I’ve read, researched and sought truth on this subject for decades. That does not in any way make me an expert, an authority or one that has any greater understanding of this topic than anyone else. How sad is that? Over a decade of fairly directed research and nothing to show for it.
I do know this. There are over 3,000 known and recognized religions in the world. Of those, at least 30 of them have over 1,000,000 followers. Do me a favor and stop reading and think about that for a moment.
Of those 30, at least 3 have over 1,000,000,000 followers if you include those nasty atheist/agnostic types. Personally I do include those since hey, why not, many of them approach their stance in the same maniacal and fanatic way that the staunchest Christians and Muslims do. In the end, it is a belief system, and in turn, what is religion if not a belief system?
If you as a reader just couldn’t read another sentence without categorizing me in one way or another, pains me to think some need to do this, then you can lump me in the atheist camp. I’m not fanatic though. Let’s be honest, if God or Allah or even Muhammad or Jesus or Charles Taze, Marcus Garvey……whomever…… were to materialize and provide me with such a persuasive argument, and tangible evidence, then I reserve the right to change my mind. I’ll never shut the door on learning and growing.
Honestly though. If it turns out that the most widely recognized religious texts are in any way historically or spiritually accurate, then I’m going to have some very strong words and questions for our divine creator. If that lands me in some eternity of suffering or Hell…..I’m cool with that. I’d rather suffer eternally than mingle with mass murderers. Just sayin’.
The Qur’an and the Bible are two of the most violent and sadistic books I’ve experienced in my life, and I’ve read some crazy ****. The fact that so many humans lean on these texts for moral guidance is one of the strangest phenomenon on this entire planet. It’s also strong evidence to suggest that the VAST majority of followers of these religions have not actually taken the time to read these texts cover to cover. I know this because I believe that people are innately good. I’m not a Leviathan kind of guy. With my belief that people are generally good and want to help other people when and where they can, I feel confident that most people would be appalled if they read the Bible cover to cover and they would start asking quite a few questions. As I did.
I didn’t come to any of my conclusions historically or spiritually out of anger. Quite the opposite. I never felt abandoned or let down by any divine being. My conclusions were solely derived by curiosity. I keep asking questions until I understand something. Then I recognize that there’s always a deeper understanding to be had so I keep asking questions.
So. After all this research, all these questions, all this reading……do I come to you today with evidence, a strong case to support my world view, historical evidence, scientific evidence, quotes from past great leaders or thinkers, empirical data that can’t be refuted?
No.
I have nothing. You know what though. Neither do you.
I don’t know how it all began. I’m very confident I understand how it all has grown and come together. I’m referring to society and religion. But where it all began. Big Bang, 7 great days, whatever. I don’t know. You don’t know. I’m willing to suggest that we’ll never know. Ever. And you know what else?
THAT’S OK!!!!
The day we can answer every question is the day we die as a species. If there’s no pursuit or quest to improve and advance and learn, what would we do with ourselves? Take comfort in the unknown. It won’t hurt you. All the time…….
My research of religion mostly encompassed my 20’s. I’m 40 now and the past decade my passion transitioned to Economics and that’s where my research has been recently focused. Surprisingly, both topics are pretty similar. It’s the same thing. How could that be?? Because they both deal in the same base of understanding the world and people around us. And they are both created to answer questions that people believe they need answers to. Unfortunately, both have led me to a very similar outcome with regard to my philosophy and outlook.
More on Economics later. Religion.
I think it’s hard for most to understand the roots of religion because it’s difficult to conceptualize life on this planet in eras prior to our own. We see pictures, we read books and we listen to the stories of others. Still though, I think most don’t take the time and step back and empathize with those from generations and eons past. It’s left to your imagination, it will never be truly accurate, but it’s a necessary step to take in order to try to understand the actions of historical people, the writings of those people and the evolutions of systems, processes, governments, etc. If you want to even approach comprehending the why, you need to try and imagine the how.
Let’s start with WHY. Why is there religion? I know, for all believers in absolutes (more on that topic on a later day) and in established religions; Religion exists because the divine being ______ was kind enough to create this world and breathe life in to our lungs so the least we could do is worship Him and his Holiness and thank him endlessly for the opportunity and wondrous life, gaze upon the thought of Him in awe and constantly remind ourselves of our flaws and absolute inferiority and also then, apologize that He made us inferior to himself. (Shouldn’t we be upset about that?) Joking…...
So I get that. But here’s my take. Religion exists, at its core and in its infancy, for two primary reasons. (You’ll find I like to oversimplify things, this is necessary to prevent a 2,000 page document and still illicit some form of understanding relative to my world view)
No. 1. To provide answers for the otherwise inexplicable. As our species’ body of knowledge increases in aggregate, we rely less and less on religion to do this. There are still quite a few holes in our Universal understanding though, even in our technological brilliance of 2015, so boom: Religion and Divine Intervention. Thanks Divinity.
No. 2. To provide comfort, sanctuary and hope to those who would otherwise be lost without it. This started off (probably, I wasn’t there) in quite the innocent fashion and has since been brutally and sadly manipulated over the ages in an exorcise that allowed “The Church” (whatever that means given the part of the world and the time in history) to literally confiscate the majority of the wealth within a given region and the majority of the power over other equal humans. (More on this another day)
So. Imagine living pre – civilization. Pre – Sumeria. You were born in to a beautiful, natural world that beside its beauty was quite unforgiving and at times pretty dangerous. (Still like that today really) You were raised by a Mother and a Father, usually, and they both assumed certain roles to keep the family together, fed and comfortable to the degree that comfort could be attained. Frankly, given their perspective at the time, they were probably no less perceptually comfortable than anyone living today. Your parents understanding of the world was only limited to the few square miles that they called home. You may move a bit throughout your life in search of greener pastures or greater herds of proteins to increase your family’s comfort. Largely though, your exposure and understanding of the world was quite limited. Your Mother and Father teach you what had been taught to them. They may change that teaching a bit based on their individual life experience and you in turn do the same for your children.
One caveat to this very limited view and understanding of the world in which they lived. THEY do not believe their worldview to be limited. They believe their understanding of the world to be quite complete. Just as we do. (I assure you we 21st centurions haven’t figured out much) Like us, they are confident, adapted to their surroundings, understand what it takes to survive and believe they have answers and those answers are in accordance with the teachings of their predecessors. Stories. Their ancestors told stories to explain the surrounding world and they in turn told stories to the next generation. Again, jaded slightly based on their experiences and ability to paint a virtual picture. (I feel my ability is waning, too many details here)
One more caveat. My explanation above went on for probably close to 250,000 years. Think about that for a second if you don’t mind. “Civilization” has been around for roughly 13,000 years and look where we’ve come. 13,000. 250,000. Think of how many generations, Fathers, Sons, Mothers, Daughters came and went in that QUARTER of a BILLION years. How many different iterations and stories were developed over that time? I believe it’s within these years that the construct and deities of our species oldest and even modern religions were created.
Eventually humans began to gather in larger groups. Initially this happened in Mesopotamia and the first civilization was formed, Sumeria. Civilization formed here as a result of the discovery of vegetation that had the ability to be domesticated (we think). Vegetation domestication allowed for mass food production which would suitably feed more than just one family. This was attractive to the people of that time as this system provided safety and security from one of this planet’s unforgiving traits, starvation.
As this group of people eventually formed in to an actual civilization many things began to happen organizationally. For 250,000 years individual humans had to largely focus on one thing to survive. Food.
Hunt. Gather. Do one, do the other, either way you spent your day collecting food to feed yourself and your family. If you didn’t, you died. If there were no food to be hunted or gathered, you moved. Hopefully you made it somewhere with enough energy left to hunt or gather.
Now, for the first time in human history, there was food in abundance relative to the amount of people and individual human beings had to start finding things to do. Never in history have we been a very inactive species. We, generally speaking, will act to provide value for ourselves or for those around us. If it’s not apparent or directed, humans will typically seek activity that is gratifying individually, whether that’s self-absorbed or outwardly focused.
With this new found freedom of thought and ability to act what do you think happened? Professions were created for the first time. Politicians came in to existence as the need for social organization was recognized. Religious leaders came in to existence as the people of that community sought truth and wanted to continue the traditions of passing along worldly knowledge. Writing was created at this time in order to track and measure and trade. Professional soldiers and standing Armies were created as a perceived need of protection from wild threats or other groups of people stealing crops, etc.
I could go on; Smiths as the need for tools and weapons arose. Scribes, educators, market vendors….you get the picture.
It was at this time that you began to see the first semblance of an organized religion. As you might guess, temples started off small as did the Sumerian city-states. Religious leaders and the temples in which they worked served as the cultural, religious and political center for thousands of years. Stop again please and think about that. For roughly 2,000 years civilization existed in this way.
Eventually military leaders that had grown in power over generations and had grown in response to neighboring civilizations that had been created over the centuries and began to pose a threat, took power from the religious leaders of that time.
The aspects of this very first religion are not all that unique or alien to you. Regardless of your choice of beliefs. The earliest deities worshiped by these people were largely anthropomorphic in nature representing cosmic and earthly traits that had been interpreted by their predecessors and explained in a supernatural way. (Reason No 1 for religion) It’s only natural that this first civilization adopted the widely spread stories and belief systems of the hunters/gatherers who first settled there. Once all the stories had been compiled and the rise of religious community leaders took place, you now had a recognized expert and authority on all things religious. As opposed to simply learning from Mom, Dad and extended family. With the centralization of religion during this time you got your very first unified creation story. Everyone always wants to know. How did this all begin and why? Well let’s apply a logical story and this story stuck for much, much longer than modern day Christianity. And, frankly, it’s the same story, just naturally massaged and modified by 6,000 years.
The Sumer said, as my understanding goes, the many Gods (the ones noted above) created us lowly humans as their servants but eventually we became a pain in the ass (not much has changed there) so they set us free to fend for ourselves.
The main Sumer God, Enlil, had parents (that’s a bit different, but it actually makes more logical sense than our modern explanations) An and Ki. Enlil was ousted from the God community for raping the goddess of Air. (Sounds like a pleasant guy) That produced a bastard God, Nanna, god of the moon. Nanna eventually gave birth to Utu, god of the Sun. Long story short, they had what they felt were reasonable explanations for the world around them.
This region, historically and geographically would naturally explain many of the spiritual tales we see in modern texts. The entire Persian Gulf area flooded at the end of the Ice Age and the hunters/gatherers who lived in that area at that time (pre-Sumer) would naturally have interpreted that event as a “world-wide” flood. Hence ancient tales of Gilgamesh and later, Noah.
It took 1000’s of years of small bands of people to develop and perfect domestication, farming and irrigation from the Tigris and Euphrates river. I would guess nearly 8,000 years before you had what archaeologists would agree was a continuous and collected civilization and empire. Eventually, the soil salinity of the area rose and the agricultural productivity of the land could no longer support Sumer populations and people began to migrate, just as they had millennia before when food in a certain area ran out. They took their religion with them.
The next great historical empire to rise as a result of shifting populations and rival conquests with the Akkadian empire was the Babylonian empire around 1900 BC. Babylonians were known for great advances in science, medicine, astronomy, etc. Centuries of their observations are recorded in cuneiform tablets known as “Enuma Anu Enlil.” Those names sound familiar? Thought they might.
Babylonians were known for a more agnostic approach to the ancient tales of their ancestors and made great advances in science and technology. It’s widely assumed that their writings and teachings had direct influence over later Greek philosophy as the Babylonian text “Dialog of Pessimism” is quite similar to the thought and teachings of Heraclitean doctrine of contrasts, the dialogue of Plato and the Socratic method of Socrates.
Not far from this was another rising empire, having risen in a similar fashion and likely with some shared learning and people. Egypt.
It’s here that one can find so many direct routes to modern religion. Like the Sumer, Egyptians anthropomorphized elements of nature around them in to the living deities to explain the world. Like Sumer, these stories arose from tales in the pre-historic hunter/gatherer families of that region. Their religion molded and shifted over time as one deity would rise in importance as others would fall. Don’t for one second believe that this doesn’t still happen today. Christianity has been in a constant state of evolution for the last 2,000 years as individuals routinely make their own religion in their heads. Don’t believe me? You do it. You accept everything you are taught about your religion that is aligned with your personal belief and worldview, and everything that ventures beyond what you feel is right and palatable with your world view you throw out or find a way to justify the reason they did that before…….”but we know better now.” You do it. We all do. It’s OK.
The primary characters in Egyptian mythology were Ra, the Sun God, similar in many ways to our Christian or Islamic God today. Horus was a primary rival in Egyptian culture and can often be compared to modern day Jesus Christ. He was born of a miracle conception, not necessarily of a virgin, but the conception was that of a miracle with a magical golden penis by Isis, who can be familiarized with today’s Mary. Miracle birth, death, resurrection, etc., etc. Don’t believe my “etc.’s?” Let’s see, Horus: Born on Dec 25th to Isis (addressed above), birth was signified by a star in the East, child prodigy, historical gap between the age of 12-30, baptized at 30 by Anup (Christian’s John) who was later beheaded (like John) and thus begins his ministry. Horus had 12 disciples that he traveled around with performing miracles and he was known as “The Truth”, “The Light”, “The Lamb of God” and even “KRST” (Horus the KRST). Horus was eventually betrayed by Typhon, persecuted, crucified, buried in a tomb and was resurrected three days later.
And you know, it would be unfair to just pick on Horus, it’s not his fault and he’s not alone. I strongly urge you to research Buddha, Krishna, Odysseus, Romulus, Dionysus, Heracles, Glycon, Zarathustra, Attis of Phrygia and, of course, Horus. Here you will find a million arguments about how each of these characters has differences with Christ, thus disproving the point I’m making above. You will find chronological discrepancies, some were crucified, some were not, some had virgin births, and some did not. Some were so far away geographically (South America for example) that they could not have possibly influenced Christianity. All good observations. What they fail to recognize is that it’s not that these Gods and cultural ideologies were directly re-incarnated into the Christ story, rather it’s all one long, continuous and related dialogue. A naturally evolving tale as Humans continue to try and understand the world around them. ALL have their roots in the ancient anthropomorphic teachings of our pre-historic ancestors. ALL of them. It all comes from the same place. Us.
You can even find these exact same historical tenants in modern day astrology. Astrology and Pagan beliefs are all the exact same story and the worship of the exact same thing. Pre-historic peoples anthropomorphized the elements around them, worshiped the things that they depended on to create and sustain life (sun, air, water, etc.) and from those ancient stories you have modern religious figures and teachings. It’s all centered on sun worship and the changing of the seasons which was, and still is, celebrated. Guess who “dies” every year right around DEC 25th, is at a low point “dead” for several days, and then rises again “resurrected” three days later and begins “his” transgression toward life, health, warmth, harvest, etc.? THE SUN. You know, the one in the sky.
Anything look familiar in the zodiac to you? It’s all centered on the sun as naturally pre-historic humans recognized the Sun as the provider of life, warmth, food once they started farming, etc. Naturally you would worship what provides life and naturally the greatest Gods in history have been centered on the Sun. In the Zodiac what is the Sun surrounded by? Hey look, 12 disciples all anthropomorphized in to a deity of sorts that can, at some point in history be shown to have been worshiped. It’s just logic.
These stories all manifest upon one another and evolve over time to adapt and change to ever progressing modern circumstances. All our modern religions have the exact same roots though, pre-historic hunters and gatherers interpreting the world around them and passing along their cosmic teachings to their children. It’s logical, I don’t think you can erase 250,000 years of teaching in just 13,000 short years. Not going to happen. Those teachings are simply going to evolve and mature as they continue to do so. Even our modern Bible. How many re-writes and interpretations has that thing been through?
I haven’t talked much about Reason 2 for religion. Humans have largely been taught, therefore conditioned, to believe in certain aspects relating to right and wrong, risk and reward, death and punishment and what happens after you die. Here is Reason 2. Religion conveniently answers a lot of these questions for modern cultures and answers to those questions provide people with comfort and what they interpret as defined direction. Guidance.
I would argue that this is not necessary. I’m not a believer in absolute right and wrong. Unfortunately the world is not that black and white. How nice if it were. What’s right for one person is generally going to be wrong for someone else. To one person you have the hero vs. terrorist, to another person whose opinions are just as valid; you have freedom fighter vs. invader/occupier. Nobody is right here, nobody is wrong. Generally I know that there’s not much needed other than the great Golden Rule. You know, “Do Unto Others.” I will say that I feel that any damage caused to another or another’s private property (this includes their physical bodies) is, in my humble opinion, wrong. You really don’t need any other guidance than that. Don’t hurt people or take their stuff. There’s your moral compass.
I know most people accept the Golden Rule as noble and the best guidance; it’s what we teach our kids. Why can’t we practice that as adults? Why do we need a violent and sadistic text book to teach us what we already know? I’m a non-violent guy; I stand up for those I believe can’t stand up for themselves. I’m a nice guy. I don’t feel arrogant in saying that. I LOVE people. I’ve yet to meet one single person in the world I didn’t like. Don’t get me wrong, there are those I will actively look to spend time with and others whose company I don’t prefer. However, I don’t dislike those people and if they asked me for help and I was able to provide that assistance without endangering my family or anyone else…….I would give it. And I have. To quite a few people whose company I don’t enjoy.
The after-life. Come on, it’s time. Let it go. Stop talking about it. I’m not saying it doesn’t exist, I’m simply saying I have no idea and I’ll either find out when I die…..or I won’t because I’ll just simply be dead. My only point is that you don’t know either and neither does your Priest or Minister or Sheik, etc. They don’t know. Here’s what I definitely know about anyone who has EVER written ANYTHING about the afterlife. They were alive when they wrote it. So they didn’t know. I don’t know. You don’t know.
Believe what you need to believe, it’s all good. Doesn’t cause any harm to anyone…..most of the time. Although, one thing that’s so curious to me is that in the modern Christian description of Heaven and Hell, they go WAY overboard to describe Hell and barely discuss Heaven. Scare tactic? Better stay in line with our teachings……OR ELSE! What they do describe about Heaven sounds miserable to me. No offense. Eternity of Happiness (I love being happy, don’t get me wrong, I’m happy right here, everyday), Eternity of Peace, Love, Harmony. Perfect world with your Savior! That sounds good for about 3 or 4 days. After that, seriously? I’m looking for something to do, something to fix, something to improve, something to research, some advancement that needs to be made, some huge problem that nobody else can solve. Send me to Hell, and then at least I could spend an eternity looking for ways to kill Satan or whomever. I may fail for eternity, but I’ll never stop trying and who knows, perhaps one day, I’d win. And then I can deliver Hell back to Heaven and everyone can be happy. Joking. Of Course.
Another aspect of comfort is JUSTICE! What a crazy concept. I know, I’m the one who’s crazy here. But seriously, you know what justice is? Revenge. Nothing more. In following all the historical religious teachings revenge goes counter to the core tenants of your beliefs. Forgiveness is what you are supposed to practice. Not Justice. Besides, does not your benevolent God provide forgiveness to all who ask? Wouldn’t, by that logic, it mean that you may spend an eternity in Heaven with the most heinous of criminals if they accepted your Savior and asked for forgiveness? It would, you know it would. It has to or the whole construct of your belief system falls apart. God doesn’t grant forgiveness to all, except for the one’s that John Smith is really angry at because the perpetrator aggressed upon him individually.
Risk vs Reward. I’ve had so many religious friends and family say to me; “What if you’re wrong!? You’ll go to Hell!” Ok. As stated above. If our interpretation in modern times is accurate, I’ll go to hell. I’m more moral than the teachings of the Bible and other religious texts and guess what. SO ARE YOU!!!!! I’m not a nice guy for the reason of being rewarded with some eternity of Happiness. I’m a nice guy because I’m a nice guy. I do good things for those around me and provide value in other’s lives because it’s what makes me happy. And I believe that most people on this planet are aligned with my inner feelings here. Some people are not so nice, some are sociopaths. Those types of folk are naturally drawn to theaters and environments that allow them to act upon their not so nice and sociopathic tendencies……more on politics later.
Purpose. Many others have said things that I find quite strange. “If you don’t believe in Heaven then what’s the point of living?” Wow, if you are one to whom this question makes sense…..please help me understand this thought process because it makes ZERO sense to me. As a matter of fact, it actually flies directly in the face of logic all together. Here’s my question, if you believe in Heaven and you have an eternity of Happiness awaiting you with your Creator, what’s YOUR point in living???? Go be happy with your Creator! For the record, I don’t want anyone to kill themselves, I’m just trying to understand. Since I don’t know what is waiting for me after death, EVERY single day is a treasure for me. I wouldn’t waste a single day because I’ll never get it back and this is my one and only life. I need to optimize my time here. How do I do that? By being happy. That’s it. You and I both only get a finite number of days on this planet. We could have a bunch of days left or very few. We don’t know, what we do know is that it’s measurable, there will come an end. Understanding that, I refuse to lose one single day to anger, pessimism, loathing, etc. I’m happy. Every day. Because I choose to be, every morning. Some mornings that decision is harder than others, but I still make it. As you’ll see in future writings, I see ugliness all over the world in actions taken by collectivist mentalities, yet, even amidst all this ugliness, I’m happy, always. You can be too.
So. Religion is culture, culture is history, history is us, we haven’t changed all that much.
I’m not here to change anyone’s mind about religion.