What is the pattern of religious allegiance globally at the time of WW1?
Not only ethnic, national and racial diversity but religious diversity too.
On all fronts, the war evidently involved variations of race, nationality and ethnicity. Diversity of religion was also very evident throughout the war, though until recently less remarked upon.
Europe predominantly but not exclusively Christian
In 1914 the population of countries within Europe was predominantly Christian, with a minority Jewish presence, itself often the butt of prejudice. Secularist rejection of religion was clear, but the greatest diversity remained between different versions of Christianity – Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant and variants within them. Islam was more obviously practised in countries on the other edges of the Mediterranean in N Africa and Turkey. There were individual Muslims within the UK, as also Buddhists, Hindus, Sikhs and Zoroastrians but few in overall numbers.
Other Continents
Christianity was also present in many other countries throughout the world, the result of its historical spread over 2000 years and more recently from its missionary accompaniment of European empire building in Africa, the Americas, Asia and the Antipodes. The population of the undivided India was mainly Hindu, Muslim and Sikh, plus minorities of Buddhists, Christians, Jains, Jews and Parsees. In China, traditional Folk Religion predominated with Buddhist, Confucian and Daoist ingredients, as similarly in Japan with strong Shinto variations.
'Guesstimated’ figures for religious allegiance in 1900
CHRISTIAN 558,132,000
Roman Catholic 266,500,000
Protestant 103,000,000
Orthodox 115,000,000
Anglican/CofE 30,500,000
MUSLIM 200,000,000
Sunni 173,000,000
Sufi 80,000,000
Shia 26,000,000
HINDU 203,000,000
Vaishnavite 143,000,000
Shaivite 53,000,000
NON-RELIGIOUS/ 3,250,000
ATHEIST
BUDDHIST 127,000,000
Mahayana 71,500,000
Theravada 48,000,000
CHINESE FOLK- 380,000,000
RELIGIONIST
JEWISH 12,300,000
SHINTO 6,720,000
SIKH 3,000,000
JAIN 1,323,300
ZOROASTRIAN 108,490
CONFUCIAN 640,050
DAOIST 375,000
These are approximations of the global adherents of the world’s religions in 1900 as estimated in David B Barrett, et al World Christian Encyclopedia: A comparative survey of churches + religions in the modern world (Oxford UP 2001) vol 1, table 1:1.