Cao Dai Religion
Cao Dai pronunciation (help•info) (Cao ?ai) is a relatively new, syncretist, monotheistic religion, officially established in Tay Ninh, southern Vietnam, in 1926. ??o Cao ?ai is the religion's shortened name, the full name is ??i ??o Tam Ky Pho ?o (Great Religion of the Third Period Revelation Salvation). The term Cao ?ai literally means "high place." Figuratively, it means that highest place where God reigns. It is also the abbreviated name for God, the creator of the universe, whose full title is Cao ?ai Tien Ong ?ai Bo Tat Ma-ha-tat.
Caodaiists credit God as the religion's founder. They believe the teachings, symbolism and organization were communicated directly from ?uc (means Venerable) Cao ?ai. Even the construction of the Tay Ninh Holy See is claimed to have had divine guidance. Cao ?ai's first disciples Ngo Van Chieu, Cao Quynh Cu, Pham Cong Tac, and Cao Hoai Sang claimed to have received direct communications from God, who gave them explicit instructions for establishing a new religion that would commence the Third Era of Religious Amnesty.
Adherents engage in ethical practices such as prayer, veneration of ancestors, nonviolence, and vegetarianism with the minimum goal of rejoining God the Father in Heaven and the ultimate goal of freedom from the cycle of birth and death. Estimates of the number of Cao ?ài adherents in Vietnam vary, but most sources give two to three million. Some estimates are as high as eight million adherents in Vietnam. An additional 30,000 (primarily ethnic Vietnamese) in the United States, Europe, and Australia.