The Origin of Religion

[jonathan180iq]

I don't think it's really all that interesting of a topic, personally. It's like asking about the origin of fiction.

People tell stories and people embellish their adventures. The more lavish the story, the better people and audiences will react to it.
It's like any other art-form; the more lavish the painting, the more attention will be paid to it.. Use enough colors and shading, and people can get lost in a painting for a very long period of time...
Religion is very similar. Enough details, and enough super-natural elements, and people get sucked into whatever the narrative is. But the truth behind the embellished narrative is usually much more mundane than anyone would like to believe - which is why the original story-tellers injected more fascinating elements to begin with...

Religion is just a vicious cycle of embellishments, run amok.

 

[paarsurrey]

Religion is just a vicious cycle of embellishments, run amok.

I thin atheism is more if not most a vicious cycle of embellishments, run amok.
Isn't it?
Regards

 

[jonathan180iq]

I thin atheism is more if not most a vicious cycle of embellishments, run amok.
Isn't it?
Regards

There are no claims made at all, and certainly no embellishments, in implicit atheism.

 

[Looncall]

I thin atheism is more if not most a vicious cycle of embellishments, run amok.
Isn't it?
Regards

No, it's just a matter of not being conned by the embellishments of religion.

 

[Looncall]

The first priest, the first and original wise-sayer of myth and legend said that the 'search stops here,' and born in that moment was a 'meaning' constructed for why we are all here. For the first organized religion did not come with Hinduism, though that is old, but with the first gathering of 2 or 3 that listened to another for their opinion on the matter. So now, the wondering of people could supposedly be sated. They need search no longer, for they have installed a lens upon their perception in order to paint reality with the brush of words uttered toward its supposed delineation.

I think you give it too much credit.

As I am sure some here are tired of my saying, I think someone(s) found they could escape the daily grind of survival by pretending to talk to (pretend) gods. Given our tendency to ascribe agency where there is none, it would have been easy to con the gullible (as it continues to be).

 

[amorphous_constellation]

I don't think it's really all that interesting of a topic, personally. It's like asking about the origin of fiction.

However, we are talking about the very first 'fiction' ever created by a living organism on this earth. Somehow, against at least some measure of odds, it was found to be pervasive. There was something in the process of us reaching anatomic and cognitive modernity that caused a certain fascination and reverence toward the inexplicable that would overwhelm all reason. Perhaps it was the astonishment caused by our being inexplicably trapped in the perspective of a conscious primate animal. Rather than be haunted by the perplexing rays of the strangeness of existing thus, it was immediately the object upon which painters would paint on the culture, the religion, the logos of its worth and meaning. Wishful fiction is all we have to wall ourselves from truths which may otherwise cause all human structure and endeavor to crumble, ever consider that?

 

[amorphous_constellation]

I think you give it too much credit.

As I am sure some here are tired of my saying, I think someone(s) found they could escape the daily grind of survival by pretending to talk to (pretend) gods. Given our tendency to ascribe agency where there is none, it would have been easy to con the gullible (as it continues to be).

Maybe the problem is that we ourselves are products of unseen and elusive agency. Naturally we seem to think and talk, but the thing about that is that it is quite unusual. The earth appears to birth itself pilots. What could be stranger than that?

 

[JoStories]

I think I still have to disagree there. Druidism for example was part of an oral tradition, Julius Caesar said it involved 20 years of training. That was back when the Celts had no writing. Not every shaman or priest or animist on earth as always had a text to embody their spiritual beliefs, and there's really no telling how far back their religions went. Now, when a paleolithic hunting party started bringing animals in front of a priest on a daily basis for blessings and sacrifice, I'd say their organizational status is already changing. Pretty soon you have 20 people loyal to ritual, counting moons until festivals, sacrificing, blessing, and praying to specific invisible forces.

But that defeats your original argument. Pagan faiths are the oldest on earth. Christianity is a late bloomer in comparison and definitely is heavily influenced by older faiths and myths. Yet, the fact remains that nearly credible scholar agrees that Hinduism is the first organized faith.

 

[JoStories]

I'm not sure. I think it might be a secular concept, this idea that religion can be untangled from its integration in a life. But I suppose Christianity was oddly enough, one step removed from a creation story, one step removed from texts describing the rules for all aspects of life. By reading the New Testament and not reading the Old (I read the New first a long time ago) it comes off as more of a philosophy than a religion in some ways.

I could not disagree more. The basis of Christianity, not talking here about Judaism, is the Christ story and how that leads the lot of you to heaven. How is that a philosophy? It does give you rules to live by but that is the extent of it.

 

[Riverwolf]

Good one, I guess that's getting more on point to what I was trying to figure out. It's the oddest thing though. There are questions I wanted to ask about the origins of religion, but I'm unsure if any single question can really ask it the way I want it to. It's not only behavior, but how it relates to either being something that creates or is a sub-category in a culture, as well as what the religion was perceptually replacing, as all religion and even culture is but a dam created upon the river of reality which may in fact be naturally inexplicable.

I don't think it's inexplicable. We just need to find the right terminology to explain it.

I've often described organized religion as being "club-like". However, a more accurate way of describing it is tribal. Humans are socially tribal by nature, and thus we naturally seek "tribes" to be part of, even if rather loosely. Broadly speaking, Christianity can be thought of a larger pan-tribe, with all the thousands of denominations being the individual tribes.

When part of a tribe, groupthink can be a very easy trap to fall into. For many people (not everyone, of course), being ostracized is far scarier than being wrong, and so people will think and believe according to the rest of the tribe, regardless of how reasonable it is. Without another tribe to fall back on, leaving a harmful tribe is incredibly difficult, if not impossible in some cases. I actually am sympathetic to this, because it evokes my own intense fear of being wholly Alone (that first episode of the original Twilight Zone actually triggered a small anxiety attack for me).

So it could be that the "origin of religion" partially lies somewhere in our evolutionary past, perhaps even before we were homo sapien sapiens. There is, after all, evidence of religious behavior among our cousins, the neanderthals.

 

[Riverwolf]

These similarities are what to expect though, the idea of clearly defined 'religions' is largely a Christian invention. The idea that 'religion' can be separated from other aspects of society, culture, law, etc. is also a Christian concept.

I'm not so sure it's an "invention" of Christianity, so much as Christians expanded an earlier concept into what we know think of as "religion".

The Latin word religio translates to (according to Wiktionary):

religiō f (genitive religiōnis); third declension

1. scrupulousness, conscientious exactness
2. piety, religious scruple, religious awe, superstition, strict religious observance
3. scruples, conscientiousness
4. (of gods) sanctity
5. an object of worship, holy thing, holy place

This tells me that the Romans probably had a "prototype", as it were, of the modern conception of religion. It does make sense for an imperial force to develop such a conception, as they encounter large varieties of practices. I expect there'd be similar conceptions among other imperial forces, such as the Alexandrian Greeks or Persians.

When Christianity came to Northern Europe, it was referred to as the "New Way", while the earlier traditions were collectively called the "Old Way". This tells me that they, by contrast, probably thought of the traditions that we'd collectively lump under religion as being under the same topic as other traditions. Modern equivalents would lump birthdays, national holidays, etc. together with praying, attending a church/temple/whatever, etc. under the same broad category. That's why I refer to them as "traditions".

 

[paarsurrey]

No, it's just a matter of not being conned by the embellishments of religion.

You mean Atheists say all truth neither they deceive nor they get deceived?
Regards

 

[amorphous_constellation]

I could not disagree more. The basis of Christianity, not talking here about Judaism, is the Christ story and how that leads the lot of you to heaven. How is that a philosophy? It does give you rules to live by but that is the extent of it.

It takes the format of a man expressing his ideas in the face of societal resistance. I can be read without first reading genesis and still make sense, and there are a few more qualities about it that make it sort of philosophical. Gods don't argue dialectically for their ideas, they tend more to tell people what to do. Jesus argued for what should be done.

And to your prior point, I still am of the opinion that it doesn't take so much to 'organize a religion,' I was just upping the ante to see what kind of minimum requirements you might consider for a religion to be organized. But anyway, I'm not so much interested in that as I am in the first origin of religious or spiritual feelings, and the first practice centered around those feelings. So, setting aside all prior debate I am simply trying to consider what the first sensation of spirituality put into a practice meant for the human race.

 

[amorphous_constellation]

I don't think it's inexplicable. We just need to find the right terminology to explain it.

I've often described organized religion as being "club-like". However, a more accurate way of describing it is tribal. Humans are socially tribal by nature, and thus we naturally seek "tribes" to be part of, even if rather loosely. Broadly speaking, Christianity can be thought of a larger pan-tribe, with all the thousands of denominations being the individual tribes.

Yes, that's interesting to consider. Thinking of Christianity and all the myriad little denominations in terms of tribal structure. What is this a projection of? Well, I'd argue along with you that it does take a tribal basis, and I would add to that argument that much more human behavior also follows that form. And the tribal basis we mold ourselves into also is a projection of our primate nature.

Now, Neanderthals I'm sure were tribal. As are all apes, chimpanzees, macaques. These are really the flesh of our flesh. They laugh, live, roam and die in groups. Just as we do, they are alleviated by seeing life through the eyes of their group. They are social creatures, not solitary ones. And naturally, as we project from their same sphere, so are we. Now, does any primate really have it figured out, though it may try? Is there any real reason why we should have it figured out? After all, existence has surely been inexplicable to all the other primates and the other hominids that used to be throughout history. I don't think knowing the truth about reality is really what the brain was sculpted toward. Brain mass had to increase so that we could do things like build fires and hurl spears good enough to give us the edge over 1 ton bears and carnivorous entelodont pigs, but contemplating the galactic center? I'm just not entirely sure about that.

 

[Looncall]

You mean Atheists say all truth neither they deceive nor they get deceived?
Regards

They are not carefully organized in huge institutions to promote ideas they cannot show are true. That's what religions do.

 

[JoStories]

It takes the format of a man expressing his ideas in the face of societal resistance. I can be read without first reading genesis and still make sense, and there are a few more qualities about it that make it sort of philosophical. Gods don't argue dialectically for their ideas, they tend more to tell people what to do. Jesus argued for what should be done.

And to your prior point, I still am of the opinion that it doesn't take so much to 'organize a religion,' I was just upping the ante to see what kind of minimum requirements you might consider for a religion to be organized. But anyway, I'm not so much interested in that as I am in the first origin of religious or spiritual feelings, and the first practice centered around those feelings. So, setting aside all prior debate I am simply trying to consider what the first sensation of spirituality put into a practice meant for the human race.

Regarding your second paragraph, if that is the case and you are studying this topic in ernest, then you know that the first recorded evidence for spirituality and religious inclination was Pagan in nature. Well before Hinduism or any type of organization. And furthermore, one has to define what the word organization means here. What are the parameters used to define the term? As you say, what kind of minimum requirements are we using here. My dissertation is on the history and development of mysticism in all faiths. The first evidence I have found in my research, again, is around Pagan rites. But what is more interesting, at least to me, is the commonalities that exist in mysticism across all faiths, and even the lack thereof. I would ask you this...what are the parameters you are using to define the concept spirituality and organized religion? Remember that they must be, of necessity, able to be defended by other peer reviewing scholars.

 

[Riverwolf]

Yes, that's interesting to consider. Thinking of Christianity and all the myriad little denominations in terms of tribal structure. What is this a projection of? Well, I'd argue along with you that it does take a tribal basis, and I would add to that argument that much more human behavior also follows that form. And the tribal basis we mold ourselves into also is a projection of our primate nature.

Now, Neanderthals I'm sure were tribal. As are all apes, chimpanzees, macaques. These are really the flesh of our flesh. They laugh, live, roam and die in groups. Just as we do, they are alleviated by seeing life through the eyes of their group. They are social creatures, not solitary ones. And naturally, as we project from their same sphere, so are we. Now, does any primate really have it figured out, though it may try? Is there any real reason why we should have it figured out? After all, existence has surely been inexplicable to all the other primates and the other hominids that used to be throughout history. I don't think knowing the truth about reality is really what the brain was sculpted toward. Brain mass had to increase so that we could do things like build fires and hurl spears good enough to give us the edge over 1 ton bears and carnivorous entelodont pigs, but contemplating the galactic center? I'm just not entirely sure about that.

Such contemplation has always been limited to the most evil, counter-culture, anti-social sorcerers.

NERDS!!! ^_^ (Another modern "pan-tribe", but one I'm proud to be one of.)

 

[amorphous_constellation]

.what are the parameters you are using to define the concept spirituality and organized religion?

I'm neither a scholar nor looking for reviews nor am I studying anything in ernest. I'm just giving it a little thought, seeing if my brain can churn up anything new, or somebody else has ideas I hadn't considered. Sometimes these things happen, and it is good.

As for the parameters, hm, well let's see. Well, I'd like to think of it as a paleolithic ontological line that was crossed. The very moment a caveman for example arranged stones so as not to simply be seats around a fire, but to reflect something he saw in some stars, he was doing something a little out of the ordinary.

 

[JoStories]

I'm neither a scholar nor looking for reviews nor am I studying anything in ernest. I'm just giving it a little thought, seeing if my brain can churn up anything new, or somebody else has ideas I hadn't considered. Sometimes these things happen, and it is good.

As for the parameters, hm, well let's see. Well, I'd like to think of it as a paleolithic ontological line that was crossed. The very moment a caveman for example arranged stones so as not to simply be seats around a fire, but to reflect something he saw in some stars, he was doing something a little out of the ordinary.

You're right of course but most modern scholars today include a deity and quite a few other parameters for what constitutes an organized religion.

 

[amorphous_constellation]

You're right of course but most modern scholars today include a deity and quite a few other parameters for what constitutes an organized religion.

Ok. Well, I don't I've ever really been that concerned about it crossing thresholds of organization. It certainly can become more grandiose, there's a long road from the vatican to the neolithic vegetable tithe area, but embryonic or not, the spiritual activity is still there.