Data source: Gina A. Zurlo, ed., World Religion Database (Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2024).
| Glossary item | Definition |
|---|---|
| Theosophists | Persons and bodies holding to Theosophy, or synthesist views combining philosophy and religions. A small number, including Liberal Catholics (qv), are specifically Christian. |
| Theosophy | A syncretistic system following chiefly Hindu philosophies originating in the USA in 1875. |
| Theravadins | (Theraveda). The Teaching of the Elders or the Hinayana school of Buddhists (qv), or Southern Buddhism (in Sri Lanka, India, Burma Thailand, Cambodia, Laos). |
| Third World | Developing nations not politically aligned with either the Western (Capitalist) world (the First World) or the Communist/Marxist-related world (the Second World). The term is purely chronological (like ‘third child’) and has never carried connotations of inferiority (as ‘third-rate’ does). It is the standard term to use for the nonaligned world and should be used instead of popularized alternatives like ‘Two-Thirds World’, a noncomparative term based only on population size. |
| transient (noun) | A person who is present in a country or area temporarily before moving on; usually a visitor, tourist, person on business, military personnel, refugee, displaced person. |
| translinguals | Persons able to navigate with reasonable competence between 2 or more languages within their own language cluster (or, a wider definition, within their own language net). |
| trend | A tendency, change, rate of change in a religious population, event, condition, or property, which can then be measured; usually expressed per diem (day), per year, per decade, per century, or per millennium, etc. |
| tribal religionists | Ethnoreligionists (qv). |
| Twelvers | Ithna-Asharis (qv). |
| typology | The study of types, symbols, symbolism, especially those describing religion or religious properties or phenomena, in order to make sense of vast masses of intractable data. |
| ulema, ulama | (Arabic). The highest body of religious authorities in Islam; a group of Muslim theologians and scholars who are professionally occupied with the elaboration and interpretation of the Muslim legal system from a study of Quran and hadith. |
| ummah | (Arabic) The community of faith embracing all Muslims, adherents of Islam. |
| unbelief | Non-belief, doubt, incredulity, agnosticism, apathy in matters of religious faith. |
| unbelievers | Non-religious persons: doubters, non-believers, agnostics, freethinkers, liberal thinkers, non-religious humanists, persons indifferent to both religion and atheism. |
| universal georeligion | A large non-local religion making membership open to all of any race, language, or background. |
| universalism | The theological doctrine that all men will eventually be saved or restored to holiness and happiness. |
| Untouchables | A large hereditary group in India having, in traditional Hindu belief and practice, the quality of defiling by contact the person, food, or drink of members of higher castes, and formerly being strictly segregated and restricted to menial work; the term has been illegal in India since 1949 and in Pakistan since 1953, and is now replaced by Harijans (Children of God) or Scheduled Castes. |
| urban dweller | urbanites (qv). |
| urbanites | Urban dwellers, persons residing in a city, town, or recognized urban area. |
| users of a language | All persons in a country who can understand a language since it belongs to a language cluster containing their own. |
| Vaishnavites | Worshippers of Vishnu in any of his forms or incarnations, in several schools, including Sri Sampradayins, Vadagalai, Tengalai, Ramanandis, Vallabhacharins, Chaitanyas, Nimbarkas, Madhvas, and others. |
| Vajrayana | The Tantrism school of Buddhists; Tantrayana (qv). |
| valid_sample_size | The number of observations, or number of people interviewed in the survey. In some of the DHS (Demographic and Health Surveys), the women are chosen from selected households for the sample, but the men are interviewed if they happen to be around the house while the women are being interviewed. In this case, the "valid sample size" is the sample size of only the women. For example, in the DHS survey of Chad in 1996, there were 7454 women and 2320 men interviewed. Because the men were not sampled independently of the women, our valid sample size is 7454, not 7454 + 2320. |
| variable | Any quality or phenomenon or aspect of religion that varies or changes and then can be measured by an instrument or measuring device. |
| Vedas | The most ancient sacred writings of Hinduism; any of 4 Samhitas (Aranyaka, Brahmana, Sutra, Upanishad). |
Data on 18 categories of religion, including non-religious, by country, province, and people.
Data on all religions, Christian activities, and trends.
Membership data, year begun, and rates of change.
Population and religion data on all major cities & provinces.
Detailed information covering religion, culture, and geography.
A repository of historical data, including a chronology of Christianity from the 1st to 21st centuries.