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Sunday, November 24, 2019

Religion and Its Overwhelming Denominations

According to reference.com, there are an estimated 4,200 different religions in the world, and these can be categorized into several main religions, such as: Christianity, Roman Catholicism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Judaism [although Roman Catholicism is often categorized under Christianity]. There are many smaller yet still prevalent religions, such as the Baha'i faith.

When including Roman Catholicism, Christianity is the world's largest religion. Christianity also includes Protestantism and its many denominations, such as Lutherans, United Methodists, Southern Baptists and the Assemblies of God. There are also nondenominational Christians.

While there are 11 basic religions that exist in the world today, there are thousands of branches that are offshoots of these main religions, such as Protestants and Evangelicals. These main religions consist of: Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, Baha'i, Shintoism, Judaism, Sikhism, Taoism, Jainism, Hinduism and Zoroastrianism. According to humanreligions.info, some of the following religions around the world are specified in the chart below.

ReligionHeritageArea of OriginFoundedFounder
AmishChristianitySwitzerland1693 CEJakob Ammann and his followers split from the Anabaptists
AsatrúScandinavian folkloreIceland1972 CE
Aum ShinrikyoChristianity and Far Eastern religionJapan1984 CEShoko Asahara
Bahá'í FaithShi'a IslamIran1863 CEBy Bahá'u'lláh
Brahma KumariHinduismIndia1930s CELekhraj Kripalani (called Brahma Baba)
Branch DavidiansChristianityUSA1930 CEBenjamin Roden
BuddhismHinduismIndia1st millennium BCETraditions based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama
Celtic PaganismPrehistoricUKprehistoric
Chen TaoChristianity and BuddhismTaiwan1996 CEBy Hon Ming Chen
Chinese ReligionPrehistoricChinaprehistoric
ChristadelphiansChristianityUSA1840s CEBy Dr John Thomas
Christian Apostolic Church In ZionChristianityUSA1895 CEJohn Alexander Dowie
ChristianityJudaism and paganismRoman Empire1st-3rd centuryCEMultiple Greek writers. St Paul
Concerned ChristiansChristianityUSA1980s CEMonte Kim Miller
ConfucianismChinese religionChina-551 to 479 BCEBy Confucius
Dami XuanjiaoChristianitySouth Korea1980s CE
Divine LightmissionHinduismIndia1960 CEIndian guru Shri Hans Ju Maharaj
DruidismPrehistoricUKprehistoric
DruzeIslamEgypt11th century
EbionitesJudaismJudea (now Israel)1st century
EckankarNew AgeUSA1965 CEBy Paul Twitchell
GnosticismPrehistoricGreeceprehistoric (1st century?)
Hare KrishnaHinduismUSA1966 CEBy A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
HeathenismAsatruScandinavia
Heaven's GateChristianity and New AgeUSA1970s CEMarshall Applewhite and Bonnie Nettles
HinduismPrehistoricIndiaprehistoric
Hookers For Jesus / The Family Of GodChristianityUSA1968 CEDavid Berg
HumanismThe enlightenmentEuropeThe EnlightenmentEnlightenment thinkers
IslamJudaismSaudi Arabia0610 CEBy Muhammad
Jainism PrehistoricIndia6th century BCELord Vardhamana Mahavira
Jedi KnightsScience fictionUK2001 CECampaign for UK Census
Jehovah's WitnessesChristianityUSA1870s CEBy Charles Taze Russell
JudaismPrehistoricBabylon (mostly-now Iraq) and Israel1st millennium BCECombination of prehistoric practices which became organized in Babylon
MennoniteChristianityCentral Europe
MithraismRoman mystery religionsGreece50 BCE to 50 CE 
MysticismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universalprehistoric
Native American ChurchThe Peyote religionMexico1880s CEBy Quanah Parker
New AgeCountercultureThe West1850s CEPopular beliefs from the 1850s, attaining identification in the 1960s
Order Of The Solar TempleChristianity and New AgeFrance1984 CEJoseph Di Mambro & Luc Jouret
PaganismCountercultureThe West19th centuryRomantic revival of interest in Celtic, Greek and pre-Christian spiritualities
PastafarianismParodyUSA2005 CEBy Bobby Henderson
People's TempleChristianityUSA1960s CERev. James (Jim) Warren Jones
Raja YogaHinduismIndia
RastafarianChristianityJamaica1930s CE
RavidassiaHinduism and SikhismIndia14th centuryBy the guru Ravidass
Salvation ArmyChristianity (Methodist)UK1865 CEBy Methodist minister William Booth
SanteríaChristianity and West African spiritualityCuba
SatanismAtheismUSA1966 CEBy Anton Lavey
ScientologyScience fictionUSA1952 CEBy L. Ron Hubbard
ShamanismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universalprehistoric
ShintoJapanese cultureJapan3rd century BCEGradually formed
SikhismHinduismIndia15th centuryBy Guru Nanak
SpiritualismChristianity and New AgeUSA1848 CEBy fraudsters Kate and Margaret Fox
TaoismChinese philosophyChina3rd century BCEBased on teachings attributed to Lao Tzu
ThelemaOccultismUK1904 CEBy Aleister Crowley
TheosophySpiritualism and Westernized Indian spiritualityUSA1875 CEBy Madame Blavatsky
Traditional African ChurchChristianity and African cultureAfrica
Unification ChurchChristianitySouth Korea1954 CEBy Sun Myung Moon
Unitarian-universalismChristianityUSA19th century
UnitarianismChristianityPoland, Lithuania, Hungary16th century
Unitas FratrumChristianity (Protestant)Bohemia (now Czech Republic)1457 CE
VoodooAfrican traditional theologyAfricaprehistoric
WiccaCountercultureUK1954 CEBy Gerald Gardner
WitchcraftNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universal
YezidismZoroastrianism and ancient Mesopotamian cultureAssyria (now Iraq)12th centuryBy Abi ibn Musafir
Zhu Shen JiaoThe ShoutersChina1993 CE
Zoroastrianism PrehistoricPersia (now Iran)Before 5th century BCEBy Zoroaster
agnosticismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universal
ancestor worshipNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universalprehistoric
animismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universalprehistoric
atheismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universalprehistoric
deismtheismPrehistoric/universalprehistoric
dualismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universal
monotheismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universal
no religionNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universal
occultismCounterculturePrehistoric/universal
pantheismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universalprehistoric
polytheismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universal
sun worshipPrehistoricUniversalprehistoric
theismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universalprehistoric
universalismNatural thoughtPrehistoric/universal

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