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The documented history of Indian religions begins with the historical Vedic religion, the religious practices of the early Indo-Aryans, which were collected and later redacted into the Samhitas (usually known as the Vedas), four canonical collections of hymns or mantras composed in archaic Sanskrit.
Religion in India is characterised by a diversity of religious beliefs and practices. Throughout India's history, religion has been an important part of the country's culture and the Indian subcontinent is the birthplace of four of the world's major religions, namely, Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, and Sikhism, which are collectively known as native Indian religions or Dharmic religions and ...
The history of Hinduism covers a wide variety of related religious traditions native to the Indian subcontinent. [1] It overlaps or coincides with the development of religion in the Indian subcontinent since the Iron Age, with some of its traditions tracing back to prehistoric religions such as those of the Bronze Age Indus Valley Civilisation.
Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for people living in the Indian subcontinent. In the 18th century, European merchants and colonists began to refer to the followers of Indian religions collectively as Hindus until about mid 20th century.
Hinduism is the largest and most practised religion in India. [1] [2] About 80% of the country's population identified as Hindu in the last census. India contains 94% of the global Hindu population. [3] [4] The vast majority of Indian Hindus belong to Shaivite, Vaishnavite and Shakta denominations. [5]
The notion and reports on "Hinduism" as a "single world religious tradition" [142] were also popularised by 19th-century proselytising missionaries and European Indologists, roles sometimes served by the same person, who relied on texts preserved by Brahmins (priests) for their information of Indian religions, and animist observations that the ...
The history of India up to (and including) the times of the Buddha, with his life generally placed into the 6th or 5th century BCE, is a subject of a major scholarly debate. The vast majority of historians in the Western world accept the theory of Aryan Migration with c. 1500-1200 BCE dates for the displacement of Indus civilization by Aryans ...
In early colonial era Anglo-Hindu laws and British India court system, the term Hindu referred to people of all Indian religions as well as two non-Indian religions: Judaism and Zoroastrianism. [112] In the 20th century, personal laws were formulated for Hindus, and the term 'Hindu' in these colonial 'Hindu laws' applied to Buddhists, Jains and ...