Religious text

Religious texts, also known as scripture, are the texts and mythologies which various religious traditions consider to be sacred, or of central importance to their religious tradition. Many religions and spiritual movements believe that their sacred texts are divinely or supernaturally inspired.

Contents

History of religious texts

See also: history of religion, timeline of religion, and history of writing

The oldest known religious texts are Pyramid texts of Ancient Egypt that date to 2400-2300 BCE although there are older quasi-religious texts that indicate a religious undertone without specifying the actual incantations performed (e.g. the Sumerian "Locust Charm" text that is a listing of someone clearing out pests from various people's fields). The Epic of Gilgamesh from Sumeria is also one of the earliest literary works dating to 2150-2000 BCE, that includes various mythological figures . The Rigveda of Hinduism is proposed to have been composed between 3000–3500 BCE. [1]

[2] making it possibly the world's oldest religious text still in use. The oldest portions of the Zoroastrian Avesta are believed to have been transmitted orally for centuries before they found written form, and although widely differing dates for Gathic Avestan (the language of the oldest texts) have been proposed, scholarly consensus floats at around 1000 BCE.

The first scripture printed for wide distribution to the masses was The Diamond Sutra, a Buddhist scripture, and is the earliest recorded example of a dated printed text, bearing the Chinese calendar date for 11 May 868 CE.[3]

Views

Attitudes to sacred texts differ. Some religions make written texts widely and freely available, while others hold that sacred secrets must remain hidden from all but the loyal and the initiate. Most religions promulgate policies defining the limits of the sacred texts and controlling or forbidding changes and additions. Some religions view their sacred texts as the "Word of God", often contending that the texts are inspired by God and as such not open to alteration. Translations of texts may receive official blessing, but an original sacred language often has de facto, absolute or exclusive paramountcy. Some religions make texts available free or in subsidized form; others require payment and the strict observance of copyright.

References to scriptures profit from standardisation: the Guru Granth Sahib (of Sikhism) always appears with standardised page numbering while many other religions (including the Abrahamic religions and their offshoots) favour chapter and verse pointers.

Other terms

Other terms are often by adherents to describe the canonical works of their religion. In the United States, terms like 'Holy Writ' and others are used by some Christian groups (including the King-James-Only Movement) to describe the Christian Bible or, less often, by Muslim groups to describe the Qur'an.

Another term is 'Holy Scripture' or 'Sacred Scripture', used to denote the text's importance, its status as divine revelation, or, as in the case of many Christian groups, its complete inerrancy. Christianity is not alone in using this terminology to revere its sacred book; Islam holds the Qur'an in similar esteem, as does Hinduism the Vedas and Bhagavad Gita, and Buddhism the sutras.

Hierographology

Hierographology (Ancient Greek: ἱερός, hieros, "sacred" or "holy", + γραφή, graphe, "writing", + λόγος, logos, "word" or "reason") (archaically also 'hierology') is the study of sacred texts.

Increasingly, sacred texts of many cultures are studied within academic contexts, primarily to increase understanding of other cultures, whether ancient or contemporary. Sometimes this involves the extension of the principles of higher criticism to the texts of many faiths. It may also involve a comparative study of religious texts. The hierographology of the Qur'an can be particularly controversial, especially when questioning the accuracy of Islamic traditions about the text.

List of sacred texts of various religions

Ancient Greece

Atenism

Ayyavazhi

Bahá'í Faith

Bön

Buddhism

Ancient style of scripture used for the Pāli Canon
See also: Buddhist texts
The Chinese Diamond Sutra, the oldest known dated printed book in the world, printed in the 9th year of Xiantong Era of the Tang Dynasty, or 868 CE. British Library.

Cheondoism

Christianity

Christian Bible, 1407 handwritten copy

Unless mentioned otherwise, all texts are from the Bible

Nag Hammadi texts
Cover page of The Book of Mormon from an original 1830 edition, by Joseph Smith, Jr.
(Image from the U.S. Library of Congress Rare Book and Special Collections Division.)

Confucianism

Discordianism

Druze

Ancient Egyptian religion

Pyramid texts from Teti I's pyramid.

Etruscan religion

The Cippus of Perugia, 3rd or 2nd century BCE

Hermeticism

Hinduism

The Bhagavad Gita is Lord Krishna's counsel to Arjuna on the battlefield of the Kurukshetra.

Islam

11th Century North African Qur’an in the British Museum

Jainism

Judaism

A Sefer Torah opened for liturgical use in a synagogue service

LaVeyan Satanism

The Satanic Bible

Lingayatism

Mandaeanism

Manichaeism

Meher Baba

Cover of God Speaks

New Age religions

Various New Age religions may regard any of the following texts as inspired:

Orphism

Pastafarianism

Rastafari movement

Samaritanism

Scientology

Shinto

Sikhism

Illuminated Guru Granth folio with nisan (Mool Mantar) of Guru Gobind Singh. Collection of Takht Sri Harimandir Sahib, Patna

Spiritism

Swedenborgianism

Taoism

Tenrikyo

Thelema

Unification Church

Yazidi

Zoroastrianism

Yasna 28.1 (Bodleian MS J2)

References

  1. ↑ N.S. Rajaram, Hindustan Times. N.S. Rajaram, Aryan Invasion of India: The Myth and the Truth. More recent scholars, such as David Frawley, Dr. B.G. Siddharth, Dr. S.B. Roy, Professor Subhash Kak, Dr. N.R. Waradpande, and Bhagwan Singh have made a case for much more ancient dates of the Rig Veda. Also B.G. Tilak, P.C. Sengupta, Pargiter, Jagat Pati Joshi, Dikshit, K.N. Shastri, Sri Aurobindo, Hermann Jacobi, Dayananda Saraswati, B.G. Sidharth, among many others, have argued for its greater antiquity. David Frawley and N.S. Rajaram, in Vedic “Aryans” and the Origins of Civilization, put forward an interesting and compelling theory of the origins of Vedic civilization. Drawing upon a large array of evidence from anthropology, satellite mapping, geology, historical linguistic, and literary study, they have helped discredit the old “Aryan invasion theory” to establish that the Rig Veda was of much greater antiquity than Muller had estimated.
  2. ↑ The oldest mention of Rigveda in other sources dates from 600 BCE, and the oldest available text from 1,200 CE. Oberlies (1998:155) gives an estimate of 1100 BCE for the youngest hymns in book 10. Estimates for a terminus post quem of the earliest hymns are far more uncertain. Oberlies (p. 158) based on 'cumulative evidence' sets wide range of 1700–1100. The EIEC (s.v. Indo-Iranian languages, p. 306) gives 1500–1000. It is certain that the hymns post-date Indo-Iranian separation of ca. 2000 BC and probably that of the Indo-Aryan Mitanni documents of c. 1400 BCE. Philological estimates tend to date the bulk of the text to the second half of the second millennium. Compare Max Müller's statement "the hymns men of the Rig-Veda are said to date from 1500 B.C." ('Veda and Vedanta', 7th lecture in India: What Can It Teach Us: A Course of Lectures Delivered Before the University of Cambridge, World Treasures of the Library of Congress Beginnings by Irene U. Chambers, Michael S. Roth. Some writers out of the mainstream claim to trace astronomical references in the Rigveda, dating it to as early as 4000 BC, a date corresponding to the Neolithic late Mehrgarh culture; summarized by Klaus Klostermaier in a 1998 presentation
  3. ↑ British Library
  4. ↑ chondogyo.or.kr

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