Religion: In search of a definition

I have taken somewhat of an academic interest in studying religion. I’ve come to notice that religion forms a large part of people’s lives. Religion seeks to influence morality, so that (at least within the same religion) people can live together.

My interest in studying religion is to understand how people belonging to different religious beliefs can interact with each other peacefully. Religious differences can lead to conflicts, which can be an everyday occurrence in some parts of the world. Sometimes, these conflicts take violent forms.

Earlier this year, I read Robert Barro and Rachel McCleary’s book The Wealth of Religions (Adam Smith is perhaps not only the father of economics but also the father of many book titles now). At the time, as an economist, this book seemed like a good entry point. But I was turned away from the book as I began reading chapter 2:

“We view a person as religious if he or she believes in a transcendent being or beings with supernatural powers that can intervene in human affairs.” (p. 15)

Why? Because the book tied religion to theism. It failed to describe my beliefs as a Jain. To be a Jain, I do not need to believe in the existence of a God or anything transcendent. Nor does it properly describe Buddhism, which the book discusses in great detail (it does not discuss Jains — understandably — they constitute only 0.075% of the world’s population).

A Google search yields results that seem to indicate a consensus that a religion constitutes a belief in the supernatural, divine, or transcendental. But the Wikipedia entry on religion notes that religions may vary in whether they include these elements.

Why is this an important question, if it is at all?

One, it matters to me when someone asks me what my religion is. I would like to say that I am a Jain, but it then puzzles people, mainly those who are familiar only with Abrahamic religions or Hinduism with three million gods, that I am an atheist.

Two, it matters in understanding what motivates people’s actions that they view as religious. This, admittedly, comes from an academic interest as a social scientist. Do people follow religious rules because God will punish them otherwise, or because the society would look down upon them, or because they won’t attain a better reincarnation due to accumulating bad karma (karma here is seen as a natural law, one where no divine intervention may be possible), or a mix of these?

Third, it matters, I think, in countries like India, where religious secularism is understood very differently. In the US, there is a separation of the “Church” and the state. The state is indifferent to what an individual’s religion is. But in India, this takes the form of protection of minorities from the majority and thus the state plays an active role in trying to maintain freedom of religion.

I like to see religion as a cultural and social phenomenon which encompasses rituals, moral codes, and community practices that provide a framework for living and understanding the world. My worry though, is that this can lead to false positives, where the definition becomes overly broad that almost anything can be a religion and then it loses tractability in analysis.

Hopefully, I’ll have decided on a definition—or the necessity of one—by the time I begin writing academically.

P.S. in writing this, I came across an excellent post from Aaron Ross Powell, which I highly recommend: Just One Fewer God?