What are world religions: signs and features

2024 Author: Miguel Ramacey | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 06:11

Interestingly, some states put forward additional hallmarks of world religions. For example, in the USSR there were additional criteria according to which a world religion should have a clear philosophical school, have a great influence on historical events and the development of culture, and should not be closely associated with national identity.

According to the main features of world religions proposed by UNESCO, there are three of them:

• Buddhism;
• Christianity;
• Islam.

It is believed that it was they who reached the highest level of development of religious consciousness, acquiring features that do not depend on nationality and place of residence.

Buddhism

Buddhism is the oldest of the world's religions. It got its name from its founder Buddha, who lived in the 5th-4th century BC. e. Buddhism originated in the northeastern part of India, at that time the most developed region of India.

The distinctive feature of Buddhism lies in its ethical and practicalorientation. He opposes attaching excessive importance to the external manifestations of religious life - institutions, rituals, spiritual hierarchy, and focuses his attention on the problem of human existence.

In Buddhism, unlike Christianity and Islam, there is no institution of the church. Religious life is formed around monasteries and temples, where the community of believers is consolidated, and everyone can receive support and guidance.

This is a very flexible religion. During its existence, it has absorbed many traditional ideas of those peoples who professed it, speaking with them in the language of their culture. Initially, Buddhism was spread among the peoples of Asia: mainly South, Central and East, in Russia - among Tuvans, Kalmyks and Buryats. To this day, it continues to spread, and its followers can be found in Europe, America, Africa, Australia, as well as in those parts of Russia where it was not previously.

Christianity

Christianity began to spread during the late Roman period, around the middle of the 1st century BC. e. It strengthened its position against the backdrop of severe social instability in the empire, attracting people with ideas of a strong intercessor, universal equality and salvation.

Christianity successfully managed to supplant the pagan religion of ancient Rome also because many of its ideas and rituals were already known to people from Judaism. The common features of Judaism and Christianity are the belief in the coming of the Messiah, the immortality of the soul and the existence of the afterlife.

From disparate sects formed by those who accepted Christ as the messiah, Christianity was gradually formed into a powerful social force. Eventually, after a period of persecution, the church became the first and strongest ally of the Roman state around the beginning of the 3rd century.

And although Christianity still had to go a long way of development and development of dogmas, the prerequisites for its triumphant march around the planet were formed even then. Even the subsequent divisions of the church did nothing to dampen his popularity.

Islam

Islam is the youngest of the three religions. It originated in the early 7th century AD. e. on the Arabian Peninsula. At that time, the Arab world was experiencing the collapse of the tribal system, was very fragmented, which made it weak. The specifics of that time required the unification of the tribes and the creation of a single Arab statehood. This task was solved largely thanks to the rise and spread of Islam.

The Prophet Mohammed is considered to be the founder of Islam. A characteristic feature of this religion is that Islam is not just a religion, but also a certain way of life. Initially, it does not assume a gap between the secular and the religious, the secular and the sacred.

Despite its youth, Islam quickly acquired signs of a world religion. Today it is the second largest religion in the world. According to rough estimates, the total number of Muslims on the entire planet is more than a billion people. Bigsome of them live in Asia and Africa.

Alternative opinions

Despite the terminology established in religious studies, modern world religions and their attributes are largely an open question. Although traditionally there are only three of them, there are other views on this matter.

For example, Max Weber and his followers include others among them, highlighting several distinct features of world religions. Thus, according to the Weberian tradition, Judaism can be attributed to them, since it had a huge influence on Christianity and Islam, as well as Hinduism and Confucianism, since they are religions of vast cultural regions in which different nationalities live.

World religions or religions of humanity?

There are also a considerable number of scientists who consider this term obsolete, and the accepted signs of world religion are untenable in modern conditions.

The presence of any criteria for considering a particular religion as global or not suggests that it is static. However, this is not the case. The world is changing, and the geography of the distribution of religions is becoming more and more bizarre. For example, in different countries around the world, there is a growing number of Hindus who are also part of the Hindu community. Also, many representatives of non-world religions repeatedly challenged the selection criteria, offering their own and desiring worthy recognition of their religion by the world community.

There have been attempts to abolish the term "world religions", as well asproposals to introduce alternative, for example, "living religions" or "religions of humanity" with more thoughtful and versatile criteria. However, there is no agreement on this issue in the scientific world, and there is still a long way to revise this problem.