World Religions

The human search for the sacred, expressed in belief, ritual, and community. Every branch below is one great family's answer to what is holy, how to live, and what happens after death.

from Religion

The covenant faith of the people of Israel and the oldest of the monotheisms. Its Torah, one God, and moral law became the shared root of Christianity and Islam.

from Judaism

Grew from Judaism around the life and teaching of Jesus of Nazareth, proclaimed as Messiah. Now the world's largest religion, it later split into three great communions.

from Christianity

The Western church centred on the bishop of Rome, the largest Christian body. It preserved the sacraments, canon law, and scholastic theology through the Middle Ages.

from Christianity

The Eastern churches that split from Rome in 1054 over authority and doctrine. Rooted in Byzantium, they preserve the ancient liturgy, icons, and conciliar governance.

from Christianity

Born of the Reformation launched by Luther, it rejected papal authority for scripture and faith alone. It fractured into countless churches and reshaped Europe and the Americas.

from Judaism

The faith revealed to the Prophet Muhammad, holding the Qur'an as God's final word and Abraham among its patriarchs. The second-largest religion, it soon divided over succession.

from Islam

The majority tradition, holding that the community rightly chose the first caliphs as successors. It follows the Sunna of the Prophet through four established schools of law.

from Islam

The tradition holding that leadership belonged to Ali and the Prophet's family. Its imams, devotion, and distinct law shape Iran, Iraq, and communities across the Muslim world.

from Religion

Not one founder's creed but a vast family of Indian traditions sharing dharma, karma, and rebirth. From the Vedas it grew into the soil from which the other Dharmic faiths sprang.

from Hinduism

Founded by the Buddha, who taught release from suffering through the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path. It spread across Asia and split into three great vehicles.

from Buddhism

The 'teaching of the elders', the oldest surviving school, closest to the early canon. It stresses monastic discipline and personal liberation and prevails across Southeast Asia.

from Buddhism

The 'great vehicle', which broadened the path with the bodhisattva ideal of saving all beings. It gave rise to Zen, Pure Land, and the Buddhism of East Asia.

from Buddhism

The 'diamond vehicle' of tantric Buddhism, using mantra, ritual, and the guru's guidance for swift awakening. It shapes the Buddhism of Tibet and the Himalayas.

from Hinduism

An ancient Indian faith reformed by Mahavira, teaching radical non-violence (ahimsa) and asceticism as the road to liberating the soul from karma.

from Hinduism

Founded by Guru Nanak in Punjab, it teaches one formless God, equality, and honest work, drawing on both Hindu devotion and Islamic monotheism.

from Religion

The Chinese way of harmony with the Tao, the natural order behind all things. Blending philosophy, ritual, and the ideal of effortless action, it shaped East Asian life.

from Religion

Confucius's ethic of virtue, ritual propriety, and social harmony. More a moral order than a church, it governed family, learning, and the state across East Asia for millennia.

from Religion

Japan's indigenous way of the kami — the spirits of nature, place, and ancestor. Centred on purity, shrine, and festival, it coexists with Buddhism across Japanese life.

from Religion

The ancient Persian faith of Zarathustra, teaching a cosmic struggle between truth and falsehood. Its ideas of heaven, judgement, and a saviour deeply marked the Abrahamic faiths.

from Religion

The civic polytheism of Greece and Rome — Olympian gods, temple sacrifice, oracle, and myth. It framed classical art, politics, and philosophy before Christianity supplanted it.

from Religion

The many local, often oral traditions of Africa, the Americas, Oceania, and beyond — animist, ancestral, and shamanic faiths bound to land, kin, and living memory.