reply to post by djbj597922
Is religion the number 1 killer of all time?
If you mean "has religion killed more people than everything else combined" then that could go either way. It's close. If you mean "is religion
responsible for more deaths than any other single source," then yes, very likely.
This site combined with
wikipedia give some excellent lists with numbers, but there are some
issues.
According to the World Christian Encyclopedia, a total of roughly
248 million people have been "martyred." Meaning, "killed because of their
faith." This beats the roughly 222 million listed on wikipedia from wars and conflicts, but comes in at less than the roughloy 290 million you get if
you combine all wars and conflicts with famanes, and genocides. But...there are other causes of death not listed. Heart attacks, trafiic accidents,
disease, etc. Getting an all-inclusive total would take some time.
However...as the first linked source points out, the "people martryed" figure only includes people killed for their religion...not for their lack of
religion. So, if muslims kill hindus for being hindu, that gets counted. But if christians kill athiests for not being christian, that wasn't
counted.
So the 248 million figure may be a bit low. Either way though, again, "greatest single cause of death" is very likely.
[edit on 7-2-2010 by LordBucket]