Pocket Guide to World Religions

Winfried Corduan

• Publisher: IVP Academic
• Year: 2010
• Print ISBN: 9780830827053
• eBook ISBN: 9780830867080
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Comparative Religion

Have you ever wondered . . .

• what the red dot on an Indian woman's forehead means?
• whether all Buddhist monks practice martial arts?
• if the Emperor of Japan is still considered a god?

Here is a concise, informative guide for anyone looking for answers to basic questions about the world's varied religions. In short, incisive chapters, Winfried Corduan introduces readers to twelve of the world's major religions, including Baha'i, Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Daoism, Hinduism, Islam, Jainism, Judaism, Parsi, Shinto and Sikhism. For each, he offers brief descriptions of its name, numbers and distribution, key symbols, history, Scriptures, major beliefs, subgroups, worship practices, home practices, clothing, diet and calendar. Also included are even briefer descriptions of sixteen new religious movements and traditional or tribal religions.

This book is for students, pastors and other busy people who want the quick, bare-facts scoop on current religions.

Designed for students and pastors alike, the short and accessible volumes in the IVP Pocket Reference Series will help you tackle the study of biblical languages, church history, apologetics, world religions, Christian spirituality, ethics, theology, and more.

1

Introduction

It was New Year’s Eve 1999, the birth of the new millennium. A famous TV personality was interviewing the Dalai Lama, head of Tibetan Buddhism. “Would you tell me, Your Holiness,” fawned the reporter, “do they celebrate New Year’s in the Islamic religion?”

It is, of course, possible that the interviewer thought the Dalai Lama, though a Buddhist himself, was a good source of information about Islam. More likely, this could have been a slip of the tongue. But most probably, the reporter was genuinely confused.

And who wouldn’t be these days? There was a time in America when the question “What is your religion?” was intended to elicit an answer such as “Presbyterian,” “Catholic,” or “Jewish.” Everyone seemed to fit into a preconceived pattern of religion. Now we are becoming far more used to the idea that the answer to the question about someone’s religion may include Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism or any number of other faiths.

Your coworkers, fellow students or neighbors down the street may be immigrants who have brought their home culture with them. In previous generations, people coming to this country often left their original identity behind them, seeking to blend in and copying the lifestyle of those they perceived as being typically American. Many immigrants even Anglicized their names so as to be less conspicuous, whereas nowadays getting to know your new neighbors may begin with the seemingly insurmountable hurdle of learning to say their names correctly.

Here’s the bad news: this book will be of little help to you with learning to pronounce your neighbor’s name. But the good news is that this book will help you understand at least one part of your new neighbor’s culture: his or her religion. This book is written for those of us who do not know anything about other religions and do not have the option of subjecting ourselves to lengthy and laborious study.

Imagine we find out that the new family who has just moved in across from us is Hindu, and we would like to have them come over to our house for dessert or a meal, but we don’t want to embarrass ourselves by not having a clue as to what they believe. Much as we would want to, we cannot afford to take a week off from work to do an in-depth study of Hinduism. We need some quick, practical help—now. Of course, we can go on the Internet and see if we can find what we need courtesy of Google. Unfortunately, although we are bound to get a lot of information instantaneously, we are going to find so many conflicting and obscure claims that, without further help, all of that content may not be of more use than an encyclopedia written in a foreign language. This book is intended to fill this gap.

Everyone has heard certain things about other religions, but few of us are in a position to check out the rumors. Here are some common questions people have:

• What does the red dot on an Indian woman’s forehead mean?
• Are Muslims commanded to conquer the world for Islam?
• Do Buddhist monks practice martial arts?
• Is the emperor of Japan still considered a god?
• Do all Jews want to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem?
• Why does the Svetambara sect of the Jain religion recognize different Tirthankaras from the Digambara sect?

Well, okay, the last question is not likely to come up anytime soon in casual conversation. But there are many important concerns for which we need to get straight answers lest we embarrass ourselves or, worse yet, offend our neighbors.

What are some things we need to know about a religion? Well, you might start out by saying that it would be good to know what the people believe. Not a bad answer, but—believe it or not—not necessarily the best one. For a lot of people, what they believe is not nearly as important as what they practice. If you asked them to describe their religion, they would probably spend a lot of time telling you all about what they do and not necessarily much about what they believe.

Think about it: two people may hold the same beliefs in their minds and follow different religious practices, or two people could believe different things but do some of the same things. For example, some people may believe similar things about God but pray to him in different styles, or some other people may follow similar patterns in how they pray to God but believe different things about him.

So we would like to know what members of different religions do as well as what they believe. Of course, the doing part contains a lot of aspects: how to worship; how to be born, marry or die; how to relate to people who are not of their religion; how to dress; what to eat and how; what holidays to observe and how; how to make sure nothing evil will befall them… You get the picture.

This book addresses these concerns in such a way that you can look up the information you need efficiently. Even though it may become a little artificial at times, we are going to stick to a rigorous set of categories. Each of them will have its unique icon. Sorry, you can’t click on it, but you can use it to quickly find the information for which you are looking. The categories are the following:

NAME. Some religions go by more than one name. Sometimes there is a difference between what people like to call themselves and how others refer to them. At times, believers of a particular faith may consider what others call them to be offensive. So we need to pay attention to using the correct names.

NUMBERS AND DISTRIBUTION. This is a quick review of the statistics for each religion. For instance, did you know that one of the religions with the smallest number of adherents claims the second largest geographical distribution, just behind Christianity? Read the chapter on Baha’i to find out more about this little giant of faiths.

SYMBOLS. Religions usually employ a plethora of symbols, and many of them overlap from religion to religion, but most religions also have symbols that are special to them. Chances are, you know that the cross represents Christianity and the star of David stands for Judaism. But does Islam have a similar symbol? Why is there one symbol that is common to most Eastern religions but that is seldom seen in this country?

HISTORY. Some religions have a single founder whose teachings brought the religion into existence; others seem to have just happened. Some have changed a lot over time; others have remained quite constant. For some religions, their history is crucial to understanding them, while for others, the history of their faith does not seem to matter to their adherents. It’s important to know which is the case in each instance.

SCRIPTURES. Many religions have sacred books. There is, however, a large amount of diversity in how important the scriptures of a religion are to an individual believer. We will give a brief description of the scriptures of each religion and the roles they play in the religion.

MAJOR BELIEFS. A religion usually attempts to help people make sense of their existence. Who and what am I? Why does it matter how I live my life? Where do I go when my life is over? Is there a deity? If so, how should I relate to him or her or it? Does my belief in a spiritual reality have implications for how I treat my fellow human beings? Whenever you see the “thinking man” icon, you will find a summary of the fundamental beliefs of a religion.

SUBGROUPS. “What in the world is a Protestant?” a man asked me recently in India. Good question. For that matter, what in the world is a Shi’ite Muslim? Is the Buddhism of the Dalai Lama different from that portrayed in, say, Jackie Chan movies? When you talk to members of a large religion, they may downplay the subgroups within their faith, perhaps because they consider their own branch the only true or important one or perhaps even because they are embarrassed by fragmentation in their ranks. However, it is important for us to know when some people might be representing their religion as a whole and when they might be speaking for only a small segment of their faith community.

WORSHIP PRACTICES. Worship is a general term that may encompass many different kinds of activities, from private devotions to public sacrifices in a temple. We will look at the major worship activities in each religion.

RELIGIOUS BUILDINGS. Most major religions have buildings that are dedicated specifically to religious activities. Most of them (though not all) have offering boxes where you can drop off some money. But that is where the similarity ends. There are many different kinds of religious buildings, and what’s more, you can’t necessarily tell by a building’s size or decorations whether it’s crucial to the religion. We will take a quick tour of each kind of house of worship and see how it fits into the religion.

HOME PRACTICES. In some religions, the house of worship is central, whereas in others, what transpires in homes on a daily basis is more important. So it is necessary that we focus on the more personal dimension of how people put their religion into practice in their homes.

CLOTHING. Not every religion requires special clothing, thou...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Baha’i
• 3 Buddhism
• 4 Christianity
• 5 Confucianism
• 6 Daoism
• 7 Hinduism
• 8 Islam
• 9 Jainism
• 10 Judaism
• 11 New Religions
• 12 Parsiism (Zoroastrianism)
• 13 Shinto
• 14 Sikhism
• 15 Traditional and Tribal Religions
• About the Author
• More Titles from InterVarsity Press
• Copyright