towards human sexuality. Catholicism in particular favours exclusively penetrative vaginal intercourse between men and women within the boundaries of marriage over all other forms of human sexual activity, including autoeroticism, masturbation, anal sex, oral sex, non-penetrative and non-heterosexual sexual intercourse (all of which have been labeled as "sodomy" at various times), believing and teaching that such behaviors are forbidden because they're considered sinful, and further compared to or derived from the alleged behavior of the residents of Sodom and Gomorrah. However, the status of LGBT people in early Christianity and early Islam is debated. Baháʼí Faith In the Baháʼí Faith, sexual relationships are permitted only between a husband and wife. Bahá'u'lláh, the founder of the Baháʼí Faith, forbids extramarital sexual intercourse in his book of laws; the Kitáb-i-Aqdas. He developed the belief that all humans are spiritual individuals that help develop and further the advancement of society physically and spiritually. The Baháʼí consideration of sex is that chastity should be practiced by both sexes before marriage because it is commendable ethically and leads to a happy and successful marital life. The Baháʼí Faith recognizes the value of the sex impulse, but judges that its proper expression is within the institution of marriage: Baháʼís do not believe in suppression of the sex impulse but in its regulation and control. Christianity The Old Testament and Christianity have historically affirmed and endorsed a patriarchal and heteronormative approach towards human sexuality, favouring exclusively penetrative vaginal intercourse between men and women within the boundaries of marriage over all other forms of human sexual activity, including autoeroticism, masturbation, anal sex, oral sex, non-penetrative and non-heterosexual sexual intercourse (all of which have been labeled as "sodomy" at various times), believing and teaching that such behaviors are forbidden because they're considered sinful, and further compared to or derived from the behavior of the alleged residents of Sodom and Gomorrah. In the New Testament, Jesus discussed little about sex, and most of the information about sex comes from the Old Testament and Paul's writings, and some are controversial today. Sexuality carried out between different sexes, between 2 people (Monogamy, although polygamy is not forbidden) and in particular procreation, is generally understood as the ideal state. There is conjugal love through Song of Songs in which it is about eroticism and romance. New Testament Paul the Apostle stated in 1 Corinthians "To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is well for them to remain unmarried as I am. But if they are not practising self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to be aflame with passion." Importantly, Paul's view of sex is also that it is actually unnecessary for those with certain gifts (presumably "celibacy"). Jennifer Wright Knust says Paul framed desire a force Christians gained control over whereas non-Christians were "enslaved" by it. Further, Paul says the bodies of Christians were members of Christ's body and thus sexual desire must be eschewed. New Testament scholar N. T. Wright asserts that Paul absolutely forbade fornication, irrespective of a new Christian's former cultural practices. Wright notes "If a Corinthian were to say, 'Because I'm a Corinthian, I have always had a string of girl-friends I sleep with, that's part of our culture,' Paul would respond, 'Not now you're a Christian you don't.'... When someone disagreed with Paul's clear rules on immorality or angry disputes, the matters he deals with in Colossians 3.5–10, he is... firm, as we see dramatically in 1 Corinthians 5 and 6. There is no place in the Christian fellowship for such practices and for such a person." Some have suggested that Paul's treatment of sex was influenced by his conviction that the end of the world was imminent. Under this view, Paul, believing that the world would soon end, took it as a corollary that all earthly concerns, including sex, should hold little interest for Christians. Paul's letters show far greater concern with sexual issues than the gospel writers attributed to Jesus, since Paul was building Christian communities over decades and responding to various issues that arose. The theologian Lee Gatiss states that "the word 'fornication' has gone out of fashion and is not in common use to describe non-marital sex. However, it is an excellent translation for [the Biblical term] , which basically referred to any kind of sex outside of marriage... This has been contested... but the overwhelming weight of scholarship and all the available evidence from the ancient world points firmly in this direction. 'Flee sexual immorality and pursue self-control' (cf. 1 Thess 4:1–8) was the straightforward message to Christians in a sex-crazed world." Early Christianity In early Christianity, reflection on scriptural texts introduced an eschatological hermeneutic to the reading of the Book of Genesis. The Garden of Eden was seen as a normative ideal state to which Christians were to strive; writers linked the future enjoyment of Heaven to the original blessedness of Adam and Eve in their reflections. The valuation of virginity in the ancient church brought into relief a tension between the Genesis injunction to "be fruitful and multiply" with its understood contextual implication of marriage as a social institution, and the interpretation of the superiority of virginity over marriage, sexual activity and family formation from the Gospel texts Matt 19:11-12, Matt 19:29. One way patristic thinkers tried to harmonize the texts was through the position that there had actually been no sexual intercourse in Eden: on this reading, sex happened after the fall of man and the expulsion from Eden, thus preserving virginity as the perfect state both in the historical Paradise and the anticipated Heaven. John Chrysostom, Gregory of Nyssa, Justin Martyr, Epiphanius of Salamis, and Irenaeus of Lyons all espoused this view: Gregory of Nyssa, On Virginity, 12 "He did not yet judge of what was lovely by taste or sight; he found in the Lord alone all that was sweet; and he used the helpmeet given him only for this delight, as Scripture signifies when it said that 'he knew her not' till he was driven forth from the garden, and till she, for the sin which she was decoyed into committing, was sentenced to the pangs of childbirth. We, then, who in our first ancestor were thus ejected, are allowed to return to our earliest state of blessedness by the very same stages by which we lost Paradise. What are they? Pleasure, craftily offered, began the Fall, and there followed after pleasure shame, and fear, even to remain longer in the sight of their Creator, so that they hid themselves in leaves and shade; and after that they covered themselves with the skins of dead animals; and then were sent forth into this pestilential and exacting land where, as the compensation for having to die, marriage was instituted". John Chrysostom, On Virginity, 14.3 "When the whole world had been completed and all had been readied for our repose and use, God fashioned man for whom he made the world... Man did need a helper, and she came into being; not even then did marriage seem necessary... Desire for sexual intercourse, conception, labor, childbirth, and every form of corruption had been banished from their souls. As a clear river shooting forth from a pure source, so they were in that place adorned by virginity." 15.2 "Why did marriage not appear before the treachery? Why was there no intercourse in paradise? Why not the pains of childbirth before the curse? Because at that time these things were superfluous." Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book 3, ch 22:4 "But Eve was disobedient; for she did not obey when as yet she was a virgin. And even as she, having indeed a husband, Adam, but being nevertheless as yet a virgin (for in Paradise they were both naked, and were not ashamed, inasmuch as they, having been created a short time previously, had no understanding of the procreation of children: for it was necessary that they should first come to adult age, and then multiply from that time onward), having become disobedient, was made the cause of death, both to herself and to the entire human race..." Epiphanius of Salamis, Panarion, 78.17–19 "And as in paradise Eve, still a virgin, fell into the sin of disobedience, once more through the Virgin [Mary] came the obedience of grace." Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, ch 100 "For Eve, who was a virgin and undefiled, having conceived the word of the serpent, brought forth disobedience and death. But the Virgin Mary received faith and joy, when the angel Gabriel announced the good tidings to her..." Prof. John Noonan suggests that "if one asks... where the Christian Fathers derived their notions on marital intercourse – notions which have no express biblical basis – the answer must be, chiefly from the Stoics". He uses texts from Musonius Rufus, Seneca the Younger, and Ocellus Lucanus, tracing works of Clement of Alexandria, Origen and Jerome to the works of these earlier thinkers, particularly as pertaining to the permissible use of the sexual act, which in the Stoic model must be subdued, dispassionate, and justified by its procreative intent. Augustine of Hippo had a different challenge: to respond to the errors of Manichaeism. The Manichees, according to Augustine, were "opposed to marriage, because they are opposed to procreation which is the purpose of marriage". "The method of contraception practised by these Manichees whom Augustine knew is the use of the sterile period as determined by Greek medicine", which Augustine condemns (this stands in contrast to the contemporarily permitted Catholic use of Natural family planning). Elaine Pagels says, "By the beginning of the fifth century, Augustine had actually declared that spontaneous sexual desire is the proof of—and penalty for—universal original sin", though that this view goes against "most of his Christian predecessors". As monastic communities developed, the sexual lives of monks came under scrutiny from two theologians, John Cassian and Caesarius of Arles, who commented on the "vices" of the solitary life. "Their concerns were not with the act of masturbation, but with the monks who vowed chastity. The monks' vow made masturbation an illicit act; the act itself was not considered sinful... In fact... prior to Cassian, masturbation was not considered a sexual offence for anyone." Catholicism From the beginning of the thirteenth century, the Catholic Church formally recognized marriage between a freely consenting, baptized man and woman as a sacrament – an outward sign communicating a special gift of God's love. The Council of Florence in 1438 gave this definition, following earlier church statements in 1208, and declared that sexual union was a special participation in the union of Christ in the church. However the Puritans, while highly valuing the institution, viewed marriage as a "civil", rather than a "religious" matter, being "under the jurisdiction of the civil courts". This is because they found no biblical precedent for clergy performing marriage ceremonies. Further, marriage was said to be for the "relief of concupiscence" as well as any spiritual purpose. The Catholic moral theologian Charles E. Curran stated "the fathers of the Church are practically silent on the simple question of masturbation". The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that "the flesh is the hinge of salvation". The Catechism indicates that sexual relationships in marriage is "a way of imitating in the flesh the Creator's generosity and fecundity" and lists fornication as one of the "offenses against chastity", calling it "an intrinsically and gravely disordered action" because "use of the sexual faculty, for whatever reason, outside of marriage is essentially contrary to its purpose". The "conjugal act" aims "at a deeply personal unity, a unity that, beyond union in one flesh, leads to forming one heart and soul" since the marriage bond is to be a sign of the love between God and humanity. Pope John Paul II's first major teaching was on the theology of the body, presented in a series of lectures by the same name. Over the course of five years he elucidated a vision of sex that was not only positive and affirming but was about redemption, not condemnation. He taught that by understanding God's plan for physical love we could understand "the meaning of the whole of existence, the meaning of life." He taught that human beings were created by a loving God for a purpose: to be loving persons who freely choose to love, to give themselves as persons who express their self-giving through their bodies. Thus, sexual intercourse between husband and wife is a symbol of their total mutual self-donation. For John Paul II, "The body, and it alone, is capable of making visible what is invisible: the spiritual and divine." He says there is no other more perfect image of the unity and communion of God in mutual love than the sexual act of a married couple, whereby they give themselves in a total way – exclusively to one another, and up to the end of their lives, and in a fruitfully generous way by participating in the creation of new human beings. Through this perspective, he understands the immorality of extra-marital sex. It falsifies the language of the human body, a language of total love worthy of persons by using the body for selfish ends, thus treating persons as things and objects, rather than dealing with embodied persons with the reverence and love that incarnate spirits deserve. John Paul II stresses that there is great beauty in sexual love when done in harmony with the human values of freely chosen total commitment and self-giving. For him, this sexual love is a form of worship, an experience of the sacred. Roman Catholics believe that masturbation is a sin. In September 2015, the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, responsible for enforcing Catholic doctrine, did not permit a transgender man in Spain to serve as a godfather effectively barring transgender Catholics from serving as a baptismal sponsors. The statement concluded: "[...] the result is evident that this person does not possess the requisite of leading a life conformed to the faith and to the position of godfather (CIC, can 874 §1,3), therefore is not able to be admitted to the position of godmother nor godfather. One should not see this as discrimination, but only the recognition of an objective absence of the requisites that by their nature are necessary to assume the ecclesial responsibility of being a godparent." Protestantism Views over sexuality in Protestant churches differ. Conservative evangelical Protestant churches Some Protestants assert that any and all sex outside of marriage, including that conducted between committed, engaged or cohabiting couples, is the sin of fornication. Unlike Roman Catholics, Protestants do not disapprove of masturbation due to the lack of a Biblical injunction against the act. Mainstream and conservative Protestants agree masturbation is not a sin, although there are various restrictions, such as making sure it does not lead to use of pornography or looking lustfully at people or mutual masturbation or addiction to the act. It must also not be undertaken in a spirit of defiance against God. Lutheran, Reformed, and United churches All 20 Lutheran, Reformed, and United churches of the Evangelical Church in Germany welcome LGBT members, as well as the Protestant Church in the Netherlands. In these Lutheran, United, and Reformed churches gay ministers are permitted in ministry and gay married couples are allowed in their churches. More recently, the United Methodist Church has seen somewhat of a divide over the subject of human sexuality. The 2019 General Conference Special Session met, hoping to resolve the ongoing division regarding the homosexual community. This topic was first debated at a General Conference in 1972, resulting in a statement that the church "does not condone the practice of homosexuality and considers this practice incompatible with Christian teaching." While the church still believes that church-goers should not "reject or condemn" those in the LGBTQ community, their statement still remains and additionally restricts their pastors from being "self-avowed, practicing homosexuals." With uncertainty about what the Church will look like in the future, calls for individual churches to separate from the United Methodist denomination have increased. The COVID-19 pandemic moved the original 2020 General Conference to 2024, when those present plan to address the possibility of altering the existing policies. Inside the Lutheran Church of Sweden, the Bishop of Stockholm, Eva Brunne is a lesbian in a registered partnership with Gunilla Lindén, who is also an ordained priest of the Church of Sweden. Anglicanism The Anglican Church upholds human sexuality as a gift from a loving God, designed to be between a man and a woman in a monogamous, lifetime union of marriage. It also recognises singleness and dedicated celibacy as Christ-like. It reassures people with same-sex attraction they are loved by God, and are welcomed as full members of the Body of Christ. The church leadership has a variety of views in regard to homosexual expression and ordination. Some expressions of sexuality are considered sinful, including "promiscuity, prostitution, incest, pornography, paedophilia, predatory sexual behaviour, and sadomasochism (all of which may be heterosexual and homosexual), adultery, violence against wives, and female circumcision." The church is concerned with pressures on young people to engage sexually and encourages abstinence. In the Anglican Church, there is a large discussion over the blessing of gay couples, and over tolerance of homosexuality. The discussion is more about the aspect of love between two people of the same-sex in a relationship than it is about the sexual aspect of a relationship. Metropolitan Community Church The Metropolitan Community Church, also known as the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches, has a specific outreach to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender families and communities. Latter Day Saints movement Within the many branches of the Latter Day Saints movement, the principal denomination, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), teaches conservative views around sexual ethics in their Law of Chastity, which holds that masturbation, pre- and extra-marital sex, and same-sex sexual activity are sins. In the mid-1800s, however, it was allowed for men to be married to and have children with several women, and this was also discontinued in the late 1800s. On various occasions, LDS Church leaders have taught that members should not masturbate as part of obedience to the LDS law of chastity. The LDS Church believes that sex outside of opposite-sex marriage is sinful, and that any same-sex sexual activity is a serious sin. God is believed to be in a heterosexual marriage with the Heavenly Mother, and Mormons believe that opposite-sex marriage is what God wants for all his children. Top LDS Church leaders formerly taught that attractions to those of the same sex were a sin or disease that could be changed or fixed, but now have no stance on the etiology of homosexuality, and teach that therapy focused on changing sexual orientation is unethical. Lesbian, gay, and bisexual members are, thus, left with the option of attempting to change their sexual orientation, entering a mixed-orientation opposite-sex marriage, or living a celibate lifestyle without any sexual expression (including masturbation). The LDS Church teaches that women's principal role is to raise children. Women who rejected this role as being a domestic woman in the home, were seen as unstable and corrupted. Before 1890, the Mormon leaders taught that polygamy was a way to salvation, and many had multiple wives into the early 1900s, and some women practiced polyandry. The Mormon religion teaches that marriage should be with a man and a woman. The LDS Church teaches its members to obey the law of chastity, which says that "sexual relations are proper only between a man and a woman who are legally and lawfully wedded as husband and wife." Violations of this code include: "adultery, being without natural affection, lustfulness, infidelity, incontinence, filthy communications, impurity, inordinate affection, fornication." The traditional Mormon religion forbids all homosexual behavior, whether it be intra-marriage or extramarital. In Romans 1:24-32, Paul preached to the Romans that homosexual behavior was sinful. In Leviticus 20:13, Moses included in his law that homosexual actions and behaviors were against God's will. In the 1830s, LDS founder, Joseph Smith, instituted the private practice on polygamy. The practice was defended by the church as a matter of religious freedom. In 1890, the church practice was terminated. Since the termination of polygamy, Mormons have solely believed in marriage between two people, and those two people being a man and a woman. The LDS community states that they still love homosexuals as sons and daughters of the Lord, but if they act upon their inclinations, then they are subject to discipline of the church. Unitarian Universalism Several Unitarian Universalist congregations have undertaken a series of organizational, procedural, and practical steps to become acknowledged as a "Welcoming Congregation": a congregation which has taken specific steps to welcome and integrate gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) members. UU ministers perform same-sex unions and now same-sex marriages where legal (and sometimes when not, as a form of civil protest). On June 29, 1984, the Unitarian Universalists became the first major church "to approve religious blessings on homosexual unions." Unitarian Universalists have been in the forefront of the work to make same-sex marriages legal in their local states and provinces, as well as on the national level. Gay men, bisexuals, and lesbians are also regularly ordained as ministers, and a number of gay, bisexual, and lesbian ministers have, themselves, now become legally married to their partners. In May 2004, Arlington Street Church was the site of the first state-sanctioned same-sex marriage in the United States. The official stance of the UUA is for the legalization of same-sex marriage—"Standing on the Side of Love." In 2004 UU Minister Rev. Debra Haffner of The Religious Institute on Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing published An Open Letter on Religious Leaders on Marriage Equality to affirm same-sex marriage from a multi-faith perspective. In December 2009, Washington, DC Mayor Adrian Fenty signed the bill to legalize same-sex marriage for the District of Columbia in All Souls Church, Unitarian (Washington, D.C.). Unitarian Universalists for Polyamory Awareness is a group within Unitarian Universalism whose vision is "for Unitarian Universalism to become the first poly-welcoming mainstream religious denomination." Islam Interfaith marriages are recognized between Muslims and Non-Muslim "People of the Book" (usually enumerated as Jews, Christians, and Sabians). According to the traditional interpretation of Islamic law (sharīʿa), a Muslim man is allowed to marry a Christian or Jewish woman but this ruling does not apply to women who belong to other Non-Muslim religious groups, whereas a Muslim woman is not allowed to marry a Non-Muslim man of any Non-Muslim religious group. In general, the Quran tells Muslim men not to marry Non-Muslim women, and it tells Muslim women not marry non-Muslim men, but it makes an allowance for Muslim men to marry women of the People of the Book (usually Jews, Christians, and Sabians). No such allowances are made for women. Some Muslim scholars discourage all interfaith marriages, citing cultural differences between Muslims and Non-Muslims. In some societies outside the traditional dar al-islam, interfaith marriages between Muslims and Non-Muslims are not uncommon, including marriages that contradict the historic Sunni understanding of ijmāʿ (the consensus of fuqāha) as to the bounds of legitimacy. The tradition of reformist and progressive Islam, however, permits marriage between Muslim women and Non-Muslim men; Islamic scholars opining this view include Khaleel Mohammed, Hassan Al-Turabi, among others. Despite Sunni Islam prohibiting Muslim women from marrying Non-Muslim men in interfaith marriages, interfaith marriages between Muslim women and Non-Muslim men take place at substantial rates, contravening the traditional Sunni understanding of ijmāʿ. The modern tradition of reformist and progressive Islam has also come to permit marriage between Muslim women and Non-Muslim men, with Islamic scholars opining this view including Khaleel Mohammed and Hassan Al-Turabi, among others. In the United States, about 10% of Muslim women are today married to Non-Muslim men. Attitudes toward LGBTQ+ people and their experiences in the Muslim world have been influenced by its religious, legal, social, political, and cultural history. The religious stigma and sexual taboo associated with homosexuality in Islamic societies can have profound effects for those Muslims who self-identify as LGBTQ+. Today, most LGBTQ-affirming Islamic organizations and individual congregations are primarily based in the Western world and South Asian countries; they usually identify themselves with the liberal and progressive movements within Islam. Homosexual acts are forbidden in traditional Islamic jurisprudence and are liable to different punishments, including flogging, stoning, and the death penalty, depending on the situation and legal school. However, homosexual relationships were generally tolerated in pre-modern Islamic societies, and historical records suggest that these laws were invoked infrequently, mainly in cases of rape or other "exceptionally blatant infringement on public morals". Public attitudes toward homosexuality in the Muslim world underwent a marked negative change starting from the 19th century through the global spread of Islamic fundamentalist movements such as Salafism and Wahhabism, and the influence of the sexual notions and restrictive norms prevalent in Europe at the time: a number of Muslim-majority countries have retained criminal penalties for homosexual acts enacted under European colonial rule. In recent times, extreme prejudice, discrimination, and violence against LGBT people persists, both socially and legally, in much of the Muslim world, exacerbated by increasingly socially conservative attitudes and the rise of Islamist movements in Muslim-majority countries. Judaism In the perspective of traditional Judaism, sex and reproduction are the holiest of acts one can do, the act through which one can imitate God, and in order to preserve its sanctity there are many boundaries and guidelines. Within the boundaries, there are virtually no outright strictures, and it is in fact obligatory. It prohibits sexual relations outside of heterosexual marriage, maintains biblical strictures on relations within marriage including observance of niddah, a prohibition on relations for a period including the menstrual period, and tzniut, requirements of modest dress and behavior. Traditional Judaism views the physical acts of adultery, incest, intentional waste of semen, the physical act of men having sex with men, and male masturbation as grave sins. Judaism permits relatively free divorce, with Orthodox Judaism and Conservative Judaism requiring a religious divorce ceremony for a divorce to be religiously recognized. Worldwide movements in Judaism considered more liberal have rejected Jewish law as binding but rather inspirational and allegorical, so adapted perspectives more consistent with general contemporary Western culture. Most of mainstream Judaism does not accept polyamory, although some people consider themselves Jewish and polyamorous. One prominent rabbi who does accept polyamory is Sharon Kleinbaum who was ordained in Reconstructionist Judaism which considers biblical Jewish law as not considered binding, but is treated as a valuable cultural remnant that should be upheld unless there is reason for the contrary. She is the senior rabbi at Congregation Beit Simchat Torah in New York which works independently of any major American Jewish denomination; R Kleinbaum says that polyamory is a choice that does not preclude a Jewishly observant, socially conscious life. Some polyamorous Jews also point to biblical patriarchs having multiple wives and concubines as evidence that polyamorous relationships can be sacred in Judaism. There is an email list dedicated to polyamorous Jews, called AhavaRaba, which roughly translates to "big love" in Hebrew. (Its name echoes the Ahava rabbah prayer expressing thanks for God's "abundant love".) Orthodox There are several levels to the observance of physical and personal modesty (tzniut), according to Orthodox Judaism, as derived from various sources in halakha. Observance of these rules varies from aspirational to mandatory to routine across the spectrum of Orthodox stricture and observance. Orthodox Judaism also maintains a strong prohibition on interfaith sexual relations and marriage. Orthodox Judaism, alone of all the Jewish denominations, retains relatively mild traditional disabilities on divorce, including a Biblical prohibition on a Kohen (priestly descendant of Aaron) marrying a divorcee or a woman who has engaged in certain types of sexual misconduct. An Orthodox bill of divorce is required for a divorce to be recognized. Conservative Conservative Judaism, consistent with its general view that halakha (Jewish law) is a binding guide to Jewish life but subject to periodic revision by the Rabbinate, has lifted a number of strictures observed by Orthodox Judaism. In particular, in December 2006, Conservative Judaism's Committee on Jewish Law and Standards adopted responsa presenting diametrically opposed views on the issue of homosexuality. It adopted an opinion restricting a prior prohibition on homosexual conduct to male-male anal sex only, which it declared to be the only Biblical prohibition, declaring all other prohibitions (e.g. male-male oral sex or lesbian sex) rabbinic, and lifting all rabbinic restrictions based on its interpretation of the Talmudic principle of Kevod HaBriyot ("human dignity"). While declining to develop a form of religious gay marriage, it permitted blessing lesbian and gay unions and ordaining openly lesbian and gay rabbis who agree not to engage in male-male anal sex. It is also a traditionalist opinion, upholding all traditional prohibitions on homosexual activity, also adopted as a majority opinion, The approach permits individual rabbis, congregations, and rabbinical schools to set their own policy on homosexual conduct. It reflects a profound change from a prior blanket prohibition on male homosexual practices. It acknowledges a sharp divergence of views on sexual matters within Conservative Judaism, such that there is no single Conservative Jewish approach to matters of sexuality. Conservative Judaism currently straddles the divide between liberal and traditional opinion on sexual matters within contemporary American society, permitting both views. Conservative Judaism has maintained on its books a variety of requirements and prohibitions, including a requirement that married women observe the family purity laws and a general prohibition on non-marital heterosexual conduct. The family purity laws require women to be recognized as tumah or niddah during their menstrual period. As a tumah, a woman is to wait 7 days for her menstrual cycle to end and then 7 "clean days" in order to enter the mikveh and begin sexual relations. During this time, it is forbidden to have any type of contact with the niddah, thus anything she touches is not to be touched and no physical contact is permitted. On the same day as the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards released its homosexuality responsa, it released multiple opinions on the subject of niddah including a responsum lifting certain traditional restrictions on husband-wife contact during the niddah period while maintaining a prohibition on sexual relations. The permissive responsum on homosexuality used the Conservative movement's approach to niddah as an analogy for construing the Biblical prohibition against male homosexual conduct narrowly and lifting restrictions it deemed Rabbinic in nature. The responsum indicated it would be making a practical analogy between an approach in which male homosexual couples would be on their honor to refrain from certain acts and its approach to niddah: The responsum enjoined young people not to be "promiscuous" and to prepare themselves for "traditional marriage" if possible, while not explicitly lifting or re-enforcing any express strictures on non-marital heterosexual conduct. Even before this responsum, strictures on pre-marital sex had been substantially ignored, even in official circles. For example, when the Jewish Theological Seminary of America proposed enforcing a policy against non-marital cohabitation by rabbinical students in the 1990s, protests by cohabiting rabbinical students resulted in a complete rescission of the policy. Conservative Judaism formally prohibits interfaith marriage and its standards currently indicate it will expel a rabbi who performs an interfaith marriage. It maintains a variety of formal strictures including a prohibition on making birth announcements in synagogue bulletins for children on non-Jewish mothers and accepting non-Jews as synagogue members. However, interfaith marriage is relatively widespread among the Conservative laity, and the Conservative movement has recently adapted a policy of being more welcoming of interfaith couples in the hopes of interesting their children in Judaism. Conservative Judaism, which was for much of the 20th century the largest Jewish denomination in the United States declined sharply in synagogue membership in the United States the 1990s, from 51% of synagogue memberships in 1990 to 33.1% in 2001, with most of the loss going to Orthodox Judaism and most of the rest to Reform. The fracturing in American society of opinion between increasingly liberal and increasingly traditionalist viewpoints on sexual and other issues, as well as the gap between official opinion and general lay practice vis-a-vis the more traditionalist and liberal denominations, may have contributed to the decline. Reform, Liberal, Reconstructionist, and Humanistic Reform Judaism, Humanistic Judaism, and Reconstructionist Judaism do not observe or require traditional sexuality rules and have welcomed non-married and homosexual couples and endorsed homosexual commitment ceremonies and marriages. Reform and Reconstructionist Judaism are more tolerant of interfaith partnerships and often explicitly welcome interfaith families at their synagogues and services. Reform and Liberal branches of Judaism do not currently perform religious (and therefore legally binding) marriage ceremonies for interfaith couples; however as of October 2020, Liberal Rabbis may bless an interfaith marriage under a chuppah at their discretion, provided the couple intend to keep a Jewish household. Humanistic Judaism permits interfaith marriage. Reform, Reconstructionist, and Humanistic Judaism also do not require a religious divorce ceremony separate from a civil divorce. It has been speculated that the more tolerant attitudes of Reform, Reconstructionist, and Humanistic Judaism towards both sexual diversity and interfaith marriage may have contributed to the rise in their popularity during the 1990s, from about 33% of affiliated households to 38%, passing Conservative Judaism as the largest Jewish denomination in the United States. Dharmic religions Buddhism The most common formulation of Buddhist ethics are the five precepts and the Noble Eightfold Path, which say that one should neither be attached to nor crave sensual pleasure. These precepts take the form of voluntary, personal undertakings, not divine mandate or instruction. Of the five precepts, the third vow is to refrain from sex with another's spouse, someone under age (namely, those protected by their parents or guardians), and those who have taken vows of religious celibacy. In Chinese Buddhism, the third vow is interpreted as refraining from sex outside marriage. Buddhist monks and nuns of most traditions are expected to refrain from all sexual activity and the Buddha is said to have admonished his followers to avoid unchastity "as if it were a pit of burning cinders." While laypersons may have sex within marriage, monastics are not to have any sexual conduct at all. Hinduism Religiously, Hindus begin life at the Brahmacharya or "student" stage, in which they are directed to chastely advance themselves educationally and spiritually to prepare themselves for a life of furthering their dharma (societal, occupational, parental, etc. duties) and karma (right earthly actions); only once they reach the Grihastya or "householder" stage can they seek kama (physical pleasure) and artha (worldly achievement, material prosperity) through marriage and their vocations, respectively. According to the Dharmasastras or the religious legal texts of Hinduism, marriage in Hinduism is an institution for reproduction and thus is naturally limited to heterosexual couples. Furthermore, sex outside of marriage is prohibited. The Manusmriti list eight types of marriage of which four are consensual and encouraged and four are non-consensual and discouraged. However, popular practices did not necessarily reflect religious teachings. The Kama Sutra (Discourse on Kāma) by Vatsayana, widely believed to be just a manual for sexual practices, offers an insight into the sexual mores, ethics and societal rules that were prevalent in ancient India. The erotic sculptures of Khajuraho also offer insight. Abhigyana Shakuntalam, a drama in Sanskrit by Kālidāsa, cited as one of the best examples of shringara rasa (romance, one of the nine rasas or emotions), talks of the love story of Dushyanta and Shakuntala. Sikhism A disciplined Sikh is expected to be in control of sexual desire at all times. Kaam, or excessive lust, is one of the five thieves, or vices, that interfere with one's spiritual journey. Normal and healthy amounts of sexuality and lust are not condemned nor considered kaam. East Asian religions Taoism In Chinese mythology, Jiutian Xuannü is the goddess of war, sex, and longevity. She is closely related to Sunü (素女), who is her divine sister. Both their names combined, as xuansu zhidao (玄素之道), signify the Daoist arts of the bedchamber. Most books bearing Jiutian Xuannü's name were about warfare, but there were a few books that were specifically about sex. The Xuannü Jing (玄女經, "Mysterious Woman Classic") and the Sunü Jing (素女經, "Natural Woman Classic"), both dating to the Han dynasty, were handbooks in dialogue form about sex. Texts from the Xuannü Jing have been partly incorporated into the Sui dynasty edition of the Sunü Jing. From the Han dynasty onwards, these handbooks would be familiar to the upper class. On the other side, during the Han dynasty, Wang Chong had criticized the sexual arts as "not only harming the body but infringing upon the nature of man and woman." During the Tang dynasty and earlier periods, Jiutian Xuannü was often associated with the sexual arts. The Xuannü Jing remained a familiar work among the literati during the Tang and Sui dynasties. The Dongxuanzi Fangzhong Shu (洞玄子房中術, "Bedchamber Arts of the Master of the Grotto Mysteries"), which was likely written by the 7th-century poet Liu Zongyuan, contains explicit descriptions of the sexual arts that was supposedly transmitted from Jiutian Xuannü. The sexual practices, that Jiutian Xuannü supposedly taught, were often compared to alchemy and physiological procedures for prolonging life. In Ge Hong's Baopu Zi, there's a passage in which Jiutian Xuannü tells Huangdi that sexual techniques are "like the intermingling of water and fire—it can kill or bring new life depending upon whether or not one uses the correct methods." Tu'er Shen, The Leveret Spirit is a Chinese Shenist or Taoist deity who manages love and sex between men. His name is often colloquially translated as "Rabbit God". Wei-Ming Temple in the Yonghe District of New Taipei City in Taiwan is dedicated to Tu'er Shen. About 9000 pilgrims visit the temple each year to pray to find a suitable partner. The Wei-ming temple also performs love ceremony for gay couples. Indigenous religions African Diasporic religions Within Candomblé, a syncretic religion primarily found in Brazil, there is widespread (though not universal) support for gay rights, many members are LGBT, and have performed gay marriages. Practitioners of Santería, primarily found in Cuba, generally (though not universally) welcome LGBT members and include them in religious or ritual activities. Also a Brazilian syncretic religion, Umbanda houses generally support LGBT rights and have performed gay marriages. Homosexuality is religiously acceptable in Haitian Vodou. The lwa or loa (spirits) Erzulie Dantor and Erzulie Freda are often associated with and viewed as protectors of queer people. The lao Ghede Nibo is sometimes depicted as an effeminate drag queen and inspires those he inhabits to lascivious sexuality of all kinds. Ancient Mesopotamian religion Individuals who went against the traditional gender binary were heavily involved in the cult of Inanna, an ancient Mesopotamian goddess. During Sumerian times, a set of priests known as gala worked in Inanna's temples, where they performed elegies and lamentations. Men who became gala sometimes adopted female names and their songs were composed in the Sumerian eme-sal dialect, which, in literary texts, is normally reserved for the speech of female characters. Some Sumerian proverbs seem to suggest that gala had a reputation for engaging in anal sex with men. During the Akkadian Period, kurgarrū and assinnu were servants of Ishtar who dressed in female clothing and performed war dances in Ishtar's temples. Several Akkadian proverbs seem to suggest that they may have also had homosexual proclivities. Gwendolyn Leick, an anthropologist known for her writings on Mesopotamia, has compared these individuals to the contemporary Indian hijra. In one Akkadian hymn, Ishtar is described as transforming men into women. Some modern pagans include Inanna in their worship. Pre-colonial religions of the Americas Among the Indigenous peoples of the Americas prior to the European colonization, many Nations had respected ceremonial, religious, and social roles for homosexual, bisexual, and gender-nonconforming individuals in their communities and in many contemporary Native American and First Nations communities, these roles still exist. Homosexual and gender-variant individuals were also common among other pre-conquest civilizations in Latin America, such as the Aztecs, Mayans, Quechuas, Moches, Zapotecs, and the Tupinambá of Brazil and were accepted in their various religions. New religious movements Since the beginning of the sexual liberation movement in the Western world, which coincided with second-wave feminism and the women's liberation movement initiated in the early 1960s, new religious movements and alternative spiritualities such as Modern Paganism and the New Age began to grow and spread across the globe alongside their intersection with the sexual liberation movement and the counterculture of the 1960s, and exhibited characteristic features, such as the embrace of alternative lifestyles, unconventional dress, rejection of Abrahamic religions and their conservative social mores, use of cannabis and other recreational drugs, relaxed attitude, sarcastic humble or self-imposed poverty, and laissez-faire sexual behavior. The sexual liberation movement was aided by feminist ideologues in their mutual struggle to challenge traditional ideas regarding female sexuality, male sexuality, and queer sexuality. Elimination of undue favorable bias towards men and objectification of women, as well as support for women's right to choose their sexual partners free of outside interference or societal judgment, were three of the main goals associated with sexual liberation from the feminist perspective. Modern Paganism Most Neopagan religions have the theme of fertility (both physical and creative/spiritual) as central to their practices, and as such encourage what they view as a healthy sex life, consensual sex between adults, regardless of gender. Heathenry, a modern Germanic Pagan movement, includes several pro-LGBT groups. Some groups legitimize openness toward LGBT practitioners by reference to the gender-bending actions of Thor and Odin in Norse mythology. There are, for instance, homosexual and transgender members of The Troth, a prominent U.S. Heathen organisation. Many Heathen groups in Northern Europe perform same-sex marriages, and a group of self-described "Homo-Heathens" marched in the 2008 Stockholm Pride carrying a statue of the Norse god Freyr. Research found a greater proportion of LGBT practitioners within Heathenry (21%) than wider society, although noted that the percentage was lower than in other forms of modern Paganism. Wicca, like other religions, has adherents with a broad spectrum of views, ranging from conservative to liberal. It is a largely nondogmatic religion and has no prohibitions against sexual intercourse outside of marriage or relationships between members of the same sex. The religion's ethics are largely summed up by the Wiccan Rede: "An it harm none, do as thou wilt", which is interpreted by many as allowing and endorsing responsible sexual relationships of all varieties. Specifically in the Wiccan tradition of modern witchcraft, one of the widely accepted pieces of Craft liturgy, the Charge of the Goddess instructs that "...all acts of love and pleasure are [the Goddess'] rituals", giving validity to all forms of sexual activity for Wiccan practitioners. In the Gardnerian and Alexandrian forms of Wicca, the "Great Rite" is a sex ritual much like the hieros gamos, performed by a priest and priestess who are believed to embody the Wiccan God and Goddess. The Great Rite is almost always performed figuratively using the athame and chalice as symbols of the penis and vagina. The literal form of the ritual is always performed by consenting adults, by a couple who are already lovers and in private. The Great Rite is not seen as an opportunity for casual sex. Raëlism Raëlism, an international new religious movement and UFO religion which was founded in France in 1974, promotes a positive outlook towards human sexuality, including homosexuality. Its founder Raël recognised same-sex marriage, and a Raëlian press release stated that sexual orientation is genetic and it also likened discrimination against gay people to racism. Some Raëlian leaders have performed licensed same-sex marriages. Santa Muerte The cult of Santa Muerte is a new religious movement centered on the worship of Santa Muerte, a cult image, female deity, and folk saint which is popularly revered in Mexican Neopaganism and folk Catholicism. A personification of death, she is associated with healing, protection, and safe delivery to the afterlife by her devotees. Santa Muerte is also revered and seen as a saint and protector of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) communities in Mexico, since LGBTQ+ people are considered and treated as outcasts by the Catholic Church, evangelical churches, and Mexican society at large. Many LGBTQ+ people ask her for protection from violence, hatred, disease, and to help them in their search for love. Her intercession is commonly invoked in same-sex marriage ceremonies performed in Mexico. The Iglesia Católica Tradicional México-Estados Unidos, also known as the Church of Santa Muerte, recognizes gay marriage and performs religious wedding ceremonies for homosexual couples. According to R. Andrew Chesnut, PhD in Latin American history and professor of Religious studies, the cult of Santa Muerte is the single fastest-growing new religious movement in the Americas. Satanism LaVeyan Satanism is critical of Abrahamic sexual mores, considering them narrow, restrictive and hypocritical. Sex is viewed as an indulgence, but one that should only be freely entered into with consent. The Eleven Satanic Rules of the Earth only give two instructions regarding sex, namely "Do not make sexual advances unless you are given the mating signal" and "Do not harm little children", although the latter is much broader and encompasses physical and other abuse. This has always been consistent part of Church of Satan policy since its inception in 1966 as Peter H. Gilmore wrote in an essay supporting same sex marriage: Satanists are pluralists, accepting gays, lesbians, bisexuals, BDSM, polyamorists, transgender people, and asexuals. In that essay, he also stated: Allegations have been made by antifascist organisations, several British politicians and the media that the Order of Nine Angles condones and encourages sexual abuse, and this has been given as one of the reasons why the O9A should be proscribed by the British government. Many O9A members openly view rape as an effective way to undermine society by transgressing against its norms. White Star Acception commits rapes by their own admission and O9A texts such as "The Dreccian Way", "Iron Gates", "Bluebird" and "The Rape Anthology" recommend and praise rape and pedophilia, even suggesting rape is necessary for "ascension of the Ubermensch". To advance in rank, ONA member must perform assaults, lynching and sexual assault being the most recommended. Material promoting pedophilia has also appeared in ONA's in house magazine Fenrir. According to BBC News, "the authorities are concerned by the number of paedophiles associated with the ONA". Western esotericism and occultism Sex magic is a term for various types of sexual activity used in magical, ritualistic, or otherwise religious and spiritual pursuits found within Western esotericism which is a broad spectrum of spiritual traditions found in Western society, or refers to the collection of the mystical, esoteric knowledge of the Western world. One practice of sex magic is using the energy of sexual arousal or orgasm with visualization of a desired result. A premise of sex magic is the concept that sexual energy is a potent force that can be harnessed to transcend one's normally perceived reality. The earliest known practical teachings of sex magic in the Western world come from 19th-century American occultist Paschal Beverly Randolph, under the heading of The Mysteries of Eulis. In the latter part of the 19th century, sexual reformer Ida Craddock published several works dealing with sacred sexuality, most notably Heavenly Bridegrooms and Psychic Wedlock. Aleister Crowley reviewed Heavenly Bridegrooms in the pages of his journal The Equinox, stating: It was one of the most remarkable human documents ever produced, and it should certainly find a regular publisher in book form. The authoress of the MS. claims that she was the wife of an angel. She expounds at the greatest length the philosophy connected with this thesis. Her learning is enormous. [...] This book is of incalculable value to every student of occult matters. No Magick library is complete without it. Aleister Crowley became involved with Theodor Reuss and Ordo Templi Orientis following the publication of The Book of Lies between 1912 and 1913. According to Crowley's account, Reuss approached him and accused him of having revealed the innermost (sexual) secret of O.T.O. in one of the cryptic chapters of this book. When it became clear to Reuss that Crowley had done so unintentionally, he initiated Crowley into the IX° (ninth degree) of O.T.O. and appointed him "Sovereign Grand Master General of Ireland, Iona and all the Britains." While the O.T.O. included, from its inception, the teaching of sex magick in the highest degrees of the Order, when Crowley became head of the Order, he expanded on these teachings and associated them with different degrees as follows: VIII°: masturbatory or auto-sexual magical techniques were taught, referred as the Lesser Work of Sol IX°: heterosexual magical techniques were taught XI°: anal intercourse magical techniques were taught. Hugh Urban, professor of comparative religion at Ohio State University, noted Crowley's emphasis on sex as "the supreme magical power".<ref name="urban">Urban, Hugh. Unleashing the Beast: Aleister Crowley, tantra and sex magic in late Victorian England . Ohio State University</ref> According to Crowley: Zoroastrianism See also Christianity and homosexuality Christianity and sexual orientation Christian views on birth control Erotic plasticity Forbidden relationships in Judaism Homosexuality and Judaism Incest#Religious views Jewish views on marriage LGBT-affirming denominations in Judaism Martinus Nazar ila'l-murd Pederasty in ancient Greece Polyamory#Acceptance by religions Religious censorship Religious trauma syndrome Sexual abstinence Side A, Side B, Side X, Side Y (theological views) Sodomy law Song of Songs Unification Church and sex Virgin goddess References Citations Sources Further reading General on sex and religion. Eisler, Riane, Sacred Pleasure: Sex, Myth, and the Politics of the Body: New Paths to Power and Love, HarperOne 1996. Endsjø, Dag Øistein, Sex and Religion: Teachings and Taboos in the History of World Faiths, Reaktion Books 2011. Also published in Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese, Italian, Macedonian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Serbian, Swedish, and Ukrainian. Helminiak, Daniel A., Sex and the Sacred - Gay Identity and Spiritual Growth, Routledge 2006. Kolodny, Debra (editor), Blessed Bi Spirit: Bisexual People of Faith, Continuum, 2000. , Buddhism Faure, Bernard, The Red Thread: Buddhist Approaches to Sexuality. . Sudo, Philip T., Zen Sex: The Way of Making Love. . Christianity Boswell, John, Christianity, Social Tolerance and Homosexuality: Gay People in Western Europe from the Beginning of the Christian Era to the Fourteenth Century, University Of Chicago Press, 1st ed. 1980 , paperback 2005 De La Torre, Miguel A., A Lily Among the Thorns: Imagining a New Christian Sexualitym . Kern, Jan, Seduced By Sex: Saved By Love. . Köstenberger, Andreas J., God, Marriage, and Family: Rebuilding the Biblical Foundation. . Kuefler, Mathew (editor), The Boswell Thesis: Essays on Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality, University Of Chicago Press, Nov. 2005 Pagels, Elaine, Adam, Eve, and the Serpent: Sex and Politics in Early Christianity, Vintage 1988. Hinduism Smith, David, The Hindu Erotic: Exploring Hinduism and Sexuality, I.B. Tauris 2015. Vanita, Ruth and Saleem Kidwai, Same-Sex Love In India: Readings from Literature and History, Palgrave, 2001. Islam El Feki, Shereen, Sex and the Citadel - Intimate Life in a Changing Arab World, Vintage 2014. Kugle, Scott Siraj al-Haqq, Homosexuality in Islam: Critical Reflection on Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender Muslims, SD Books 2010. Judaism Alpert, Rebecca, Like Bread on the Seder Plate: Jewish Lesbians and the Transformation of Tradition, Columbia University Press, 1998. , Boteach, Shmuley, Kosher Sex: A Recipe for Passion and Intimacy. . Gold, Michael Does God Belong in the Bedroom? . Critical perspectives Savramis, Demosthenes, The Satanizing of Woman: Religion Versus Sexuality. . Other Kebacqz, Karen, and Ronald G. Barton, Sex in the Parish, First ed., Westminster/John Knox Press, 1991. Tolle, Eckhart, The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment'', New World Library, 1st ed. 1999, paperback 2004 Kosman, Admiel, Homosexuality - Between Early Judaism and Early Christianity (Lecture at Winchester University, UK) Prof. Admiel Kosman 20 March 2014 LGBTQ and religion

Relativism

Relativism is a family of philosophical views which deny claims to objectivity within a particular domain and assert that valuations in that domain are relative to the perspective of an observer or the context in which they are assessed. There are many different forms of relativism, with a great deal of variation in scope and differing degrees of controversy among them. Moral relativism encompasses the differences in moral judgments among people and cultures. Epistemic relativism holds that there are no absolute principles regarding normative belief, justification, or rationality, and that there are only relative ones. Alethic relativism (also factual relativism) is the doctrine that there are no absolute truths, i.e., that truth is always relative to some particular frame of reference, such as a language or a culture (cultural relativism). Some forms of relativism also bear a resemblance to philosophical skepticism. Descriptive relativism seeks to describe the differences among cultures and people without evaluation, while normative relativism evaluates the word truthfulness of views within a given framework. Forms of relativism Anthropological versus philosophical relativism Anthropological relativism refers to a methodological stance, in which the researcher suspends (or brackets) their own cultural prejudice while trying to understand beliefs or behaviors in their contexts. This has become known as methodological relativism, and concerns itself specifically with avoiding ethnocentrism or the application of one's own cultural standards to the assessment of other cultures. This is also the basis of the so-called "emic" and "etic" distinction, in which: An emic or insider account of behavior is a description of a society in terms that are meaningful to the participant or actor's own culture; an emic account is therefore culture-specific, and typically refers to what is considered "common sense" within the culture under observation. An etic or outsider account is a description of a society by an observer, in terms that can be applied to other cultures; that is, an etic account is culturally neutral, and typically refers to the conceptual framework of the social scientist. (This is complicated when it is scientific research itself that is under study, or when there is theoretical or terminological disagreement within the social sciences.) Philosophical relativism, in contrast, asserts that the truth of a proposition depends on the metaphysical, or theoretical frame, or the instrumental method, or the context in which the proposition is expressed, or on the person, groups, or culture who interpret the proposition. Methodological relativism and philosophical relativism can exist independently from one another, but most anthropologists base their methodological relativism on that of the philosophical variety. Descriptive versus normative relativism The concept of relativism also has importance both for philosophers and for anthropologists in another way. In general, anthropologists engage in descriptive relativism ("how things are" or "how things seem"), whereas philosophers engage in normative relativism ("how things ought to be"), although there is some overlap (for example, descriptive relativism can pertain to concepts, normative relativism to truth). Descriptive relativism assumes that certain cultural groups have different modes of thought, standards of reasoning, and so forth, and it is the anthropologist's task to describe, but not to evaluate the validity of these principles and practices of a cultural group. It is possible for an anthropologist in his or her fieldwork to be a descriptive relativist about some things that typically concern the philosopher (e.g., ethical principles) but not about others (e.g., logical principles). However, the descriptive relativist's empirical claims about epistemic principles, moral ideals and the like are often countered by anthropological arguments that such things are universal, and much of the recent literature on these matters is explicitly concerned with the extent of, and evidence for, cultural or moral or linguistic or human universals. The fact that the various species of descriptive relativism are empirical claims may tempt the philosopher to conclude that they are of little philosophical interest, but there are several reasons why this is not so. First, some philosophers, notably Kant, argue that certain sorts of cognitive differences between human beings (or even all rational beings) are impossible, so such differences could never be found to obtain in fact, an argument that places a priori limits on what empirical inquiry could discover and on what versions of descriptive relativism could be true. Second, claims about actual differences between groups play a central role in some arguments for normative relativism (for example, arguments for normative ethical relativism often begin with claims that different groups in fact have different moral codes or ideals). Finally, the anthropologist's descriptive account of relativism helps to separate the fixed aspects of human nature from those that can vary, and so a descriptive claim that some important aspect of experience or thought does (or does not) vary across groups of human beings tells us something important about human nature and the human condition. Normative relativism concerns normative or evaluative claims that modes of thought, standards of reasoning, or the like are only right or wrong relative to a framework. 'Normative' is meant in a general sense, applying to a wide range of views; in the case of beliefs, for example, normative correctness equals truth. This does not mean, of course, that framework-relative correctness or truth is always clear, the first challenge being to explain what it amounts to in any given case (e.g., with respect to concepts, truth, epistemic norms). Normative relativism (say, in regard to normative ethical relativism) therefore implies that things (say, ethical claims) are not simply true in themselves, but only have truth values relative to broader frameworks (say, moral codes). (Many normative ethical relativist arguments run from premises about ethics to conclusions that assert the relativity of truth values, bypassing general claims about the nature of truth, but it is often more illuminating to consider the type of relativism under question directly.) Legal relativism In English common law, two (perhaps three) separate standards of proof are recognized: proof based on the balance of probabilities is the lesser standard used in civil litigation, which cases mostly concern money or some other penalty, that, if further and better evidence should emerge, is reasonably reversible. proof beyond reasonable doubt is used in criminal law cases where an accused's right to personal freedom or survival is in question, because such punishment is not reasonably reversible. Absolute truth is so complex as to be only capable of being fully understood by the omniscient established during the Tudor period as the one true God Related and contrasting positions Relationism is the theory that there are only relations between individual entities, and no intrinsic properties. Despite the similarity in name, it is held by some to be a position distinct from relativism—for instance, because "statements about relational properties [...] assert an absolute truth about things in the world". On the other hand, others wish to equate relativism, relationism and even relativity, which is a precise theory of relationships between physical objects: Nevertheless, "This confluence of relativity theory with relativism became a strong contributing factor in the increasing prominence of relativism". Whereas previous investigations of science only sought sociological or psychological explanations of failed scientific theories or pathological science, the 'strong programme' is more relativistic, assessing scientific truth and falsehood equally in a historic and cultural context. Criticisms A common argument against relativism suggests that it inherently refutes itself: the statement "all is relative" classes either as a relative statement or as an absolute one. If it is relative, then this statement does not rule out absolutes. If the statement is absolute, on the other hand, then it provides an example of an absolute statement, proving that not all truths are relative. However, this argument against relativism only applies to relativism that positions truth as relative–i.e. epistemological/truth-value relativism. More specifically, it is only extreme forms of epistemological relativism that can come in for this criticism as there are many epistemological relativists who posit that some aspects of what is regarded as factually "true" are not universal, yet still accept that other universal truths exist (e.g. gas laws or moral laws). Another argument against relativism posits a Natural Law. Simply put, the physical universe works under basic principles: the "Laws of Nature". Some contend that a natural Moral Law may also exist, for example as argued by, Immanuel Kant in Critique of Practical Reason, Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion (2006) and addressed by C. S. Lewis in Mere Christianity (1952). Dawkins said "I think we face an equal but much more sinister challenge from the left, in the shape of cultural relativism - the view that scientific truth is only one kind of truth and it is not to be especially privileged". Philosopher Hilary Putnam, among others, states that some forms of relativism make it impossible to believe one is in error. If there is no truth beyond an individual's belief that something is true, then an individual cannot hold their own beliefs to be false or mistaken. A related criticism is that relativizing truth to individuals destroys the distinction between truth and belief. Views Philosophical Ancient Sophism Sophists are considered the founding fathers of relativism in Western philosophy. Elements of relativism emerged among the Sophists in the 5th century BC. Notably, it was Protagoras who coined the phrase, "Man is the measure of all things: of things which are, that they are, and of things which are not, that they are not." The thinking of the Sophists is mainly known through their opponent, Plato. In a paraphrase from Plato's dialogue Theaetetus, Protagoras said: "What is true for you is true for you, and what is true for me is true for me." Modern Bernard Crick Bernard Crick, a British political scientist and advocate of relativism, suggested in In Defence of Politics (1962) that moral conflict between people is inevitable. He thought that only ethics can resolve such conflict, and when that occurs in public it results in politics. Accordingly, Crick saw the process of dispute resolution, harms reduction, mediation or peacemaking as central to all of moral philosophy. He became an important influence on feminists and later on the Greens. Paul Feyerabend Philosopher of science Paul Feyerabend is often considered to be a relativist, although he denied being one. Feyerabend argued that modern science suffers from being methodologically monistic (the belief that only a single methodology can produce scientific progress). Feyerabend summarises his case in Against Method with the phrase "anything goes". In an aphorism [Feyerabend] often repeated, "potentially every culture is all cultures". This is intended to convey that world views are not hermetically closed, since their leading concepts have an "ambiguity" - better, an open-endedness - which enables people from other cultures to engage with them. [...] It follows that relativism, understood as the doctrine that truth is relative to closed systems, can get no purchase. [...] For Feyerabend, both hermetic relativism and its absolutist rival [realism] serve, in their different ways, to "devalue human existence". The former encourages that unsavoury brand of political correctness which takes the refusal to criticise "other cultures" to the extreme of condoning murderous dictatorship and barbaric practices. The latter, especially in its favoured contemporary form of "scientific realism", with the excessive prestige it affords to the abstractions of "the monster 'science'", is in bed with a politics which likewise disdains variety, richness and everyday individuality - a politics which likewise "hides" its norms behind allegedly neutral facts, "blunts choices and imposes laws". Thomas Kuhn Thomas Kuhn's philosophy of science, as expressed in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, is often interpreted as relativistic. He claimed that, as well as progressing steadily and incrementally ("normal science"), science undergoes periodic revolutions or "paradigm shifts", leaving scientists working in different paradigms with difficulty in even communicating. Thus the truth of a claim, or the existence of a posited entity, is relative to the paradigm employed. However, it is not necessary for him to embrace relativism because every paradigm presupposes the prior, building upon itself through history and so on. This leads to there being a fundamental, incremental, and referential structure of development which is not relative but again, fundamental. From these remarks, one thing is however certain: Kuhn is not saying that incommensurable theories cannot be compared - what they can't be is compared in terms of a system of common measure. He very plainly says that they can be compared, and he reiterates this repeatedly in later work, in a (mostly in vain) effort to avert the crude and sometimes catastrophic misinterpretations he suffered from mainstream philosophers and post-modern relativists alike. But Kuhn rejected the accusation of being a relativist later in his postscript: scientific development is ... a unidirectional and irreversible process. Later scientific theories are better than earlier ones for solving puzzles ... That is not a relativist's position, and it displays the sense in which I am a convinced believer in scientific progress. Some have argued that one can also read Kuhn's work as essentially positivist in its ontology: the revolutions he posits are epistemological, lurching toward a presumably 'better' understanding of an objective reality through the lens presented by the new paradigm. However, a number of passages in Structure do indeed appear to be distinctly relativist, and to directly challenge the notion of an objective reality and the ability of science to progress towards an ever-greater grasp of it, particularly through the process of paradigm change. In the sciences there need not be progress of another sort. We may, to be more precise, have to relinquish the notion, explicit or implicit, that changes of paradigm carry scientists and those who learn from them closer and closer to the truth. We are all deeply accustomed to seeing science as the one enterprise that draws constantly nearer to some goal set by nature in advance. But need there be any such goal? Can we not account for both science's existence and its success in terms of evolution from the community's state of knowledge at any given time? Does it really help to imagine that there is some one full, objective, true account of nature and that the proper measure of scientific achievement is the extent to which it brings us closer to that ultimate goal? George Lakoff and Mark Johnson George Lakoff and Mark Johnson define relativism in Metaphors We Live By as the rejection of both subjectivism and metaphysical objectivism in order to focus on the relationship between them, i.e. the metaphor by which we relate our current experience to our previous experience. In particular, Lakoff and Johnson characterize "objectivism" as a "straw man", and, to a lesser degree, criticize the views of Karl Popper, Kant and Aristotle. Robert Nozick In his book Invariances, Robert Nozick expresses a complex set of theories about the absolute and the relative. He thinks the absolute/relative distinction should be recast in terms of an invariant/variant distinction, where there are many things a proposition can be invariant with regard to or vary with. He thinks it is coherent for truth to be relative, and speculates that it might vary with time. He thinks necessity is an unobtainable notion, but can be approximated by robust invariance across a variety of conditions—although we can never identify a proposition that is invariant with regard to everything. Finally, he is not particularly warm to one of the most famous forms of relativism, moral relativism, preferring an evolutionary account. Joseph Margolis Joseph Margolis advocates a view he calls "robust relativism" and defends it in his books Historied Thought, Constructed World, Chapter 4 (California, 1995) and The Truth about Relativism (Blackwell, 1991). He opens his account by stating that our logics should depend on what we take to be the nature of the sphere to which we wish to apply our logics. Holding that there can be no distinctions which are not "privileged" between the alethic, the ontic, and the epistemic, he maintains that a many-valued logic just might be the most apt for aesthetics or history since, because in these practices, we are loath to hold to simple binary logic; and he also holds that many-valued logic is relativistic. (This is perhaps an unusual definition of "relativistic". Compare with his comments on "relationism".) To say that "True" and "False" are mutually exclusive and exhaustive judgements on Hamlet, for instance, really does seem absurd. A many-valued logicwith its values "apt", "reasonable", "likely", and so onseems intuitively more applicable to interpreting Hamlet. Where apparent contradictions arise between such interpretations, we might call the interpretations "incongruent", rather than dubbing either of them "false", because using many-valued logic implies that a measured value is a mixture of two extreme possibilities. Using the subset of many-valued logic, fuzzy logic, it can be said that various interpretations can be represented by membership in more than one possible truth set simultaneously. Fuzzy logic is therefore probably the best mathematical structure for understanding "robust relativism" and has been interpreted by Bart Kosko as philosophically being related to Zen Buddhism. It was Aristotle who held that relativism implies that we should, sticking with appearances only, end up contradicting ourselves somewhere if we could apply all attributes to all ousiai (beings). Aristotle, however, made non-contradiction dependent upon his essentialism. If his essentialism is false, then so too is his ground for disallowing relativism. (Subsequent philosophers have found other reasons for supporting the principle of non-contradiction.) Beginning with Protagoras and invoking Charles Sanders Peirce, Margolis shows that the historic struggle to discredit relativism is an attempt to impose an unexamined belief in the world's essentially rigid rule-like nature. Plato and Aristotle merely attacked "relationalism"the doctrine of true for l or true for k, and the like, where l and k are different speakers or different worldsor something similar (most philosophers would call this position "relativism"). For Margolis, "true" means true; that is, the alethic use of "true" remains untouched. However, in real world contexts, and context is ubiquitous in the real world, we must apply truth values. Here, in epistemic terms, we might tout court retire "true" as an evaluation and keep "false". The rest of our value-judgements could be graded from "extremely plausible" down to "false". Judgements which on a bivalent logic would be incompatible or contradictory are further seen as "incongruent", although one may well have more weight than the other. In short, relativistic logic is not, or need not be, the bugbear it is often presented to be. It may simply be the best type of logic to apply to certain very uncertain spheres of real experiences in the world (although some sort of logic needs to be applied in order to make that judgement). Those who swear by bivalent logic might simply be the ultimate keepers of the great fear of the flux. Richard Rorty Philosopher Richard Rorty has a somewhat paradoxical role in the debate over relativism: he is criticized for his relativistic views by many commentators, but has always denied that relativism applies to much anybody, being nothing more than a Platonic scarecrow. Rorty claims, rather, that he is a pragmatist, and that to construe pragmatism as relativism is to beg the question. '"Relativism" is the traditional epithet applied to pragmatism by realists' '"Relativism" is the view that every belief on a certain topic, or perhaps about any topic, is as good as every other. No one holds this view. Except for the occasional cooperative freshman, one cannot find anybody who says that two incompatible opinions on an important topic are equally good. The philosophers who get called 'relativists' are those who say that the grounds for choosing between such opinions are less algorithmic than had been thought.' 'In short, my strategy for escaping the self-referential difficulties into which "the Relativist" keeps getting himself is to move everything over from epistemology and metaphysics into cultural politics, from claims to knowledge and appeals to self-evidence to suggestions about what we should try.' Rorty takes a deflationary attitude to truth, believing there is nothing of interest to be said about truth in general, including the contention that it is generally subjective. He also argues that the notion of warrant or justification can do most of the work traditionally assigned to the concept of truth, and that justification is relative; justification is justification to an audience, for Rorty. In Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity he argues that the debate between so-called relativists and so-called objectivists is beside the point because they do not have enough premises in common for either side to prove anything to the other. Nalin de Silva In his book Mage Lokaya (My World), 1986, Nalin de Silva criticized the basis of the established western system of knowledge, and its propagation, which he refers as "domination throughout the world".He explained in this book that mind independent reality is impossible and knowledge is not found but constructed. Further he has introduced and developed the concept of "Constructive Relativism" as the basis on which knowledge is constructed relative to the sense organs, culture and the mind completely based on Avidya. Colin Murray Turbayne In his final book Metaphors for the Mind: The Creative Mind and Its Origins (1991), Colin Murray Turbayne joins the debate about relativism and realism by providing an analysis of the manner in which Platonic metaphors which were first presented in the procreation model of the Timaeus dialogue have evolved over time to influence the philosophical works of both George Berkeley and Emmanuel Kant. In addition, he illustrates the manner in which these ancient Greek metaphors have subsequently evolved to impact the development of the theories of "substance" and "attribute", which in turn have dominated the development of human thought and language in the 20th century. In his The Myth of Metaphor (1962) Turbayne argues that it is perfectly possible to transcend the limitations which are inherent in such metaphors, including those incorporated within the framework of classical "objective" mechanistic Newtonian cosmology and scientific materialism in general. In Turbayne's view, one can strive to embrace a more satisfactory epistemology by first acknowledging the limitations imposed by such metaphorical systems. This can readily be accomplished by restoring Plato's metaphorical model to its original state in which both "male" and "female" aspects of the mind work in concert within the context of a harmonious balance during the process of creation. Postmodernism The term "relativism" often comes up in debates over postmodernism, poststructuralism and phenomenology. Critics of these perspectives often identify advocates with the label "relativism". For example, the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis is often considered a relativist view because it posits that linguistic categories and structures shape the way people view the world. Stanley Fish has defended postmodernism and relativism. These perspectives do not strictly count as relativist in the philosophical sense, because they express agnosticism on the nature of reality and make epistemological rather than ontological claims. Nevertheless, the term is useful to differentiate them from realists who believe that the purpose of philosophy, science, or literary critique is to locate externally true meanings. Important philosophers and theorists such as Michel Foucault, Max Stirner, political movements such as post-anarchism or post-Marxism can also be considered as relativist in this sense - though a better term might be social constructivist. The spread and popularity of this kind of "soft" relativism varies between academic disciplines. It has wide support in anthropology and has a majority following in cultural studies. It also has advocates in political theory and political science, sociology, and continental philosophy (as distinct from Anglo-American analytical philosophy). It has inspired empirical studies of the social construction of meaning such as those associated with labelling theory, which defenders can point to as evidence of the validity of their theories (albeit risking accusations of performative contradiction in the process). Advocates of this kind of relativism often also claim that recent developments in the natural sciences, such as Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, quantum mechanics, chaos theory and complexity theory show that science is now becoming relativistic. However, many scientists who use these methods continue to identify as realist or post-positivist, and some sharply criticize the association. Religious Buddhism Madhyamaka Buddhism, which forms the basis for many Mahayana Buddhist schools and which was founded by Nāgārjuna. Nāgārjuna taught the idea of relativity. In the Ratnāvalī, he gives the example that shortness exists only in relation to the idea of length. The determination of a thing or object is only possible in relation to other things or objects, especially by way of contrast. He held that the relationship between the ideas of "short" and "long" is not due to intrinsic nature (svabhāva). This idea is also found in the Pali Nikāyas and Chinese Āgamas, in which the idea of relativity is expressed similarly: "That which is the element of light ... is seen to exist on account of [in relation to] darkness; that which is the element of good is seen to exist on account of bad; that which is the element of space is seen to exist on account of form." Madhyamaka Buddhism discerns two levels of truth: relative and ultimate. The two truths doctrine states that there are Relative or conventional, common-sense truth, which describes our daily experience of a concrete world, and Ultimate truth, which describes the ultimate reality as sunyata, empty of concrete and inherent characteristics. Conventional truth may be understood, in contrast, as "obscurative truth" or "that which obscures the true nature". It is constituted by the appearances of mistaken awareness. Conventional truth would be the appearance that includes a duality of apprehender and apprehended, and objects perceived within that. Ultimate truth is the phenomenal world free from the duality of apprehender and apprehended. Catholicism The Catholic Church, especially under John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI, has identified relativism as one of the most significant problems for faith and morals today. According to the Church and to some theologians, relativism, as a denial of absolute truth, leads to moral license and a denial of the possibility of sin and of God. Whether moral or epistemological, relativism constitutes a denial of the capacity of the human mind and reason to arrive at truth. Truth, according to Catholic theologians and philosophers (following Aristotle) consists of adequatio rei et intellectus, the correspondence of the mind and reality. Another way of putting it states that the mind has the same form as reality. This means when the form of the computer in front of someone (the type, color, shape, capacity, etc.) is also the form that is in their mind, then what they know is true because their mind corresponds to objective reality. The denial of an absolute reference, of an axis mundi, denies God, who equates to Absolute Truth, according to these Christian theologians. They link relativism to secularism, an obstruction of religion in human life. Leo XIII Pope Leo XIII (1810–1903) was the first known Pope to use the word "relativism", in his encyclical Humanum genus (1884). Leo condemned Freemasonry and claimed that its philosophical and political system was largely based on relativism. John Paul II John Paul II wrote in Veritatis Splendor As is immediately evident, the crisis of truth is not unconnected with this development. Once the idea of a universal truth about the good, knowable by human reason, is lost, inevitably the notion of conscience also changes. Conscience is no longer considered in its primordial reality as an act of a person's intelligence, the function of which is to apply the universal knowledge of the good in a specific situation and thus to express a judgment about the right conduct to be chosen here and now. Instead, there is a tendency to grant to the individual conscience the prerogative of independently determining the criteria of good and evil and then acting accordingly. Such an outlook is quite congenial to an individualist ethic, wherein each individual is faced with his own truth, different from the truth of others. Taken to its extreme consequences, this individualism leads to a denial of the very idea of human nature. In Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life), he says: Freedom negates and destroys itself, and becomes a factor leading to the destruction of others, when it no longer recognizes and respects its essential link with the truth. When freedom, out of a desire to emancipate itself from all forms of tradition and authority, shuts out even the most obvious evidence of an objective and universal truth, which is the foundation of personal and social life, then the person ends up by no longer taking as the sole and indisputable point of reference for his own choices the truth about good and evil, but only his subjective and changeable opinion or, indeed, his selfish interest and whim. Benedict XVI In April 2005, in his homily during Mass prior to the conclave which would elect him as Pope, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger talked about the world "moving towards a dictatorship of relativism": How many winds of doctrine we have known in recent decades, how many ideological currents, how many ways of thinking. The small boat of thought of many Christians has often been tossed about by these waves – thrown from one extreme to the other: from Marxism to liberalism, even to libertinism; from collectivism to radical individualism; from atheism to a vague religious mysticism; from agnosticism to syncretism, and so forth. Every day new sects are created and what Saint Paul says about human trickery comes true, with cunning which tries to draw those into error (cf Ephesians 4, 14). Having a clear Faith, based on the Creed of the Church, is often labeled today as a fundamentalism. Whereas, relativism, which is letting oneself be tossed and "swept along by every wind of teaching", looks like the only attitude acceptable to today's standards. We are moving towards a dictatorship of relativism which does not recognize anything as certain and which has as its highest goal one's own ego and one's own desires. However, we have a different goal: the Son of God, true man. He is the measure of true humanism. Being an "Adult" means having a faith which does not follow the waves of today's fashions or the latest novelties. A faith which is deeply rooted in friendship with Christ is adult and mature. It is this friendship which opens us up to all that is good and gives us the knowledge to judge true from false, and deceit from truth. On June 6, 2005, Pope Benedict XVI told educators: Today, a particularly insidious obstacle to the task of education is the massive presence in our society and culture of that relativism which, recognizing nothing as definitive, leaves as the ultimate criterion only the self with its desires. And under the semblance of freedom it becomes a prison for each one, for it separates people from one another, locking each person into his or her own 'ego'. Then during the World Youth Day in August 2005, he also traced to relativism the problems produced by the communist and sexual revolutions, and provided a counter-counter argument. In the last century we experienced revolutions with a common programme–expecting nothing more from God, they assumed total responsibility for the cause of the world in order to change it. And this, as we saw, meant that a human and partial point of view was always taken as an absolute guiding principle. Absolutizing what is not absolute but relative is called totalitarianism. It does not liberate man, but takes away his dignity and enslaves him. It is not ideologies that save the world, but only a return to the living God, our Creator, the Guarantor of our freedom, the Guarantor of what is really good and true. Pope Francis Pope Francis refers in Evangelii gaudium to two forms of relativism, "doctrinal relativism" and a "practical relativism" typical of "our age". The latter is allied to "widespread indifference" to systems of belief. Jainism Mahavira (599-527 BC), the 24th Tirthankara of Jainism, developed a philosophy known as Anekantavada. John Koller describes anekāntavāda as "epistemological respect for view of others" about the nature of existence, whether it is "inherently enduring or constantly changing", but "not relativism; it does not mean conceding that all arguments and all views are equal". Sikhism In Sikhism the Gurus (spiritual teachers) have propagated the message of "many paths" leading to the one God and ultimate salvation for all souls who tread on the path of righteousness. They have supported the view that proponents of all faiths can, by doing good and virtuous deeds and by remembering the Lord, certainly achieve salvation. The students of the Sikh faith are told to accept all leading faiths as possible vehicles for attaining spiritual enlightenment provided the faithful study, ponder and practice the teachings of their prophets and leaders. The holy book of the Sikhs called the Sri Guru Granth Sahib says: "Do not say that the Vedas, the Bible and the Koran are false. Those who do not contemplate them are false." Guru Granth Sahib page 1350; later stating: "The seconds, minutes, and hours, days, weeks and months, and the various seasons originate from the one Sun; O nanak, in just the same way, the many forms originate from the Creator." Guru Granth Sahib page 12,13. See also References Bibliography Maria Baghramian, Relativism, London: Routledge, 2004, Gad Barzilai, Communities and Law: Politics and Cultures of Legal Identities, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2003, Andrew Lionel Blais, On the Plurality of Actual Worlds, University of Massachusetts Press, 1997, Benjamin Brown, Thoughts and Ways of Thinking: Source Theory and Its Applications. London: Ubiquity Press, 2017. . Ernest Gellner, Relativism and the Social Sciences, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985, Rom Harré and Michael Krausz, Varieties of Relativism, Oxford, UK; New York, NY: Blackwell, 1996, Knight, Robert H. The Age of Consent: the Rise of Relativism and the Corruption of Popular Culture. Dallas, Tex.: Spence Publishing Co., 1998. xxiv, 253, [1] p. Michael Krausz, ed., Relativism: A Contemporary Anthology, New York: Columbia University Press, 2010, Martin Hollis, Steven Lukes, Rationality and Relativism, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1982, Joseph Margolis, Michael Krausz, R. M. Burian, Eds., Rationality, Relativism, and the Human Sciences, Dordrecht: Boston, M. Nijhoff, 1986, Jack W. Meiland, Michael Krausz, Eds. Relativism, Cognitive and Moral, Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1982, Markus Seidel, Epistemic Relativism: A Constructive Critique, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014, External links Westacott, E. Relativism, 2005, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy Westacott, E. Cognitive Relativism, 2006, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy Professor Ronald Jones on relativism What 'Being Relative' Means, a passage from Pierre Lecomte du Nouy's "Human Destiny" (1947) BBC Radio 4 series "In Our Time", on Relativism - the battle against transcendent knowledge, 19 January 2006 Against Relativism, by Christopher Noriss The Catholic Encyclopedia Harvey Siegel reviews Paul Boghossian's Fear of Knowledge Epistemological schools and traditions

Secular ethics

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World religions

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Religious naturalism

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