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Here's something interesting...prior to religious dogma, people used to believe in a pre religion (now known as mythology) with many gods. For example you have the Greek and Roman mythologies, followed by Egyptian. My question is, how did people go from worshiping many gods to one god?

VineetHonkan 7 Nov 3
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0

Er, sorry there but Egyptian beliefs existed long before either the Roman or the Greek belief systems.
Egyptian belief system have been dated back to at least 3,000 years B.C.E.

my use of ancient religions is NOT chronological...
my use of the word following is not used to signify where it lies chronologically, but is used as a replacement for the word 'and'.

@VineetHonkan Well, since ONE of my very numerous interests and studies IS both Ancient History AND Theologies(Religions in the times B.C.E. plus having a ThD ( Doctorate in Theology and Comparative Modern Religions) which encompasses ALL systems of belief arising POST the assumed year of 0 C.E. chronological ordering is IMPORTANT.
Almost just as important as NOT putting someone's D.O.D. BEFORE their D.O.B. is, if you can understand that.

@Triphid that I understand...my only reason for non-chronological order was bc I didn't know which came first...

@VineetHonkan B.C. ( now often know amongst Historical circles as B.C.E. aka Before Common Era) came first meaning that it encompasses before the myth of Jesus' birth was spread about as a great event in religion for ALL mankind, BUT they even managed to get the date wrong there since they totally forgot that the Roman Emperor Augustus was in actual fact Gaius Julius Caesar Octavian for 5 years BEFORE becoming OFFICIALLY Emperor of Rome and as such the Christian Calendar, with we are all cursed, is actually out by 5 years, i.e. we are actually in the calendar year of 2024 and not 2019.

@Triphid here I'm using bc as a short for. For because. If I was using BC/BCE it would be in all caps.

8

mythology isn't pre-religion. it's religion. my definition of mythology: someone else's religion. monotheism isn't the definition of religion. polytheistic religions were still religions. catholicism is actually polytheistic; it just doesn't admit it.

g

I was thinking the same thing...though in my mind, mythology is what religion is called when no one believes in it anymore...hence greek myth, norse myth etc...(but that might be an oversimplification on my part)...

@VineetHonkan That makes currently active religion mythology to atheists -- same effect as my definition lol

g

7

Egyptian civilization / gods were exsisted way b4 the Greek gods and Greek mythology .

The Greeks covered all their basic needs and shortcomings and flaws and wishes and fears pretty much in 12 god critters . From weather phenomena , to sex and orgies , to drinking and party , to hunting and farming , to death and motherhood , to ego dad , to jealous wife / mom , to music , arts , and of course wisdom . It's like an iPhone . U got a problem ? There is an app for it . There is an unexplained issue or a common behavior ? There is a god for it 😂
The Greek gods had so many flaws and weakness , perfectly made to give humans excuses to be assholes too . Greeks were very clever w their gods 😂
I am half Greek , and lived in Greece for 5 yrs as an adolescent . I think the Greek gods are HILARIOUS 😂😂😂
No idea how they lost power and credit , I will think , medicine and control of elements came along , or they just got tired of worshiping 12 stars and their entourage . Hello sokrates too .

5

I suspect that it's easier to control a population when they all go to the same church and have the same priests. Just a thought.

4

I believe it was the Jewish people who started that. Saves money.

4

Conversion of the Roman Emperor Constanine who then held The First Council of Nicaea where they created what we now know as the bile-ble.

They removed many previously revered writings including all written by women, except one; the one glorifying sacrifice and humbleness.

And it set up the subsequent enforcement of Christianity by law. This was combined with torture and indoctrination. This was the Christian way for hundreds of years.

Still is. Some would say.

4

There are plenty of people who believe in multiple gods today. Such as Hindus. You need to read and learn about other cultures in the world. This will help you with your understanding.

4

Blame the Jews. Although monotheism was not unknown eg Zoroastrianism , polytheism was more common. The Jewish tribe gradually converted to monotheism, probably suited their aggressive, warlike behaviour better.
The rest as they say is history.

The word Jew was devised merely two centuries ago, I prefer Babylonians as Abraham is from the ancient Sumerian city of Ur according to the Torah or Old Testament. Judaism is merely a religion, not an ethnicity or race of people now scientifically proven through DNA testing across the state of Israel. Dr. Shlomo Sand from the University of Tel Aviv wrote a best selling (in Israel) book about it, "The Invention of the Jewish People." ~ [amazon.com]

Both I and J were used interchangeably by scribes to express the sound of both the vowel and the consonant. It wasn't until 1524 when Gian Giorgio Trissino, an Italian Renaissance grammarian known as the father of the letter J, made a clear distinction between the two sounds.

@Allamanda Thanks 🙂

@ExculpatoryLover An excellent book.Well call them Hebrews or Israelites then but not Babylonians .

@Moravian ! Watch out, a linguist informed me that Hebrew is an Egyptian word that has a derogatory meaning, similar to wet back today in reference to Mexicans who also were considered unwanted settlers. Babylon is where they originated, not Palestine that they took by force twice, David back in antiquity and the Zionists in 1947.

@ExculpatoryLover

Hebrew

NOUN
Hebrews (plural noun)
a member of an ancient people living in what is now Israel and Palestine and, according to biblical tradition, descended from the patriarch Jacob, grandson of Abraham. After the Exodus (c.1300 bc) they established the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, and their scriptures and traditions form the basis of the Jewish religion.

So some Egyptians may use the word in a derogatory sense. So what ?.

@ExculpatoryLover
"The word Jew is only two centuries old " ?
That's odd. I wonder how Flavius Josephus the helenised Jew manage to write "The antiquities of the Jews" in the 1st century ce.

@Moravian ! My comment was clear... the ORIGIN of the word Hebrew is Egyptian, not Israeli and any research on the English language and the Roman alphabet reveals the creation of the modern letter J with it's current pronunciation is less than 500 years old. If you wish to contradict Dr. Shlomo Sand of the University of Tel Aviv, please write to him and tell him how he is wrong. I am not suited to fight his battles over his work... thank you. My guess is what you find are modern translations, or do you read classical Latin and classical Greek to honestly know what was presented? The Roman empire was a dual language empire, the western half of the empire used Latin while the eastern half of the empire used Greek.

3

"The greatest tragedy in mankinds history , may be the hijacking of Morality by Religion.".....Arthur C.Clarke...

3

Every culture develops their own religion, aka mythology. Monotheism is an egocentric development that a particular tribal god is the only god. Why? Bragging rights!

love it

3

First, pre-religion is an ethnocentric observation. The beliefs of the people you reference; Greeks, Romans, Egyptians believed in their pantheon with every bit of commitment as any Christian. Their beliefs were religions.

Second. to dismiss them as only a "mythology" is once again ethno-Christian centric. You may claim agnosticism or atheism, but you are bringing Christian biases and prejudices to your post.

Third, there are people today, Native Americans, Hindu, etc., that believe in pluralistic pantheon. Their belief is as real to them as the Abrahamic God is to Christian's.

Fourth, Constantine, the last Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, converted to Christianity as means to an end. The Empire was crumbling from it's own internal deterioration. There were multiple sects of peoples wandering around the Empire that had moved to a monotheistic belief system. At the time these small sects appeared more stable and economically secure than many other groups existing in the Empire. He reached out these sects, brought them together in the city of Niceain 325 CE (Council of Nicea) and collected various works that were floating around the Middle East in one document (original Old Testament Bible is born). With Constantine's support Christianity gain political and economic advantage and lo, Christianity was born and monotheism drove pantheism out of the Middle East and southern Europe.

interesting...and yes my use of the "ethno-Christian" term is because it's what I was taught during my hs years (over 20 years ago).

Constantine the last emperor of the HRE? Wow...

3

Pre-religion is not mythology. What we call mythology was once the religion of its time for selected areas.

3

The answer to that is a comparative religions degree.

2

It was manipulated by the leaders, purposely . . . . how can you enforce tribalism on a vast scale with people believing in many gods? In fact, I have said that if we want to dispense with dictatorships of every type, we must destroy monotheism . . . . You can find some videos on youtube about how christianity was invented by the Flavians.

Prior to and long after the Council of Nicaea in 325 C.E. the 'christians' were still known as AND calling themselves the Messianics.
It only became known as Christianity AFTER the 3 Flavians were named as the " Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit" in a biography of the Flavian Dynasty written by the Freed Slave known as Flavius Josephus, a traitor to his own people btw.

So the christian side of the story goes, if you are willing to give it credibility.

2

I believe at some point someone realized they could control large amounts of people by manipulating them to believe in one god for power and money.

2

All religions are mythologies to people that do not believe in the, from the earliest of mankind (most have been lost except for a few monuments) to the latest incarnations of christanity. Fewer gods mean fewer divided loyalties (read money).

2

At times, Egyptians were forced to. Akhenaten decreed there was only one sun god.

In ancient Rome, christians were fed to the lions and crucified as a punishment for being a cult and not recognizing Roman gods. Many were offered their lives if they renounced their faith., so the story goes... They didn't and were killed. But many Romans saw that courage and thought the christian god must be stronger if someone would give their life for it.

When Nero burned Rome and then blamed it on the christians, he really stepped this up in the arena. That crazy asshole is partially responsible for christianity now.

2

Sooooo.... what is the interesting part?

You can get your answer by searching the web: religious history and polytheism.

1

Monotheism tends to emerge firstly as a unifying force, polytheist societies tend to be pretty tolerant of one another the Romans for instance believed that the Greek gods were the same gods as their own but with local names, the Egyptians would use several names for the same god depending on what city they happened to be in.
However, if you can convince you population that there is only ONE God (capital G) and that he will be pissed at you if you don't kill or convert the followers of the False gods, you have a ready made army of fanatics willing to die for said god and be rewarded in heaven.
Secondly monotheism tens to emerge in civilizations that are moving in to more advance states of being, especially capitalist economies.
People start thinking that praying and paying to a dozen tributes to lots of gods for different things is stupid, time consuming and will settle for one weekly tithe to one almighty catch all deity.
The first major society to go monotheistic was Egypt under Pharaoh Akhenaten in the so called "Amarna
heresy"
Of course it failed and the priest of the old polytheist religions not only killed him but tried to erase his dangerous ideas from history, because it cost them too much lost revenue and made the King far to rich and powerful, as all tributes were going directly to him.
However many historian believe this was what inspired both the Zoroastrians (a new religion) and the Jews (previously polytheistic Israelites) to move toward and popularize Monotheistic dualism.

I’m not positive, but I think Zoroastrianism preceded Egyptian monotheism

@Haemish1 You maybe correct but both date from the second millenium BCE and early Zoroastrians followed the usual path of polytheism to monotheism. It is possible the influence was inverted, thanks for the clarification.

@Haemish1 In a small way it did but it was still somewhat polytheist in nature except their ONE major deity was the Ahura-Mazda, the Eternal Burning Flame, the rest were just co-incidental much like the Roman Lares or Household Gods and Goddesses were, and, I suppose akin to the Christians with their ever growing list of demi-gods ( Saints).

1

"Father, son, and holly ghost", sounds like three to me. However, the believers will be quick to claim that it is all "one God in three persons", what ever the hell that means.

When the Catholic church adopted and voted upon ("oh no, the trinity is in the bibly. It was not man created" says an evangelical asshole), the trinity their church lost sections throughout the Mid-East and middle Europe who felt it wrong and they stayed firm. Later many were killed or, as in the Arab and Persian nations, left for Islam. So, the argument continued for a long time. Still does.

1

I read part of a book some time ago, but I don't recall the title nor the author except his first name Robert. The book was about how religions evolve over time. This book said that with pa theons of Gods, it was not unusual for new Gods to be adopted from other religions. In one case where one country had conquored another, the Gods of the conquored people began showing up in the pantheon of the victor's. The theory was that God of neighboring cultures weren't necessarily considered heretical or non-existent, but rather lesser Gods less deserving of worship - until enough familarity with the new Gods earned them a place with the older established ones.

The reduction of Gods in a pantheon was also discussed in this book. Eliminating Gods from a pantheon often corresponded with consolidating political power. The Gods accepted and worshipped by royalty often took the most promenant roles and positions in the pantheon. When a religion transitioned to monotheism, the last remaining deity was typically either the king of the Gods (a Zeus like God) or a God of war (like Aries). This last God would be the one worshipped by the king who may have required his chosen God be worshipped and paid hommage to.

Could be Robert Bauval

@Geoffrey51 - That appears to be a very good guess. I believe it was "The Evolution Of God" by Robert Wright. Sorry I couldn't recall it earlier.
[goodreads.com]

For an enjoyable read, Gore Vidal's "Creation" is one of my favorite books. It is set in the 5th century BCE.

1

check out Yuval Harari's "Sapiens"

A great book!

1

Check out Akhenaten in Egypt, Brahman in Vedic philosophy and Ahura Mazda in Zoroastrianism.

Yeah I heard lieutenant Uhura had a Mazda she traded in her Nissan for it.😉

0

One "God" is better for the conduct of government and business. A whole pantheon of the critters gets in the way--too many religious festivals, and 'holy' days!

0

People still believe in Harry Potter god mythology worship. Not saying they believe Harry Potter exists with supernatural whiz bang, but people sure do worship with their money buy books, movies and other fandom.

Word Level 8 Nov 6, 2019
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For those who post that Egyptian mythology came before both greek/roman, please note, I am not citing them in chronological order. My use of the word 'followed' in this list is used as a replacement for the word and. Further, my main point is when did people change from being polytheistic to monotheistic.

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