it was back?

AlofRI

I think people had no answers to all that scared them, lightning, hunger, beasts, earthquakes, etc. They invented "gods". Some to protect  them, some to appease, some as heroes/protectors from the natural death causes. Some people, such as witch doctors, found they could use the fears of the people for power. Later on these people were called ministers, Popes, Padre's etc. Many actually tried to do good without the controlling power … a few. Some invented a single "god" for all. He took control for a few centuries, but, many thought he was too cruel, so, they invented a son. A woman was impregnated by the original "god" so that HE, as her child, could be born in original sin. Once alive he allowed himself to be killed as a sacrifice to himself to save the rest of us from the sin he originally condemned us to ….. I think the old ones made (a little) more sense!

If that makes any sense to you, please try to explain it to me (not YOU, We_are_Deniable … or whatever you call yourself now ;-) 

MayCaesar

As far as I know, the predominant hypothesis among historians nowadays explains it in two different (albeit related) ways: the need to feel the gaps in people's knowledge that lead to anxiety and uncertainty (as pointed by @AlofRl), and the need to maintain a stable leadership (attributing a divine mandate to the rulers, which seriously discourages struggles for power).

What caused people to even consider religion in the first place? After all, there are many ways to reach to anxiety caused by uncertainty, inventing religion being just one of them. That I do not know, but given that religion spontaneously emerged all over the world shows that it has some evolutionary advantage over the alternatives, Perhaps a faith-based world view just unifies people better, while, say, a logic-based one would cause people to constantly question the claims, decreasing societal stability and increasing the probability and the amount of dissent.

That is as far as the distant past goes, when survival of the society was one of the primary concerns. Nowadays it is obviously not the case, as most people in the modern world are pretty self-sufficient and can survive even if the society as a whole collapses, hence society being unified might at this point be detrimental to its success. You see that the most unified societies nowadays, such as the North Korean one, are actually some of the worst performers in terms of the quality of life: at this stage one's ability to realize their potential, rather than being melded into the same monotonous mass, is far more important, than unity and stability.

maxx

well, I cant quite agree that they decided to invent gods; they had to believe in them first.@AlofRI

maxx

i believe religion began much farther back than early egypt or and china.  it must have began in early human because of cause and effect; something happened in which they did not understand and they attributed this lack of understanding to what they believe was a conscience force and behavior. perhaps as when reasoning and self awareness began, early humans  would see natural forces such as the sun, or wind, storms and other weather either as good or bad for them and began leaning to what they sought was good and shunning the bad for it could cause misery and death. weather itself may be the reason for the beginnings of religion.  @MayCaesar

MayCaesar

@maxx

Well, early tribal proto-civilizations were quite savvy when it comes to dealing with natural phenomena; shamans used pretty advanced techniques to predict the weather, animal movement patterns, crop growth, etc. I do not think they were nearly as afraid of the unknown as people nowadays think, and, in turn, the amount of things they knew were much greater than you would naturally think.

That said, indeed, religion goes much further back than the recorded history back. In some shape religion has probably existed for as long as humans have had the ability to speak, if not for more.

AlofRI

maxx said:

i believe religion began much farther back than early egypt or and china.  it must have began in early human because of cause and effect; something happened in which they did not understand and they attributed this lack of understanding to what they believe was a conscience force and behavior. perhaps as when reasoning and self awareness began, early humans  would see natural forces such as the sun, or wind, storms and other weather either as good or bad for them and began leaning to what they sought was good and shunning the bad for it could cause misery and death. weather itself may be the reason for the beginnings of religion.  @MayCaesar

That's just about what I said, isn't it? Weather, the sun, an eclipse, these not understood things, in many cases, became attributed to, or "actual" gods. I call that "making up a god". Many may disagree but, that's exactly what I believe Christians, Muslims and Jews … among others, did. Certain people see a chance to USE these "gods" to gain power over the masses and they become witch doctors, prophets, religious leaders with "connections" to a god or gods.                  

They had gods in china, in Australia, in South America and Mexico (before they were even "discovered"). The Christian god had to be "introduced" in these places before it was even thought of. Lacking that, they "invented" their own.