In a world where more than 80 percent of people subscribe to some religion, you might think that the word “religion” has a straightforward meaning. But in fact, different cultures have widely divergent ideas about Scripture and behavior, truth, tradition, tolerance, conformity, deity, doctrine, salvation, morality, and death. And when scholars and academics use the term “religion,” they mean something very different from what the term means to lay people.
The broadest definition of religion, used by theologians and philosophers, refers to an entire unified system of thought and feeling about someone or something that is sacred to believers. It also encompasses a code of behavior and a belief in supernatural forces or powers that are beyond human control. It is also a way of life that gives believers an explanation for the origin and meaning of events and of their place in the universe, and it provides guidelines for how to live one’s daily life.
A more specialized definition, which sociobiologists have used for the past century, refers to early and enduring protective systems that are tied to the potentialities of the body and brain and necessary for survival. It includes those religions that are characterized by explorations of what is inside the body (e.g., enlightenment, peace, sunyata, the Buddha-nature) as well as those that are focused on exploring outside the body in terms of nature and society.
For many historians and anthropologists, the concept of religion is most useful when it is seen as a taxon of social formations rather than a set of facts that can be defined in substantive or functional ways. Emile Durkheim, for example, emphasized that the concept of religion refers to a social genus and not to a specific set of facts.