Religious studies

Theocracy or ethiocracy is a form of autocracy or oligarchy in which one or more deities are recognized as supreme ruling authorities giving divine guidance to human intermediaries with executive, legislative or judicial power who manage the government's daily affairs.

branch of philosophy concerned with religion, God, religious knowledge, language etc.

objective study of religion

field of history concerned with the development of religion

study of religion related to other religions or institutions

Laicism (also laicity, from the Ancient Greek "λαϊκός" "laïkós", meaning "layperson" or "non-cleric") refers to a legal and political model based on the strict separation of religion and state. The French term laïcité was coined in 1871 by French educator and future Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ferdinand Buisson, who advocated for secular education. In some countries, laicism is constitutionally enshrined, while others—primarily Western states—do not explicitly define themselves as Laicist but implement varying degrees of separation between religion and government.

myths attributed to the Proto-Indo-Europeans

In the fields of philosophy and mythography, euhemerism () is an approach to the interpretation of mythology in which mythological accounts are presumed to have originated from real historical events or personages. Euhemerism supposes that historical accounts become myths as they are exaggerated in the retelling, accumulating elaborations and alterations that reflect cultural mores. It was named after the Greek mythographer Euhemerus, who lived in the late 4th century BC. In the more recent literature of myth, such as ''Bulfinch's Mythology'', euhemerism is termed the "historical theory" of my

[[File:Importance of Religion in the World (Gallup Poll 2008-2009).svg|thumb|550px|Results of a 2008/2009 Gallup poll on whether respondents said that religion was "important in [their] daily life." {| border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="width:100%;" |- |valign="top"|

implicit religious values of a nation

experiential aspect of religion

five or more largest and most widespread religious movements

emergence of religious behavior discussed in terms of natural evolution

Demythologization as a hermeneutic approach to religious texts seeks to separate or recover cosmological, sociological and historic claims from philosophical, ethical and theological teachings. Mostly applied to biblical texts, demythologization often overlaps with philology, biblical criticism and form criticism. The term demythologization (in German: Entmythologisierung) was introduced by Rudolf Bultmann (1884–1976) in existential context, but the concept has earlier precedents.

phenomenon whereby an element of a nation's culture is transformed elsewhere, then re-imported back to its culture

philanthropic organization

The term ' (German for "primeval monotheism") or "primitive monotheism'" expresses the hypothesis of a monotheistic Urreligion, from which polytheistic religions allegedly degenerated. This evolutionary view of religious development contrasts diametrically with another evolutionary view on the development of religious thought: the hypothesis that religion progressed from simple forms to complex: first pre-animism, then animism, totemism, polytheism, and finally monotheism.

branch of theology that evaluates the phenomena of other religions

metatheories of religion in the social sciences

religious thought and practice independent of belief in deities

stance that only one spiritual belief is true

indigenous religious belief systems

question which has been addressed in various religious traditions and in scientific studies

the relationship between religion and politics

1991 essay by Richard Dawkins

study of animal behaviours that suggest proto-religious faith

interdisciplinary subfield

development and spread of a religion within society

the combination of a naturalist worldview with ideals, perceptions, traditions, and values traditionally associated with religions

Dheghom ( or ; lit. 'earth'), or '''''' (PIE: , lit. the 'Broad One'), is the reconstructed name of the Earth-goddess in the Proto-Indo-European mythology.

idea that individuals can belong to more than one religious tradition

thumb|270x270px|Importance of religion by country in a 2008-2009 poll by Gallup.In sociology, desecularization (also spelled desecularisation) is a resurgence or growth of religion after a period of secularization. The theory of desecularization is a reaction to the theory known as the secularization thesis, which posits a gradual decline in the importance of religion and in religious belief itself, as a universal feature of modern society. The term desecularization was coined by Peter L. Berger, a former proponent of the secularization thesis, in his 1999 book The Desecularization of the Worl

demarcation of religion from other forms of human activity or ideology

phenomenon of groups using the Internet for text distribution, recruitment, and information sharing

experience interpreted within a religious framework

women's roles and history surrounding religion