Over the Millenia which Religion Killed the Most People? (30/6/26)

I was asked that question the other day, by a meddlesome troublemaker, who treated it as a rhetorical question and answered it himself with - Muslims! I, in my own deliberately annoying way, told him that it’s not religion that has killed the most innocents, although they have certainly shamed themselves often throughout history. But it is fascist dictators and communist dictators that have caused the most deaths - often their own people.

Either way before we get to that, let’s ask the question - which religion is the most bloodthirsty?

Christianity? Islam? Hinduism? Buddhism? Judaism? Or maybe the polytheistic belief system native to pre-Christian Scandinavia - aka Vikings.

Christian monarchs marched with the Cross during the Crusades. Muslim empires expanded through conquest as did Christian ones before and after them. Hindu and Muslim kingdoms fought each other for centuries on the Indian subcontinent. Even Buddhism, often presented as the world's most pacifist religion, has had monks blessing violence in places like Myanmar and Sri Lanka. Vikings did whatever they wanted.

Ironically, the biggest killers of christians have often been other Christians. Similarly the group resonsible for killing more muslims than any other group is muslims. Vikings killed vikings. Religious history is littered with arguments over who was following the "right" version of their God. And it got very nasty indeed. All the religions also have their various terrorist groups who are basically people who have lost their religion and their humanity or had it taken from them by religious zealots .

If we count wars fought in the name of religion, the numbers are high - as are the death tolls accompanying them.

Most deaths from war don’t come from religion, however, but from another much worse source.

The biggest killers of the twentieth century weren't religious leaders. It was the likes of some of the worst people who have existed - Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Mussolini, Franco, Idi Amin, king Leopold II of Belgium and others. There were many millions of people killed, sold and tortured  as slaves during the 19th century. Between them, they were responsible for well over 100 million deaths. Back in the day Genghis Khan probably killed over 30 million people through his conquests. Their number of victims dwarf any of the religious wars - as awful as they are and were. Perhaps they were motivated to invade other lands as a way to protect trade routes - but having a lot of hatred and a deeply held belief in their divine mandate to rule the world helped.

None of them needed religion. They needed ideology about race, class, nationalism, the need for revolution, the need for more land. Or the utopia they promise. They lived on xenophobia or extreme ideology - among other horrid things.

Then, they needed people willing to believe and back them.

We don’t require religion to justify killing. We require a certainty that says ‘this cause is so important that normal moral rules no longer apply – to us.’

We specifically need a mad man who gets power then does whatever is needed to keep it – with the help of enough of the population to make it happen.

Those who use religion to justify murder are not proving religion is evil. They are proving that people will use whatever tool is available. If religion isn't there, they'll use politics. If politics isn't there, they'll use race. If race isn't there, they'll invent something else. If people are disgruntled, as many are today, they will build on that to achieve control not deliver the needs of the people.

Ironically, every major religion teaches some version of loving your neighbour, showing mercy, forgiving others and treating people as you would like to be treated. And the great majority of the members of those religions practice what they preach - until some maniac turns up with charisma and some doctrine - and off we go again.

The deadliest force over the millennia hasn't been Christianity, Islam, Hinduism or any other faith. It has been enough people to let one person convince them that a cause is so right that everyone else deserves to die. Those causes have nearly always been far right or far left and violence is where those extremes meet.

The winner of that awful body-count are those who are extremely ruthless and lack empathy; who are narcissistic and megalomaniacs; who demand absolute authority; are also manipulative pragmatists with political shrewdness; and can cultivate mass loyalty.

We know who they are but the best way to keep them at bay is democracy - freedom of the press, the separation of powers, free quality education, free open elections and universal health support.

Also it helps if we have democratic governments that are not corrupt or fiscally inept  – that we definitely need.

(If anyone reading this thinks I am talking about the One Nation Party and Trump and their ilk - you are correct. The argument needs to be more about what they represent in the long run, which is violence and war, but also about all the outcomes that goes with those two things.)