Let's Talk Religion

 Different people respond to religious diversity (the existence of other religions) in different ways: The religious exclusivist holds that only their own religion is true. The religious inclusivist holds that while other religions may be partly true, only the religion of the inclusivist is the most true. The religious  pluralist  accepts the presence of all religions while remaining personally committed to their own religion. Basically: "live and let live". The religious universalist holds that no matter what religion one follows, all will ultimately lead to salvation. The religious syncretist personally embraces multiple religions, often combining elements from two or more, essentially creating their own personal spiritual path. I am getting a metaphoric image in my mind of how these paths relate to and differ from each other:  Imagine a mountain that all are climbing, trying to reach the top (the goal of religion, God or salvation, if you want). ·  ...

How can there be a religion (e.g. Hinduism) without a founder? We can compare this to language. We can't point to the "founder" (inventor) of most languages: who invented English?... Just as language develops over a long period of history, so too do religions. Even religions that do have an identifiable "founder" (Buddha for Buddhism, Muhammad for Islam, etc...) those religions that are hundreds and thousands of years old, have developed over time, well beyond what the "founder" even imagined and likely ever intended. Every generation adds something, changes something. Many aspects of a language are drawn from multiple pre-existing languages (English has many words with roots, prefixes and suffixes coming from Latin and Greek and countless other older languages). So too, most if not all religions also draw on ideas already present in pre-existing religions while rejecting other aspects of those older religions. Christianity drew from Judaism, but als...