I think what General Cornpone is asking is not “what do you think?”, but “do you know, and if so, how?”.
You seem to be claiming that every religion began as an attempt to explain the workings of the natural world. I think the history of religion convinces us that it is a little more complicated than that. Much of early religion is not: “this is how things work”, but “this is how you ought behave”. Was Tiamat sleeping inside the earth to explain what was actually inside the earth, or to explain the existence of evil in the world?
Can you provide any evidence that the creation story of any major religion came before the religion, or was the “start” of the religion?
It is my impression that the ancients weren’t really that much less sophisticated in many things than we are today. They understood myth and allegory as well as we do today. Did Plato believe that there were invisible people living at the top of a big mountain?
A deeper question for you (the real question) is: how is the origin of religion important to the existence (or non-existence) of God? If there is a God, could he have not introduced himself to us by planting creation stories in early civilizations?
Well, I apologise for any missunderstanding I may have caused. It apears as though we must have not thought that the question was pretaining to the same thing… Or perhaps I thought that I the explanation I gave was adaquit for the situation, and for the needs of others on the SD forum…
I claim that religion did most likely start as an explanation to why things are as they are… In the beginning I am sertain they did, why do you call the early religions myths? surely they are no harder to believe than in one god… if there was a higher power, whould he not have brothers, or sisters? the concept of one god, makeing the wourld in six days, is harder to believe than many gods forming, along with people, out of Chaos…
But yes you are right, moddern religions do not any more explain why things are as they, or how things were formed any longer. Thus it is harder for people to understand why this would need to be done… New religions explain how things should be, and I am sure ancient religions did too. The old testiment for example, was filled with comandments, all ones that would help the people survive and get along together in the desert, such as do not eat pork…
Which brings this whole thing down to the question that remains, which I thought I had answered, but obviously not to your saticfaction… The existance of god: god was created by man, not the other way around… god or gods were used as an explanation to why things were in the beginning. Later as a way of liveing your life, a code of conduct if you will… god gives a sence of reason, and a place to go after death…
the origin of god, as previously stated, was to explain how things are, or how to go about life, as an example to live up to… this is the origin of religion, and the answer of the existance of god… god, only exists in the human heart, and then, only in the hearts of the believers…
I also noticed that you capitalize god. I know that most or all of the modern religions have one god, but, what denomination are you? or is that just instinctive? Also, you assume one god, when all the ancient religions were multible gods… why?
With all due respect, I don’t think it was adequate. Here are just some of the reasons why.
How did you determine that all theistic systems have a creation story? There are an awful lot of such systems out there, past and present. What methodology did you use to cover every single one?
Now, for the sake of argument, let us grant that every one has a creation story. How did you determine that this creation story marks the beginning of the theistic thought? Is it not possible that belief in God came first, and was followed by the creation story?
In fact, let’s consider a hypothetical scenario. What if God had directly manifested himself to the first humans, as some religions believe? Does this not mean that belief in God could have preceded the development of a creation story? (Saying that men concocted religion in order to explain physical phenomena tacitly assumes that there was no other reason for believing in a higher being.)
Why is this necessary? How did you conclude that this god must have siblings?
Well first of all, not all theistic systems believe in a six-day creation. And second, why would it necessarily require many gods to create the universe? If the creator is omnipotent, then multiple gods would not be necessary – and if he isn’t, then having multiple gods wouldn’t necessarily make the task any more feasible.
Well, no, I didn’t feel your explanations were adequate. You make the claim that the first purpose of religious belief in man was to explain the natural world. OK, what if I grant you that point. Wasn’t the first purpose of special relativity to explain the natural world?
You can feel free to reject religion out of hand, because you view it as an attempt by man to explain the world. But the real question remains: does the belief have any correspondence to the real world? And you haven’t justified why we should automatically conclude “no”.
I didn’t refer to the “early religions” as myths, I referred to the early myths as myths. My flip reference to Plato was only because he was a guy who I am pretty sure understood allegory. If you start with an understanding of myth and allegory, you can see that kernels of truth can be contained in stories that are completely “untrue”. And when one claims to “believe” the myth, they sometimes mean they believe in the expressed truths, not the literal story.
Why not multiple gods? Well, first, I think it is easier to understand God as one. Why do we perceive only one universe? Do you worry about that? What about love? There are lots of different kinds of love, but when we examine them, we find that they are all facets of a single emotion known as “love”. Does that bother you, that there’s only one love? Second, if God had brothers and sisters, we would have to ask “who created them”? And that answer might be the real God. Just like the universe: if we could perceive multiple universes, then we’d ask “what container holds the universes?”, and that might be a more important idea than universes.
Personally, I reject the notion of multiple Gods because there is only one God I’ve ever perceived. I’ll grant you that I perceive different facets of God (just like love), but that is adequately explained by his triune nature. Upon personal reflection, I find that the God I perceive is one. I wouldn’t believe in multiple gods unless I’d had some positive reason to do so.
It seems clear to me that you believe this. But it’s not clear that it’s true. Without falling into the whole morasses of subjectivity and extreme scepticism, I’ll just say that we form a view of reality through our perceptions and our reason applied to those perceptions (most of us, that is). What you’re talking about is the “idea of God” or the “perception of God”, which is formed by humans, as a reaction to their perceptions and reason. The question remains: does this idea of God reflect any reality in the objective world?
Finally, I capitalize God as a sign of respect and out of force of habit.
I apologise for my grose assumptions… Yes, it is precivable that not all religions have a creation story, rightly so… I have not come acrost any to my recolection, but you aparently have seen more than I, if you have…
I also apologise for any generalizations that I have made, but the first religions did explain why things were as they are, and the later ones usualy just picked up from there…
Yes, saying that men concocted religion in order to explain creation does assume that there was no other reason for believing in a higher power, or in a higher being… But, that “assumtion” is the answer to the question, is it not?
Why do you conclude that god does not have siblings? If there is one, is it not a safe assumption that there is more? If you see one mouse in your house, do you not assume that there must be more? I just find it easyer to believe a polytheistic set of beliefs… Not that that is much easyer to believe…
Wile not all theistic systems bais their creation on a six day time frame, Genisous is… therefor the black sea scroles, teh Jewish belief, and if I understand the qur’ an correctly they do as well, so that is what persentage of the worlds population again?
as for ancient religions, well, I am not sure of the timeframe for the greeks, or anyone else, but I don’t think they had quite the concept of millions of years as our science does…
I have one biological father. Should I assume I have more? The US currently has one president. Should I assume there are currently other US presidents? I live on the third planet in our solar system. Should I assume there is another third planet in our solar system?
For some things, it is actually impossible for there to be more than one.
Wait a minute. I’ve said nothing about whether I believe god has siblings or not. Rather, I have asked you to explain how you arrived at your conclusion – that is, that a god must surely have siblings of his own.
You insinuated that a god, if one exists, should have siblings. I’m asking you to explain why this would be necessary.
Well, one way I could answer your question to why I think god has siblings is to just say that the only plausible answer to the question: “why?” is: “Why not?”… but that does not support anything, or help anyone… I did not say that I arived at the conclusion that god must have siblings, I simply stated that it was hard for Me to see that there was only one god, and no others…
but then again even the bible does not say that there is only one god… for it reads:
“I am the Lord your God. Who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the House of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not take for your self any carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in the heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God., but showing mercy to thousand to those who love Me and keep my commandments.”
Exodus 20-1-6; Isaiah 43:10;44:6 Versus Deuteronomy 6;14; 1 Chronicles 16:25; Psalm 82:1,6; Jeremiah 10:11; Zephaniah 2:11; John 10:34.
“You shall not go after other gods, of the gods of the people which are round about you.”
(Deuteronomy 6:14)
“And the temple which I build will be great, for our God is greater than all gods.”
(2 Chronicles 2:5)
“For the LORD is great and greatly to be praised; He is also to be feared above all gods.”
(Chronicles 16:25)
“God stands in the congregation of the mighty; He judges among the gods.”
(Psalm 82:1)
siblings are something not usualy brought up when thinking of god but, somewhere on this forum I say a response of Jesus=god and Jesus had siblings…
which grings up a more inportant question of who made god, or where did he come from?
Not good enough. In fact, such an answer would hurt your stance. After all, you’re the one who said,
"if there was a higher power, whould he not have brothers, or sisters? " (sic)
… the clear implication being that God must have brothers and sisters. I’m asking you to explain why this is so. Saying “Why not?” is not a sufficient response, and it’s not even remotely logical.
The passages which you cite merely prohibit God’s people from worshipping other gods. It does not mean that those gods actually exist. One could create, for example, a golden calf to worship – but it would not be a real, genuine god.
At any rate, this still doesn’t support your argument that God must have brothers or sisters. So please… explain why a supreme deity should be expected to have siblings. In other words, explain how you arrived at your conclusion instead of merely challenging other people to refute it.
Pardon me if I offend, but that’s ridiculous. Are you saying that what you believe depends on how the question is phrased?
If I ask “why should God have siblings”, your answer is “why not, so he must”.
If I ask “why should God be alone”, would your answer be “why not, he must be”?
We could debate the meaning of your quotes from the bible, but I don’t think that is necessary. You can’t first claim that the bible is invented by men and is not true, and then later use it as a justification for anything.
In addition, since Ipse is dismissing religion in general, it makes no sense to base his attacks on the Bible. “The Bible” is not the same as “religion” – as billions of non-Biblical theists would agree.
I apologise for seeming to suport god as haveing siblings, I simply wished to put forth the posobility of more than one god… It is simply hard for Me to believe that there is only one… prehaps there is… but perhaps there isn’t…
but on to the question which I think was posed originaly in this forum: The existance of god, and the justifacation there of… It is interesting that you bring up the golden calf, and the fact that he was invented… That is the point that I have been trying to make… Perhaps all gods were invented as well… For example, the Christian religion would not have neer as many, if any, members if it were not for Emperor Constintine’s attempt to unify Rome under one god… With this said, perhaps all gods, in every religion were an atempt to unify people…
I do not deny the posibility of one god, I simply state that, well, posibly your one god is a golden calf…
I apologise for seeming to suport god as haveing siblings, I simply wished to put forth the posobility of more than one god… It is simply hard for Me to believe that there is only one… prehaps there is… but perhaps there isn’t…
but on to the question which I think was posed originaly in this forum: The existance of god, and the justifacation there of… It is interesting that you bring up the golden calf, and the fact that he was invented… That is the point that I have been trying to make… Perhaps all gods were invented as well… For example, the Christian religion would not have neer as many, if any, members if it were not for Emperor Constintine’s attempt to unify Rome under one god… With this said, perhaps all gods, in every religion were an atempt to unify people…
I do not deny the posibility of one god, I simply state that, well, posibly your one god is a golden calf…
I apologize… for the first part… I just liked that, my roomate said it to me, and I guess I put it in there, there was more fo a question than simply asking why, but I think i answered it later on in my post…
I also realise that debateign the meaning of quotes from teh bible would get us nowhere… but, teh bible was work of human hands, and the point that i am trying to make is that god was too…
Let’s see. So far we have established that Gods are like mice, because if you see one, there must be more. Yet a few pages ago it was considered highly improbable that any accounts of having seen God were anything but superstitious drivel. And the reason Christianity has spread has nothing to do with what its believers feel but because Constantine was (at least partly) moved by political considerations.
Huh.
Learn something every day. I was convinced I believed in God because I had experienced Him in my life and found that the stories about him, subject to critical interpretation, say a great deal about how I see the universe operating under His guidance. Now I find it’s because of a decree of a Roman Emperor who lived before the last mastodons became extinct.
Cool.
I think I’ll go look at the homophobia thread – maybe somebody can prove to me that Fred Phelps is actually helping gay people. Or check out one of the politics thread; maybe I’ll learn that GWB is really a closet liberal.
no, the bible is religion… not all religion, but religion none the less… I could base my attacks on the Qur’an if you would like, of the black sea scroles, or posibly on some ancient greek gods, or even on cave paintings if that would help you… maby you do not follow the bible, it is understandable, but the bible is religion… would you rather that I consult a thesaurus? perhaps gospel… or perhaps guide or guidebook… does this better suit you?