Religion: Meaning and Definition

Religion: Meaning and Definition

In Ayto (2005, pp. 419-420) book Word Origins: The hidden histories of English words from A to Z  have given a clear etymologically on religion. He said that the word religion is taken from Latin ‘religio’ originally meant ‘obligation, bond’. It was probably derived from the verb religare ‘tie back, tie tight’ (source of English rely), a compound formed from the prefix re- ‘back’ and ligare tie’ (source of English liable, ligament, etc). It developed the specialized sense ‘bond between human beings and the gods’, and from the 5th century it came to be used for ‘monastic life’ - the sense in which English originally acquired it via Old French religion. ‘Religious practices’ emerged from this, but the word’s standard modern meaning did not develop until as recently as the 16th century.

Studying the primitive religion, the French Sociologist Émile Durkheim (1995, p. 44) in his book The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life gives a definition of religion where he understands religion as “a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things, that is to say, things set apart and forbidden—beliefs and practices which unite into one single moral community called a Church, all those who adhere to them.”

References

Ayto, J. (2005). Word origins: The hidden histories of English words from A to Z (2nd ed.). A & C Black. 

Durkheim, E. (1995). The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life: Newly Translated By Karen E. Fields (K. E. Fields, Trans.). Free Press.