Tracing religion back to its source?

[mewtwo]

So I was wondering if we could try and make a family tree out of religions? Like try and trace it back to its source.

[Apech]

So I was wondering if we could try and make a family tree out of religions? Like try and trace it back to its source.

 

 

Where are we going to start?

[teopakees]

as a place to start i would like to suggest searching, "religions of mesopotamia"

[h.uriahr]

I think it's impossible to actually trace the older religions to their very beginning. I mean the newer ones sure but to actually trace the very BEGINNING....difficult...we can get pretty close maybe.

[Anabhogya-Carya]

Define religion. Then we can trace it obscurely and unsuccessfully, the earliest signs in the archaeological records are in connection with what we think is the emergance of abstact thought and symbolism. Religion is an extension, in a sense of those two things. And archaeology is always changing so I would not take any evidence of a beggining as concrete.

[mewtwo]

Well what i was trying to see with this topic is where the religions originated from and some of the similaritys but through some research i finally understand that all religions are the same. Thanks for helping.

[shontonga]

Well what i was trying to see with this topic is where the religions originated from and some of the similaritys but through some research i finally understand that all religions are the same. Thanks for helping.

 

 

What an amazingly intricate family tree you would have

With tangled webs of roots and intertwining branches

all growing in and out, with and from each other

like a never ending maze of an endless knot

 

Would be marvelous

 

folks have tried to do it

fun to look at their work

more fun to this wild child to look and find the commonalities

need to have a framework when trying to research stuff like this

a starting point, a liner direction

Which is hard with something so circular

any point can be a starting point, LOL

 

Have a good time with it if you do pursue it!

Would love to see what you find Mewtwo!

 

Stay well,

Shon

 

*edit*

this doesn't tell much at all but it is interesting just for the timeline

SoSo Much is Missing from it but for what it's worth?

http://www.mapsofwar.com/images/Religion.swf

Edited January 6, 2009 by shontonga

[baloneyx]

I would recommend a documentary from ITV "Legacy.The.Origins.of.Civilization" There are 6 episodes

 

#1 Iraq #2 India #3 China #4 Egypt #5 Central America and #6 The Barbarian West

 

Though it's not all about religion it has a fair amount about it, and is a really good documentary. I've seen the first 3 episodes up to now. Also since the documentary is a bit old it seems like it's a different world at times, like some footage taken in Iraq is from before the first gulf war. Well I'm really enjoying it and I'm sure many here would too.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Legacy-Origins-Civil...n/dp/B0000A9XYT

 

I found the first episode on google video, the rest you'll have to buy or search a bit for

 

http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?d...=en&fs=true

[Apech]

The youngest 'major' religion is Sikhism I think. The oldest must be Neolithic mother goddess worship (which was presumably preceded by earlier versions).

[sheng zhen]

Someone posted a link to an article a while ago describing evolutionary research showing how religious thought began around 40.000BC when the human brain developed the necessary faculties for imagination.

[seadog]

How people interact with the land and the types of enviorment they live in dictate their expression of belief.

For instance the mythology of archaic paleoithic hunters is common within a given latitudinal range. Remarkabley similar belief systems are expressed in peoples that share a particular climatic region even though they have no historical contact with one another.

The mythologies and belief systems of Amazon indigenous,Central African,and south east asian rainforest dwellers share many and corresponding beliefs inregards to birth, adolescense,marriage and magic.

 

Also of note is the effect agriculture has upon belief systems.The nature of agriculture forces the human pscyhe to change on profound levels and many of standard religions of today are a direct result of this.

Hinduism,Buddhism,Judeoism,Christanity,Islam,and religious Taoism are all offspring of Agriculture.

 

Agriculture not only cultivates the land but it also harness time.I will plant this seed today and reap my reward in the future.

This simple act has had a profound impact on how all of us percieve reality.

Agriculture stopped people from wandering,created class divide,encouraged greed and as we see so clearly today creates massive enviromental damage.

The panetheon of Gods, which we may label as relgion, can only exsist in a well furrowed highly managed landscape.

The beginning of relgion starts with the knowlege of "Good and evil."

[zanshin]

Animism - seeing spirits and divinities in all natural things- is considered one of the oldest forms of religion and one followed by hunter/gatherer people- which at one point in history was everyone. When we changed to an agricultural society people started focusing on distant sky gods as the weather was so important to their prosperity. Also societies became much bigger and were controlled by kings who might rarely interact with the common people and seen as gods themselves or given right to rule from the gods, so less focus on the individual experience of religion listen to the government dogma instead.

[Spirit Ape]

Sun worship!