The word Hindu is an exonym, and while Hinduism has been called the oldest religion in the world, many practitioners refer to their religion as Sanātana Dharma (Sanskrit: सनातन धर्म, lit. ''the Eternal Dharma''), which refers to the idea that its origins lie beyond human history, as revealed in the Hindu texts.

What is the oldest known religion?

The Vedic Age began in India after the collapse of the Indus Valley Civilisation. The reign of Akhenaten, sometimes credited with starting the earliest known recorded monotheistic religion, in Ancient Egypt.

Which is oldest Jain or Hindu?

But Jains believe that the real dispute is whether Jainism predated Hinduism. All the stuff in the text books that treats Jainism and Buddhism as contemporaneous religions is rubbish. Jains regard Rishabh (or Adinath) as the first Tirthankar and the founder of the religion, many many centuries before Mahavir was born.