Rolling_Stone
Well-Known Member
I'd say about the time the first human poked his head out his cave, saw the stars, and came to the realization I IS.
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When Did Religions First Begin?
- Thread starter Sunstone
- Start date
drukenhard
New Member
When the first person wanted a way to control groups of people he created a "god" that they could fear.
Hema
Sweet n Spicy
Vedas are Shruti texts (Shruti literally means what is heard). The Vedas are divine wisdom given to the earth at the beginning of each cycle of creation. Between cycles, when creation rests, the Vedas are reabsorbed into that Absolute Reality and manifested again when there is a new cycle of creation. The Vedas were not composed by any human being. The first saints and sages on the earth by meditating, heard the sounds of the universe and were able to hear the Vedas. The people who followed the teachings of the Vedas were those who lived according to Sanathan Dharma - or righteousness conduct. The word "Hindu" was given by the Persians who came to India. This was the name given to the people who followed this way of life; who settled near the Indus river in India. The river was called Sindhu but the Persians mispronounced it and called it "Hindu." Thus, the word "Hindu" originated long afterwards. Sanathan Dharma is a way of life and is more than a religion.
religion-science
New Member
As soon as humans had the ability to "wonder" about something, how, why ect. It is human nature to look for the reason for things.
Heracles
Canadian eh
religion-science said:
I agree completely! Humans have an innate need to define and eplain everything around us. Nowadays I guess we call that science, but before we had science we needed an explanation for what was happeneing. Death, sex pregnancy and birth, weather, dreams, coincidence, these are all things that for a curious caveman needed a cause. I think that religious thought and religious action should be talked about seperately too. It's one thing to explain things theistically ( God did it, spirits did it, fairies did it etc.) and another thing to ritualize. Rituals are, some would argue, the foundation of religions. But rituals are a way for us to try and affect nature and occurences, or to commemorate them. I think that rituals developed very early on, like ritual burials for instance, which neanderthals even performed.
charles brough
Member
Those who deem themselves religious now feel above those who believe in animism. But religion is a process. It is a common belief system that brings a sense of community to large numbers of people. Whether it is based on the belief in One God or millions of spirits (animism) is irrelegant to its function.
And, how things should be defined is what function they serve. A chair has to be defined in a way that explains that is is to sit on! Religion defined nereds to include a description AND what function it serves.
This explains why many social science scholars refer to East Asian Marxism as a "secular religion." It serves the same function---not very well, but it does even so!
In other words, a "religion" does not even require the belief in ONE god!
And, how things should be defined is what function they serve. A chair has to be defined in a way that explains that is is to sit on! Religion defined nereds to include a description AND what function it serves.
This explains why many social science scholars refer to East Asian Marxism as a "secular religion." It serves the same function---not very well, but it does even so!
In other words, a "religion" does not even require the belief in ONE god!
sandy whitelinger
Veteran Member
Could it have been when money was invented?
Pariah
Let go
Meaning could be the reason, but here is my take.
What is personality?
Personality is a series of actions which change very little over time and become predictable. When someone asks you to define someone's personality, you don't say, "Well, on Monday, his personality is usually this... and then on Wednesday...". Any changes would be temporary (with exceptions of course in the case of life changing or reality altering experiences, etc.) and are called moods.
The ability to project our feelings and emotions onto animals is a great evolutionary advantage because it allowed us to perceive the "personality" of animals. If I can assume that a lion, tiger, cheetah, hyena, bear, wooly mammoth, sabertooth tiger, etc. is dangerous, then I will avoid it all together, instead of lingering around to figure out its personality. Considering that the first man evolved in Africa, it makes more sense, since there are a variety of carnivorous animals that would hunt humans in that area, while less so in others.
In that area, we did not see ourselves as humans and as we do today.
"Oh, I am a human, I'm not an animal! I'm better than that!"
In those days, we were the hunted, anxious of our surroundings and as susceptible and if not more vulnerable to attack than the other animals. This makes sense if we realize that the first Gods were animals that were often considered dangerous and needed to be worshiped in order to prevent future attacks.
Other animals have males, and females, and families, hunt for their food, live on the same ground, hunt for the same food, etc. Why should the animals be any different than us? And this is where personality comes in.
As humans, we perceived intentionality. The animals hunted us so well yesterday or evaded us well yesterday - they must have known or were faster, better, stronger, etc. The same with the weather. On a good year, "The clouds must have known that we needed rain this year," or "I wished for rain yesterday, and look, we have it!", "If I had control over the rain or the harvest, or the hunt, I would want to help out!"
The projection of personality and intentionality are key in my theory.
Confirmation bias, along with the coincidence of prayer also played a large part in cementing the idea that intentionality existed in nature.
God once lived on mountains, and then we climbed mountains and found he wasn't there and said, "He must in the sky." We took to the skies and said, "God is not in the clouds; God must be in space!" And so we went to space and said, "God is not in space, he must be out of time and space!"
What is personality?
Personality is a series of actions which change very little over time and become predictable. When someone asks you to define someone's personality, you don't say, "Well, on Monday, his personality is usually this... and then on Wednesday...". Any changes would be temporary (with exceptions of course in the case of life changing or reality altering experiences, etc.) and are called moods.
The ability to project our feelings and emotions onto animals is a great evolutionary advantage because it allowed us to perceive the "personality" of animals. If I can assume that a lion, tiger, cheetah, hyena, bear, wooly mammoth, sabertooth tiger, etc. is dangerous, then I will avoid it all together, instead of lingering around to figure out its personality. Considering that the first man evolved in Africa, it makes more sense, since there are a variety of carnivorous animals that would hunt humans in that area, while less so in others.
In that area, we did not see ourselves as humans and as we do today.
"Oh, I am a human, I'm not an animal! I'm better than that!"
In those days, we were the hunted, anxious of our surroundings and as susceptible and if not more vulnerable to attack than the other animals. This makes sense if we realize that the first Gods were animals that were often considered dangerous and needed to be worshiped in order to prevent future attacks.
Other animals have males, and females, and families, hunt for their food, live on the same ground, hunt for the same food, etc. Why should the animals be any different than us? And this is where personality comes in.
As humans, we perceived intentionality. The animals hunted us so well yesterday or evaded us well yesterday - they must have known or were faster, better, stronger, etc. The same with the weather. On a good year, "The clouds must have known that we needed rain this year," or "I wished for rain yesterday, and look, we have it!", "If I had control over the rain or the harvest, or the hunt, I would want to help out!"
The projection of personality and intentionality are key in my theory.
Confirmation bias, along with the coincidence of prayer also played a large part in cementing the idea that intentionality existed in nature.
God once lived on mountains, and then we climbed mountains and found he wasn't there and said, "He must in the sky." We took to the skies and said, "God is not in the clouds; God must be in space!" And so we went to space and said, "God is not in space, he must be out of time and space!"
Prometheus
Semper Perconctor
I think it was the first time someone went without food for a while, began to have hallucinations and then went and told their friends about it.
Mr Spinkles
Mr
Here's something to consider: Hubble deep space images indicate that the observable universe contains 50 to 100 billion galaxies, each containing billions of star systems. If inflationary theory is correct, the actual universe is in fact unimaginably bigger than that. It seems plausible, then, that other intelligent life forms elsewhere in the universe had religions of their own before our species evolved.Sunstone said:
charles brough
Member
Pariah, let's put your theory to the test. If you have the cause and effect process accurately there, you ought to be able to project it into the future. So, what's ahead?
charles
charles
The word Re-Legion stems from Latin meaning to group and contain people or bring back under control...so in ancient Hebrew of the same word or hieroglyphics as they should be called:
R = Mans head talking
E = a Way of doing something
L = A path or road, from a rook to begin
I = Man or EGO
G = open space, yet in this form would use it as God
I = another man surrounding God in mans principles
O = Oneness, circle of life etc, out side of the laws of man concerning God
N = To continue
So in a that definition to my self anyways, would say we have contained God in our principles and so that is not since the beginning of time .
It has gotten much worse since Pharisee infected everyone with their principles.
Is the mustard seed religious in the way it grows? NO!
It seeks the light without needing prior knowledge of which way to grow, then when that is contained in books globally, it is our own short sightedness, to separate our self from each other, when the books link together as one.
R = Mans head talking
E = a Way of doing something
L = A path or road, from a rook to begin
I = Man or EGO
G = open space, yet in this form would use it as God
I = another man surrounding God in mans principles
O = Oneness, circle of life etc, out side of the laws of man concerning God
N = To continue
So in a that definition to my self anyways, would say we have contained God in our principles and so that is not since the beginning of time .
It has gotten much worse since Pharisee infected everyone with their principles.
Is the mustard seed religious in the way it grows? NO!
It seeks the light without needing prior knowledge of which way to grow, then when that is contained in books globally, it is our own short sightedness, to separate our self from each other, when the books link together as one.
ker crypter
gun of a sun
did they have a better idea of who god was 160,000 years ago?
charles brough
Member
Before people believed in "the God," they believed in many gods. The Ancient Egyptians worshiped thousands of gods. Before that---before polytheism---people believed only in "spirits"---that is, they believed everything had a "spirit". So, that is what people logically believed 160,000 years ago if language and religion go back that far.
Ernesto
Member
The origin of religion is an interesting topic. There is much evidence displaying that religion is a psychological by-product of something else. (Huzzah, using evolution to explain religion!) Most psychologists agree that the brain is a collection of modules for dealing with sets of needs, such as a module for dealing with kinship, one for empathy, love, and so forth. It is possible, therefore, that religion is merely a by-product of the misfirings of several of these modules. This theory would help to explain why religion exists in every human culture on Earth - it is nothing but an evolutionary mishap, a mutation.
charles brough
Member
On this topic, I often offend people; please take no offense. It is just that I regard that line of thinking as a dead end used to avoid dealing with the real evolution issue.
I consider the real explanation to be that we evolved as hunting-gathering group social primates whose whole instinctive repertoire is bult around adjusting to, living in and feeling secure in such small groups. The only way we manage to function in such large societies we have learned to accomodate to is that we evolved religions that unite us into these societies and enable us to feel a common bond with everyone else in that society. Now, we have attached Secular HUmanism to these old religions and it has enabled a weak but effrective uniting of the whole world.
But the secular bond is superficial. It is just resting on the other old religions which
will remain whether secularism survives or not---and the growing distrust of the U.S. world wide is a bad sign. Our near failure in Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan help cast the future of our whole Secular HUmanism in doubt.
In other words, we have always had religions because we have always had a need for ideology to bind us together in larger groups so we can better survive in the world---even to thrive and dominate it even to the point of wearing it down and over using it.