What Is Religion?
Religion is a complex phenomenon with important consequences for society. It takes many forms, from a group’s beliefs to the practices by which members live their lives. While it is often associated with peace, it can also be a source of conflict in societies and can divide families.
Anthropologists believe that religion began as an attempt to control uncontrollable aspects of the environment, such as weather, pregnancy and birth, and success in hunting. There are two different ways that humans try to accomplish this goal: manipulation through magic and supplication through religion. Magic tries to make the environment directly subject to human will through rituals, such as drawing pictures of animals on cave walls in the hope of assuring success in hunting. Religion tries to achieve this goal through a relationship with gods or goddesses.
The term religion evolved from religio, a Latin word meaning “scrupulous devotion.” Today it is used to describe a genus or cultural type. It is a broad concept that encompasses all the practices grouped under it, from polytheistic belief systems to the monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism. The diverse array of practices that are said to belong to this genus raises philosophical issues that are similar to those encountered when one uses other abstract concepts to sort cultural types such as literature, democracy, and culture itself.
Philosophers who have studied the notion of religion include Christian apologists such as A.N. Whitehead and Bertrand Russell, as well as German and French Continental philosophers such as Heidegger, Martin Buber, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Simone de Beauvoir. In the twentieth century, philosophers who would not normally be considered religious have addressed these topics, including Albert Camus and Luce Irigaray.