this post was submitted on 07 Feb 2024
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[–] Cold_Brew_Enema 108 points 9 months ago (5 children)

The thing I love about religion is that there are thousands of them, yet yours is the correct one? Those are pretty low odds.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 9 months ago (1 children)

The odds dip much further due to all of them being made up horse shit.

[–] uis 27 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Hey! Don't insult horsies! They have much better religions.

[–] TokenBoomer 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I don’t recognize that pony.

[–] ArcaneGadget 10 points 9 months ago

That is Lauren Faust's OC. Lauren is the creator of "Friendship is Magic " AKA generation 4 of My Little Pony.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 9 months ago

Did not expect to see mlp here <3

[–] TehBamski 15 points 9 months ago (4 children)

Yeah... "thousands of them" is overexaggerated. That being said, there have been a lot of faiths, myths, and mysticism throughout human history..

Here's an interesting timeline of belief systems.

I grew up Mormon and had a hard time believing that we were the "true church," "taught the true teachings.," etc., when I learned about how many different current and old religions and beliefs people had throughout human history. Cracks started to form in my faith foundation then. The following thoughts throw me for a loop back then. Exibit A. Exibit B. Exibit C.

[–] LifeInMultipleChoice 32 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

There are over 40,000 sects of christianity last I knew. I'm going to say thousands isn't an overexageration. I won't consider religions the same if they have different beliefs.

[–] andros_rex 5 points 9 months ago

Part of it is probably what determines what counts as “a religion.” My mind went to indigenous groups in the Americas, Australia, and Africa - thousands seems appropriate there!

Historically, religions as practiced on the ground were very syncretistic - like in the late medieval Muslim world, a Christian might carry a verse from the Koran as a charm or Muslim might visit a rabbi. Not to say that there wasn’t religious persecution and attempts by religious authorities to make sure that everyone was following the rules, but the species of religious fundamentalism we see today is a product of the 19th century and widespread literacy.

Even within a modern Protestant church of a specific denomination, there’s probably a mix of people who are universalists, into spiritualism, etc.

I don’t really think religions can be considered discrete in a way that one could report “there are X religions in the world.”

[–] AngryCommieKender 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

That timeline leaves off The Babis, The Baha'is, The Mormons, and tons of fracturing among Christians and Muslims, that I am aware of.

It also ignores Shintoism, Daoism, and the other far eastern belief systems.

Also I am intentionally not counting Scientology, because that was a bet.

[–] TehBamski 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I wasn't able to find Babi, but did find Bahai and Mormon in the tree. I don't have the time right now to try to find the others, but I'm going to guess that they're in there or didn't make the cut when making the tree.

[–] AngryCommieKender 1 points 9 months ago

No surprise on the Babi. They either became Baha'is, or got massacred by the Persian Army.

[–] Chocrates 3 points 9 months ago

Do you happen to know where a higher resolution version of this image is?

I am not very knowledgeable about religion but that chart buckets European Animism as one "Religion" while I think it was not organized and refers to the disparate beliefs of folks in the area at the time, so one could argue that there were lots of version I think.

Regardless really fascinating info.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I think it's funny that the timeline you provided counts time since Jesus. The attempt to erase AD is interesting but it still counts time since Jesus.

Those "Exhibits" are interesting. The first I would counter that God does whatever God wants to do. People get hung up on that one a lot and think God needs to conform to their expectations. The second is a bit odd, people convert religious beliefs all the time. It's speaking to a certain audience that does believe or is questioning what they parents taught them. The last I would counter that of the 3,000 supposed Gods only one God has dominated the Earth resulting in a majority of people on the planet worshiping him.

[–] TehBamski 1 points 9 months ago

Both the Tree of Religion and the Religion Timeline use Common Era as their year notation.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 9 months ago (1 children)

This is why Pascal's Wager is bullshit. Well one reason why.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Honestly, I think the variant on it, Pascal's mugging, evidences why it's nonsense as well.

[–] UncleGrandPa 3 points 9 months ago

Overr 18,000 at last count