Religion
According to the CIA World Factbook, Library of Congress, Oxford University, over 97% of the population of Pakistan is Muslim and the remaining 3% is Christian, Hindu and others. Majority of the Muslims practice Sunni Islam with Shi'as being the minority who make up 10–15%.
Nearly all Pakistani Sunni Muslims belong to the Hanafi school, although there are some Hanbalis and Ahlul Hadeeth. The majority of Shia Muslims belong to the Ithnā‘Ashariyyah branch, while a smaller number practice Ismailism. There are small non-Muslim religious groups, including Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, Parsis, Bahá'ís and Zoroastrians (Parsis).
The religious breakdown of the Pakistani population is as follows:
- Muslims: 181,723,000
- Christians: 2,700,000 (approx. 1.8%)
- Hindus: 1,800,000 (approx. 1.6%)
- Buddhists: 50,000
- Sikhs: 30,000
- Zoroastrian/Parsis: 25,000 (many are undocumented migrants from Iran)
- Jews: 200
- Animists, Baha'i, Atheists: n/a
Read more about this topic: Demographics Of Pakistan
Famous quotes containing the word religion:
“We think of religion as the symbolic expression of our highest moral ideals; we think of magic as a crude aggregate of superstitions. Religious belief seems to become mere superstitious credulity if we admit any relationship with magic. On the other hand our anthropological and ethnographical material makes it extremely difficult to separate the two fields.”
—Ernst Cassirer (1874–1945)
“Every sect is a moral check on its neighbour. Competition is as wholesome in religion as in commerce.”
—Walter Savage Landor (1775–1864)
“Surely the day will come when color means nothing more than skin tone, when religion is seen uniquely as a way to speak one’s soul; when birth places have the weight of a throw of the dice and all men are born free, when understanding breeds love and brotherhood.”
—Josephine Baker (1906–1975)