Self-governing churches under patriarchs, deciding in synod

A denomination is a distinct branch, school or movement within a larger religious tradition: the churches and confessions of Christianity, the schools of Buddhism, the schools of law and theology in Islam, the movements of Judaism, and the sampradayas and movements of Hinduism. The category also holds the divisions of smaller and newer traditions.

Each entry records the parent tradition, what distinguishes the branch in belief, practice or authority, and, where known, when and how it emerged: often through reform, schism, revival or the following of a particular teacher.

Divisions within a religion arise for many reasons (disputes over doctrine, authority, ritual, or the interpretation of scripture, and sometimes ethnic, political or regional difference as much as theology), and the entries describe the grounds of each without taking a side in it. What one tradition calls a school, another calls a sect or a movement, and the terminology itself can carry judgement; the atlas uses neutral description.

The denominations group under their parent religion, so a browser can move from a tradition to its internal branches (the denominations of Christianity, of Buddhism, of Islam), in a single step.