Islam. Buddhism. Hinduism

Islam, another monotheistic major world religion, originated in the Arabian Peninsula in the seventh century. Its adherents follow the teachings of the prophet Muhammed (570-632), who lived in Arabia.

The term Islam means "submission to the will of Allah."' Muslims believe that there is no God but Allah, and that Muhammed was the Prophet of Allah. They regard Muhammed as the last and greatest of a series of prophets, including the principal Jewish prophets.

Recognition that there is no God but Allah is one of the five pillars of the Islamic faith. Muslims are expected to pray five times daily, facing in the direction of Mecca. The month of Ramadan, or the ninth month of the year in the Muslim calendar, is observed with prayer and fasting. Alms must be given to the poor, and those Muslims who can afford to do so are expected to visit Mecca at least during their lifetime.

Muslims date their calendar to the Hegira, the flight of Muhammed from his native city of Mecca to the nearby city of Medina in 622. Eight years later, Muhammed returned to capture Mecca, which has since been regarded as the holiest city of Islam.

After Muhammed's death, in 632, Islam spread rapidly as a result of the missionary activity of Muslim political leaders and conquerors. Within a decade, Muslim conquerors had united the previously divided pagan tribes of the Arabian Peninsula and had overthrown established empires in what are now Israel, Iraq, and Iran. Islam spread across North Africa, and for several centuries Muslim conquerors occupied Spain. To the east, Islam spread across much of central and southern Asia to parts of Southeast Asia. Today, Islam is the dominant religion of a large area stretching from North Africa to Southeast Asia. Smaller communities of Muslims can be found throughout Africa, the United States, and elsewhere.

Buddhism. Among polytheistic religions, Buddhism is the major universalizing religion. Buddhism is based on the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama, who was born in northern India sometime between 500 and 600 B.C. Gautama was the son of a wealthy landowner, but he renounced his worldly advantages in an effort to achieve spiritual peace. He became known as the Buddha, or "enlightened one," and preached his views throughout South Asia for the rest of his life.

For several centuries, Buddhism was the primary religion of India, although gradually it was replaced with the Hindu faith. Its diffusion was quite limited until the Indian emperor Asoka became a convert and supported missionary activity abroad. Thereafter, Buddhism rapidly became established in China, Japan, Korea, and Southeast Asia. Today it is much more prevalent in East Asia than within the Indian subcontinent.

Although Buddhism is a universalizing religion, it is nonexclusive. In many regions, people combine Buddhism with elements of other religious beliefs. Traditional Chinese religious beliefs include aspects of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism, while the traditional religious beliefs of Japan combine Buddhism with the ancestral Japanese Shinto religion. The combination of two or more religious traditions into a single tradition is known as syncretism.

Hinduism, the predominant religion of India, is the world's largest ethnic religion. Unlike the major universalizing religions. Hinduism is not associated with a particular founder or a specific theology. Rather. Hindu theology dates back thousands of years into the past.

Hinduism originated in the religious practices of the Aryan tribes, who moved into India from Central Asia more than three thousand years ago. The Aryans, who are also responsible for the diffusion of Indo-European languages into India, first moved into the Punjab region of northwest India. Eventually, they spread across northern India, pushing the indigenous Dravidian population southward.

Central to Hindu theology is the idea that human and animal spirits undergo an endless series of reincarnations. Souls move up or down in a continuous hierarchy depending on behavioral patterns in life. The caste system, in which each person in Hindu society is an important manifestation of these beliefs.

Hindu social organization includes four major castes—the Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, and Sutras. At the top of the social hierarchy are the Brahmins, or priests. The second caste includes soldiers and kings and the third, merchants and farmers. In the lowest caste, the Sutras, are laborers and craftspeople. Each of the major castes is subdivided into hundreds of subcastes. Each caste and subcaste maintains an often complex series of regulations and traditions governing all types of activities, including marriage, family relationships, employment, and social customs.

Below the four traditional castes are harijahns, or "untouchables." Untouchables are thought to be descended from Dravidian and other aboriginal people living in India prior to Aryan takeover, and many perform menial or dirty work considered offensive to the castes above them. Untouchables have long been subjected to discrimination and poverty. The newly independent government of India outlawed the caste system in 1948, and it has promulgated laws restricting discrimination and promoting equal rights for all people. Despite these goals, caste remains an important component of Indian society.

The Diffusion of Religions. Each of the world's major religions has diffused extensively from its area of origin. Both expansion and relocation diffusion contribute significantly to changing distributions of religious populations.

Universalizing religions spread as a result of both expansion and relocation diffusion. In the case of expansion diffusion of these religions, conversion has often played a key role. Christianity diffused outside Europe and Southwest Asia largely through the efforts of Christian missionaries, who accompanied early European explorers and settlers as they discovered and colonized the Americas, Africa, and Australia. The Christian population of these areas includes both descendants of Christians who migrated from Europe and other Christians, descended from local people who converted to the religion.

Ethnic religions, on the other hand, spread primarily as a result of relocation diffusion. Whereas nearly all Hindus live in India, large Hindu congregations are found in Fiji. Guyana, Trinidad, and South Africa as a result of Indians who have emigrated to these areas.

At various times in history, large numbers of people have converted from ethnic to universalizing religions. Because universalizing religions tend to promote equality among believers, they hold appeal for people belonging to lower social and economic classes. India experienced large-scale conversion from Hinduism to Buddhism in the centuries after Buddha's lifetime, and from Hinduism to Islam during the Middle Ages. In both cases, members of the lower classes of Indian society were especially likely to convert. Similarly, Christianity's diffusion throughout the Roman Empire began with the conversion of the lower classes. Upper-class Romans did not begin to convert to Christianity until the Emperor Constantine made it the official religion of the state in A.D. 325.