Shaivism is among the largest and oldest Hindu traditions, with roots reaching into the earliest Indian religion and a rich philosophical and devotional development. Its affirmation of Shiva's supremacy parallels and contrasts with the Vaishnava exaltation of Vishnu and the Shakta exaltation of the Goddess, the three forming the principal theistic streams of Hinduism.
Within the common Hindu cosmology of rebirth and release, Shaivism presents the path to moksha as devotion to, and ultimately identity or union with, Shiva as the absolute. A further, distinct current is Lingayatism (Virashaivism), founded or substantially reformed in twelfth-century Karnataka by the poet-saint Basava, which rejects caste hierarchy, Vedic ritual, and temple worship of images in favour of personal devotion focused on a small linga worn on the body, and produced its own vernacular scripture, the Vachanas.
Whether Lingayatism is a reform movement within Shaivite Hinduism or an independent religion remains politically live: in March 2018 the Karnataka state government, on the recommendation of an expert committee, approved separate religious minority status for Lingayats, and India's central government rejected the request in November 2018, citing the community's classification as a Hindu sect since the 1871 census; the underlying disagreement remains unresolved among Lingayats themselves.