what are the main religions?

Question

How and where were these religions started.

Answer 1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yTs0wtemvU

It's all explained in 53 seconds or less.

Answer 2

The main religions in the world today would probably include Judaism (Jewish), Christianity, Muslim, Buddhism, and Hinduism. Honestly I'm not sure when they were all started. However, Judaism has been around since the day God created the Earth, more or less. There were also some major religions that faded out. But most of them were pretty much the same thing, Every part of the earth has a god and there is a leader of the gods, one of those is Zeus. However, no matter what anyone says there is one and only one true God, Jesus Christ. But that doen't mean not to be tolerant of other peoples religions like some people. Hope that this helped!

Answer 3

Religion was created to keep law and order among humans and that's how it was started. Otherwise we would all be out of control like all animals on this planet. Every religion may seem different but it all is the same. The Catholics run most all world governments and have more wealth than any Royal or Rich person on the planet. All religions have a standard (10 commandments) that people should live by which created religious laws. In some country's the religious laws are extreme like stoning a person to death for adultery or cutting off hands for stealing. Then there are religions that use a human sacrifice to please there beliefs. There is a book called Genesis Revisited that will explain this all to you.

Answer 4

If by "main" you mean the religious groups with the largest "memberships" it can be broken down in a few ways.

First, you can classify religions as "dispersed religions" meaning those religions which have a strong presence in many parts of the world simultaneously, and "regional religions" meaning those religions primarily concentrated in one part of the world. (My terms, btw).

Major dispersed religions include Christianity and its denominations and Islam and its sects.

Major regional religions include Hinduism, Buddhism and Chinese folk religion.

All of these have at least 300 million followers worldwide each with Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism being the largest at at least 1 billion followers each.

Judaism is often considered a major religion because it is the core Abrahamic religion. It should be noted though that Judaism has a total of approximately 15 million followers, making it very small in population.

Other large groups include the primal indigenous peoples of Africa and the African traditional and diasporic groups, although I consider these to be more of an amalgamation of distinct cultures and religions.

If you want to go by a more traditional definition of religious groupings, the following may help:

Christianity - 2.1 billion
Islam - 1.3 billion
Hinduism - 1.1 billion
Chinese folk - 400 million
Buddhism - 350 million

Some people argue that distinctions such as Catholicism vs Protestantism, Sunnism vs Sh'ism, or Shaivism vs Vaishnavism is important, but I don't subscribe to this view largely because even within each denomination there are large differences, making such categorizations arbitrary at best.

Finally, one could group religions by historical foundation. These groups would likely be as follows:

Abrahamic (3+ billion or so) - Christianity, Islam, Judaism
Dharmic (1.5 billion or so) - Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Jainism
Taoic (unknown) - Taoism, Confucianism, Shinto and others
Other (unknown) - This is just miscellaneous including Chinese folk, Shinto, Baha'i, various indigenous, etc

Fact is, no really good categorization exists for religions. Each is distinct in its own right.

Oh, and since SilverStogie chose to edit his response, I will add this: Hinduism did not grow out of Buddhism. In a formal sense, it's the other way around. There were many buddhas before Siddhartha but he is considered to be the "main" (not a technical term :D). Siddhartha was a Hindu prince who believed that the Hinduism of the time did not lead people away from suffering. He sought his own path, and - according to Buddhists - found it.

Answer 5

Judaism Christianity and Islam are huge. But there are also others like Hindu. Judaism Christianity and Islam all believe in the same God- the God of Abraham... Islam and Judaism split with Isaac and Ishmael. Theres the extent of my knowledge of the begining of Islam. Christianity diverted from Judaism after Christs death because Christians believed Christ was God, but the ones who clung to Judaism said He wasn't.

Answer 6

Christianity - Officially started after the Council of Nicaea in 325 C.E.

Islam - Officially started by the prophet Muhammad (pbuh) around 600 C.E.

Judaism - No official start, has kinda always been around

Answer 7

paganism predates all other known religions and generally refers to earth based, often polytheistic religion

muslim is based in the middle east, or mecca - i am not aware of the time frame for the beginning

judiasm can be traced to ancient times and began in the middle east

christianity can be traced by the current calander in most western civilizations. it is an offshoot of judiasm in which the people believe that jesus is the son of god & thier savior. whereas in judiasm they believe jesus was a profet and are still waiting for thier savior.

Answer 8

The following are the largest religious bodies in terms of numbers:

Sunni Islam (Mohammed in aroun 573 AD)

Hinduism (kind of grew out of buddhism, no sure date)

Shi'ite Islam (Split from Sunni around 650-700 AD with Ousman and Ali dispute)

Roman Catholicism (started when Emperor Constantine made the Bishop of Rome the official religious authority of the Roman Empire in 325 AD at the Nicene Council and defined the secular view of the Trinity)

Confucianism/Taoism (same philosophies as Buddhism without the Buddha, has existed since Confucius)

Buddhism (Buddha, around 300 BC)

Orthodox Catholicism (split from Roman Catholicism in roughly 500 AD; 'The Great Schism')

Anglican/Episcopalian Christianity (from England, around 1500 AD, when King George divorced his queen and was excommunicated from Roman Catholic Church)

Sikhism (roughly 1200 AD)

Southern Baptist Christianity (Since early 1800's)

Judaism (Since Jacob, son of Isaac, son of Abraham, around 1800 BC)

United Lutheran Church (traced back to Luther in the late 1500's but didn't exist as an official religious body until 1870's or so)

Mormon/LDS Christian (1830, founded by Joseph Smith who claimed 'restoration' of the 'true Christian Gospel')

JW (1920's, started by Pastor Charles Russell and a group of college students who held Bible study together)

Bah'a'i (split from Islam when the "Bah'a'i" messiah came in 1860's AD)

Shinto (Japanese religion, uncertain when it started)

Zoroastrianism (Zoroaster, founder, around 900 AD)

Note: There are several Native American, African, and South American tribal religions that are related one to another, but are not 100% harmonious and therefore can't be defined as one 'body', as is the case with many lutheran/calvinist/methodist protestant churches.

Simbha: Thanks for the clarifications; it's amazing that with all of the advances of research and historical reporting, there are still sources deemed 'reliable' that report inaccuracies. Maybe Britannica was referring to Hinduism being derived from the 'earlier' buddhas you referred to... who knows.

Answer 9

Chrisanainty
Islam
Judiasm

(Spelling)

Answer 10

82% of Americans belong to a Christian denomination.

Start here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_denominations_by_number_of_members

Answer 11

Judaism , Christianity and Islam.