History of religion Facts for Kids

The history of religion looks at how people's religious feelings, thoughts, and ideas have changed over time. This story really begins when humans invented writing, about 5,200 years ago. Before writing, we can only guess about religious beliefs from old tools and sites. Writing helped a lot! It made it easier to share religious stories and rules, and to remember prayers.

The idea of "religion" as we use it today is quite new. It became common in the 16th and 17th centuries. Old sacred books like the Bible or the Quran didn't even have a word for "religion" in their original languages. The people who wrote them didn't think of their beliefs as a "religion" in the same way we do now.

How We Study Religion's Past
Where Did Religion Begin?
- Ancient Discoveries
The "Axial Age"
Religion in the Middle Ages
Religion in Modern Times
See also

How We Study Religion's Past

In the late 1800s, a group of German scholars started to study religion in a new way. They saw religion as something that changed and grew with human culture. They thought it developed from believing in many gods (polytheism) to believing in one God (monotheism).

Studying religion is important because it has shaped many parts of human life. It has influenced laws, moral rules, how societies are set up, and even art and music.

Where Did Religion Begin?

Some very old discoveries might show early religious ideas. These go back hundreds of thousands of years! Some experts think that when early humans like Neanderthals buried their dead carefully, it might mean they had religious thoughts. But this is just a guess.

Other clues are symbolic items found in Africa from the Stone Age. But it's hard to be sure if these are truly religious. Things become clearer from the Upper Paleolithic period (50,000–13,000 BCE). Scientists often see items from this time as showing religious ideas. Examples include the "lion man" statue, small "Venus figurines," and special burials.

In the 1800s, people had many ideas about how religion started. Some thought it came from enjoying life's pleasures. Others believed it began with trying to explain nature through myths. Today, there isn't one single answer everyone agrees on.

Ancient Discoveries

One of the oldest possible religious sites ever found is Göbekli Tepe in Turkey. It has huge stone pillars arranged in circles. These stones are decorated with carvings of animals and strange symbols. This amazing site was built before farming even began, around 9000 BCE!

Göbekli Tepe shows that people had a very organized way of life much earlier than we thought. This site is still being studied. It might help us understand the religious beliefs of ancient hunter-gatherers.

The oldest known religious writings are the Pyramid Texts from ancient Egypt. They date back to about 2400 to 2300 BCE. In India, the earliest records of religion are the Vedas, written around 1500–1200 BCE.

Some very old copies of religious texts that still exist today include:

The Upanishads, some from the middle of the first millennium BCE.
The Dead Sea Scrolls, which are pieces of the Hebrew Bible.
Complete Hebrew texts, translated into Greek (called the Septuagint), used widely by the 1st century CE.
The Avesta, a holy book of Zoroastrianism.

The "Axial Age"

Some historians call the period from 900 to 200 BCE the "axial age." A German philosopher named Karl Jaspers came up with this term. He believed that during this time, important spiritual ideas for humanity were created all over the world, at the same time but separately.

Many of the world's most important ways of thinking started then. This includes the idea of one God in Persia and Canaan. In Greece, Platonism developed. In India, Buddhism and Jainism began. In China, Confucianism and Taoism emerged. These ideas later became part of organized religions. For example, Emperor Ashoka helped spread Buddhism.

Religion in the Middle Ages

Major world religions during the Middle Ages.

During the Middle Ages, many of today's major world religions spread across Europe and Asia.

Christianity spread throughout Western Europe.
Buddhism traveled to East Asia along the Silk Road.
Islam spread across the Middle East, Central Asia, North Africa, and parts of Europe and India.

This period also saw many conflicts between different religious groups.

Muslims fought with Zoroastrians when they conquered Persia.
Christians fought Muslims in various wars, like the Crusades.
Shamanism clashed with Buddhists, Taoists, Muslims, and Christians during the Mongol invasions.
Muslims fought with Hindus and Sikhs in India.

Many religious groups in the Middle Ages focused on mysticism. This is a way of trying to connect directly with God or a higher power. Examples include the Cathars in the West, Jewish mystics in Spain, the Bhakti movement in India, and Sufism in Islam. Ideas about one God became very clear in Christianity and Islam. Hindu ideas about Brahman (the ultimate reality) also became well-defined.

Religion in Modern Times

From the 1400s to the 1800s, European countries explored and settled new lands. This led to Christianity spreading to Africa, the Americas, Australia, and the Philippines.

The invention of the printing press in the 1400s was a huge deal. It helped the Protestant Reformation spread quickly. Leaders like Martin Luther and John Calvin challenged the Catholic Church. This led to many wars over religion, like the Thirty Years' War in Europe (1618–1648).

In the 1700s, Europe started to become more secular. This means people began to separate government and public life from religious control. This trend grew stronger after the French Revolution in 1789. By the late 1900s, religion had become less central in many parts of Europe.

By the early 2000s, people started using the internet to learn about or practice their religious beliefs. Websites like Beliefnet, which started in 2000, quickly gained millions of visitors.

History of religion facts for kids

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