Talk:Religion/Archive 11

...an order of existence.
The opening definition does not match the dictionary/wiktionary definitions. Additionally, "order of existence" seems to have been invented solely for this article, its not a wiki page and Google didn't have a single hit... The article sites approx. 4,200 religions, if we can confirm that a single one of those does not have supernatural components that would begin the discussion for dropping it. To date, the supernatural element is what defines religion. Removing it from the opening line fails to communicate the fundamental mechanism behind religion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wetodid (talk • contribs) 19:10, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I think you raise an interesting point about the phrase "order of existence". I'd like to hear from other editors about whether there is a good argument in favor of us using that phrase, and, if not, what other wording might be used in its place. (But I'd like to have some discussion here before anyone changes the page.) --Tryptofish (talk) 19:38, 18 August 2014 (UTC)


 * Dictionaries do not go as in depth as the academic works that are summarized and cited in this article. Wikipedia does not cite Wikipedia, much less Wiktionary.  "Order of existence" was hardly invented for this article (that you claim so leaves me incapable of believing you've done any reading on the subject except beyond a few misguided polemics), but is quoting the work of Clifford Geertz, and is cited in a variety of religious studies courses.  Even criticism by Talal Asad shows it to be a common definition, which is what the article aims to use.  It is readily found in a Google books search, including this book, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one... That's just in the first two pages of my search results.
 * Random Google web searches are not used for any indication of popularity (much less reliability) because Google does tailor its results to individuals. For example, when I searched for it, I got this, this, this, this, this, this, and this just on the first page of my search.
 * The supernatural element fails as a definition because there are agnostics, "spiritual but not religious," and other non-religious folks who believe in the supernatural, and there are religious folks who firmly deny anything they understand to be supernatural. Many religious persons do not believe in something that is beyond (supra-) nature, but believe that whatever entities exist in their religion exist within the realm of natural law (even if they operate on principles not yet understood).  To say that such beliefs are supernatural is to misrepresent what they claim as their beliefs.  They may not be scientific, but they are a form of naturalism, even if it's not a colonialist white naturalism that is historically rooted in Protestant deism.  Further, supernaturalism is at odds with skepticism, and as Jamy Ian Swiss will tell you, atheists do not possess a monopoly on skepticism, and there are superstitious atheists.
 * To define religion in relation to the supernatural requires redefining the supernatural in a way that makes my ghost-hunting, luck-charm-buying, fortune-teller-visiting, horoscope-reading, conspiracy-theory-believing agnostic friends somehow more scientifically minded than (*raises hand*) the religious friend who constantly responds to their Facebook posts with links to Snopes, Hoaxbuster, and scientific journals because he believes that logic and scientific laws are emanations of the Logos.
 * To define religion in terms of theism is also wrong, because that means that Albert Einstein is religious for his Spinozan view of God, Thomas Jefferson religious for his deistic belief in a first cause; but Buddhism, Confucianism, Jainism, some branches of Taoism, Raelianism, Scientology, and the Church of Satan are somehow not religions.
 * Theism, supernaturalism, and religion are clearly three distinct things that can be compatible but are still not the same.
 * And for the record, I had nothing to do with writing the lede, I just cannot support the OP's approach. Ian.thomson (talk) 20:23, 18 August 2014 (UTC)


 * 1. Every Google book referenced contains the description made by Geertz, which was dissected and re-worded in the description for this article. Why are we cherry picking from his description and re-writing, if it is the authority shouldnt we use it in whole or risk corrupting it? 2. Spirituality comes with both Natural and Supernatural components depending on interpretation, Agnostics are by definition claiming neither faith nor disbelief and may need a category created called "sitting on the bench", I am not sure why that was brought into the conversation? 3. The word supernatural references things that are outside the realm of nature (beyond nature).  In simple terms, if we call empirically proved things nature then the things claimed to be proved but which lay beyond empirical measurements are supernatural which includes religion, ghosts (aka the soul), lucky charms (ex. Rosary), fortune telling (Divination), Horoscope reading (Astrology is a form of divination).  The point here is that these beliefs are no more and no less scientific than religion, they are by description claiming unique mechanisms which exist in the realm of the supernatural.  I recommend reading the Standford Encyclopedia of Philosphy's reference on the meaning of life for clarification on my destination; http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/life-meaning/#Sup. 4. Agreed that Theism is a subset of religion.   — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wetodid (talk • contribs) 20:13, 9 October 2014 (UTC)
 * There's a difference between cherry-picking and due weight. If a ton of sources support a particular idea, Wikipedia follows suit.  If I was cherry-picking, it'd be easy enough to go to books.google.com and completely overshadow the 18 results I found (out of the first 20!).
 * And again, "Many religious persons do not believe in something that is beyond (supra-) nature, but believe that whatever entities exist in their religion exist within the realm of natural law (even if they operate on principles not yet understood). To say that such beliefs are supernatural is to misrepresent what they claim as their beliefs.  They may not be scientific, but they are a form of naturalism, even if it's not a colonialist white naturalism that is historically rooted in Protestant deism."
 * For example, the Church of Satan regards itself as completely materialist, Kopimism doesn't have anything to say about the supernatural (other than distributing any literature about it whether or not it agrees with any of it), Confucianism regularly rejected all the supernaturalism of Buddhism and Taoism but advocated keeping the ancestor worship and belief in a divine right of emperors as purely civil rites, and the Hashashin probably reinterpreted all of Islam's commandments as purely political (Zakat being a form of taxation for a rebel state rather than charity to earn brownie points with God). And those are systems of thought compatible with modern western science.  Going into pre-modern or non-western cosmological beliefs, many forms of magical thinking did not regard their beliefs as supernatural, but Preternatural or even (especially in animist societies) just plain natural.  These beliefs assume that there are natural laws, but make mistaken assumptions as to what those laws are.
 * From an emic perspective, those beliefs are a form of naturalism, not supernaturalism; and from an etic perspective, to say that they are not a form of naturalism (if an admittedly mistaken form) is just the prejudices of a modern western emic perspective.
 * And we are not agreed regarding the relationship between theism and religion. I clearly stated that theism overlaps with but has distinct points from religion.  Einstein, Ben Franklin, Goethe, Thomas Jefferson, Socrates, and Spinoza were certainly theistic but far from religious.  Ian.thomson (talk) 20:45, 9 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Wow, I wrote a short, snarky comment about this but ian.thomson's edit just conflicted with mine, and he explains this in far better detail. Thank you.
 * Too many people come to this article thinking that their own personal pet definitions can simply supplant the consensus of reliable sources. We as long-term editors must demand citations for claims like this. Shii (tock) 20:27, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Those explanations are good enough for me – thanks! --Tryptofish (talk) 20:40, 18 August 2014 (UTC)

Definition
Religion is defined as, according to this article, "an organized collection of beliefs, cultural systems, and world views that relate humanity to an order of existence". Numerous scientific fields, like anthropology/evolutionary biology, and certain parts of philosophy, can also fit into this category. I suggest you add the word "unsubstantiated" at the start of the definition. JDiala (talk) 22:41, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
 * I think that change would violate WP:NPOV, but I wonder if there is reliable sourcing for adding a word or two to convey the spiritual nature of it. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:45, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
 * I suggest making use of Durkheim's wording (given in the later Definitions section). Thus: "Religion is an organized collection of beliefs, cultural systems, and world views that relate humanity to an order of existence relative to sacred things including but not limited to gods and spirits". Manbooferie (talk) 07:38, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
 * If we want to avoid violating NPOV, but still address JDiala's valid point about science not being a religion, then I suggest adding the word "faiths" to the definition. As faiths are, by definition, unconditional, it would mean that science would no longer apply. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.104.242.109 (talk) 18:58, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

The definition is baloney. Religion is defined in the bible as something made up by men telling each other what to do. There is no connection to cultural systems and only accidental connections to beliefs. (Pretense of belief is acceptable in religion.) Morality is the adjective form of more, pronounced "mor-ay", and a more is any rule made up by a group of people who live near each other. A more does not have to be right, only accepted. There is no particular connection between religion, morality, and law. For example many people think illicit sex should be punished by death, laws prescribe jail time, and the bible commands banishment.

Jewels Vern (talk) 02:52, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

Religion is defined as, according to this article, "an organized collection of beliefs, cultural systems, and world views that relate humanity to an order of existence". This is very confusing, since it mixes together anthropological and phylosophical terminology requiring separate explanation to be properly understood (and the reference to Geertz in the note does not suffice). I recommend changing the entire initial definition as follows: "Religion refers to sets of variously organized beliefs about the relationship between natural and supernatural aspects of reality, and about the role of humans in this relationship." — Preceding unsigned comment added by ELCLant (talk • contribs) 02:40, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

Religion has a page in wikitionary I'm still a newbe here so I can't add it, if anyone able to add this link somewhere and define it by a dictionary or something that'll be great! Night-changer (talk) 10:32, 24 May 2014 (UTC)


 * New stuff goes at the bottom. We don't use user-generated sources (i.e. anything with "wiki" in the name) as a source.  And at any rate, a dictionary definition would be woefully understating a small selection of sources on the subject instead of accurately summarizing the variety of views out there.  Ian.thomson (talk) 15:15, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Wetodid (talk) 19:01, 13 August 2014 (UTC)If you take supernatural out of the definition for religion the description becomes that of traditions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tradition. The definition for religion must include a reference to the supernatural or it will not be accurate.


 * The current definition is not correct as it would include ideas such as Democracy. Religion requires a belief in a god or gods per standard Dictionary definitions, we should not be attempting to redefine it here. Lexlex (talk) 12:06, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * The dictionary is just plain unreliable compared to academic works dedicated to studying the subject. The dictionary is not written by specialists in relevant fields, but by people who copy colloquialisms (or attempting to re-define things themselves).  Citing a dictionary to define religion when there are academic sources (and already in the article), is like citing newspapers on Global warming instead of scientists.
 * Belief in a god or gods is theism, not necessarily religion. The Church of Satan, Raëlism, Scientology, Jainism, and some forms of Buddhism and Confucianism lack gods, but are religions.  Spinozism has beliefs about God, but is still not considered a religion (just as deists like Thomas Jefferson are also not considered religious).  Ian.thomson (talk) 15:37, 21 October 2014 (UTC)

New notice at the top?
Maybe something along the lines of "If you cite a dictionary against the academic sources in the article, we will not consider your attempts to change the definition" or "dictionaries do not trump academic sources when defining religion"...? Ian.thomson (talk) 15:40, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Sounds good to me. Talk:Historicity of Jesus has a ton of notices to steal from. Shii (tock) 16:25, 21 October 2014 (UTC)

Introductory image
I reverted the 'Religious activities around the world' collage photo back to its original, which happens to include an image of animal sacrifice (which incidentally is a topic in the article). My edit has been undone on the grounds that "requiring an image of animal sacrifice seems WP:POINTy and unnecessary". My response is that it was the earlier change that was unnecessary, and which should have been challenged at the time. This latest undo is inconsistent and unnecessary editorial behaviour. Manbooferie (talk) 23:32, 9 November 2014 (UTC).
 * Whatever my "editorial behavior" {, here is my thinking about it. Although animal sacrifice is certainly an aspect of a number of religions, it seems to me to be WP:UNDUE to give it that kind of prominence in the lead image. Giving it that kind of prominence has the effect of drawing attention to it in a way that presents religion, perhaps inaccurately, in a potentially negative way, and that was the "point" I was talking about in my edit summary. The edit history was that another editor (not me) created the new image on the grounds that that editor was concerned that some people would be offended by the animal sacrifice image. Myself, I think that WP:NOTCENSORED partly argues against that reasoning, but I also think that, just because Wikipedia does not censor images simply because some people might not like them, editorial judgment also allows us the freedom to not feel obligated that we must use images to which some people would object. I see to some extent that the sacrifice image could be a little bit unhelpful, but I cannot see what good it does, that would make it important for us to use it. On the other hand, I'd be fine with taking that one portion of the collage, just the animal sacrifice image, and using it as a thumbnail image at Religion, lower on the page. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:57, 10 November 2014 (UTC)
 * IIRC, it was removed because it gave the impression that animal sacrifice is more common in Hinduism than it really is (and really, religion in general). It is quite appropriate in the animal sacrifice section, though. Ian.thomson (talk) 21:06, 10 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Shii (tock) 23:32, 10 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Whilst I appreciate the gesture to retain the animal sacrifice image in the body of the article, I still maintain that the decision to remove the image from the original photomontage is unnecessary and unjustified. When the photomontage was first created (back in February 2013) the image of animal sacrifice was included not to provoke or offend anyone, but like all of the other images, merely to provide a broad cross-range of religious rituals and peoples from around the world (East/West, young/old, black/white, offerings, sacrifices, music etc). It wasn't especially about sacrifice in Hinduism and maybe an image from e.g. Eid al-Adha would have been more 'neutral'. As I recall, someone was indeed unhappy about the animal sacrifice image, but objections were also raised about Christianity being represented by scary guys in hoods, and even the relevance of the children sat around a dinner table. These objections were discussed at the time, but recognising that it's an impossible task to please everyone (as happened with the symbols), the consensus reached was that the photomontage was acceptable, and hence remained unaltered until very recently. Anyway, it appears I'm outvoted so I'll leave it there. ps. Putting the above arguments aside, an unfortunate side-effect of replacing the original photomontage is that important details about the individual images have now been lost (unless you're motivated to delve into the history). The licensing of the latest photomontage is also highly dubious. Manbooferie (talk) 12:41, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Assignment for my class on theories of religion
Hello

I am a professor of religion in Norway. I teach an introductory class on religion where the students learn how to define religion. I would like to use the wikipedia as an assignment where I ask them to improve the page. They will have a number of assignments where they will edit the entry offline and then the class as a whole will vote on the changes we want to suggest for the wikipedia entry. Once we have voted, I would like to upload the changes on behalf of the class. How does this sound and do you have any advice on the best way to do this? I think it will be a way to improve the entry.Gabriellevy1 (talk) 14:36, 11 June 2015 (UTC)Gabriel Levy June 11 2015

Cherry picking the description of religion given by Geertz has resulted in an incomplete and dare I say intellectually dishonest description.
"a religion is: (1) a system of symbols which acts to (2) establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations in men by (3) formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and (4) clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that (5) the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic."

https://isites.harvard.edu/fs/docs/icb.topic152604.files/Week_4/Geertz_Religon_as_a_Cultural_System_.pdf — Preceding unsigned comment added by 144.223.172.78 (talk) 22:12, 1 July 2015 (UTC)
 * The article is not simply using Geertz's definition in isolation but the widespread development of his definition. Secondary and tertiary sources emphasize the "order of existence" aspect, while paraphrasing the rest.  Ian.thomson (talk) 22:24, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Assignment for my class on theories of religion
Hello

I am a professor of religion in Norway. I teach an introductory class on religion where the students learn how to define religion. I would like to use the wikipedia as an assignment where I ask them to improve the page. They will have a number of assignments where they will edit the entry offline and then the class as a whole will vote on the changes we want to suggest for the wikipedia entry. Once we have voted, I would like to upload the changes on behalf of the class. How does this sound and do you have any advice on the best way to do this? I think it will be a way to improve the entry.Gabriellevy1 (talk) 14:36, 11 June 2015 (UTC)Gabriel Levy June 11 2015

Cherry picking the description of religion given by Geertz has resulted in an incomplete and dare I say intellectually dishonest description.
"a religion is: (1) a system of symbols which acts to (2) establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations in men by (3) formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and (4) clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that (5) the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic."

https://isites.harvard.edu/fs/docs/icb.topic152604.files/Week_4/Geertz_Religon_as_a_Cultural_System_.pdf — Preceding unsigned comment added by 144.223.172.78 (talk) 22:12, 1 July 2015 (UTC)
 * The article is not simply using Geertz's definition in isolation but the widespread development of his definition. Secondary and tertiary sources emphasize the "order of existence" aspect, while paraphrasing the rest.  Ian.thomson (talk) 22:24, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 3 one external links on Religion. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20150317173728/http://richarddawkins.net/article,1454,Richard-Dawkins-on-Hardtalk,BBC-Richard-Dawkins to http://richarddawkins.net/article,1454,Richard-Dawkins-on-Hardtalk,BBC-Richard-Dawkins
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20150317234525/http://richarddawkins.net/articles/915 to http://richarddawkins.net/articles/915
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20100728042608/http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu:80/~kfoster/FosterKokko2008%20Proc%20B%20superstition.pdf to http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~kfoster/FosterKokko2008%20Proc%20B%20superstition.pdf

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

Cheers. —cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 11:40, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Stickee (talk) 04:58, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 25 September 2015
Atheistic Churches There is presently a movement of “atheistic churches” where professed atheists and agnostics gather as communities. Their goals are to form community and discuss scientific and moral issues in the world. This particular group encourages its followers to pursue their individual beliefs without any interference. Atheistic churches often hold “Sunday Assemblies” in which congregations of secular humanists, atheists, and agnostics come together to celebrate life without an influence of the government or of a church.

Religion301 (talk) 17:50, 25 September 2015 (UTC) More importantly, you have not cited reliable sources to back up your request, without which no information should be added to, or changed in, any article. - Arjayay (talk) 17:58, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: as you have not requested a specific change in the form "Please replace XXX with YYY" or "Please add ZZZ between PPP and QQQ".

Semi-protected edit request on 25 September 2015
Please change "The word religion is sometimes used interchangeably with faith or set of duties" to "The word religion is sometimes used interchangeably with faith and is also often associated with set of duties"; however, in the words of Émile Durkheim, religion differs from private belief in that it is "something eminently social." The existing phraseology is misleading because it only addresses the distinction between "faith" as used interchangeably with religion by quoting Durkheim. Indeed, the existing sentence does not identify the issue of religion as used interchangeably with "set of duties," which is a distinctly separate entity from the concept of faith. Therefore, the word "association" to describe "set of duties" more accurately addresses and more clearly explains the distinction between faith and "set of duties" and their rhetorical respective relationships to the popular understanding, or discourse of, religion.


 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the template. -- Sam Sailor Talk! 18:43, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

Definition
The most comprehensive definition for religion is:

Religion is that which is concerned with what happens after you die. This can include a system of beliefs, rituals, worship and lifestyle choices that are related to improving the prospects of what happens after your death. Or it can simply relate to a belief in what happens after death without any concept of ritual or lifestyle choice etc.

If you wish to exclude atheism from this definition, then you could include a clause whereby religion is the belief that something happens after your death. Different religions believe different things happen and many believe that lifestyle choices will influence what happens. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.227.44.41 (talk) 20:32, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 8 October 2015
Please change "A religion is an organized collection of beliefs, cultural systems, and world views that relate humanity to an order of existence." to "A religion is a collection of beliefs, cultural systems, and practices that, together, comprise world views that relate humanity to the cosmos and an order of existence." Deleted “organized,” as organization is not a key element of the definition of religion and therefore is misleading to include in the first sentence. Added the word “practices” to emphasize that religion also includes a performative, active/ participation component. Additionally, cosmos makes the following term “order of existence” more precise and specific to religion as apposed to other

Religion301 (talk) 04:33, 8 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please establish a consensus for any non-factual, PoV alteration, such as this, before using the template. thanks - Arjayay (talk) 20:49, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 20 October 2015
Please add this text: Scripture is an especially common way to define certain religions, and it has been used from the past to the present-day forms of religions. As Wilfred Cantwell Smith in his work, What is Scripture?, points out, “scripture is a reality and a concept inherited from the past, and involved in the general novelty and in the pluralism of our modern world.” Please add it after the second paragraph of the page that reads: "Many religions may have organized behaviors, clergy, a definition of what constitutes adherence or membership, holy places, and scriptures."

USC Religion (talk) 05:56, 20 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. Also, please provide reliable sources. &mdash;Skyllfully (talk &#124; contribs) 19:24, 27 October 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 21 October 2015
I believe there needs to be more information under "Animal Sacrifice". It should include all kinds of sacrifice and not just animals. It should also demonstrate how religious people viewed this. It should look something like this:

Sacrifice was popular throughout many religions including amongst the greeks. It was not always solely animals but sometimes people as well. In the case of the greeks they saw sacrifice as a way of "doing business with the gods" (Jane Ellen Harrison) rather than viewing it as a terrible thing or even seeing it as barbaric. They had a calm cool sense towards it. If they gave the gods this goat, the gods would in turn aid them in battle.

Agillos94 (talk) 20:35, 21 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. &mdash;Skyllfully (talk &#124; contribs) 19:24, 27 October 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 14 October 2015
I think the following small edit clarifies the first line of the origins and development section.

The origin of all religion is uncertain and rarely agreed upon. However, there are a number of theories regarding the subsequent origins of specific religious practices.

USC Religion (talk) 21:46, 14 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Pictogram voting wait.svg Already done. &mdash;Skyllfully (talk &#124; contribs) 19:24, 27 October 2015 (UTC)
 * If this has already been done then I'm setting this to answered. The current wording is slightly different, but if that's important it can be discussed here before a formal request is made. The current wording seems simpler and clearer anyway. Grayfell (talk) 22:35, 4 November 2015 (UTC)

Religious groups: re-organize?
I suggest to change "Religious groups" to "Major religions". Instead of "Abrahamic religions" I would use the subheadings "Christianity", "Islam" etc. That is much more user-friendly and in line with current classification. The "minor" religions should be left under the sub-headings of the major religions. Peteruetz (talk) 18:55, 7 November 2015 (UTC)

"Religious" religion
The topic of Religion as in this article has become excessively narrow, likely by accident or laziness. The narrowness really lowers the quality of the article. As mentioned sporadically, the word also means "conscientious", "go over again", "consider carefully", i.e. nothing to do with life after death, or the meaning of life, or even Jesus. The Federal 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in New York decided that Alcoholics Anonymous is a religion, even though its main focus is staying sober. "Xerox religiously spends most of its profits on research." "Global warming has become a religion". In this article, the emphasis on faith groups has lowered the quality of the discussion of religion. It really needs to spend some time sorting the confusion so that readers understand why Islam and civil engineering are religions, for example, while Rastafarianism and Global Warming aren't. Is anybody interested in helping out? Santamoly (talk) 07:24, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 20 October 2015
Please add this text as a separate idea underneath the "Social Constructionism" section: Another way in which religion can be a social construct is through experiencing spiritual practices with others. French social scientist and sociology pioneer, Emile Durkheim, states that “religion is something eminently social,” meaning that one discovers and learns about religion through a communal and social (rather than individual) experience.

USC Religion (talk) 05:57, 20 October 2015 (UTC)
 * ❌ PoV request by now-blocked user - Arjayay (talk) 11:21, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 14 October 2015
I want to add the following text to the page. I believe it would fit best in the origins and development section, after the section beginning with "According to anthropologists John Monaghan and Peter Just" and ending with "a group of supporters who are able to institutionalize the movement."

The text I would like to add is copied below. The second paragraph, in quotations, is a direct quote from Tylor's text, Primitive Culture. It should be indented and in italics between the two other small paragraphs, which are my original words.

Ethnologist E.B. Tylor proposed that primitive peoples acquired their first religious ideas by the same reasoning process modern humans use in all aspects of their lives: they observed their world and tried to explain it. According to Tylor, two observations occupied the fascination of early humans: death and dreams.

''It seems as though thinking men...were deeply impressed by two groups of biological problems. In the first place, what is it that makes a difference between a living body and a dead one; what causes waking, sleep, trance, disease, death? In the second place, what are those human shapes which appear in dreams and visions?'' - from Tylor’s Primitive Culture (1871)

From these questions, early peoples reasoned that two things composed every man: a body and a phantom, or soul. Thus, Tylor suggests that the origin, or the essence of religion, is animism, “the belief in spiritual beings.”

USC Religion (talk) 21:07, 14 October 2015 (UTC)
 * ❌ Pov request by now-blocked user - Arjayay (talk) 11:22, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 October 2015
Under 'Social Constructionism' it would be informative to the modern concept paragraph to add scholar Brent Nongbri's analysis of the names of religious groups. The names of supposedly venerable old religions can often be traced back to a relatively recent past. For example, Hinduism first appears in 1787 and Buddhism comes up in 1801. There are ancient forms of these words but they described verbal activities rather than conceptual entities. In ancient Greek, ioudaismos was not "the religion of Judaism but rather the activity of Judaizing or following the practice associated with the Judean ethnicity. the Arabic islām was not the religion of Islam but "submitting to authority."

USC Religion (talk) 17:23, 12 October 2015 (UTC)
 * ❌ PoV request by now-blocked user - Arjayay (talk) 11:23, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

You will enjoy my papers
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Sujay_Rao_Mandavilli/contributions

Sujay Rao Mandavilli

106.216.133.49 (talk) 02:12, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 14 October 2015
PLEASE CHANGE (the text near the end of the Etymology section): One of its central concepts is "halakha", sometimes translated as "law""

TO: One of its central concepts is "halakha", meaning the "walk" or "path" sometimes translated as "law""

in order to include the significant and accurate translation information which is truly etymological, because although the current translation is technically correct it also fails to convey the essential source of the concept.

JUSTIFICATION: The Hebrew verb to walk: ללכת (LaLechet) has the three letter root הלך (hey-lamed-chet which is the imperfect past tense form meaning "he walked") which is grammatically the source of the abstract singular noun "Halakha" spelled: הלכה which is the exact word in question. This can be verified with any Hebrew-English lexicon and knowledge of the morphology of the Hebrew language. The substitution of "way", "walk" or "path" indicates the etymological sense of the word in the tradition.

DavidSternman (talk) 19:42, 14 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: Thanks for wanting to improve this article, but we can't make changes based on personal knowledge, we need a reliable source. Regards, Older and ... well older (talk) 15:45, 26 November 2015 (UTC)
 * ✅ -- -- Moxy (talk)

Morality and Religion
I recently added the following information to provide balance to the morality and religion section:


 * The suggestion that the Gallup findings demonstrate religious people are more generous has been challenged, however, by atheist groups who point out that the charitable giving described in the Gallup poll includes in large part donations made to the church and faith-based charities.

The material was removed on the grounds that "this blog is not reliable source". I disagree. The primary source for the information is based on data published in The Chronicle of Philanthropy. The secondary source is an article published by patheos and authored by Hemant Mehta.

Hemant Meta is not just a reliable source, he is a good representative of the challenging voice to the dubious suggestion that religious people are more generous.

Unless there is some reasonable objection, I plan to return this perspective to the morality and religion section. Mmyotis  (^^o^^)  20:38, 3 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Hi Mmyotis. Thanks for sharing your thoughts here, but there are a few issues here. 1) The blog itself is not a reliable source since the author of the blog is not an expert on the matter (I would be ok if this was written by an expert), 2) the blog itself is a self-published source which adds to the problems since no oversight is given by any peer or editor for what is written (See WP:RS for problems with this), and 3) even what you wrote in your edit is not even addressed by the Hemant's piece (e.g. Gallup is not even discussed nor any of the other global findings - looks like WP:SYN). Lastly, it is unclear why charitable giving for ANY cause would even be an issue considering that all other studies focus on the very fact of giving - which usually results in various kinds of social services and support for people's lives either way.


 * Despite this, I searched for the piece from the newspaper The Chronicle of Philanthropy and it does not exist or was removed from the Chronicle's page. From some of quotes that are to be found, it is clear that it shows that religious people give more of their income than do secular counterparts.Mayan1990 (talk) 21:52, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
 * For most readers I think they understand that giving 5$ in church so the priest can by some boozes is not the same as giving to a real charity. I think this is what is trying to be said here about the polls...but ...in a tack-full manner. -- Moxy (talk) 21:57, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
 * In reality it could be argued that since the "secular" often do not give to "religious" charities, it shows that secular people discriminate against organizations that do provide social services to those in need based on genetic fallacies, whereas religious can go either way since they want to help no matter how it gets done.Mayan1990 (talk) 22:12, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
 * I would agree ..its bases on secular people concerns about money going to Proselytism and Dogma over helping. -- Moxy (talk) 22:44, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
 * I would agree aswell considering that even atheists donate to "their" charities which include proselytizing and dogmatic organizations such as Atheists United, American Atheists, Secular Student Alliance, Richard Dawkins Foundation, etc. Its ironic. Mayan1990 (talk) 23:03, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
 * The piece you were looking for is right here: https://philanthropy.com/article/FaithGiving/156239 Mmyotis   (^^o^^)  16:05, 4 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks for that Mmyotis. The news article is surprisingly short.Mayan1990 (talk) 22:30, 4 December 2015 (UTC)

Articles regarding unproven beliefs have language to that effect
Other articles regarding unproven beliefs or systems, with no verifiable factual basis, have language stating this, typically in the introduction. See, for example, the article regarding astrology, which states "However, with the onset of the scientific revolution astrology was called into question; it has been challenged successfully both on theoretical[5]:249;[6] and experimental[7][8] grounds, and has been shown to have no scientific validity[3] or explanatory power." See also the article regarding acupuncture, which states "Scientific investigation has not found any histological or physiological evidence for traditional Chinese concepts such as qi, meridians, and acupuncture points,[n 1][25] and many modern practitioners no longer support the existence of life force energy (qi) flowing through meridians, which was a major part of early belief systems."

Similar "disclaimer" language exists throughout Wikipedia in articles regarding beliefs that have no proven factual basis. Therefore, for the sake of consistency, this language should be added to the introduction of the "religion" article. By this I mean language like the following, "With the onset of the scientific revolution, religion has been called into question. There is no factual basis for any known religion."

Thoughts? — Preceding unsigned comment added by ChicagoDilettante (talk • contribs) 14:27, 9 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Astrology and acupunture are specific traditions, which may make claims to being "scientific." "Religion" is a collective term for a limitless number of traditions; I don't think that "religion" in general, as a "reified entity," makes a general claim to being "scientific." The "disclaimer" you'd like to add is value-loaden over-generalisation, I think. I do understand your point, but it's just to vague/broad/non-specific.  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   16:48, 9 December 2015 (UTC)


 * I disagree. The "religion" article is exactly where the disclaimer should be placed, because the articles regarding specific religions, like Christianity, for example, do not contain the disclaimer (unlike astrology and acupuncture), but instead refer to the religion article. It makes sense, then, to put the disclaimer in the religion article, which is more efficient than including it for each of the individual religions. Religions should be treated no differently from the other non-fact-based belief systems, whether astrology, acupuncture, or homeopathy. The fact that in Wikipedia, religions are currently given a pass and treated differently, is itself a value-laden policy which elevates religions over the other non-fact-based belief systems. If the disclaimer doesn't appear on the religion page, as I believe it should, then it should appear in the articles about the specific religions, though that would less efficient. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ChicagoDilettante (talk • contribs) 17:35, 9 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Does "religion" claim to be scientific? Or do specific religious persons make those claims? I think it's too gross; you might as well just state: "science is superior." Science is superior for those people who are concerned about science; maybe religious people are concerned about religion, not about science. So, if we add such a disclaimer, we can also add another disclaimer: "most/xx% of the religious people in this world are not concerned with this diclaimer; only yy% of the non-religious people in this world are." With other words: to whom does this concern? And don't get me wrong here; see my own "disclaimer" at my userpage, and this conversation. NB: religion has been questioned long before the onset of the scientific revolution. Best regards,  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   18:52, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Ah, here's another pint; see Religion. If you treat religion as a social phenomenon, then the dosclaimer makes no sense; religion just exists. What you are disputing are the truths-claims being made "by"/within religions. There is a section on Secularism and irreligion; you can summarize that section with a few lines in the lead. Those sections can be expanded, of course. How about that? Best regards,  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   18:59, 9 December 2015 (UTC)

Religious practice
This article emphasizes the cognitive aspect of religions: belief systems, world views, and neglects the praxis-aspect. Take, for example, the Roman Catholic aspects of bringing in the light at the Eastern mass: the church is dark, and the priest walks in with a candle. Or, laos Roman Catholic: the mass for a deceased person, in which the coffin is spronkled with holy water and blessed with incense. You don't have to be a Roman Catholic (I'm not) to be impressed by these rituals. People have an intuitive sense for it; the explanations come thereafter, if at all. See all the lights outside at the northern hemisphere at Christmass-time; be sure that I live in an area where Christians have become a small inority, yet many houses have some form of Christmas-lighting at the moment. Why? Yes, why....  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   04:23, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Strange thing is: the lead mentions a lot of aspects of religious practice, yet they are not worked out in the article.  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   04:32, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Aspects of religion
Religious practice should be part of such a section, which should also mention belief systems, religious ecperience, and the social aspects. Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   04:32, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Types
This section fits better with the demographics and descriptions of various world-religions. Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   06:05, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Theories
This section is seriously lacking in theories. The book Contemporary Theories of Religion (ed. Michael Stausberg) describes 15 theories of religion; add to those the eight theories described in Eight Theories of religion (Daniel L. Pals), and it's clear that a lot is missing. Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   04:28, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Related aspects
A bit of an odd section, but alas, it works, though not everything belongs here. Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   06:05, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Secularism, atheism and criticism
Ah, and now we come to CD's cherished part. I've moved "Science" to this section, and renamed it "Faith and reason," to give a clearer hint of the issue at stake here. The part on "IQ and atheism in society" is ridiculous POV-pushing, of course. I guess it implicates that the USA is, on average, a disadvantaged society, while Europe stands out for its superiority? Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   06:05, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Joshua Jonathan. However, I am strongly opposed to putting the discussion of religion's method of validating its doctrinal claims in this section. It is not "criticism" of religion to say that religions support their doctrines through, in sum, faith and subjective revelation. Nor does this issue have anything to do with secularism, or with atheism. So, why would it be placed here? The use of faith and subjective revelation, rather than empiricism, to validate doctrinal claims is, in fact, a characteristic, and not inherently a criticism, of religions. Moreover, the problem with putting it in this section is that implies that it's a criticism, and thus potentially a biased take, on religions, rather than an ojective, neutral statement regarding religions. I actually think it is pro-religion POV to put this material here, because it effectively discounts the material and, basically, buries it. I would suggest instead putting it either "Aspects of Religion" or "Related Aspects." ChicagoDilettante (talk) 07:38, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
 * So, you're going to write a "Faith and reason" section, using Swindall?  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   07:50, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
 * I've thought about it. To be clear, for those who don't know, the Swindal material is available here: http://www.iep.utm.edu/faith-re/. Another source is cited in the belief article, in particular Wittgenstein, Ludwig (2007). Lectures and Conversations on Aesthetics, Psychology and Religious Belief. University of California Press. p. 53. ISBN 0520251814. However, I do not have access to this book, so would need to try to get it from the library. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 21:48, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
 * I am willing to pitch in with drafting something up, as long as it goes in the right place, which would be either "Aspects of Religion" or "Related Aspects." However, I don't think anything complicated needs to be done, just a starting point that will hopefully, in the future, be fleshed out. Perhaps a subsection titled "Religious Beliefs," which I prefer to "Faith and Reason." It could include a statement like one of the ones I proposed earlier and point to the Beliefs article for additional material. Or it could say something like "Traditionally, faith, in addition to reason, has been considered a source of religious beliefs. The interplay between faith and reason, and their use as actual or perceived support for religious beliefs, has been a subject of interest to philosophers and theologians." Then cite to Swindal. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 22:09, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

Lynn et al.
Why are the United States more religious? Because Americans need the church to belong to a social group? Complicated issue. How are the figures when "spirituality" is also included into "religion"? Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   06:35, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Religion and science
I think that this section belongs to the Secularism-section; they are clearly related. With science came secularisation, and vice versa. Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   06:47, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Though, when the "related aspects" section is moved under the "Atheism"-section, then "religion & science" also fits into the "related aspects" section.  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   06:56, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Proposal
I think this article needs a new section, probably under the "issues" heading, clarifying that religions often have core beliefs that are not factually verified and that the adherents do not feel the need to verify. For example, to take one specific religion, the Christianity article states in the lede that "Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God and the savior of humanity...." This is an extraordinary claim that Christians have not backed up with any evidence, nor do they feel the need to do so. Nowhere, however, in either the Christianity article nor in this article on religion is it made clear that these claims have not been verified. I don't mean to single out Christianity. Most of the major religions have core beliefs that are unverified. I don't think that all of them necessarily do. See, for example, Deism and, even more clearly, the Church of Satan, which do not seem to make factually unverified claims. However, most of the major world religions do make factually unverified claims, which is a key feature of them and which should be mentioned in this article on religion.

I am not an expert on philosophy, but I believe that the view that claims should be verified is a feature of one way of thinking, known as logical positivism. Logical positivism seems to be the underlying assumption of most Wikipedia articles. For example, in topics other than religions, when the views of the adherents or practitioners are not backed up with any evidence, the article always points this out, as a service to the reader. See for example, astrology, acupuncture, homeopathy, pyramid power, and Bigfoot. However, in articles regarding specific religions, and in this article on religions more generally, it is not pointed out to the reader that the claims of the adherents are typically not backed up with evidence.

Some philosophers have commented on the fact that religions do not attempt to objectively verify their claims. See for example, this quote regarding Søren Kierkegaard: "The subject of truth is a complicatedhttps://genvideos.org/ notion, but the first thing to say about it is that it is a quite conscientious slap in the face of philosophers. For a philosopher, truth, whatever else it might be, is objective. The central concept of Kierkegaard’s philosophy is 'subjective truth': making a commitment, making the leap of faith to believe. Kierkegaard allows that objectivity is fine in its place (e.g., in science). Kierkegaard is happy to say, 'all power to the sciences, but… .' Questions concerning God and religion are not objective questions." Taken from Robert C. Solomon, No Excuses: Existentialism and the Meaning of Life. Course Guidebook. p. 31, and quoted by in another discussion.

In any event, the core tenets of religions are not being held to the same standards of evidence as in the case of virtually all other topics discussed in Wikipedia articles, nor do the adherents seem to feel that such verification is necessary. I believe this, a key feature of religions, should be mentioned in this article.

I am not an expert on these issues, but as a starting point, I would recommend language added to a new section stating something like "A key feature of many religions is that they incorporate a faith-based belief system according to which their core claims are not subject to objective verification." I would appreciate any thoughts or suggestions regarding this potential edit. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 18:09, 21 December 2015 (UTC)


 * I think those with an academic background would agree..but all we can do here is regurgitate what is out there. Got to remember that the majority of the world  has not develop the academic thinking skills to look at this topic objectively.  Thus we have sources from all over....yes not basses in reality...but its there truth that has been published widely and is here in this article. -- Moxy (talk) 18:41, 21 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Regarding your point about regurgitating what is out there, I believe it's fairly easy to find sources for the proposition that "A key feature of many religions is that they incorporate a faith-based belief system according to which their core claims are not subject to objective verification." I'd start with Kierkegard, including in the quote I included. I am not an academic expert in this area, but I'm sure that someone who is could easily come up with even more sources, and I'd appreciate any suggestions on this from other editors. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 19:20, 21 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Perhaps add info to the "Criticism of religion" section....see what others think. -- Moxy (talk) 19:33, 21 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Why do you repeat yourself, instead of continuing the discussion we'd already started before? I've already suggested how you can add info from the "Secularism and irreligion"-section into the lead; I think that you're POV-pushing here, and showing a serious lack of knowledge of religion, and/or of the study of religion. The aim of Wikipedia is not to assess topics with "standards of evidence," but to provide an overview of the relevant info from reliable sources. Which means, for example: what do Christiams believe? Criticisms are relevant, though; there are also articles on Atheism and Criticism of religion. But your main interest seems to be with promoting an atheist agenda; not a good start for a contribution.
 * Regarding Christianity: you write: ""Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God and the savior of humanity...." This is an extraordinary claim that Christians have not backed up with any evidence, nor do they feel the need to do so." There are about 20,000 different Christians denominations, from extremely conservative to exteremely liberal; find me the author who dares to make such sweeping stements about all of Christianity. Regarding the "evidence:" ever been in the library of a theological seminary? More books then you could ever read in your lifetime. Not exactly "evidence" as in the natural sciences, but a lot of arguments and discussion available. So what makes you think that Christians "do [not] feel the need to do so."
 * Regarding Kierkegaard: the way you're interpreting him shows a lack of understanding. This is not about "not attempt[ing] to objectively verify their claims," but about "a leap of faith," about letting go of those attempts. Thoughtfull believers will not claim that theirs is an objective "truth" as in the natural sciences; they will explain that thier truth is a personal truth, which they follow in their daily lifes. "Love your neighbour like yourself" is a basic belief, in several religions; who cares about "objective" truth here? Maybe you would like to add a disclaimer for the urgence of that belief? It would be like saying "Beware, being compassionate toward Syrian refugees is not an objective, verified truth." I trust you sense the nonsensical nature of such a disclaimer. But as long as you confuse living, practiced religion with decontextualised dogmas, you won't understand what religion is about. Let me quote Shin'ichi Hisamatsu, a Zen-Buddhist, which is also a religion: "If nothing what you do will do, then what will you do?" See also and.
 * Best regards, and succes with the start of your theological studies,  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   19:43, 21 December 2015 (UTC)


 * No, the statement that "A key feature of many religions is that they incorporate a faith-based belief system according to which their core claims are not subject to objective verification" should not go in the "Criticism of Religion" section nor in the Atheism article. This statement is, in fact, 100% uncontroversial, since the adherents of religions readily admit that their claims are not objectively verified. They say repeatedly that their claims are faith-based. So, no, it's not something that should go in the criticism section nor the separate article regarding atheism. It is, actually, a principal (if not THE principal) feature of religions that their claims are not objectively verified, and since it is uncontroversial, it should go here under the "Issues" heading and be summarized in the lede. That it is not already here, and that it would generate any controversy to add it, shows that you are yourself pushing a POV. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 19:54, 21 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Also, I have clarified my thinking on this topic and am requesting something sufficiently different from in my previous request that I felt it warranted a new discussion. If you review that previous discussion, you will see the difference from the current one.


 * In fact,, you yourself stated that "Thoughtfull believers will not claim that theirs is an objective 'truth' as in the natural sciences; they will explain that thier truth is a personal truth..." You also stated that people who adhere to religions engage in a 'leap of faith.'" So, it appears that you essentially agree with the statement that I want to add, which is that "A key feature of many religions is that they incorporate a faith-based belief system according to which their core claims are not subject to objective verification." If you would like to propose alternative language, perhaps involving something about a leap of faith, then please do so, and let's talk about it. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 20:08, 21 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Hi ChicagoDilettante. The line you are trying to add does not make much sense since there are numerous researchers and laypeople who are religious and write about all sorts of "verifications" of their religions. For example, for Jews and Christians, there are numerous books on history and archaeology that argue that there is evidential convergence with the Bible. There is even a field called "Biblical Archaeology" which investigates not just the lands, people, and events in Bible, but also other cultures too. An easy publication on this is Biblical Archaeology Review which brings updates on archaeological finds in relation to the Bible. Furthermore, there are numerous writings already available which argue from philosophical and scientific evidences and reasons for God (Kenneth Miller, Francis Collins, etc). Of course going down through church tradition, there are writings of the Church Fathers which also argue from evidences of various kinds from their time period (from nature, culture, history, scripture). On top of that there are other lines of evidences that people use as basis for their subscription to a belief system such as miracles (which carry lots of weight for many across many traditions - Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, etc). To say that religions broadly have no evidences for themselves or that religious people do not believe that their beliefs are verifiable to some degree is really to ignore the evidences that religious people use and argue from regularly.


 * What makes this interesting is that when one looks at the "non-religious" one finds that even they have all sorts of interesting and diverse beliefs. For example from a Pew Research Study on the non-religious (aka Nones, religiously unaffiliated) notes that "Among the “nothing in particulars,” about eight-in-ten (81%) say they believe in God or a universal spirit – and a plurality of those who believe in God say they are “absolutely certain” about this belief. In addition, about four-in-ten atheists and agnostics (including 14% of atheists and 56% of agnostics) say they believe in God or a universal spirit." The majority of the non-religious have a belief in God or a higher power in the US. On top of that "The unaffiliated are about as likely as others in the general public to believe in reincarnation, astrology and the evil eye. And they are only slightly more likely to believe in yoga as a spiritual practice and in spiritual energy located in physical things such as mountains, trees and crystals...For the most part, the religiously unaffiliated look similar to Christians on these beliefs. For example, the unaffiliated are about as likely as Christians to believe in reincarnation, astrology or the evil eye. There are two exceptions, however. The unaffiliated are somewhat more likely than Christians to believe in spiritual energy in physical things such as mountains, trees and crystals (30% vs. 23%), although this is a minority viewpoint within both groups. The unaffiliated also are somewhat more likely than Christians to believe in yoga as a spiritual practice (28% vs. 21%), though again, this is a minority viewpoint among both the unaffiliated and Christians....The 2009 survey also found few differences between the unaffiliated and Christians in terms of self-reported experiences with the supernatural...Roughly equal portions of the unaffiliated (31%) and of Christians (28%) report having been in touch with someone who has died. Similarly, roughly one-in-six of each group has used a fortuneteller or psychic (15% among the unaffiliated, 14% among Christians). And 19% of the unaffiliated and 17% of Christians report having seen or been in the presence of a ghost." Stuff like this shows that people come to believe things for numerous reasons. Mayan1990 (talk) 00:00, 22 December 2015 (UTC)


 * First of all,, let's dismiss as irrelevant the "non-religious," including the "non-religious" who believe in a god or other spiritual being, because the non-religious are completely irrelevant to this discussion. The issue at hand in this discussion is a feature of RELIGIONS, specifically that their claims are often not subject to objective verification. Whatever the "non-religious" do, or do not, believe has absolutely no bearing on this discussion. Moreover, if they believe in a god or other spiritual being, it does not sound to me as if they are truly non-religious, regardless of how they self-identify. Again, though, the non-religious are irrelevant to this discussion. Same goes for the use of fortune-tellers or whatever by the non-religious. In point of fact, the non-religious are not who we are discussing here.


 * So, back to religions. Even if adherents of some religions believe that their claims are verifiable, they have not provided OBJECTIVE evidence in the ordinary sense, meaning evidence that would stand up to independent, peer-reviewed studies. The consensus among the well-known religious scholars, including Kierkegaard and others, seems to be that religious truths are a subjective experience to the individual believer, commonly called "faith-based" belief. Often these truths are believed to be gleaned through revelation or a "leap of faith." There is, in fact, an article on leap of faith that discusses this phenomenon. See also the faith article, which cites the dictionary definition of faith as "confidence or trust in a person or thing; or the observance of an obligation from loyalty; or fidelity to a person, promise, engagement; or a belief not based on proof; or it may refer to a particular system of religious belief." In fact, the common, ordinary term for religious beliefs is "faith-based." This is all quite clear, and even though I don't have a wealth of citations at the moment, I am quite certain that they could easily be found. (And I would appreciate some help with this, since I am not a trained religious academician.)


 * Moreover, even if SOME religious adherents believe that they have objectively verifiable evidence of their core religious beliefs, that doesn't change the fact that a very common (probably the most common) method that the religious use to purportedly back up their claims is referring to faith, and subjectively revealed reputed truths.


 * So, again, we are back to the fact that a very key feature of religions is that they often do not back up their claims in the way that claims in other fields and disciplines are backed up, meaning with objective evidence. Instead, they believe that faith, or subjectively revealed experience, is a sufficient reason to believe their claims. This, in and of itself, is not necessarily a criticism of religions, unless one believes that all claims should be objectively verified. Rather, it is an observation about a feature of religions, that philosophers and theologians have written about extensively, but about which this article is currently silent. This article would be improved significantly by broaching this topic and describing this common feature of religions. The resistance to doing so, with all due respect, may be an attempt to POV push. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 01:49, 22 December 2015 (UTC)

To reiterate, the language I am proposing adding in a new section under "Issues" is the following: "A key feature of many religions is that they incorporate a faith-based belief system according to which their core claims are not subject to objective verification." There are respected sources of authority that can be cited, including both sources that are "believers" and those that are "non-believers." I have not yet heard any reasons, other than potential POV-based obfuscation, to omit this important material from this article. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 02:01, 22 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Well, for one thing, Kierkegaard is not really a representative of religion in general nor even of Judaism or Christianity so not much weight can be put on him to represent 84% of the worlds population which has a religion. Actually the anthropology of religion shows that many cultures do not have concepts of religion like we do so this complicates things a bit more when making broad assertions about the "nature" of religion. There are enormous differences between Islam and say Taoism that it does make talking about religion very problematic.


 * Actually, the reason why I brought up the non-religious was to provide a contrast to what you were mentioning about the religious. Considering that they too have many diverse beliefs and are not uniform in their thinking, despite them not having a religion was the point. I think that this is why Joshua Johnathan has provided some excellent points to show that your assertion is not really true nor is it acceptable for this article or any other. One cannot go around making hasty generalizations on something a massive as religions - which vary just as much as culture. Remember, the non-religious do not subscribe to any particular religion and yet they still have all sorts of other beliefs so this complicates things incredibly. People are simply not uniform and of course the issues you mention about religion would fall nicely with non-religion too. Most of the non-religious do not study secularism or non-religion so they have diverse interpretations of that also. Also when you say "objective evidence" meaning independent peer-reviewed studies, it is a pretty odd thing to say considering there are peer reviewed studies on miracles, religion, God, Islam, Buddhism, and even atheist religions like the Church of Satan and Unitarian Universalists, etc. In fact all positions and evidences have been presented in peer reviewed journals and books for instance, "The Oxford Handbook of the Abrahamic Religions", "The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology", "Oxford History of Islam", "An Archaeological History of Indian Buddhism (Oxford Handbooks in Archaeology)", "Hume's Abject Failure: The Argument Against Miracles", and of course thousands of other resources!


 * I hope you know that there are journals from the philosophy of religion, archaeology, history, etc that do have all sorts of evidences and arguments for all sorts of positions for numerous religions. Just like anything in life, there is much to debate about when it comes to worldviews, but to say that religions do not have justifications by either evidences and reason for some of their core beliefs is really questionable considering the amount of literature and research that has already gone into the topics from various angles. Considering all of this, to put what you suggest in the article is to misrepresent religions and all of their diversity. Mayan1990 (talk) 02:58, 22 December 2015 (UTC)


 * How about instead of running from one thread to another, and even running from one article to another to get your pet sentence added to articles, you complete a discussion in one place. You have been all but unanimously opposed for a reason - several reasons, actually, which you have been given and seem to do nothing but ignore.  If you're not going to collaborate, stop wasting wikipedia's time.Farsight001 (talk) 03:13, 22 December 2015 (UTC)


 * I would be happy to merge the threads if I believed they covered the same topic, but I do not. Also, only three editors have responded to my comment, and it's clear that they are all (including you) pushing a pro-religion POV agenda. That's not surprising given that it's likely to be pro-religion POV editors who are following the religion page (kind of a fox/hen-house problem). It's obvious that that's why I have been mostly opposed. I would suggest that we focus on the topic at hand, which is my proposal to add an (obviously correct) statement that "A key feature of many religions is that they incorporate a faith-based belief system according to which their core claims are not subject to objective verification." This would clearly strengthen this article. Do you have some language tweaks or suggestions on sources? ChicagoDilettante (talk) 03:21, 22 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Maybe you should take a look at my userpage. A couple of weeks ago I was accused of corrupting Buddhism, because I seemed to believe there's no truth. I'm definitely religious (though not institutional), yet I'm also thoroughly academic. My main reasons to be "religious" are a personal religious experience, and compassion. This religious experience is the most truthfull "thing" I've ever experienced, yet I consider it to be a subjective experience, which may well be explained by neurological mechanisms (see also neurotheology and cognitive science of religion). The compassion-part is also subjective, yet as important as the religious experience part. I may be "wrong" there, who knows; my criterium of truth here is that it is my personal responsibility how I act. If I do something wrong, I'm accountable for it. But I'm pretty sure that this world needs compassion, be it Christian, Islamic, Buddhist, or atheist.
 * This being said, and now I'm going to repeat myself: the "belief systems" you're referring too, like astrology and acupuncture, make specific truth-claims which they present as empirical facts, and which provide an income for some of their practitioners. That's what makes them scrutinable. They are not scientific endeavours, and the truth-claims may be misleading, and even harmfull. But "religion" in general is such a broad topic; you can dismiss specific truth-claims, but not the whole category of human behaviour. It's not specific.
 * Western religion, c.q. western theology, has been struggling for more than two centuries already with modernism and science. See the article on religious experience. Some have responded with a growing dogmatism; others have responded with a growing emphasis on "religious experience" as providing certainty about beleifs and worldviews. Please read the article; it's a fascinating topic.
 * And please do understand the difference between official dogmas, and what individuals belief. Why do we have Christmas-trees? There's no doga for it; yet, it is definitely a religious thing.
 * I think that the sentence you want to add is a token of a simplistic, or better said, undeveloped atheism. It may be an American issue (are you American?); in Europe, who cares? The churches are on sale here, and most people have become some sort of "spiritual," that is, liberal Christians under a new name. But alas, I'll see what I can find, since you doon't know where to begin. Seriously, you should read some theology! Or start here:.
 * Best regards,  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   06:13, 22 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Okay, now we're cooking with oil. Thanks for your thoughtful commentary and list of sources, . Yes, I am an atheist or an agnostic, depending on how those terms are defined, meaning that I make no claim that a deity does not exist, but I have never seen any evidence that one does exist and therefore do not believe in one. If at some point I were to see some evidence that one exists, then I'd reconsider. In any event, I am what you would likely call a "non-believer." I think this is a good thing, because I can look at this page with a fresh eye.


 * In fact, this page really is missing something. Perhaps my proposed language needs some tweaking, but something does need to be done here. In particular, the pages regarding the various individual religions, e.g. Christianity and Islam, refer to this page by saying that their individual religion is a religion, then proceed to state the claims and beliefs of their followers, i.e. in Christianity's case that "Jesus" is the "savior of humanity." Never is there any discussion of whether evidence, objective or otherwise, has been presented by the religious adherents to support their beliefs or claims, not on the individual religion page, nor on this page. What's more, there is not any discussion of the view of the religious that no objective evidence is required. There is simply silence as to the question of evidence. That is a glaring, even shocking, omission, in my opinion especially since there appears to be plenty of scholarly work on this very point.


 * Note, by the way, that my narrow claim here is not that religions are somehow bad or inferior because they hold beliefs that are not objectively verified. Rather, I am suggesting that--if the common practice by adherents of religions is to forego objective, independently-verifiable evidence to support their beliefs, and to instead to rely on faith, including a leap of faith, subjective experience, and revelation, for this purpose--then FINE, but let's say this in this article! However people want to phrase it, that's fine with me. But right now, this hugely important topic, which seems to be one of the defining characteristics of religions, is completely omitted. We would make this article much stronger, and clarify the basic nature of religion, by adding a section on this. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 07:46, 22 December 2015 (UTC)


 * ChicagoDilettante, no one here supports your suggestion because it clearly violates wikipedia policy WP:NPOV. On top of that your focus on a leap of faith as being the drive for religion is not substantiated considering that the non-religious do the same thing (per the Pew Research Center's data). The reality is that people come to believe what they believe due to many factors and evidences are not the issue, its the interpretations of the evidences that is the issue. No evidence speaks for itself - it must be interpreted. In fact, now there is some research on atheists and secular people in the US and Europe and how they come to believe their atheism. They have some interesting results "Nor is it likely that most atheists and agnostics base their decision to not believe in the gods on a careful, rational analysis of the pertinent philosophical and scientific arguments. As noted earlier Europeans score about as poorly on tests of scientific knowledge as do the more religious American population. The common perplexment of rationalists that so many people are superstitious is psychosociologically naive, most people do not care all that much about scientific rationalism, which explains why three quarters of Americans and many other Westerners believe in something paranormal aside from gods (Sjodin 2002, Gallup 2005a). A growing body of research indicates that humans are not a predominantly rational species; intuitive thinking based on inadequate information being the norm (Pinker 2002; Marcus 2008)..." (Gregory Paul (2010). "The Evolution of Popular Religiosity and Secularism". Atheism and Secularity Vol.2 Edited by Phil Zuckerman) There of course are other studies which note that many atheists indeed do not cite any evidences for justifying their atheism, but rather it is taken on faith (for granted) because they do not like the alternative. Mayan1990 (talk) 23:40, 22 December 2015 (UTC)


 * , again, you bring up the belief system of "atheists and secular people" and spend nearly an entire paragraph discussing it. I will say, again, that for the purposes of this discussion, atheists and secular people, and whatever approaches they take to claim verification, and their scores on "tests of scientific knowledge," are not relevant. While the belief system of atheists and secular people is also, in my opinion, an interesting topic in its own right, it is totally off topic to this discussion. We are, here, discussing religion and the belief system of religions. So, can we agree to refrain from further discussing the belief system(s) or knowledge of atheists and secular people? ChicagoDilettante (talk) 03:27, 23 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Back to religion. In fact, I am not sure that "no one here" supports my suggestion, although certainly, I do see on this page a lot of pro-religion POV that seems to be resistant to fleshing out this article by adding a section discussing a key feature of religions, which is that they believe things without objectively verifiable evidence, in the ordinary sense of the word as applied to other topics in Wikipedia. Rather, religions believe things, like about whatever deity(ies) are a feature of their religion, and rely on things like revelation, faith, etc. as perceived support for their beliefs. I am not sure if I'm phrasing this perfectly, but that's a key point about religions, has been discussed at length by philosophers and theologians for centuries, and there is actually a section of the belief article focused on religious beliefs. Also, has been kind enough to provide a list of potentially useful sources. What I think the best thing to do now is for us to sift through all of this material and come up with some language that we can all agree on regarding this feature of religions. I will work on this, but I would appreciate whatever help other editors can provide. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 03:49, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

So, the concrete proposal is to add "A key feature of many religions is that they incorporate a faith-based belief system according to which their core claims are not subject to objective verification." The Science-section has got something to say on this issue; you may want to add a new section on "Faith and reason." But it's an immense topic... To remind you: "religious experience" came to be taken as a valid means of "religious knowledge" in the 19th century. See William James, among others. You'll have to use a serious overview on this topic, like the Sandwell-article I mentioned below. By the way, the Wiki-article itself could use some serious improvement. I'll give it a try. Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   04:15, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
 * What you suggest is my "concrete proposal" is my starting point for proposed language in the new section, and I think that gets at the concept, even if people want to tweak it. I don't think we need a massive treatise, just a framework and if later editors want to develop it further, all the better. Also, it should obviously be something that is neutrally stated, not anything that could reasonably be construed as either a disparagement of religion, or conversely as advocacy for religion. Here is an alternative proposal for language: "A key characteristic of many religions is a belief system that relies on faith, subjective revelation, or various other non-rational (or should we say non-scientific?) approaches as a perceived means of support for their doctrines." I like either that or my original proposal. Again, I'm just trying to rough something out. I also need to review sources, including those cited in the belief article, but the books are not available online and I may need to get them from a library. Any other ideas would be greatly appreciated! And thanks,, for being willing to pitch in the way that you mentioned. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 05:04, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Here is the current proposal, based on the various discussions: Create a new section under "Aspects" called "Religious Beliefs" with the following statement: "Traditionally, faith, in addition to reason, has been considered a source of religious beliefs. The interplay between faith and reason, and their use as actual or perceived support for religious beliefs, has been a subject of interest to philosophers and theologians." The source cited would be Swindal. It would also refer to the "religious beliefs" section of the beliefs article. I have not heard any comments on this recently, and am considering moving forward. ChicagoDilettante (talk) 16:13, 27 December 2015 (UTC)

Morality and Religion II
The section on morality and religion needs some work. It should provide a general summary of the Morality and religion article. I see two main issues: (1) there are three paragraphs on charitable giving that equate to about 2/3s of the entire section, and (2) there is extraneous information. First, charitable giving does not always equate to morality. One can give to organizations that act in an immoral manner (however one wants to define it). That charitable giving would not then equate to a moral act. Having said that, in general, I don't mind noting charitable giving in this section, because it equates to altruism and enhancing the well-being of others which most people view in moral terms. The main issue is that it's given undue weight. I.e., it overpowers the section. It should just be summarized. As far as the second issue, as an example, I don't see how people being registered to vote is necessarily related to morality. Thanks. --Airborne84 (talk) 12:29, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

"Religious" religion
The topic of Religion as in this article has become excessively narrow, likely by accident or laziness. The narrowness really lowers the quality of the article. As mentioned sporadically, the word also means "conscientious", "go over again", "consider carefully", i.e. nothing to do with life after death, or the meaning of life, or even Jesus. The Federal 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in New York decided that Alcoholics Anonymous is a religion, even though its main focus is staying sober. "Xerox religiously spends most of its profits on research." "Global warming has become a religion". In this article, the emphasis on faith groups has lowered the quality of the discussion of religion. Is anybody interested in helping to sort this out? Santamoly (talk) 08:34, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

Books
 * --Moxy (talk) 06:25, 27 January 2016 (UTC)
 * --Moxy (talk) 06:25, 27 January 2016 (UTC)
 * --Moxy (talk) 06:25, 27 January 2016 (UTC)
 * --Moxy (talk) 06:25, 27 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Good observation - and a "hell" of a job!  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   09:36, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

"Folk religion" in lead
About 84% of the world's population is affiliated with one of the five largest religions, namely Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism or folk religion.[1]

Can folk religion really be presented as if it were a unified system of thought, along with the other four religions mentioned? I think the statement needs to be re-written to make it clear that folk religion is not a specific belief system in the sense that the other four are. Perhaps something like "affiliated with one of the five largest religious traditions"? Or perhaps "folk religion (which is not a unified system of belief, but refers to a variety of indigenous..." What do you think? 8bitW (talk) 04:29, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

Lead & definition
Defining religion as


 * "A religion is a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the Universe. It includes the belief in, worship of, and/or obedience to a supernatural controlling power or powers. Such a power is often referred to as a God, Supreme Being, or deity, and is considered to be divine or to have control of human destiny, and is usually regarded as creating and governing the Universe. "

is a too limited definition, which focusses too much on "beliefs" (c.q. 'superstitions') and "powers" which leave humans 'powerless.' Also, the sources, such as the BBC dictionaries, are not the best sources for such a definition. Also, it does not summarise the article adequately:


 * "There are numerous definitions of religion and only a few are stated here. The typical dictionary definition of religion refers to a "belief in, or the worship of, a god or gods"[24] or the "service and worship of God or the supernatural".[25] However, writers and scholars have expanded upon the "belief in god" definitions as insufficient to capture the diversity of religious thought and experience."

And here's what the MacMillan Encyclopedia of Religion says:


 * p.7692: "The very attempt to define religion, to find some distinctive or possibly unique essence or set of qualities that distinguish the “religious” from the remainder of human life, is primarily a Western concern. The attempt is a natural consequence of the Western speculative, intellectualistic, and scientific disposition. It is also the product of the dominant Western religious mode, what is called the Judeo-Christian climate or, more accurately, the theistic inheritance from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The theistic form of belief in this tradition, even when downgraded culturally, is formative of the dichotomous Western view of religion. That is, the basic structure of theism is essentially a distinction between a transcendent deity and all else, between the creator and his creation, between God and man."
 * p.7695: "In summary, it may be said that almost every known culture involves the religious in the above sense of a depth dimension in cultural experiences at all levels—a push, whether ill-defined or conscious, toward some sort of ultimacy and transcendence that will provide norms and power for the rest of life. When more or less distinct patterns of behavior are built around this depth dimension in a culture, this structure constitutes religion in its historically recognizable form. Religion is the organization of life around the depth dimensions of experience—varied in form, completeness, and clarity in accordance with the environing culture."

Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   05:54, 27 January 2016 (UTC)


 * The first sentence in the lead as a definition of religion seems quite good to me. However, the section "definition" relies entirely on modern Western philosophy and is clearly very, very lacking. Overall the definitions do not reflect a global view of the topic. 8bitW (talk) 04:37, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

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Semi-protected edit request on 11 February 2016
Under the sub-article atheism, I believe that there is a group of people that has been left out. There is a small meeting place in my town for these Interitumists, and I figured it could be talked about here.

The group is called Interitumism. The name is derived from the Latin word "interitum", meaning afterlife. Interitumists may or may not believe in a god, but it is generally accepted by most people that there is an omnipotent being that created the universe, and interferes in it's creation. The god can be any god, from God, to Buddha, to any and all of the Hindu gods, to the Flying Spaghetti Monster. There is no set god, it is based on what you believe in.

More importantly, however, is the fact that Interitumists believe in a personalized afterlife. Whether it be reincarnation to a palace made out of clouds, if you believe in an afterlife, it is said to be that you are sent to that afterlife. However, it is believed that once your afterlife has been set, it cannot and will not be changed. If you were granted the afterlife of reincarnation by your god, every time you die, you will be reincarnated, and sent back to live another life. If you wish to live in a cloud palace, you will remain there for eternity. Yet, there is a small loophole to this, as if the person in question is unhappy with their afterlife, they can change it after completing the Fifteen Trials of Purity. Each are a personal hardship created for the person by their god. If completed, they are granted their new afterlife. If not, however, they are sent to the Eternal Void, a place where all people who have committed five of the seven deadly sins or have failed the trials goes. The Void is an endless expanse of black, where the person can see, feel, hear, taste, and smell nothing, even their own selves. If it is the first time failing the trials, they will be sent there for fifty years, for being ungrateful for the afterlife they were granted. If, however, they should fail to pass the trials a second time, they are sent to the Void for eternity.

There are no prophets or priests, each follower of Interitumism prays to their god in their own fashion at the time and place of their choosing.

There are many small meeting places, but they are most common in the Tri-State area, in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and New York.

69.141.247.1 (talk) 22:14, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Pictogram voting question.svg Question: Do you have any sources for this group or belief system? " Interitumism" is not a word...is there another name?  To be honest not sure such an obscure group will get mentioned here...we cant mention  them all.  -- Moxy (talk) 22:45, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Pictogram voting question.svg Question: Is this a parody religion? If so, it's not clear from your explanation. Otherwise it doesn't belong under atheism, the expressed denial of a god. -- Drtmv (talk) 03:15, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

Lead image
I think this article in serious need of a lead image. Any idea of what we should use?Gonzales John (talk) 07:40, 23 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Currently the article contains 17 different images. You might need to simply one closer to the top. Dimadick (talk) 09:12, 23 April 2016 (UTC)


 * The three largest global religions are Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism. Jesus is the most important figure in the first, the second greatest prophet in the second, and a deity in the third. What about | this image of Jesus? The Syrian icon is one of the most | widely known. CircularReason (talk) 01:48, 1 May 2016 (UTC)


 * No way. Talking about systemic bias...  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   04:47, 1 May 2016 (UTC)


 * Either no lead image (best) or maybe, maybe, a composite with tons. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 04:56, 1 May 2016 (UTC)
 * For now, I vouch for a composite, but one that doesn't have too many pictures.Gonzales John (talk) 13:59, 2 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Joshua Jonathan, would a composite of, say, the top nine be okay with you? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 21:09, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

That would be fine, I guess. It should include photographs of 'indigenous' religions, though; not only the 'world religions.'  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   04:54, 20 May 2016 (UTC)


 * Sounds good. According to List of religious populations and Major religious groups, I suggest the following nine, but it doesn't include indigenous. How would that be represented and how many adherents for indigenous?


 * Christianity
 * Islam
 * Hinduism
 * Chinese traditional religion
 * Buddhism
 * Taoism
 * Shinto
 * Sikhism
 * Judaism


 * Thoughts? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:44, 20 May 2016 (UTC)


 * Very Asian. Africa, Adivasi, Aboriginals?  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   06:43, 20 May 2016 (UTC)


 * True. But, we have to have some way to pick, and number of adherents would draw the fewest complaints. Should we pick the biggest one from each continent or most populous culture or something? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:11, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

For those interested, there was a similar (very long) discussion several years ago that resulted in this lead image being used. Later, I forget the details of why and when, another group of editors decided it was not appropriate and it was removed. Good luck with this one. Manbooferie (talk) 07:29, 31 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Hi Manbooferie. Sorry for the late reply. A watchlist cleanup booted this article off my list. Yes! It looks great! I will put black or white lines between the images for clarity. Please revert to older version if it looks horrible. Many thanks! Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:30, 6 September 2016 (UTC)


 * Actually, I just zoomed in on the pics. Many are of Buddhism, Islam is left out, and one is a picture of someone killing a cow. I don't think people will accept this composite. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:44, 6 September 2016 (UTC)


 * Islam is included, top centre. Like I said, there was a lot of discussion. Manbooferie (talk) 05:56, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

Founding a religion
What would it take to create a religion? And really get it out there for people to believe in it? Amandawikipedia (talk) 18:03, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

New Religion - Madharchoditism
There is a new religious movement promoted by mainly black people with local support from east indians that may have originated in New York due to the death of the baby girl of a schizophrenic patient Niladebie Debie. She had a history of mental breakdowns and psychotic behavior and her life was being exploited by black haitians who were in financial problems. Current management of Madharchoditism is in the hands of the Debie family mostly Dhirin Debie who also has a schizophrenic past. They rely on psychosis and psychological manipulation techniques to acquire adherents. Currently there is a formal court case in Suriname where there methods of trying to become someone else and mirroring others is being investigated. Madharchoditism adehrents include family Fagoe, Dihal, Narain,Panday, Mahtabsingh, Tong, etc. They are also known to use human excrements and bodly fluids to mix with foods as initiation. Dhirin Debie was initiated by swallowing human excrement, gold rings, change and also snot. They appear to have support of the Surinamese police and military. Their practices closely resemble some rakshahsa practices and elements of submissive homosexuality by sexual deprivation. The Bianchi family is an Italian family that is responsible for media and actors who promote the religion. Samla Bissessar is actively promoting the religion in the Netherlands. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.53.192.35 (talk) 03:18, 19 December 2016 (UTC)
 * If you can find sources meeting our WP:RS guidelines sufficient to establish notability as per WP:NOTABILITY, I would welcome seeing some content on it. John Carter (talk) 18:14, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

Religion Article Critique
I think this article was well written with a lot of useful information. For the most part it wasn't biased which was good. The neutrality it has makes it easier for the reader to comprehend, without trying to sway them in any direction. I think it was also good how it included that people get faith and religion mixed up a bit sometimes too. The article was mostly describing how religion is really based on culture and heritage styles. I think the article could have maybe included some of the different types of religion and describe them a little, so the reader can understand them a little better. Overall, it was very informative and useful to read about. Kimmashleee (talk) 00:34, 3 February 2017 (UTC)kim s

I agree. It's good to see a well done article about an important topic such as this and another example being the Konrad Adenauer article; the gold standard of Wikipedia articles in my view. 86.45.226.161 (talk) 20:12, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

Source 42 (Pecorino)
I don't think this source is reliable on the grounds that the work itself says "These are class notes, intended to comment on readings and amplify class discussion. They should be read as such. They are not intended for publication or general distribution." at the bottom of each page so by its own admission it's not a reliable source for a website whose information is widely distributed. Pecorino also seems to lack knowledge about religion at times given that it makes the bizarre claims that "1. Religion is more important than GOD! 2. Religion is more important than TRUTH! 3. Religion is more important than reasoning! 4. Religion is more important than nearly anything else!" 1. A contradiction since belief in God is the whole point of monotheistic religion and if someone's religion isn't monotheistic then one doesn't believe in the capital G God anyway so of course in that case religion would be more important than God! 2. For a believer religion is true; that's the whole point! 3. That's only true if someone is a fideist; a position rejected as relativist and sinful by a number of believers (notably the Catholic Church) and again point 2; if religion is true then it isn't more important than reason since it's within reason. 4. NEARLY anything else? I would think whether or not someone goes anywhere and/or to which place they go would be the most important question of all. If religion is more important than God and reason then what is it less important than? Regardless of anyone's position if a source expressing any position doesn't know what it's talking about it's a poor source and should be removed. 86.45.226.161 (talk) 20:12, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

You Should Add
Religion is our beliefs that change our lifestyle. — Preceding unsigned comment added by SchoolKid27 (talk • contribs) 17:47, 6 March 2017 (UTC)
 * That would require citing a professionally published mainstream academic or journalistic source. Ian.thomson (talk) 23:05, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

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Denomination link
please change ((denomination))s to ((Religious denomination|denominations))
 * Yes check.svg Done, thanks –72 (talk) 17:31, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Re the onset of modernization and cumulative criticism of religion
The last paragraph of the introduction reads,

"With the onset of the modernisation of and the scientific revolution in the western world, some aspects of religion have cumulatively been criticized. The religiously unaffiliated demographic includes those who do not identify with any particular religion, atheists and agnostics. While the religiously unaffiliated have grown globally, many of the religiously unaffiliated still have various religious beliefs."

Three questions: 1. Is the first sentence using weasel words? It doesn't say who criticizes aspects of religion. 2. What does the word "cumulatively" add to the sentence? Does it mean that many people have criticized religion? If so, saying where the criticisms of aspects of religion come from will either clarify the use of the word "cumulatively" or make it redundant. 3. Is criticism of aspects of religion new to the onset of modernisation in the west? Lucretius and Charvaka Hindus seem like exceptions - they were materialists and vocal ancient critics of religion. There are many other examples in pre-modern cultures. There may be a greater volume or variety of criticism than in times past, but I think that could use a citation. It also may be that more people are religiously unaffiliated now than in the 1600's or 700's or other times in the past, but that could also use a citation.

The challenge, if I see correctly, is that we want to say "Religion seems less popular than it used to before the modern age" while also saying, later in the article, "Religion is a modern Western concept."

Cheers, and thanks y'all for your work on wikipedia.

65.111.58.21 (talk) 21:03, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 30 August 2017
"(e.g. France’s president Francois Hollande" should read "France's former president Francois Hollande" Paleosue (talk) 19:05, 30 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done –72 (talk) 19:30, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

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Spiritual Magic
??? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.117.218.110 (talk) 03:59, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 28 December 2017
86.105.84.164 (talk) 08:06, 28 December 2017 (UTC) etymology Religion:latin religio /re-legio;re-ligio; lege-it.legge-eng.law (it.leggere -legge-relegere;rileggere- ...re-ligare ...eng.legitimate... the same root at the birth of the word sense "The law of God".)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. Stickee (talk) 11:37, 28 December 2017 (UTC)

Weird section
There was a recently added section on this article which looks very odd on mental disorders and religion. What is the purpose of this section?

Considering that religion is a worldview and abstraction (which anyone can opt in or out at will), not a disease or mental disorder (which is inherently genetic or biologically based and very hard to control - many involuntary consequences) the section looks like it belongs in a psychology page, not this particular page.

Here is one of the claims the section said "Hallucinations and delusions related to religious content occurs in about 60% of people with schizophrenia." This is about interactions of schizophrenia than it is about interactions of religion. Does schizophrenia cause religion? What is the point of this for the reader in this article? Schizophrenia is a biological disorder which interacts with many aspects of life including the secular. For instance with atheists also experiencing schizophrenia.

Another one of the claims says "Religious content is also common in temporal lobe epilepsy, and obsessive-compulsive disorder." Again the same issue, what is the relevance for this for the reader in this article? Is religion a disorder? One source I found mentioned that atheists suffer from temporal lobe epilepsy too: "..those with temporal lobe epilepsy are more likely to have more serious forms of emotional disturbance. This "typical personality" of temporal lobe epileptic patient has been described in roughly similar terms over many years (Blumer & Benson, 1975; Geschwind, 1975, 1977; Blumer, 1999; Devinsky & Schachter, 2009). These patients are said to have a deepening of emotions; they ascribe great significance to commonplace events. This can be manifested as a tendency to take a cosmic view; hyperreligiosity (or intensely professed atheism) is said to be common." from Clinical Neuropsychology by Kenneth M. Heilman (Author),‎ Edward Valenstein.

All of this really seems like WP:COATRACK to me since everyone suffers from mental issues.

This stuff looks controversial for this article and we have to keep in mind the scope of this article.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 08:27, 8 January 2018 (UTC)


 * The fact is that spirituality and religion are highly relevant to mental health. If a textbook on psychiatry sets aside a chapter for it, it is relevant.  If there are journal articles published on the topic, it is relevant.  Another editor seems to agree "Undid revision 819206675 by Ramos1990 (talk)Eh? Religion is not a behavioral thing?... And there's no relation between religion and mental health?." Petergstrom (talk) 09:40, 8 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Yep. See also Cognitive science of religion, for the statement that one can opt in or out of religion: religion is related to neurology, just like it is to social groups and behavior.  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   11:32, 8 January 2018 (UTC)


 * In that case, then the other references on atheism will also have to be included in that section since those are also relevant. These biological issues are apparent in all people really.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 13:38, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That seems a bit WP:POINTY. This is an article on religion, not atheism, and one references to intensely professed atheism hardly seems enough.  Most sources cite religiosity, but one quotation on atheism doesn't really seem sufficient to mention, especially in an article that is not related.Petergstrom (talk) 16:46, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The article is on religion (which includes theism and atheism since many religions do not have gods and some do + both theism and theism have both secular and religious sides too). There are many entries in the article which include the nonreligious, secular, and of course atheism on the "related aspects" section of this article. Even the sources I found make the connection between deep convictions of identity (whether religious or atheistic or secular) like many other sources in the article binarily do. So this is not a disruption at all, but a way to balance out and achieve NPOV on this controversial section. Especially since everyone including those who have no belief in god or are secular, all experience disorders just like everyone else. Considering that biological disorders interact with worldviews (religious, secular, theistic, atheistic); perceptions of reality, the self, identity, culture, family, genetics etc and are very complex, it seems to require some balance especially since the section as is, looks quite controversial and in bad taste. Why you created a section on metal health that only emphasizes disorders (which of course is biological and genetic rather than related to whether or not some one has a religion) is not clear. It is quite problematic since metal illnesses are universal across worldviews.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 00:03, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

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Semi-protected edit request on 20 February 2018
In the "western" drop-down in the "influences" section of the "spirituality" menu, change "Medieaval" to Medieval. thanks. Penniestodollars (talk) 00:13, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done This misspelling was actually in a template (although you had no way of knowing that) but that means you caught an error that was propagated to 35 pages instead of just his one. Thank you for noticing the error.  Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 00:24, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Actually, I don't think it's a spelling error as such, I think it's a valid, if somewhat uncommon, British English spelling. However, I do agree with the change, as far more common and recognisable usage, and I'm of British origin... -- Begoon 00:32, 20 February 2018 (UTC)

February 2018
The subsection title "Universal vs Ethnic" should be removed. It was added in by a SPA and brings undue weight to an opinion which is, according to the text itself, disputed among scholars (and, why would something like that go before the much more widely accepted categorizations?). 198.84.253.202 (talk) 15:14, 17 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the template. Whether this section was added by an SPA or not is not relevant but what is relevant is whether this complies with the Core Content Policies.  Determining this requires discussion among a larger selection of editors than can be accommodated in a simple edit request. I suggest that creating a relevant Request for Comment is the best way to determine if this section should be kept, removed, or improved.  Thank you.  Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 15:00, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
 * This (i.e. removing the subsection title) seems mostly uncontroversial, therefore this request cannot be rejected on those grounds. The fact that it was added by an SPA is crucial, in addition to the fact the edit was clearly done without obtaining a consensus in the first place, and the onus is not on me to prove there was no consensus (an incredibly hard proposition, more so because of the silence) but on the one who wanted it included in the first place (the SPA editor) to prove there was. And as I said, it being so prominent (because of the subsection title) is in violation of WP:NPOV which requires that due weight be given the opinions, and obviously a contested opinion should not be given such emphasis. 198.84.253.202 (talk) 20:07, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done for now: That one person contests this usage does not mean the section, which is referenced, is in violation of NPOV or other core content policies. No-one is asking you to prove no consensus for inclusion.  All I am pointing out is that there needs to be a greater consensus that this requires removal of referenced information. It is nonsensical to call this requested change "uncontroversial" and also claim NPOV concerns.  NPOV implies controversial inclusion and therefore a conversation between a mere two editors is an inappropriate way to decide inclusion.   Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 20:22, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
 * This content seems uncontroversial to me. Although it doesn't seem to need it's own section, but rather could be fitted in elsewhere. I don't think it matters that it was put there by an SPA, it's more about the quality than the poster. I think the references should be looked at carefully and then it should be integrated into another, more general section.
 * Morgan Leigh | Talk 02:18, 24 February 2018 (UTC)

Weird removal
This removal of content by User:Morgan Leigh is not sufficiently justified. The paragraph is not "poorly written", and it doesn't "not add to the article". It is explicitly on morality and religion, and is related to the other paragraphs in the section. It is also strongly sourced, and the edit goes against WP:PRESERVE. If you believe content can be improved upon, do so. To remove a large amount of well sourced content without preserving it, cannot be justified.Petergstrom (talk) 04:42, 14 February 2018 (UTC)


 * Greetings, I do stick to my contention that it is poorly written. The poor grammar alone makes it so. However I also contend that it starts with an obvious generality and then uses an example from a tiny minority view to make a point that has already been made in other paragraphs. This whole paragraph could be simply replaced by a sentence that says "different religions have different moral codes". Perhaps you could improve it if it you think it is worth saving, but I think that, as you mentioned, there is already a lot of stuff about morality that is at least grammatically correct and not relying on a minority view to make a point. Things can be well sourced and still not add anything to an article.
 * Morgan Leigh | Talk 08:25, 15 February 2018 (UTC)


 * I kind of have to agree with both of you here in that something looks worth preserving (even if a little obvious), but also that some of the wording does look weird. Perhaps copyediting would work like removing that weird example of "Rev. Fr. Simon Lokodo, Ugandan Minister of Ethics and Integrity". Not sure if that even makes a useful point because preferring rape over homosexuality is not the same as approving or encouraging either one. One could easily cite many examples that have nothing to do with religion, of odd moralities such as with street gangs, government, drug cartels etc. But none of these would make any useful point aside from the obvious - people have diverse moral views.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 23:43, 15 February 2018 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your input Huitzilopochtli1990. Perhaps what we can do here is to take a look at the entire morality section and integrate some of it into the page Morality and Religion. It's already quite a large subsection so, in order to keep what is useful but avoid unnecessary duplication, and to avoid filling this article up with obvious generalities, which are more suited to a general introductory paragraph in a more specific page, this approach might work. Thoughts?
 * Morgan Leigh | Talk 23:19, 17 February 2018 (UTC)
 * I think that would be a good idea since the main article has more to say than on here. But it looks like much of what is in this article is already in the other article. It looks more like some of the stuff here was inserted from the Morality and Religion article. Trimming seems good because the section looks way larger than the other sections of economics, politics, science and religion etc. I do think that we should keep the wording "The study religion and morality is contentious due to conceptual differences between the two topics. The ethnocentric views on morality, failure to distinguish between in group and out group altruism, and inconsistent definition of religiosity all contribute to conflicting findings." Because though it should be obvious, people do routinely confuse these variables. Plus it is true that the term religiosity is inconsistently used in the literature since there is no consensus over it, or religion for that matter. Hope this helps.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 20:20, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
 * I'll give this a bit of love soon. While I agree it would be good to keep the spirit of the passage you quote, I won't keep the exact wording as it is seriously lacking in grammatical correctness...
 * Morgan Leigh | Talk 01:59, 24 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Sounds good. Work your magic :) &#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 03:37, 24 February 2018 (UTC)

Goblins and Witches
Should we include Goblins and Witches or just goblins as Goblins dont exist but witches do. Goblins fall under the same category as Gods as they are unproven non-existant tales but witches are real tangible categories.

Concept and etymology/ use of the word religious
I would question the use of the word religious to describe what wasn't used at the time. at: Halakha and following is the use I question, as an adverb, use of thesaurus may help. Could be a minor lingual clarification, however my intent for posting is to figure out why such a word 'religion' and it's derivatives is so new (15th - 16th century?). I would also question why a word which connotes many perceptions has such a large content. The word itself is easily defined, etymological information is compact (for the English that we use here), and all other material about how it is used have their own entries in the encyclopedia. I would question why this article (and very many others like it) are filled with confusing data and fluff(my word)? Must every article be exhaustive? For those interested, Nutrition is another exhaustive topic. I am User:Deermouse, a researcher of information, a reader of all types of data. Today it is religion, I ask why it is not refined to the entry term and linked to all the articles it wants to include in its entry? Deermouse (talk) 16:44, 26 March 2018 (UTC)


 * Welcome to contributing to wikipedia Deermouse. Religion is a trickier concept that one might at first imagine. For instance, you say that the word religion is easily defined, however there is no one accepted definition within the fields of religious studies or theology! Consequently arriving at a consensus definition for this page has taken a great deal of time. Try to think of a definition that comprehensively covers all religions and you will see what I mean. In response to your question of why we use the term religion to describe things that may not have been so named by those undertaking them at the time, we use it because it is the best modern word that covers what we are describing. Sometimes an article will note that the things we are calling religious might not have been considered in that way by those we are describing, for example this occurs in the article about ancient Egyptian religion.
 * Morgan Leigh | Talk 22:49, 29 March 2018 (UTC)

Update to Religious groups table?
I suggest the table under 'Religious groups' showing numbers of adherents for the five main religions, ought to be updated and expanded with more recent data, e.g. 2010 from the Pew Research Center. Also, I think it would be a good idea to include a few other groups so that the total adds up to 100% and, quite importantly, the "non-religious" category gets a mention too. With regard to Judaism, which is clearly is a minor religion in percentage terms, I think it's worth separating out because of its (dis-proportionate) world-wide impact. The revised table would look like this:

† Includes followers of African traditional religions, Chinese folk religions, Native American religions and Australian aboriginal religions. ‡ Includes Bahai's, Jains, Sikhs, Shintoists, Taoists, followers of Tenrikyo, Wiccans, Zoroastrians and many other faiths. ¶ Includes atheists, agnostics and people who do not identify with any particular religion in surveys.

Religions table is poor and should be updated Alankrit verma (talk) 11:32, 31 March 2018 (UTC)

Article for Jashinism
I find it very disturbing that the only information that comes up when searching for a religion is an article to a children's show. The religion originates from Japan and has enough attention there for Hashimoto to know about it. I myself have gathered a bunch of information on the topic. I don't know if it's enough, but the only known text on Jashinism (written by Buddhist priests/monks in 1963) Inshi to Jashin has yet to be translated. Would other people be willing to help me get information together and work on an article? — Preceding unsigned comment added by ChimericalPhoenix (talk • contribs) 15:07, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

Western Religion in Japan
Based on another Wikipedia article

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_in_Japan

It would seem that about 200 years prior to the date claimed, saw the introduction of another religion as defined in western terms at that time according to the article being commented on.

Whether that meant a word for religion existed or not is another thing, however the argument that there was no concept of any other religion until the Americans weighed into Tokyo harbour with their boats in the 1800’s with their demands including freedom of religion, would seem to be contrary to these facts.

Robhellstrom (talk) 22:55, 25 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Look at the definitions of religion. They are not universal. Religion and Christianity are not the same thing actually either. Try reading the source - The Invention of Religion in Japan. It details how religion was introduced due to Western conceptualizations of it and how the Japanese had no words or concepts involving worldviews of beliefs, practices, as some sort of doctrine or dogma etc. It is not a universal or historical concept and much of the concept of religion as seen in the West is a Protestant thing where beliefs are the most important thing. In most cultures, ritual and practice was the norm, not beliefs, before the Protestant reformation.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 23:47, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I've removed that paragraph. The reference to "50 Great Myths About Religions" appears to rely on a reference to "The Invention of World Religions" for its claim that various terms such as Buddhism were invented in the 1800s (review).  I find this absurd.  As noted, Christianity was introduced in Japan in the 1600s, and Buddhist temples/priests existed for a long time.  Extraordinary evidence (beyond one book citing a novel taxonomy) should be needed for statements like "It was in the 19th century that the terms Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Confucianism, and World Religions first emerged."  Emerged in English, perhaps.  But the Chinese certainly could distinguish Buddhism from Taoism before then; Journey to the West certainly does that. power~enwiki ( π,  ν ) 17:08, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I have restored the paragraph because the 3 independent sources clearly state those claims about the emergence of terms in the English language. This is not about the existence of belief systems in place in those regions. For sure they did not call them religions the way Westerners did - they were not thinking in terms of reified systems in Japan or China since they did not speak Latin or had a tradition of Latin based terms or ideas. Since there are multiple academic published works on this point, removal makes no sense (at least 3 source are there and one of them is a whole book on the emergence of the concept of religion in Japan). If you find other sources that state otherwise, you can introduce it, but another thing is that Masuzawa's book is not in the section either so a dislike for her is not warranted for removal of other well sources material. Etymological dictionaries put the fist uses of these words in the 18th and 19th centuries too. For instance, Buddhism (1801), Taoism (1838) , etc. Hinduism is of course a British way of describing the plurality in India and is form the late 18th century, or the nineteenth century. I will add on this eventually.


 * Now having said that, people in China, India, etc had different ways of looking at themselves, but not the way westerners saw themselves.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 18:14, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
 * It's straight-up wrong to say that because the English word "Buddhism" and "Taoism" date to the 1800s, that the concepts of Buddhism and Taoism date to the 1800s. The paragraph as currently written implies that the concepts didn't exist before the 1800s, which is obviously wrong.  I'll attempt to revise it to make that clear. power~enwiki ( π,  ν ) 19:07, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
 * From Buddhism: Beyond Enlightenment: Buddhism, Religion, Modernity by Richard Cohen. Routledge 1999. ISBN 0415544440. pg 33. "Donors adopted Sakyamuni Buddha’s family name to assert their legitimacy as his heirs, both institutionally and ideologically. To take the name of Sakya was to define oneself by one’s affiliation with the buddha, somewhat like calling oneself a Buddhist today. power~enwiki ( π, ν ) 19:11, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I added quotes for clarity. Ok good. I am ok with the rephrasing. But Buddhism as a system of beliefs is different. Like "Platonist" are named after Plato, but it is not seen a religious movement today. Is that how "Sakya" was seen? I see that your source says "somewhat like calling oneself a Buddhist today" - maybe you can add that context in. Most works on religion are from a Western standpoint, but it would be good to know if people used similar identifiers in their own native languages.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 19:21, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't have time to do more here now (and will be offline Monday-Wednesday), but I'll try to come up with a wording that makes clear that while the traditions existed (and could be distinguished, and had priests, etc.), they didn't necessarily align with a western concept of religion. They certainly didn't align with the Peace of Augsburg style concept of religion. power~enwiki ( π,  ν ) 19:48, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Ok sounds good. You raised a good point and will try to reword myself to note that traditions, texts, etc did exist well before the 19th century. You can try too when you have some time.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 20:06, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 August 2018
the article talks about the concept of religion and it has mentioned that the Quran and bible are the only scripture to show that the concept of religion, but before the glorious Quran Gautham budhha existed in BEFORE CHRIST EXISTENCE 563 Shasshidhara (talk) 11:58, 13 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. Also, the request must be of the form "please change X to Y" ChamithN   (talk)  12:51, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 4 October 2018
Please add the Category:Causes of war. 195.36.120.226 (talk) 11:27, 4 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the template. &mdash; KuyaBriBri Talk 13:48, 4 October 2018 (UTC)

Deletion of File:Tree of Religions-en.svg
On 3 November user:Katolophyromai deleted the image  (Tree classification of religions around the world based on geography and doctrine.) placed in the top right of the page stating that: removing ridiculously oversimplified chart (Religions are made of ideas and are often related to each other in extremely complex ways that are impossible to illustrate using a chart like this one. There is also great diversity within religious groups and different groups within a religion have often been influenced by different other groups. It would be better to have an image here that illustrates the concept of religion, rather than a misleading chart like this one. On 4 November user:Lexlex restored such file asking for consensus. The file was added to the page on 3 Oct 2018 by user:MichelBakni who is also the creator of that file.

I strongly support the deletion of such file, because it is not at all supported by any source, being a wholly self-made picture. Further, in the merit, it is quite inaccurate, and, as pointed out by Katolophyromai, it is impossible or very subjective to do it accurate.A ntv (talk) 13:08, 4 November 2018 (UTC)


 * Hello everyone, I am the one who created this file, it is based on an Arabic encyclopedia called: the encyclopedia of the history of religions, it is written in 5 volumes, check here, the Author is Firas al-Sawwah, he is currently occupying the ancient near-east chair in Beijing Foreign Studies University.
 * The goal of the tree is to show how religions are connected with each other worldwide, based on the doctrine and geography. I hope that you mention exactly where the tree tends to be far from objectivity, I am waiting to hear from you.--MichelBakni (talk) 14:43, 4 November 2018 (UTC)


 * I support deleting the image because it looks too cluttered and of course much of the image can be disputed. Looking at Islam, for example, some may argue that Islam was influenced by Judaism and Christianity or that it is independent of both. Indeed, Muslims in general do not see themselves as following Jewish or Christian texts, but being an independent from these groups and even getting their own independent revelation. Actually they seem to get offended if someone says that Islam is a deformed version of Judaism and Christianity. Furthermore, there is no evidence that "religions" as belief systems or worldviews as we know them today that existed in the ancient or medieval world. So it misleads as if there were these defined packets of systems in the past and that they interacted with each other. Greek, Roman, American (indigenous religions) were all none existent and modern writers disclose this. Only us in the modern word tend to categorize things anachoristically.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 17:59, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Hello Huitzilopochtli, you totally misread the figure, it says "influenced by" not "following" and not "reforming", I would like to remind you that religions can be classified based on the doctrine, for instance, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam are Abrahamic religions, while Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism are darmatic religions.--MichelBakni (talk) 22:25, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
 * I did write about the "influenced by" in my comment. It is still disputable as all other editors have mentioned here already, especially since different scholars have different takes on influences of any particular religion. The image will have to be removed either way since no other sources corroborate with the contents of the image. There is no scholarly consensus that the relationships on the image are that simple. The article lead does better with noncontroversial symbols or generic images rather than a controversial diagram or hierarchies.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 08:05, 6 November 2018 (UTC)


 * The figure has to display the source because the figure is not based on common knowledge and presents some controversial facts. Displaying the figure at the top of the article is certainly a very bad choice and can be considered as no NPOV.
 * Then concerning the relations in the figure, I always have a problem when someone presents christianity as a religion: there is no christian religion but christianity is a group of religions like Abrahamic religions. Definitively this figure is a particular point of view where the definition of religion is missing. This figure has to be moved in the article under a section where the definitions used to create the relation between the different religions can be given. This implies that the definitions have to be broad enough to be accepted by several academic or referenced sources. Snipre (talk) 22:57, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Just have a lokk at this source to see that Christianity is not always considered as a religion but as a religious group: The Global Religious Landscape. Snipre (talk) 23:44, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Copyright notice on article page
Does anyone know what is going on with the copyright notice on the article page? Morgan Leigh | Talk 03:37, 21 November 2018 (UTC)


 * The person who posted the tag did not specify which section of the article was in dispute in this talk page, but it looks like some of the "Concept and etymology" section is the issue. If you click on the link to the book it looks like the book was actually copying wikipedia's content, not the other way around. The publisher is a self-publisher - "xlibris" whihc has been blocked on wikipedia - and the book itself is a poetry book - "Dream a Little and My Writerly Self" By Kerry Susan Drake - of random reflections. It is not an academic source from which wikipedia authors would copy from.


 * The book was copyrighted in 2014, but looking at what was written on wikipedia by say August 9, 2013 you can see that material was already there on Wikipedia . So it looks like the author of the book plagiarized wikipedia and just copied and pasted in into the book. There is no copyright issue here.&#32;Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 07:18, 21 November 2018 (UTC)


 * Ok that was my understanding of it as well. How do we get the notice removed? Morgan Leigh | Talk 07:28, 21 November 2018 (UTC)


 * Done. Joshua Jonathan  - Let's talk!  07:43, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

Could someone add a link of the following article to this topic....

 * Religious views on truth — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.111.26.30 (talk) 01:38, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 11 December 2018
The reference to "Baha'i Faith" under Abrahamic Religions -> Other needs to be linked to the "Baha'i Faith" page. Deanchurchill (talk) 07:12, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
 * It is already linked and has been for some time. If I'm misunderstanding your request, please clarify and reopen. &#8209;&#8209; El Hef  ( Meep? ) 14:12, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

New Religion
HwanIn religion was established on 1 October 2015.

Hwanin Religion which can be compatible with modern science is to attain the social stability and "peace in mind" of all the global mankind.

The general features of HwanIn religion: Humans should entertain their lives on their own ways until they finish their lives, because births were given to them anyway, and ought to be their highest goodness. In order to make this possible in-between human societies, the members should put  or , which is called golden rule, in practice. The summarized Four Commandments as specific guidelines for implementing this rule is as follows: - Don't tell a lie. - Don't steal. - Be harmonious with the Nature. - Devote to the welfare of mankind.

See: http://www.hwanin.org

Dalhee (talk) 09:06, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Which came first, the belief or the culture?
Recently an edit to the lead that was written to "highlight the fact that religion is first of all a belief system, and that from such a belief system, other aspects tend to follow," (editing comment) was reverted with an editing comment of "not any better." If you might have any more specific explanation as to why you apparently feel that somehow culture came first, and then beliefs sprang from this, and not the other way around, I would certainly like to learn how this could be.

As far as I understand it, all of our culture is essentially merely a reflection of our "belief system." Did we not have to first somehow accept our belief system, before we could create or engage in whatever our culture is? Is it not our "belief" in our cultural system, that gives it its seeming force or power, and not the other way around? I would very much enjoy learning your views on this.

Thanks, One passer by (talk) 16:05, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
 * The biggest issue I'm seeing is that it's original research (which we don't use) that doesn't really summarize the body of the article (which is the intro does).
 * Re If you might have any more specific explanation as to why you apparently feel that beliefs come from culture, and not the other way around, I would certainly like to learn how this could be: That would be more original research (which, again, we don't use). See the section "Definition" and its spin-off article Definition of religion for why the intro says what it does.
 * If that doesn't feel personally satisfactory, a personal observation I've had: many beliefs simply do not make any sense outside of certain cultural contexts. That's the crux of both modern anthropology and literary criticism, and its about the only thing that even C. S. Lewis, Friedrich Nietzsche, and William James could all agree on.  Transubstantiation and Consubstantiation are ludicrous within the context of modern materialism but makes perfect sense within the context of medieval Aristotelianism (which was the materialism of its age).  Understood within the context of medieval Aristotelianism, it is not a chemical change.  Likewise, modern ideas about equality among humanity would make no sense at all in the context of the Sumerian empire (where the gods created humans as their rightful property and appointed lines of demi-god offspring as overseers).  Likewise, freedom of religion as we now understand it (especially the right to not believe) would make no sense within the context of the Roman empire.  While you'd be free to worship your own gods as well, if you refused to worship the emperor, it must be because you oppose the the nation most favored by the gods as rightful ruler of of the world.  If you refused to worship any gods, you were seen as threatening the wrath of the gods, who would take it out on everyone.  Even outside of the Roman empire, there simply were no understandings of the world before the past thousand years that did not involve some sort of supernatural action (even Buddhism acknowledges spirits and lesser gods even if it denies a creator), the closest belief to atheism that existed was merely asserting that the gods were apathetic in the petty affairs of mortals (but still responsible for actively maintaining the world).
 * This isn't to say what belief or culture systems are right or wrong, just acknowledging a plain fact that's discovered through any adequate introduction to anthropology and the history of religion. Ian.thomson (talk) 16:39, 14 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Thank you Ian for your excellent observations regarding the distinction between “cultures” and “belief systems.” I will be the first to admit that the question, “Which came first, the belief or the culture?” may be a bit like the “chicken and the egg” question.  Clearly culture could not exist, without a supporting belief system, and clearly many cultural belief systems seem to be firmly rooted in, and perhaps springing from, culture, just as you suggested regarding the widespread Christian belief in “transubstantiation” and such.


 * It seems to me to be a cycle: belief induces culture, then culture induces related beliefs, then related beliefs induce more related culture, then….. and on and on. Still, if we were to somehow be able to “wipe the beliefs in a given culture from the minds of that culture’s members,” then that given culture would surely cease to exist.  But if we were able to remove all of the accoutrements and effects of a given culture from a given group of members of that given culture, surely that group would merely recreate the accoutrements and effects of their culture from their memories, no?


 * What I am saying here is simply that it seems to me that ultimately our thoughts, beliefs, and perhaps individual prejudices seem to me to be the fundamental source of our words, deeds, and actions, and not the other way around. This, despite the fact that we may sometimes feel that we are somehow directed by circumstances beyond our control.


 * I would like to be persuaded otherwise. If you might wish to do so, or if you might have any persuasive “counter-examples” to my reasoning here, I would certainly be happy to learn from them.


 * Thanks,
 * One passer by (talk) 20:29, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
 * That's not really a discussion for this site: talk pages are not a general discussion forums and Wikipedia doesn't use original research. As I've already explained, the sources and sourced information in the article explains how most anthropologists have approached the subject: as a product of culture.
 * That said, a counter-example immediately comes to mind. UFO religions simply did not (and could not) appear until:
 * ...Geocentrism was abandoned,
 * ...Colonialism had been around enough to make common the idea that "superior races" had a duty to help "inferior races,"
 * ...We discovered that galaxies exist besides the Milky Way,
 * ...Exoplanets were confirmed,
 * ...Evolution and Abiogenesis opened up the possibility of life forming on other Earth-like planets,
 * ...Spaceflight became regarded as realistic and plausible.
 * Before those contexts, there were no religions that advocated a belief in a divine messenger who is a material being like us (if "more advanced") who came to our world in a material craft (created solely through mundane if advanced craftsmanship) from another world that's as material as ours, just to help us because that's what advanced races do. Angels were generally regarded as non-physical intelligences whose apparent forms were mere symbols to ease communication, from outside the physical universe (once you got past the atmosphere, you were entering the lower layers of heaven).  While fairies and jinn were regarded as physical in their own way, that was because they were just as earthbound and earthly as us.  Demons were regarded as members of those previous camps. Ian.thomson (talk) 21:24, 15 December 2018 (UTC)


 * I’ve pointed out the likelihood that if we were to somehow completely forget our culture, we could probably not then accurately recreate it, but if we were to somehow be externally separated from the external trappings of our culture, we would probably still be able to recreate our culture, thus I’ve made the claim that there is a likelihood that culture is more of a function of our brains and mental processes than of our surroundings.
 * You’ve rightfully pointed out the fact that changes in our understandings of our surroundings can in fact alter our thinking and thought processes about our surroundings, as for example in the case of mankind's beliefs regarding the most probable type of alien culture that we may one day encounter, which belief has certainly changed over time as a result of recent gains in human understandings of the nature of the cosmos.
 * Exactly how accurate any belief system might ever be, including religious belief systems, is a matter of pure speculation. Naturally those who subscribe to any given belief system, often tend to be prejudiced in favor of the validity of their own particular belief system, whether that be a belief in aliens, in God, or in the accuracy of the periodic table of elements.  Through the millennia most belief systems have eventually been replaced at one time or another with what were then believed to be “upgraded” or more accurate beliefs.  As far as I can see, our beliefs about the world around us are all merely attempts to get at the Truth, but to hold our beliefs out to be the “Truth” itself, nearly always results in disappointment.
 * To claim that religion is not primarily a belief system, but rather some kind of a cultural truism which is not built upon a belief system, makes no sense to me at all. Certainly some have shifted their “beliefs” regarding aliens based upon recent scientific developments, but do not such thoughts still count as merely “beliefs,” and not as actual “truisms?”  If religion is not fundamentally a belief system, then what at its root is it, some kind of a cultural truism which is not based upon beliefs?
 * I appreciate your input and thoughts on this, and I hope to learn from them.
 * One passer by (talk) 22:02, 16 December 2018 (UTC)
 * The idea of religion primarily as a system of belief is mostly rooted in Christianity, with some infection from there to Islam. Most traditional religions are more concerned with orthopraxy than orthodoxy, and the ones that survive usually will eventually change their beliefs to make the old practices fit within new social contexts. Ian.thomson (talk) 22:08, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

So you're saying then that a belief in the value of a given religious practice shouldn't be counted as a belief, because the belief centers around a practice, and not a theology? One passer by (talk) 01:09, 17 December 2018 (UTC)
 * This discussion about whether or not "religion" should be considered as primarily a belief system has been quite good, and I thank you for helping to get to the bottom of it. It has caused me to refer to numerous dictionary definitions of the word, and to other places as well.  Every single dictionary definition I could find first and foremost described religion as a "belief system."  Other places were not as clear.  As a result of this, I plan on re-inserting this information into the article lead, unless anyone might be able to somehow explain to me here why all dictionaries are mistaken.
 * Your assistance with this process will result in the addition of proper cites accompanying this info when reinserted, and I thank you for pointing out that unless article info is properly cited, anyone can come along and rightfully challenge it as OR, regardless of whether or not it may be acurate.
 * Thanks,
 * One passer by (talk) 16:06, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Dictionary citations are woefully inadequate for something as complex as religion. Specialist sources covering research and discussion by anthropologists and philosophers are preferred -- and already cited in the article.  Ian.thomson (talk) 16:50, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * As I understand it, Wikipedia is meant to represent prevailing thought, and the current definition in the article's lead text, in so far as I can find Googling for the words "Religion Definition" is really rather a minority view. Dictionary definitions are not woeful or essentially meaningless, but do tend to represent prevailing thought.  Of the many authors who attempt to define the term outside of dictionaries, several of these also define the word as essentially a "system of beliefs."  It seems to me that the current lead of the article, being rather a minority view, may not be sufficiently broad.  Thoughts?
 * One passer by (talk) 17:22, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * More weight is given to authoritative sources by specialists who have spent decades studying the topic than to a lay definition from outside the relevant field of study. This is why our article on magnets doesn't just describe them as miracles.
 * The article is about the subject in itself, not how it the word may be commonly used. Ian.thomson (talk) 17:27, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Could you please do a Google search on the terms “Religion Definition” and summarize for me what you feel the majority of “scholarly sources” which come back within those results are saying on this? Thanks, One passer by (talk) 19:08, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Google searches are personalized based on your prior activity. The sources in the article aren't even me but a variety of users, many of whom go to libraries for sources.
 * Many sources you find on just Google are not academic sources. This includes many dictionary sites and even most popular dictionaries.
 * Even if a dictionary is an academic source (such as the Oxford English Dictionary), it is only authoritative for matters of linguistics or philology and not on anthropology, history, philosophy, sociology, or theology. There's a reason why we don't cite botanists or astronomers in the Neurology article: specialized knowledge in one field means nothing for unrelated fields: people outside of specialized fields often don't know what they're talking about.  Heck, most of India doesn't accept plate tectonics, most of Malaysia doesn't get that some radiation is natural, most of China seems to think that electrons are smaller than atoms, most of the world seems to think that lasers are made of soundwaves and doesn't get the Big Bang, about half the planet doesn't get that the father's the one with the Y chromosome and that antibiotics don't affect viruses, and well more than a third of the world doesn't get that we evolved from another species.
 * Look up books published by university presses or academic publishers (e.g. [[Brill Publishers]), written by professors in fields such as anthropology, history, or philosophy that discuss religion in general (not just their own religion) -- they will either say religion is tied to culture or that it's impossible to define (in part because the popular modern concept of religion is ultimately rooted in Christianity).
 * Ian.thomson (talk) 20:20, 19 December 2018 (UTC)

Is there some new WP policy that now effectively limits cites to books published by university or academic presses? One passer by (talk) 22:21, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * You're misreading me. Some dictionaries can be fine sources on matters of linguistics and philology.  But just because a dictionary has a definition for gravity does not make it a reliable source on physics.  However, academic sources are valued more over other kinds of sources:
 * WP:SOURCES: If available, academic and peer-reviewed publications are usually the most reliable sources, such as in history, medicine, and science. It does go on to say that non-academic sources do have some use in some areas (such as mainstream newspapers, which are rather necessary for covering recent events).
 * No_original_research: Likewise affirms this, noting that As a rule of thumb, the more people engaged in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the writing, the more reliable the publication.
 * That you use sources by people who have proven themselves to be specialists in a field (in this case, an anthropologist, philosopher, historian, or other scholar of religion) rather than a source by someone whose qualifications are utterly irrelevant (a linguist or philologist or just someone who published a dictionary) is just common sense in academia. Ian.thomson (talk) 23:06, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * You've made some valid points. I've spent a few hours developing a reply to some of your excellent points, based upon what I feel is a necessary first step for you and I to discuss this question in as objective of a fashion as reasonably possible.  This has to do with your earlier comment regarding the value of Google searches.  After researching your assertion that Google searches are weighted based on previous search history, I discovered a way to remove this effect.


 * Please review my recent edits to the Google Personalized Search article and you will see what I mean. I don't have the time right now to discuss exactly what I found by doing what I will call non-filtered Google searches on the terms "Religion Definition," but will get back here to discuss my findings within the next two days.  I appreciate your interest in doing the labor-intensive work of trying to make WP as truly unbiased and neutral as possible.  Thanks, One passer by (talk) 16:08, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 7 January 2019
please change the typo SUPERTITIO to SUPERSTITIO and the meaning to TOO MUCH EMOTION, EAGERNESS or PASSION in "The term was also closely related to other terms like scrupulus which meant "very precisely" and some Roman authors related the term ***supertitio***, which meant too much ***fear or anxiety or shame***..." 186.214.138.109 (talk) 05:38, 7 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. DannyS712 (talk) 05:39, 7 January 2019 (UTC)

Distinguishing between "parody religion" and "fiction-based religion"
Hi, my edit on this was reverted. Now, maybe I worded it clumsily (and my wording could be improved), but the gist of it is that academia has recently distinguished a new category of religion called "fiction-based religions."

See the article "Fiction-based religion: Conceptualising a new category against history-based religion and fandom" in Culture and Religion: An Interdisciplinary Journal Volume 14, 2013 - Issue 4: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14755610.2013.838798 And the interview here with Markus Davidsen PhD: https://www.religiousstudiesproject.com/podcast/podcast-markus-davidsen-on-fiction-based-religions/

Note the title of the journal issue: "Invented Religions: Creating New Religions through Fiction, Parody and Play." "Fiction" and "parody" are distinguished. Both are distinct kinds of "invented religion."

Wiktionary defines "parody" as "A work or performance that imitates another work or performance with ridicule or irony." (emphasis added)

The Church of the SubGenius and Pastafarianism are prime examples of Parody Religions. "Parody" is their primary purpose. They parody the religious phenomenon itself. Though these "religions" have since published tracts and other literature, they are not essentially based on a pre-existing fictional mythos from literature or film (such as Star Wars or Middle-earth). And so SubGenius and Pastafarianism are not "Fiction-Based Religions."

There are some "fiction-based religions" which could be described as "parodies" -- meaning they are ironic, humorous, ridiculing, and 'tongue-in-cheek'. Dudeism is based on the Cohen brothers' film, and it is also ironic and tongue-in-cheek. So it could be described as both Fiction-Based and Parody. But clearly, some Fiction-Based Religions are not "parodies."

It's clearly a mischaracterization to describe Jedism or the Tolkien-based religions as "ridiculing" or "parodying" George Lucas' films or Tolkien's writings in an "ironic" or "tongue-in-cheek" way. Nor is their primary purpose to parody the religious phenomenon itself. (If there were a "Spaceballs" religion or "Bored of the Rings" religion, those would be both parody and fiction-based.)

That is why I added "fiction-based religions" into the sentence alongside "parody religions."

Now, I'll try to edit the article again, with better wording this time. I prefer that this edit not be reverted - if you can word it better, then fine. But the concept of "fiction-based religion" (as distinct from "parody religion") is academically sourced. Traversetravis (talk) 17:15, 16 January 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 20 January 2019
In section 7.5 Economics change "Christians hold the largest amount of wealth (55% of the total world wealth), followed by Muslims (5.8%), Hindus (3.3%) and Jewish (1.1%)." to "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%)." All the other words in the list are nouns, Jewish is an adjective. Poopchen (talk) 23:36, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done DannyS712 (talk) 23:44, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 10 June 2019
I believe that the religion page needs to be updated to include more religions, as I am personally a Pastafarian, and I believe Pastafarianism needs to be added. Our deity, the Flying Spaghetti Monster requests of it. Thank you. Aidanthebeech (talk) 09:13, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Whilst this seems more like a light hearted joke than a serious request, perhaps something could be added under the Atheism subsection, or the critisim section. What would you suggest we add? ParthikS8 (talk) 11:32, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Pastafarianism is already listed in the New religious movements section of this article. &mdash; KuyaBriBri Talk 13:49, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * ...and, with its own, detailed and lengthy article, I think it has pretty good coverage really. -- Begoon 13:55, 10 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Pictogram voting wait.svg Already done - As pointed out by and, Pastafarianism is already listed in the NRM section. ParthikS8 (talk) 19:09, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

Emile Durkheim
please change ((Emile Durkheim)) to ((Émile Durkheim)) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:541:4500:1760:58cd:ca45:8cd0:9bc1 (talk • contribs)
 * Yes check.svg Done NiciVampireHeart 15:31, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Adding certain resources
Hello everyone, I was doing a wiki training assignment, and as part of the training I am supposed to leave a comment on the article. I read through the article; it is a great job that you all gathered this much informaiton. However, it is my opinion that it lacks something. When I was reading the sources, it seemed that nearly all the information is coming from the people who are not directly connected with the topic of the article. So, maybe, it would be better to add some sources from those who are directly connected with a certain religion discussed in the article. Really appreciate everyone's effort. Thank you.Skodirjanov (talk) 05:48, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

"So, maybe, it would be better to add some sources from those who are directly connected with a certain religion" Bad idea. We are supposed to use independent sources, not biased sources with conflicts of interest. See Identifying and using independent sources:
 * "An independent source is a source that has no vested interest in a given Wikipedia topic and therefore is commonly expected to cover the topic from a disinterested perspective. Independent sources have editorial independence (advertisers do not dictate content) and no conflicts of interest (there is no potential for personal, financial, or political gain to be made from the existence of the publication)."
 * "Material available from sources that are self-published, primary sources, or biased because of a conflict of interest can play a role in writing an article, but it must be possible to source the information that establishes the subject's real-world notability to independent, third-party sources. Reliance on independent sources ensures that an article can be written from a balanced, disinterested viewpoint rather than from the person's own viewpoint.  It also ensures articles can catalogue a topic's worth, its role and achievements within society, rather than offering a directory listing or the contents of a sales brochure." Dimadick (talk) 08:17, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 11 September 2019
To add more things 2A02:C7D:CAE:4F00:69A1:7F86:FDD8:3D4B (talk) 19:21, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. aboideautalk 19:28, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Another lede-in section error edit request
The very first reference given, "Religion - Definition of Religion by Merriam-Webster" is wrong. The link itself is correct but what is in the Article bears little to no resemblance to what is on the reference page. I bring this up because I am personally unhappy with the current definition given but am quite content with the definition MW provides. It is not my intent to be a radical or firebrand so I am commenting here rather than "being bold." The definition of religion needs some leeway to show its use in modern philosophy to define things that are ritualized and social constructs like countries (nationalism) or money (capitalism). The MW definition would allow the use of the word "religion" to be applied to these constructs but the lede-in definition seems to be a confabulation designed to specifically exclude them. I don't care if these items are included in the article or not but they should not be excluded by the definition given. Religion defines both sacred and non-sacred beliefs. At any rate it needs to reflect the cited reference or a new reference needs to be found. Mensch (talk) 08:25, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

I think the graphic about religiosity and wealth needs a update
The information is outdated and it kinda comes off as cherry-picking.

Like there are some countries in the middle-east that have high religiosity and high gdp per capita. CycoMa (talk) 18:41, 8 January 2020 (UTC)