Vaishnavism

Vaishnavism (), also called Vishnuism, is one of the major Hindu religious traditions, that considers Vishnu as the supreme being leading all other Hindu deities, that is, Mahavishnu. It is one of the major Hindu denominations along with Shaivism, Shaktism, and Smartism. Its followers are called Vaishnavites or Vaishnavas (), and it includes sub-sects like Krishnaism and Ramaism, which consider Krishna and Rama as the supreme beings respectively.

The ancient emergence of Vaishnavism is unclear, and broadly hypothesised as the rise of various regional non-Vedic religions which fused with one another and with worship of Vishnu. Those popular non-Vedic theistic traditions, particularly the Bhagavata cults of Vāsudeva-Krishna and Gopala-Krishna, as well as the Pancaratra-cult of Narayana, developed in the 7th to 4th century BCE, and were identified with the Vedic God Vishnu in the early centuries CE, and finalised as Vaishnavism, when it developed the avatar doctrine, wherein the various non-Vedic deities are revered as distinct incarnations of the supreme God Vishnu. Narayana, Hari, Rama, Krishna, Kalki, Perumal, Shrinathji, Vithoba, Venkateswara, Guruvayurappan, Ranganatha, Jagannath, Badrinath and Muktinath are revered as forms or avatars of Vishnu, all seen as different aspects of the same supreme being.