Chapter 6.1: Where Are Religions Distributed?

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Chapter 6.1 Where Are Religions Distributed?
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• Human Geographers study where religions are
  located and why they spread
• Scale (globalization vs. local diversity) causes
  most religious tensions in the world
• People draw their core beliefs from religion
• Some are designed for global appeal, while others
  are intended for geographically limited areas
• Religious values affect how cultures organize
  their landscapes
• Most require exclusive adherence so global
  religions make people abandon local beliefs
• Migrants take religions to new locations. While
  they may learn a new language they often keep
  their old religion
• Identification with a religion leads to pride,
  but can also lead to conflict with other
  religions

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Where Are Religions Distributed?

• There are two types of religion Universalizing
  and Ethnic
• Universalizing religions attempt to be global,
  appeal to all people wherever they are in the
  world not just one location of culture
• Three major universalizing religions
  Christianity, Islam, Buddhism

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World Distribution of Religions
Fig. 6-1 World religions by continent.
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• Each religion is divided in three ways
• Branches- large fundamental division within a
  religion (Catholic, Protestant)
• Denominations- a division of a branch that unites
  local congregations (Baptist, Lutheran, etc.)
• Sects- small group that has broken away from a
  religion

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• Christianity
• Has 2 billion adherents and widest distribution
• Three major branches Roman Catholic, Protestant,
  Eastern Orthodox
• Roman Catholic- Southwest/East Europe
• Protestant- Northwest Europe
• Orthodox- East/Russia
• In the Western Hemisphere
• 50 of N. America is Protestant (Baptist,
  Lutheran)
• 95 of S. America is Roman Catholic
• Some smaller branches exist in Asia, Middle East,
  and Africa

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Christian Branches in Europe
Fig. 6-2 Protestant denominations, Catholicism,
and Eastern Orthodoxy are dominant in different
regions of Europea result of many historic
interactions.
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Christian Branches in the U.S.
Fig. 6-3 Distribution of Christians in the U.S.
Shaded areas are counties with more than 50 of
church membership concentrated in Roman
Catholicism or one of the Protestant
denominations.
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• Islam
• 1.3 billion in Middle East, N. Africa, and Asia
• Islam means submission to the will of god
• Five major pillars of faith
• There is only one true god and Muhammad is his
  messenger
• Muslims must pray five times a day facing Mecca
• Must give generously to charity for
  purification/growth
• Must fast during Ramadan for self purification
• Must make a pilgrimage to Mecca
• Two major branches Sunni and Shia
• Dominant in Middle East and Asia, also a minority
  religion in Europe and America

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• Buddhism
• 365 million people, mostly in China/Southeast
  Asia
• Four Noble Truths (major tenets)
• All living beings must endure suffering
• Suffering is caused by desire to live and leads
  to reincarnation
• Goal of all existence is to escape suffering and
  endless cycle of reincarnation into Nirvana which
  is achieved through self-purification
• Nirvana is attained through the eightfold path
  which is rightness of belief, resolve, speech,
  action, livelihood, effort, thought, and
  meditation
• Hard to make an accurate count since there are
  not many Buddhist institutions
• It is not an exclusive religion like Christianity
  and Islam

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Ethnic Religions

• Hinduism
• 97 live in India
• Believe it is up to the individual to decide how
  to worship God
• You alone are responsible for your own actions
  and must suffer any consequences
• No central authority or holy book, you select
  your own rituals
• Others include Confucianism, Daoism, Judaism,
  Animism

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Chapter 6.2 Why Do Religions Have Different
Distributions?
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Origin of Religions

• Universalizing religions have precise places of
  origin based on events in the life of man
• Ethnic religions have unknown or unclear origins,
  not tied to historic individuals
• Origin of Universalizing religions
• Christianity founded on the teachings of Jesus
  who died around 30 AD in Jerusalem
• Islam founded by Muhammad around 610 AD in Mecca
• Buddhism founded by Siddhartha Gautama near
  present day Nepal

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• Origin of Ethnic Religion
• Hinduism existed prior to written history
• Earliest surviving Hindu documents are dated
  around 1500 BC

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Diffusion of Religions

• Diffusion of Universalizing Religions
• Hearths of the three largest universal religions
  center around 3 individuals
• All three of these hearths originate in Asia

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• Diffusion of Christianity
• Spread through relocation, hierarchical, and
  contagious diffusion
• First through relocation missionaries carried
  the religion through the Roman Empire
• Contagious spread through daily contact between
  believers and non-believers (Pagans)
• Hierarchical the emperor Constantine converts
  and encourages spread.
• Emperor Theodosius makes it the official religion
  in 380 AD
• Later spread to North/South America through
  relocation again

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Diffusion of Christianity
Fig. 6-5 Christianity diffused from Palestine
through the Roman Empire and continued diffusing
through Europe after the fall of Rome. It was
later replaced by Islam in much of the Mideast
and North Africa.
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• Diffusion of Islam
• Originally spread through the conquest of Muslim
  armies including North Africa, southern Spain,
  South Eastern Europe, Turkey
• Later spread to Sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast
  Asia through relocation diffusion and trade

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Diffusion of Islam
Fig. 6-6 Islam diffused rapidly and widely from
its area of origin in Arabia. It eventually
stretched from southeast Asia to West Africa.
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• Diffusion of Buddhism
• Spread more slowly than the other two
• The Magadhan Empire begins the spread in 257 BC
  when it sends missionaries to Kashmir, Burma and
  other parts of India
• Merchants introduce the religion to China, which
  allows missionaries to spread the religion.
• Later spreads to Korea and then Japan

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Diffusion of Buddhism
Fig. 6-7 Buddhism diffused gradually from its
origin in northeastern India to Sri Lanka,
southeast Asia, and eventually China and Japan.
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• Lack of Diffusion of Ethnic Religions
• Most ethnic religions have very limited, if any,
  diffusion
• In some places they actually mix with
  universalizing religions (Africa-Christianity)
• They can diffusion through relocation if the new
  region does not force them to change religions
• Judaism is an exception to this rule
• It is practiced in many nations and did not even
  have a home until Israel was founded 1948

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Holy Places

• Religions sometimes elevate particular places to
  holy positions
• Ethnic religions have less distribution because
  its holy places are derived from the physical
  environment of its hearth
• Universalizing religion often grants holiness to
  the cities and other places in their founders
  life, and these areas do not have to be near one
  another

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• Universalizing Holy Places
• Buddhists 8 places are holy due to important
  events in Buddhas life (Birthplace, first
  sermon, death)
• Islam cities associated with the life of
  Muhammad (birth Mecca, Medina his first
  followers)

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Holy Sites in Buddhism
Fig. 6-9 Most holy sites in Buddhism are
locations of important events in Buddhas life
and are clustered in northeastern India and
southern Nepal.
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• Ethnic Holy Places
• Tied very closely to physical geography of one
  place
• Cosmogony set of religious beliefs concerning
  the origin of the universe.
• Events in the physical universe are more likely
  to be incorporated into the principles of an
  ethnic religion (animists, Confucianism).
• Universal religions tend to think God is more
  powerful than nature.

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The Calendar

• Ethnic religions tend to celebrate holidays based
  on the seasons, while universalizing religions
  center around the founder
• Ethnic Religions
• Often celebrate the seasons and their changes
• Rituals often pray for favorable environmental
  conditions or thanks for past farming success
• Jewish calendar two holiest days are in Autumn
• Rosh Hashanah - New Year
• Yom Kippur - Day of Atonement - this corresponds
  with the planting season
• Many ethnic religions recognize the winter
  solstice
• shortest day of the year

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• Universalizing Religions
• Celebrates events of the founders life
• Easter, Christmas, Ramadan

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Chapter 6.3 Why Do Religions Organize Space in
Distinctive Patterns?
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Places of Worship

• All major religions have some form of buildings
  for spiritual use
• Christian Churches
• The Christian landscape has a very high density
  of churches
• Plays a more critical role than buildings in
  other religions
• Believe the structure itself is an image of god
• Traditionally the church was the largest building
  in the center of a town, still applies in rural
  areas
• Churches are very expensive, requires donations
  from members and rich congregations have more
  ornate churches

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• Muslim Mosques
• Considered to be a place for community assembly
• It is not viewed so much as a holy place as it is
  a place for the community to gather and pray
  together
• Mosques are usually found in larger cities, in
  small villages a simple place is chosen for this
  role
• It is organized around a central courtyard and
  the pulpit always faces Mecca
• A distinctive feature is the minaret, a tower
  where the Muzzan summons people to worship

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• Hindu Temples
• Most Asian ethnic and universal religions place
  little emphasis on collective worship
• Important religious functions are more likely to
  be done in the home in their own shrines
• Hindu temples are home to one or more god and are
  funded by wealthy individuals
• These temples contain a dimly lit interior room
  with a statue of the god and perhaps room for a
  purification pool
• There are no organized services, people come to
  worship or meditate as they please

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Sacred Space

• Religious land use is typically for burial of the
  dead and religious settlements
• Burial
• Christians, Muslims and Jews typically bury their
  dead in cemeteries
• Hindus tend to cremate rather than bury.
• They first purify the body in the Ganges River.

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• Religious Settlements
• Most human settlements serve economic purposes,
  but sometimes they are formed due to religion
• Examples include utopian settlements an ideal
  community built around a religious way of life
• Oneida, New York and New Harmony, Indiana are
  examples of these communities
• Colonial settlements were not entirely planed for
  religious purposes, but Puritans tended to settle
  in such communities

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Administration of Space

• Members of universalizing religions must be
  connected for communication and consistency of
  the religion
• Ethnic religions tend not to have these organized
  authorities
• Hierarchical Religions have a well-defined
  geographic structure and organizes territory into
  administrative units
• Roman Catholics
• Pope- Archbishops (province)- Bishops (diocese)-
  Priests (parish)

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• Autonomous Religions Self sufficient with little
  communication with other communities of that
  faith
• Islam provides a great deal of local autonomy
• Has no formal hierarchy or territory
• Each member is expected to participate equally in
  rituals
• The exception to this is when the government is
  run by and Islamic majority
• Migration to Mecca and a very explicit doctrine
  keep unity in the religion
• Judaism, and Hinduism also have no centralized
  authority

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Chapter 6.4 Religious Conflict
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Religion vs. Government

• Government policies can come into conflict with
  religious beliefs
• Religion vs. Social Change
• In LDCs, participation in the global economy
  brings western influences into society
• Westerners do not consider economic development
  as incompatible with religious values, but many
  non-Christian religions do

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• The Taliban
• Take over Afghanistan in the late 1990s
• Impose very strict Islamic principles on the
  nation
• Men are beaten for shaving beards, women stoned
  to death for adultery, homosexuals buried alive,
  women wearing nail polish have their fingers cut
  off
• Banned all western activities including TV, kite
  flying, and music.
• Soccer stadiums were converted into execution and
  flogging arenas

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• Hinduism vs. Social Equality
• The caste system divides India into four groups
  Brahmans (priests), Kshatriyas (warriors),
  Vaisyas (merchants), and Shudras (farm workers,
  very low group).
• Below these groups are the untouchables or
  descendants of the natives before Aryan conquest.
• Almost no socialization outside of your group,
  very few rights for untouchables and Shudras
• The British rulers and Christian missionaries
  fight to eliminate the system, succeed in
  abolishing the untouchable caste

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• Eastern Orthodox Christianity vs. Communism
• With the Communist revolution in Russia in 1917,
  the Soviet Government eliminates the official
  church-state connection to the church
• Religious organizations are banned from social
  and cultural work and most East Orthodox
  Christians either abandon the religion or go
  underground
• With the dissolution of the Soviet Union,
  religions are once again spreading in Russia

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Religion vs. Religion

• Conflict is most likely to occur between borders
  of major religions
• Two long-standing conflicts are in the Middle
  East and in Northern Ireland
• Religious Wars in the Middle East
• Jews, Christians, and Muslims have fought for
  control of this region for 2000 years
• Jews consider this area their holy land,
  Christians consider Jerusalem holy due to Jesus
  death/resurrection, and Muslims regard it as holy
  since Muhammad ascended to heaven here

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Jerusalem
Fig. 6-14 The Old City of Jerusalem contains
holy sites for Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
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• The Crusades
• Muslims conquer most of the middle east during
  the 7th century
• 150 years of Christian led invasions of the holy
  land known as the crusades

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• Jews vs. Muslims in Palestine
• Divided by the United Nations following WWII into
  Jewish and Muslim parts
• A series of wars between Israel and its Arab
  neighbors leaves Israel with possession of the
  Gaza Strip and West Bank, which were originally
  given to the Palestinians
• Jewish settlements in these areas caused open
  violence between Palestinian groups and the
  Israelis