Religion

===Etymology===
{{See also|History of religion}}

The term ''religion'' comes from both [[Old French]] and [[Anglo-Norman language|Anglo-Norman]] (1200s [[Common Era|CE]]) and means respect for sense of right, moral obligation, sanctity, what is sacred, reverence for the gods.<ref>{{OEtymD|religion}}</ref><ref>"Religion" Oxford English Dictionary https://www.oed.com/viewdictionaryentry/Entry/161944 {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211003070115/https://www.oed.com/viewdictionaryentry/Entry/161944 |date=3 October 2021 }}</ref> It is ultimately derived from the [[Latin]] word {{lang|la|[[Religio|religiō]]}}. According to Roman philosopher [[Cicero]], {{lang|la|religiō}} comes from {{lang|la|relegere}}: {{lang|la|re}} (meaning "again") + {{lang|la|lego}} (meaning "read"), where {{lang|la|lego}} is in the sense of "go over", "choose", or "consider carefully". Contrarily, some modern scholars such as [[Tom Harpur]] and [[Joseph Campbell]] have argued that {{lang|la|religiō}} is derived from {{lang|la|religare}}: {{lang|la|re}} (meaning "again") + {{lang|la|ligare}} ("bind" or "connect"), which was made prominent by [[Augustine of Hippo|St. Augustine]] following the interpretation given by [[Lactantius]] in {{lang|la|Divinae institutiones}}, IV, 28.<ref>In ''The Pagan Christ: Recovering the Lost Light.'' Toronto. Thomas Allen, 2004. {{ISBN|0-88762-145-7}}</ref><ref>In ''[[The Power of Myth]],'' with Bill Moyers, ed. Betty Sue Flowers, New York, Anchor Books, 1991. {{ISBN|0-385-41886-8}}</ref> The medieval usage alternates with ''order'' in designating bonded communities like those of [[monastic orders]]: "we hear of the 'religion' of the [[Order of the Golden Fleece|Golden Fleece]], of a knight 'of the [[Order of Aviz|religion of Avys]]'".<ref name="Huizinga Middle">{{cite book |last1=Huizinga |first1=Johan |title=The Waning of the Middle Ages |date=1924 |publisher=Penguin Books |page=86|title-link=The Autumn of the Middle Ages }}</ref>

==== {{lang|la|Religiō}} ====
{{Main|Religio}}
In classic antiquity, {{lang|la|religiō}} broadly meant [[conscientiousness]], sense of [[Righteousness|right]], moral [[obligation]], or [[duty]] to anything.<ref>{{cite web |title=Religio |url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0060%3Aentry%3Dreligio |website=Latin Word Study Tool |publisher=Tufts University |access-date=21 February 2021 |archive-date=24 February 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210224155206/http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0060%3Aentry%3Dreligio |url-status=live }}</ref> In the ancient and medieval world, the etymological Latin root {{lang|la|religiō}} was understood as an individual virtue of [[worship]] in mundane contexts; never as [[doctrine]], practice, or actual source of [[knowledge]].<ref name="Harrison Territories" /><ref name="Roberts Jon">{{cite book|last1=Roberts|first1=Jon|editor1-last=Shank|editor1-first=Michael|editor2-last=Numbers|editor2-first=Ronald|editor3-last=Harrison|editor3-first=Peter|title=Wrestling with Nature: From Omens to Science|date=2011|publisher=University of Chicago Press|location=Chicago|isbn=978-0-226-31783-0|page=254|chapter=10. Science and Religion}}</ref> In general, {{lang|la|religiō}} referred to broad social obligations towards anything including family, neighbors, rulers, and even towards [[God]].<ref name="50 great" /> {{lang|la|Religiō}} was most often used by the [[ancient Romans]] not in the context of a relation towards gods, but as a range of general emotions which arose from heightened attention in any mundane context such as [[hesitation]], caution, [[anxiety]], or [[fear]], as well as feelings of being bound, restricted, or inhibited.<ref name="religio roman">{{cite book |last1=Barton |first1=Carlin |last2=Boyarin |first2=Daniel |title=Imagine No Religion : How Modern Abstractions Hide Ancient Realities |date=2016 |publisher=Fordham University Press |isbn=978-0-8232-7120-7 |chapter=1. 'Religio' without "Religion" |pages=15–38}}</ref> The term was also closely related to other terms like {{lang|la|scrupulus}} (which meant "very precisely"), and some Roman authors related the term {{lang|la|superstitio}} (which meant too much fear or anxiety or shame) to {{lang|la|religiō}} at times.<ref name="religio roman" /> When {{lang|la|religiō}} came into [[English language|English]] around the 1200s as religion, it took the meaning of "life bound by monastic vows" or monastic orders.<ref name="Huizinga Middle" /><ref name="50 great" /> The compartmentalized concept of religion, where religious and [[worldly]] things were separated, was not used before the 1500s.<ref name="50 great" /> The concept of religion was first used in the 1500s to distinguish the domain of the [[Catholic Church|church]] and the domain of [[civil authorities]]; the [[Peace of Augsburg]] marks such instance,<ref name="50 great">{{cite book|last1=Morreall|first1=John|last2=Sonn|first2=Tamara|title=50 Great Myths about Religions|date=2013|publisher=Wiley-Blackwell|isbn=978-0-470-67350-8|pages=12–17|chapter=Myth 1: All Societies Have Religions}}</ref> which has been described by [[Christian Reus-Smit]] as "the first step on the road toward a European system of [[sovereign state]]s."<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Reus-Smit |first=Christian |date=April 2011 |title=Struggles for Individual Rights and the Expansion of the International System |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-organization/article/abs/struggles-for-individual-rights-and-the-expansion-of-the-international-system/9D4AB3695056FA85DCDE1D90D3C551B3 |journal=International Organization |language=en |volume=65 |issue=2 |pages=207–242 |doi=10.1017/S0020818311000038 |s2cid=145668420 |issn=1531-5088}}</ref>

Roman general [[Julius Caesar]] used {{lang|la|religiō}} to mean "obligation of an oath" when discussing captured soldiers making an oath to their captors.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Caesar |first1=Julius |translator-last1=McDevitte |translator-first1=W.A. |translator-first2=W.S. |translator-last2=Bohn |title=The Works of Julius Caesar: Parallel English and Latin |date=2007 |publisher=Forgotten Books |isbn=978-1-60506-355-3 |pages=377–378 |chapter=Civil Wars – Book 1|quote= Sic terror oblatus a ducibus, crudelitas in supplicio, nova religio iurisiurandi spem praesentis deditionis sustulit mentesque militum convertit et rem ad pristinam belli rationem redegit." – (Latin); "Thus the terror raised by the generals, the cruelty and punishments, the new obligation of an oath, removed all hopes of surrender for the present, changed the soldiers' minds, and reduced matters to the former state of war."- (English)}}</ref> Roman naturalist [[Pliny the Elder]] used the term {{lang|la|religiō}} to describe the apparent respect given by elephants to the [[night sky]].<ref>{{cite book |author1=Pliny the Elder |chapter=Elephants; Their Capacity |title=The Natural History, Book VIII |chapter-url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0137%3Abook%3D8%3Achapter%3D1 |publisher=Tufts University |language=en |quote=maximum est elephans proximumque humanis sensibus, quippe intellectus illis sermonis patrii et imperiorum obedientia, officiorum quae didicere memoria, amoris et gloriae voluptas, immo vero, quae etiam in homine rara, probitas, prudentia, aequitas, religio quoque siderum solisque ac lunae veneratio." "The elephant is the largest of them all, and in intelligence approaches the nearest to man. It understands the language of its country, it obeys commands, and it remembers all the duties which it has been taught. It is sensible alike of the pleasures of love and glory, and, to a degree that is rare among men even, possesses notions of honesty, prudence, and equity; it has a religious respect also for the stars, and a veneration for the sun and the moon." |access-date=21 February 2021 |archive-date=7 May 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210507142052/https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0137%3Abook%3D8%3Achapter%3D1 |url-status=live }}</ref> Cicero used {{lang|la|religiō}} as being related to {{lang|la|cultum deorum}} (worship of the gods).<ref>Cicero, ''De natura deorum'' Book II, Section 8.</ref>

==== {{transliteration|grc|Threskeia}} ====
In [[Ancient Greece]], the Greek term {{transliteration|grc|threskeia}} ({{lang|grc|θρησκεία}}) was loosely translated into Latin as {{lang|la|religiō}} in [[late antiquity]]. {{transliteration|grc|Threskeia}} was sparsely used in classical Greece but became more frequently used in the writings of [[Josephus]] in the 1st century CE. It was used in mundane contexts and could mean multiple things from respectful fear to excessive or harmfully distracting practices of others, to cultic practices. It was often contrasted with the Greek word {{transliteration|grc|deisidaimonia}}, which meant too much fear.<ref name="threskeia greece">{{cite book |last1=Barton |first1=Carlin |last2=Boyarin |first2=Daniel |title=Imagine No Religion : How Modern Abstractions Hide Ancient Realities |date=2016 |publisher=Fordham University Press |isbn=978-0-8232-7120-7 |chapter=8. Imagine No 'Threskeia': The Task of the Untranslator  |pages=123–134}}</ref>