These are historical figures credited with founding religions or religious philosophies, or who codified older known religious traditions. The list includes those who have founded a specific major denomination within a larger religion.
Legendary/semi-historical
Traditional founder | Religious tradition founded | Historical founder(s) | Life of historical founder |
---|---|---|---|
No single Founder (Hinduism) Indra (Vedic Hinduism) | Hinduism | The Saptarishi | c. 15th century BC to 10th century BC |
Abraham (covenant with God) Moses (religious law) | Judaism | Yahwists | c. 13th to 8th century BC |
Laozi | Taoism | Zhuang Zhou | 369 BC – 286 BC |
Ancient (before AD 500)
Medieval to Early Modern (500–1800 AD)
New religious movements (post-1800)
See also
Notes
References
Bibliography
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- Riegel, J (3 July 2002). "Confucius". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved 27 October 2018.
- Schumann, Hans Wolfgang (2003), The Historical Buddha: The Times, Life, and Teachings of the Founder of Buddhism, Motilal Banarsidass, ISBN 978-8120818170
- Smith, Christian; Joshua Prokopy (1999). Latin American Religion in Motion. New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-92106-0.
- Singh, Upinder (2016), A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India: From the Stone Age to the 12th Century, Pearson Education, ISBN 978-93-325-6996-6
- Zimmer, Heinrich (1953) [April 1952], Campbell, Joseph (ed.), Philosophies Of India, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd, ISBN 978-81-208-0739-6