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The derivation of the word religion has been a matter of dispute from ancient times. Not even today is it a closed question. Cicero, in his 'De natura deorum', II, xxviii, derives religion from relegere (to treat carefully):
 (Cicero) 'Those who carefully took in hand all things pertaining to the gods were called religiosi, from relegere.'
Max Muller favoured this view. But as religion is an elementary notion long antedating the time of complicated ritual presupposed in this explanation, we must seek elsewhere for its etymology. A far more likely derivation, one that suits the idea of religion in its simple beginning, is that given by Lactantius, in his 'Divine Institutes', IV, xxviii. He derives religion from religare (to bind):
'We are tied to God and bound to Him [religati] by the bond of piety, and it is from this, and not, as Cicero holds, from careful consideration [relegendo], that religion has received its name.' (Lactantius)
The objection that religio could not be derived from religare, a verb of the first conjugation, is not of great weight, when we call to mind that opinio omes from opinari, and rebellio from rebellare. St. Augustine, in his 'City of God', X, iii, derives religio from religere in the sense of recovering:
'having lost God through neglect [negligentes], we recover Him [religentes] and are drawn to Him.' (St Augustine)
This explanation, implying the notion of the Redemption, is not suited to the primary idea of religion. St. Augustine himself was not satisfied with it, for in his 'Retractions', I, xiii, he abandoned it in favour of the derivation given by Lactantius. He employs the latter meaning in his treatise 'On the True Religion', where he says:
'Religion binds us [religat] to the one Almighty God.' (St Augustine)
St. Thomas, in his 'Summa', II-II, Q. lxxxi, a. 1, gives all three derivations without pronouncing in favour of any. The correct one seems to be that offered by Lactantius. Religion in its simplest form implies the notion of being bound to God; the same notion is uppermost in the word religion in its most specific sense, as applied to the life of poverty, chastity, and obedience to which individuals voluntarily bind themselves by vows more or less solemn. Hence those who are thus bound are known as religious.
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The following table provides basic information of the major world religions. Although there are many different forms of religion, they are all united through the consideration of the relationship ('to bind') between the individual and the divine.
Religion ---------- Date Founded ---------- Sacred Texts ---------- Membership ---------- % of World
Christianity ------ 30 CE ------------------ The Bible ------------- 2,015 million ---------- 33% (dropping)
Islam ------------ 622 CE ----------------- Qur'an & Hadith -----1,215 million ---------- 20% (growing)
No religion * ---- No date ----------------- None ----------------- 925 million ------------ 15% (dropping)
Hinduism -------- 1,500 BCE ------------- The Veda ------------ 786 million ------------ 13% (stable)
Buddhism -------- 523 BCE -------------- The Tripitaka --------- 362 million -------------- 6% (stable
Atheists --------- No date ----------------- None ----------------- 211 million -------------- 4%
Chinese folk rel. - 270 BCE --------------- None ----------------- 188 million -------------- 4%
New Asian rel. -- Various ----------------- Various --------------- 106 million -------------- 2%
Tribal Religions,
Animism --------- Prehistory ------------- Oral tradition -------- 91 million --------------- 2%
Other ----------- Various ---------------- Various --------------- 19 million -------------- <1%
Judaism -------- No consensus ------------ Torah, Talmud --------- 18 million ------------- <1%
Sikhism ------- 1500 CE ------------------ Guru Granth Sahib ----- 16 million ------------ <1%
Shamanists ---- Prehistory --------------- Oral Tradition -------- 12 million ----------- <1%
Spiritism --------------------------------------------------------- 7 million ----------- <1%
Confucianism -- 520 BCE ----------------- Lun Yu ------------------ 5 million ---------- <1%
Baha'i Faith -- 1863 CE ---------------- Most Holy Book ----------- 4 million --------- <1%
Jainism -------- 570 BCE --------------- Siddhanta, Pakrit -------- 3 million --------- <1%
Shinto -------- 500 CE ---------------- Kojiki, Nohon Shoki ------- 3 million -------- <1%
Wicca --------- 800 BCE, 1940 CE ------ None --------------- 500,000? -------- <1%
Zoroastrianism - No consensus -------- Avesta ------------------- 0.2 million ---- <1%
* Persons with no religion, agnostics, freethinkers, humanists, secularists, etc.
Based on 2000-JAN data from the Global Evangelization Movement as reported in ReligionToday on 2000-JAN-10. They are based on a total world's population of 6,091.351,000 people.
http://www.religioustolerance.org/worldrel.htm
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 (Aristotle, 350BC) God is thought to be among the causes for all things and to be a kind of principle.
 (Zeno 333-262BC) God is not separate from the world; He is the soul of the world, and each of us contains a part of the Divine Fire. ... All things are parts of one single system, which is called Nature.
(Cicero, The Nature of the Gods) 'People who prayed and sacrificed all day long that their children might live to survive them were called superstitious (from 'superstes', a survivor), although the word later acquired a wider sense. But those who scrupulously observed and repeated all the ritual belonging to the worship of the Gods were called religious, from the verb 'relegare' (to read again and again ... )*. Today superstition and religion have become in the one case a term of contempt and in the other a term of respect.'
*Editors note: 'Cicero also cites here analogous derivations: 'elegant' from 'eligere' (to choose), 'diligent' from 'diligere' (to call for) 'intelligent' from 'intellegere' (to understand) saying that all these words contain the same sense of 'choosing' (legere) that is present in 'religious'. The more probable derivation of 'religio' however is from 'religare' (to bind).
 (Leo Tolstoy, 1879) And the cause of everything is that which we call God. To know God and to live is the same thing. God is Life.
What am I? A part of the infinite. It is indeed in these words that the whole problem lies. The essence of any religion lies solely in the answer to the question: why do I exist, and what is my relationship to the infinite universe that surrounds me?
It is impossible for there to be a person with no religion (i.e. without any kind of relationship to the world) as it is for there to be a person without a heart. He may not know that he has a religion, just as a person may not know that he has a heart, but it is no more possible for a person to exist without a religion than without a heart.
True religion is that relationship, in accordance with reason and knowledge, which man establishes with the infinite world around him, and which binds his life to that infinity and guides his actions. The principles of this true religion are so appropriate to man that as soon as people discover them they accept them as something they have known for a long time and which stand to reason. The principles are very simple, comprehensible and uncomplicated.
They are as follows:
that there is a God who is the origin of everything;
that there is an element of this divine origin in every person, which he can diminish or increase through his way of living;
that in order for someone to increase this source he must suppress his passions and increase the love within himself;
that the practical means of achieving this consist in doing to others as you would wish to do to you.
All these principles are common to Brahmanism, Hebraism, Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, Christianity and Mohammedanism.
(If Buddhism does not provide a definition of God, it nevertheless recognises that with which man unites and merges as he reaches Nirvana. And that something is the same origin which the other religions recognise as God.)
 (Gandhi 1869-1948) Truth alone is eternal, everything else is momentary. It is more correct to say that Truth is God, than to say that God is Truth. ... All life comes from the one universal source, call it Allah, God or Parmeshwara.
 (Albert Einstein, 1954) The religion of the future will be a cosmic religion. It should transcend personal God and avoid dogma and theology. Covering both the natural and the spiritual, it should be based on a religious sense arising from the experience of all things natural and spiritual as a meaningful unity. Buddhism answers this description. If there is any religion that could cope with modern scientific needs it would be Buddhism.
Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.
 (Fritjof Capra, 1974) The idea of the individual being linked to the cosmos is expressed in the Latin root of the word religion, religare (to bind strongly), as well as the Sanskrit yoga, which means union.
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