Somebody answered "Yes." I say "No." I don't see the relationship between religion in general and death, either way.

I must agree. Same thing happened with me! There is no way anybody living can tell me what happens when you die!

Dear Sir, I apologize for my last answer. I wish i could remove it. I had a moment.
I beleive religion has made man to fear death if certain restrictions were not met. I'm sure not all of them created the fear of death. I personally don't know this answer. I feel superstition has a way of being passed down from generation to generation. Early centuries had different demands of their culture and they may of had to burn a body or place coins on the dead persons eyes or even build platform's to place the dead. I didn't have a father that would help me understand my fears. It could be that he didn't understand his. I was scared by the movie
The exorcist. Not today though. I did beleive this could be real by the church i attended that spoke in tongues. I know their game now. It all about fear to control. With a little love thrown in as a feel good. These types of churches make an impression on young people. It can really screw your head up. I watched my dad rock back and forth saying oh god, oh god as he set in a recliner as he was dying. He was out of it with the fear of hell. I couldnt help him. He was so rotten in his life and he knew he was in some kind of trouble.

The real fear as a child was the back of my fathers hand. I know his game today. He wanted us out of the house so he could tackle mom. Us outside to molest my sister. Later on it was my other younger sister. Hmmm... im going to stop right here so i can cool off.

Fear obviously existed before the invention of religion. Religion likely only compounded it with silly beliefs like hell, perhaps the most inhumane teaching of the founder of Christianity.

RELIGION created the fear of death...BECAUSE death in ancient times was a welcomed time..people knew it was natural and apart of the balance of nature...

Good question! Both I think, they are certainly self-reinforcing of each other. It's the same as 'which came first, the chicken or the egg' - does it really matter, probably not, we just have to deal with both things regardless.

Some human anthropologists suggest that religion developed when speech did... a result of the frontal cortex of the brain growing bigger. So questions about the sun, rain, and yes - death - created superstitions that evolved into religion. They essentially anthropomorphised the elements into gods.

That to me makes the most sense.

I think the fear of death helped create religion as an explanation as to why there is a fear of death.

It depends - organized religion was created to legitimize the absolute role of monarchs. Spirituality might have many roots - need for continuity, attachment to loved ones that died. I think it is a bit simplistic to put it all under umbrella of "fear" a'la "grave is a cradle of gods".

I think religion started as lessons taught children of their ancestors and the world to learn and cope. The beliefs of the most prominent family in a group were the ones perpetuated. Everyone's different but I know many theists who find comfort in the thought that when they or their loved ones die they will go to heaven. Although history shows people also used religion to control other people and governments.

Both.

That is a really interesting question. I think its a mixture of both. I would imagine in the beginning religion was mans first attempt to explain unanswered questions and over time became corrupted by the leaders of the groups and as time went on it was discovered that by focusing on death it was possible to get people to follow orders much easier if there was consequences to their actions that are much worse than could be imagined to take place on earth. I view the heaven/hell concept as the carrot and stick that keeps followers in line. It is the sickest part of religion in my opinion.

You may be interested to know that the oldest religious facility ever found (70 KYA) is a cave in Botswana with a big stone python. It was used as a more or less funeral home. The cave even had a little office for the director. But of course, grave goods go back further than that. I'm guessing that once you have awareness of the self, you also get fear of losing the self.

Personally I feel that the fear of death was likely the cause of early religions, but once established then it became a self reinforcing loop.

My vote is on the former.

I'm pretty sure privilege was the motivation behind the creation of religion. Someone wanted to take advantage of others and sold them on the fact that they'd be rewarded after death.