Generative AI Alignment with Hinduism's Theological Plurality and Sacred Representation

Increasingly artificial intelligence (AI) has been cast in "god-like" roles (to name a few: film industry - Matrix, The Creator, Mission Impossible, Foundation, Dune etc.; literature - Children of Time, Permutation City, Neuromancer, I Have no Mouth and I Must Scream, Alphaville etc.). This trend has accelerated with the advent of sophisticated Large Language Models such as ChatGPT. For this phenomenon, where AI is perceived as divine, we use the term GPTheology, where ChatGPT and other AI models are treated as potential oracles of a semi-divine nature. This paper explores the emergence of GPTheology as a form of techno-religion, examining how narratives around AI echo traditional religious constructs. We draw on community narratives from online forums - Reddit - and recent projects - AI-powered Mazu Statue in Malaysia (Lu, 2025); "ShamAIn" Project in Korea (He-rim, 2025); AI Jesus in a Swiss Church (Kennedy, 2024). These examples show striking similarities to technological notions of the Singularity and the development of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). Additionally, we analyse how daily interactions with AI are acquiring ritualistic associations and how AI-centric ideologies clash with or are integrated into established religions. This study uses a dataset of Reddit posts discussing AI to identify recurring themes of salvation, prophecy, and demonization surrounding AI. Our findings suggest that new belief systems are developing around AI, and this carries both philosophical and sociotechnical implications. Our paper critically analyses the benefits and dangers, as well as the social, political and ethical challenges of this development. This transdisciplinary inquiry highlights how AI and religion are increasingly intertwined, prompting necessary questions about humanity's relationship with its creations and the future of belief.

Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) is increasingly used by Muslims for religious guidance, Qur'anic interpretation, Hadith explanation, jurisprudential rulings, and Islamic education. Despite its growing adoption, there is limited empirical evidence on whether current AI systems provide authentic, verifiable, and trustworthy Islamic knowledge suitable for high-trust religious contexts. This study evaluates six leading generative AI systems using fifty realistic open-ended Islamic questions covering Qur'anic interpretation, Hadith, Fiqh, ethics, pastoral advice, and Madhhab-sensitive topics. Responses were collected under real-world conditions from participants in Australia and the United Kingdom and analysed using a mixed-method framework examining domain accuracy, citation verification, hallucinations, jurisprudential consistency, uncertainty handling, source provenance, and geographical variation. The study addresses four research questions: (1) How accurate and authentic are AI-generated responses across major Islamic knowledge domains? (2) To what extent do AI systems produce hallucinations, incomplete citations, or unverifiable religious references? (3) How consistently do models handle jurisprudential disagreement, Madhhab diversity, and uncertainty? (4) Are current AI systems sufficiently reliable for religious guidance, Islamic education, and scholarly research? Overall, current generative AI systems are valuable as assistive tools for introductory Islamic learning but should not be treated as authoritative sources for religious rulings or Islamic research without verification against authenticated primary sources and qualified scholarly expertise. This study provides one of the first comprehensive empirical evaluations of AI reliability within Islamic knowledge, offering practical guidance for researchers, educators, AI developers, and the wider Muslim community.

We present four conceptual value-sensitive AI systems to examine how the presence of AI could influence praying experiences. Drawing on key values and practices associated with praying identified through a diary study, we designed AI systems intended to "assist" prayer practices. These designs were presented to participants through speculative design workbooks, serving as provocations to co-reflect on how the intervention of AI systems might shape their praying experiences. Our findings suggest that a sense of authenticity (or feeling a genuine connection to the divine) is a crucial value, while the presence of AI was often perceived as diminishing this authenticity, particularly when AI assumed too much agency in guiding praying practices. Based on our findings, we argue that AI system designs for deeply value-laden experiences should preserve users' agency in shaping their own experiences by maintaining interpretive openness, perhaps by leveraging AI's inexplicability as a resource for personal meaning-making or by recognizing non-use of AI as a legitimate design choice.