PEW Study has published a paper where it states that with approximately 15% of the World Population, it is the third largest Religion.
It has to be noted that while arriving at this conclusion, the innumerable sects of Christianity,like Protestants,Catholics,Greek Orthodox, and many more have been clubbed under Christianity as a whole for calculation.
Click to Enlarge.
In the case of Muslims, Shia and Sunni sects and various other Group like Wahabi and the like have been taken together to arrive at Muslim population.
Hinduism is the root for Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism.
Buddhism is more akin to Non Dualism, the difference is that while Buddhism ends up with Nireeswara vada or nihilism Advaita or Non Dualism declares the Reality to be non- one .
There are more finer points on the proximity of Hinduism and Hinduism so much so Buddha is consideerd as an Avatar of Lord Vishnu and Adi Shankaracharya is even called a ‘Pseudo Buddhist!’
One can find fundamental unity in Principles between Jainism and Hinduism.
And it is no secret the founders of these two Religions were Hindus and they have kept the essentials of Hinduism in their thoughts.
Separate blog follows on the subject.
Sikhism , no body needs to remind, is closer to Hinduism than Jainism and Buddhism.
These three Religions are more close to Hinduism than Christianity and Islam to their sects.
So clubbing these three Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism to Hinduism is equally logical as the clubbing of the sects of Islam and Christianity in one lot.
On these lines,the population figures should be,
But ‘Indian-Hindu root religion’ is still the largest religion of world if you consider Hindus (15%) + Buddhist (7%) + Other Religions (nearly 1% most of them are Sikhs, Jains etc) + Religiously Unaffiliated (16% most of them are in China and hide their practicing Buddhist culture due a oppressive Communist Govt & others actually follow the offshoot of Hindu faiths)……… SO THERE IS AT LEAST 35% INDIA ROOTS RELIGIONISTS IN THIS WORLD LARGER THAN 32% CHRISTIANS AND 23% MUSLIMS SO FAR.
(hinduexistence.org)
By this logic Hinduism is the largest Religion in the World.
With such a population in the world, Hindus have one country to call as Hindu”Nepal!
If the 32% stake holders Christian has about 30 declared Christian Countries (157 Christian-majority nations) in this world….
The 23% stake holders Muslims have 57 declared Muslim Countries….
The 7% stake holders Buddhists have 8 Buddhist Countries….
The 0.2% stake holders Jews have 1 Jews Country…
http://hinduexistence.org/category/hindus-under-christian-aggression/
http://www.pewforum.org/2012/12/18/global-religious-landscape-hindu/
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I’m surprised to see that a guy like you who delivers lecture on comparative religions, could write such an article.
Well, I don’t blame you for your personal remarks about your religion.
But it is important to state some facts here.
Followers of a religion are determined by what kind of deity they worship?
Not which books they follow or consider important or some other similarities.
If that would’ve been the case.
Islam, Christianity, Judaism & Baha’ ism would’ve been considered one religion as they all fall under the banner of Abrahamic religions, they share almost the same prophets and one way or other all share kind of the same teachings…
but they are NOT called one religion!
why?
Simply because they each have their own different ‘concept of God’!
But when you look at a sect of a particular religion e.g Islam as you mentioned, then all sects e.g Sunni, Shia, Sufi (Wahabi is not a sect, it was a movement) all have the same concept of God so they all fall under one religion.
Same is the case with different sects of Christianity such as Protestants, Catholics or Jehova’s Witnesses to name some.
So, when you talk about Buddhists or Sikhs none of them them believe in any single deity worshipped by the Hindus and both of them are strictly monotheistic religions and their standing about (Buddha or Sai Baba respectively) is not more than reformers or prophets.
Hindus on the other hand, have a very different concept of god/gods.
This is how a particular religion is considered all across the globe.
My comments in the post are to convey the message that if grouping different sects of a Religion under one head is applicable to Islam and Christianity , why not Hinduism?
The most comprehensive definition of Religion is,
Religion is an organized collection of beliefs, cultural systems, and world views that relate humanity to an order of existence.[note 1] Many religions have narratives, symbols, and sacred histories that are intended to explain the meaning of life and/or to explain the origin of life or the Universe. From their beliefs about the cosmos and human nature, people derive morality, ethics, religious laws or a preferred lifestyle. According to some estimates, there are roughly 4,200 religions in the world.[1](wiki)”
This is a very detailed definition encompassing the essential aspects Religion.
The concept of God is generally not accepted as an yardstick for there are Religions, set of beliefs that deny God, for example, Buddhism.
If we take the concept of God, as the yardstick, Buddhism negates it and hence would not qualify as a Religion, unless one says denying God is a set of Belief(logically Right, of course)
But this is not general rule followed in defining Religion.
Hinduism accepts the general description of Religion and calls the atheists as Philosophers and we have Charvakas.
Therefore on the accepted norm, the comments were made.
If the general definition of Religion is applied, then Islam and Christianity fail (because of their sects) because the differences between the sects,movements are fundamental in the Beliefs espounded by the Founders.
Worthy of note is that Christianity’s Bible was complied three hundred years after Christ, that too at the behest of Constantine to hold onto the Empire.
And what we have as Bible to day is what Constantine chose to have written to suit his Empire(Please read my post on this)
Islam, what to say?
Koran and Sharia?, the latter is it a part of the Koran?
Therefore the differences between the sects of Islam and Christianity among themselves are greater than the ones between Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.
This is also a ponit I wanted to make and I do not seem to have written properly.
Another important fact is that the quoted text is from a Hindu site whose logic seems to be correct on this study.
Personally I feel that Religion is for the development of the individual and Religion is not an Institution and studies made as the one by PEW help only to divide People, not unite, and this defeats the purpose of Religion.
Religion is simply a set of particular dogmas put together to build up a unique canon for it’s inherents to follow in order to get close to God.
Now, Culture and ritual stems from a unique society and it is possible for two religions to share the same rituals or history if they share the same geographical area, thus resulting in somewhat similar culture.
But it is up to the inherents or followers of a religion who identify themselves under a particular unique name, in order to differentiate themselves from other religions.
Now, I simply fail to understand that in what way do you merge Buddhism with Hinduism.
If it is based on the fact that they share some kind of the same culture, it still doesn’t legitimize both of them to fall under one banner of religion.
Even if we agree for a moment that Jainism, Buddhism or Sikhism are all off-shoots of Hinduism, does that still make them fall under Hinduism?
The answer is NO!
Because, none of the followers of Buddhism or Sikhism ‘IDENTIFY’ themselves as Hindus.
As I explained earlier, in the sense that you’re trying to perceive them as one religion, it simply won’t work.
Now you yourself know buddhists don’t worship the same god as the hindus, so they are far from a being a sect of one another. Same is the case with sikhs.
But if you don’t believe in this theory.
Then I would just like you to go and ask a Sikh or Buddhist yourself, if their religion is one of the sects of hinduism, if they agree with that notion. Then you have every right to consider them as one of the sects of hinduism.
What you have in your hand as sects of Hinduism are Shaivism, Smartism, Vaishnavism, Shaktism, Ganaptism or Kaumaram etc. all of them ‘Identify’ themselves as Hindus and that is what counts & nothing else be it culture, rituals or history.
About Christianity, yes you’re right in a way that it was the state which came up with an official canon after several years.
And it was at the Council of Nicea, when the dogma of trinity was set as one of the official belief of Christianity. Not to mention, Christianity itself in the beginning started off as one of the ‘SECTS’ of Judaism, they still share the same books. The Old Testament (consisting of more than 50 books) is believed to be the ‘word of God’ by both Christians and Jews. But what did seperate them?
In One Word… ‘Jesus’
Now, if you ask a Christian of today, he would never shy away from the fact that his religion started of as an off-shoot of Judaism, but in the same way he would never associate himself with Judaism.
Talking about Islam,
Although it is not an off-shoot of Christianity or Judaism, but the similarities it shares with them are tremendous.
And Although there are many sects in Islam with somewhat different ideologies but they all believe in the Qur’an to be the ‘Word of God’ and Muhammad (SAW) as their messenger and prophet, if that is not enough then they at least ‘IDENTIFY’ themselves as ‘Muslims’ and that’s what counts.
The word Sharia (which you mentioned as being the ‘latter’ part of Islam) actually means ”a path”.
And In fact, is not a latter part of Islam, but the Sharia itself is derived from Qur’an.
As we read in the Qur’an itself.
”Then We put you, [O Muhammad], on ”Sharia” concerning the matter [of religion]; so follow it and do not follow the inclinations of those who do not know.”
[The Holy Qur’an 45:18]
I have not said that Jainism,Buddhism and Sikhism are included in Hinduism.
What I was pointing out that is that if the various sub-sects were included for one Religion for calculation, the same principle has to be extended to other Religions.
That’s all.
However the point is taken.
Thank you for dropping by ,
Regds,
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