Organized Religion gave birth to Civilization

[Flavus Aquila]

You mean the crusades? Inquisition? Witch burnings? Stoning the gays?

I'm talking about the big picture too and the picture I see says that religion isn't necessary for humanity to move forward. It may have helped in the past but it is largely outdated and unneeded.

I'll concede the examples if you can answer the following, covering, say a 3000 year history:
1. What military events prompted the crusades?
2. How many people were actually put to death or imprisoned during the inquisition, that were not members of the clergy?
3. About how many 'witches' were burned?
4. Can you site more than three historical instances where gays were actually stoned on account of religion?

 

[bickelz]

I'll concede the examples if you can answer the following, covering, say a 3000 year history:
1. What military events prompted the crusades?
2. How many people were actually put to death or imprisoned during the inquisition, that were not members of the clergy?
3. About how many 'witches' were burned?
4. Can you site more than three historical instances where gays were actually stoned on account of religion?

How many people have been killed in the name of atheism? That's right, none.

All of these people were killed in the name of God and that's a reason for most of the Medieval Wars and skirmishes.

 

[Satya]

I'll concede the examples if you can answer the following, covering, say a 3000 year history:
1. What military events prompted the crusades?
2. How many people were actually put to death or imprisoned during the inquisition, that were not members of the clergy?
3. About how many 'witches' were burned?
4. Can you site more than three historical instances where gays were actually stoned on account of religion?

You can't answer these questions. You only have revisionist writings by religious people who try to minimize these travesties the same way that modern white supremacists deny the Holocaust. I had a Neo Nazi tell me not too long ago that only 600,000 Jews died in the Holocaust, not 6 million. I suppose his point is as valid as yours.

 

[Stu]

from the wikipedia article

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Göbekli_Tepe

this is an amazing discovery.

Economy

While the site formally belongs to the earliest Neolithic (PPN A), up to now no traces of domesticated plants or animals have been found. The inhabitants are assumed to be hunters and gatherers who nevertheless lived in villages for at least part of the year.[14] Schmidt speculates that the site played a key function in the transition to agriculture; he assumes that the necessary social organization needed for the creation of these structures went hand-in-hand with the organized exploitation of wild crops. For sustenance, wild cereals may have been used more intensively than before; perhaps they were even deliberately cultivated. Recent DNA analysis of modern domesticated wheat compared with wild wheat has shown that its DNA is closest in structure to wild wheat found on Mount Karaca Dağ 20 miles (32 km) away from the site, leading one to believe that this is where modern wheat was first domesticated.[15]

Schmidt considers G

 

[GracieRuth]

How many people have been killed in the name of atheism? That's right, none..

Oh hardly. Millions died in the twentieth century alone due to Communism seeking to stamp out religion.

 

[GracieRuth]

The crusades, the inquisition, and the witch trials, are all much more complicated. They don't neatly fit into good/bad. I think its dumb to lump all the crusades together since they were at different times with different objectives. However, the main objective was to fight back against militant Islam, which at one point made it as far north as France, and was obviously set on world domination. There is absolutely nothing wrong with self defense. The problem with the crusades is mainly that along they way, they'd stop and kill all the local Jews. The purpose of the Inquistion was to irradicate heresy from the church, mainly the Cathars and Conversos. We need to remember that freedom of conscious is largely a modern notion, stemming from the idea of the dignity of the individual--this idea has its foundation in the Hebrew and Christian texts, but it was an idea that took thousands of years to unfold, and continues to unfold. Remember that thousands of years is NOTHING in terms of the time the earth has been around. The witch trials may appear superficially to be religiously motivated, but they were not. They were driven by mysogyny, and that my friends is something you will find everywhere. And yeah, I get tired of people inflating the numbers of all these events. Human population was really very low.

And how come no one ever mentions the slaughter of cats, thought to be familiars????? With the cats gone, the plague spread ike...THE PLAGUE LOL

 

[randomsomeone]

If anything, religion, culture, and civilizaiton have all suffered from the same thing....nothing more (or less) than the dark side of humanity...the desire for control, for economic dominance, of placing the personal agenda/ego above community well-being or a more holistic perspective. In the absence of these impairments, human systems (of earth or of heaven) work much, much better. When they are firmly entrenched, nothing goes right for very long.

People stuck in a false sense of self (which religion can actually help counteract) will use anything handy to meet their programs (which they scarsely understand in the first place). If people care deeply about their religious and spiritual life, some will glob onto that and use it. So, religion gets distorted and manipulated.....an actual attack on the very core and heart of the religious system itself.

So if there are victims, they are victims not of the actual religion at it's core, but of the distorted, manipulated workings of those with other motives, motives religion actually tends to strongly warn against. Distortions, the false self....these are the real problems and always have been. They just pick up different vehicles in different ages. In this regard, religion itself has been raped, pillaged, dismembered, and deformed at various times, and that is the crying shame....even an affront! Fortunately, it still survives and can be still found in it's purest, most authentic state, for those who care to find it. Interesting that at all times there were other voices within the same religious system...voices not swayed by the flavor-of-the-day, voices with perspective and deep roots. We seldom hear them, even now.

Frankly, we are still stuck in the same dynamic today. Which voices are yanking the chains of our cullture? Who do we jump at to assess blame? Where does the false self go to get it's agendas met? What are we overlooking? Who are we listening to and who are we NOT listening to? Things to ponder....

 

[Billy]

Oh hardly. Millions died in the twentieth century alone due to Communism seeking to stamp out religion.

Communists werent seeking out an end to religion, religion just happened to be in the way of their domination of all mankind. And there is plenty of religion in China and Russie before during and after the communists came into power.

The idea that people came together to form society because of religion is absurd. Do wolves, primates and other social animals practice religion or do they just socialize because its encoded into their DNA?

Naturally the early humans congregated together for the same reasons we do now, mutual protection, shared work, survival. Religion came afterwards as technology and our brains grew and we needed something to do while we sat around newly discovered fires.

 

[randomsomeone]

Naturally the early humans congregated together for the same reasons we do now, mutual protection, shared work, survival. Religion came afterwards as technology and our brains grew and we needed something to do while we sat around newly discovered fires.

While these are all important things, I think the more primal instinct towards religion...or a spiritually oriented way of viewing the world...would be equally present. We tend to look at development as essentially centered around technology...I suggest this is not the only thing at the center. Also, I am not considering religion in the way we commonly think of it today, but something much more organic and tied to everyday life. Connection to ancestry, to community memory, (as previously mentioned) would be a pretty powerful driver in understanding ourselves, our place in the world, and how we nurture/guide our young and future generations. I could see this sort of thinking leading to development of a common, rudimentary civilization, even if technologies were simply based around hunting/gathering.

 

[This]

Even if true a more accurate assessment would be to say that religion helped contribute to the birth of civilization, however this too depends on what you consider to be "civil" If you consider living in towns to be civil towns were largely started because of farming, if you consider living in the comforts we live in today to be civil that was mostly made possible by figuring out how to make electricity something usable, if you consider written text to be the birth of civilization than religion could play a large part. To say it's everything though I think is near sighted, lots of things have snowballed and compounded to make the civilization that we enjoy today.

 

[Peppermint]

Naturally the early humans congregated together for the same reasons we do now, mutual protection, shared work, survival. Religion came afterwards as technology and our brains grew and we needed something to do while we sat around newly discovered fires.

Idle minds are the devil's playground indeed.

 

[Flavus Aquila]

How many people have been killed in the name of atheism? That's right, none.

All of these people were killed in the name of God and that's a reason for most of the Medieval Wars and skirmishes.

Please understand that this is not an insult: that is one of the most stupid things anyone has ever said on these forums.

Marxism, the foundation of communism is atheistic. It is estimated that Stalin alone (during his lifetime) was responsible for the death of at least 65,000,000 Russians.

Try and tell the people of Tibet, whose leader is the Dalai Lama that no one has ever been killed by an atheist.

 

[Satya]

Please understand that this is not an insult: that is one of the most stupid things anyone has ever said on these forums.

Marxism, the foundation of communism is atheistic. It is estimated that Stalin alone (during his lifetime) was responsible for the death of at least 65,000,000 Russians.

Try and tell the people of Tibet, whose leader is the Dalai Lama that no one has ever been killed by an atheist.

Political ideology or religious doctrine...both are driven by senseless dogma...both ultimately lead to horrible human suffering and death.

 

[Flavus Aquila]

Communists werent seeking out an end to religion, religion just happened to be in the way of their domination of all mankind. And there is plenty of religion in China and Russie before during and after the communists came into power.

Right - and the inquisition was really about maintaining loyalty to the Spanish king. Sure.

The idea that people came together to form society because of religion is absurd. Do wolves, primates and other social animals practice religion or do they just socialize because its encoded into their DNA?

You're confusing socialisation with civilisation.

Naturally the early humans congregated together for the same reasons we do now, mutual protection, shared work, survival. Religion came afterwards as technology and our brains grew and we needed something to do while we sat around newly discovered fires.

That is a sensible theory, but that is not what the archaeological evidence indicates.

 

[GracieRuth]

Communists werent seeking out an end to religion, religion just happened to be in the way of their domination of all mankind.

Almost. It's true that communism was imperialistic. But that is not what drove it to persecute religion. After all, the most common method of imperialistic expanse is to HARNESS religion. Rather, Communism at its core is simply OPPOSED to religion in an idealistic sense, as Marx wrote, Religion is the opiate of the people, thus it needs to be exterminated. This idealistic purge was no different from a jihad.

Do wolves, primates and other social animals practice religion or do they just socialize because its encoded into their DNA?

I've never seen a wolf paint a portrait, or a chimp build a rocket to the moon. The whole point is that humans have evolved abilities of the mind that leave other animals in the dust.

 

[GracieRuth]

That is a sensible theory, but that is not what the archaeological evidence indicates.

Exactly.

 

[Flavus Aquila]

Political ideology or religious doctrine...both are driven by senseless dogma...both ultimately lead to horrible human suffering and death.

Is there such a thing as a society that is not based on some political, or religious ideal? The Nat.Geo article's import is that the apparent answer would be: no.

Rousseau seemed to think that the cost of society outweighed the benefit and idealised the life of the 'noble savage'.

I personally think that peaceful society is possible, but that it requires two things: a peaceful, respect-cultivating uniting principle (ideology/religion); and the ability to defend itself from incursion (military, or ideological).

 

[Billy]

Almost. It's true that communism was imperialistic. But that is not what drove it to persecute religion. After all, the most common method of imperialistic expanse is to HARNESS religion. Rather, Communism at its core is simply OPPOSED to religion in an idealistic sense, as Marx wrote, Religion is the opiate of the people, thus it needs to be exterminated. This idealistic purge was no different from a jihad.

I've never seen a wolf paint a portrait, or a chimp build a rocket to the moon. The whole point is that humans have evolved abilities of the mind that leave other animals in the dust.

Interestingly Communists have never practiced what marx wrote, its not practical. So you really cant say communism IS based on what it is not.

And Certain apes have drawn pictures, and you have seen apes go to the moon, theyre called Human beings.

Religion came AFTER socialization, which is the essence of civilization. Before there was religion people were still living together, still existing in groups, THAT is what civilization is based on. Just because that simple recipe got complicated with technology and religion doesnt mean that religion began the whole thing, thats a joke.

 

[Billy]

Right - and the inquisition was really about maintaining loyalty to the Spanish king. Sure.

Ummm... yes in effect. It was. They wanted the Jews, and Muslims out, unifying the country under 1 religion was very profitable for the King AND QUEEN of Spain at the time, they went from ruling 1 little dinky portion of Northern Spain to ALL of spain. Just had to get those pesky Jews and Muslims out 1st. And that was just 1 of the inquisitions, there have been more then a few over the course of Western History.

You're confusing socialisation with civilisation.

And yet there is no civilization without socialization. This isnt a chicken and egg argument, socialization begat civilization, one portion of civilization was religion.

That is a sensible theory, but that is not what the archaeological evidence indicates.

Oh you will just have to prove that then with some sort of evidence, really honestly, just point me to wherever you get your facts from that shows that the majority of archeological evidence say that religion came 1st.

 

[Billy]

Is there such a thing as a society that is not based on some political, or religious ideal? The Nat.Geo article's import is that the apparent answer would be: no.

Rousseau seemed to think that the cost of society outweighed the benefit and idealised the life of the 'noble savage'.

I personally think that peaceful society is possible, but that it requires two things: a peaceful, respect-cultivating uniting principle (ideology/religion); and the ability to defend itself from incursion (military, or ideological).

Religion and political dogma are rationalizations for power grabbers to grab power and enforce their will on people they deem weaker then they are. Human societies always form for the same reason. Survival and protection. Its encoded into us just like its encoded into wolves and apes, and other animals. Incredibly we are all related, humans, apes, wolves etc with a common ancestor somewhere up the chain. SO it makes sense that we all perform the same actions in our own ways, we all have essentially the exact same programming. Just because we dont sniff each others butts and bite each other on the neck for dominance (wait scratch that, yes we do) We do the exact same things for the same reasons, we just found a way to make it look pretty. Its not our genes, its God! Its not our nature, it the Republicans!

This whole thread reminds me of the time I was invited to a friends bday party at some seedy club in New Haven, it was packed with 18-21 year olds, mostly Puerto Ricans who can be pretty raunchy in that atmosphere (it was latin night) I was standing there almost a foot taller then everyone looking over the crowd laughing, the music, the dancing, the ass grinding, how in one part of the song the DJ would have the girls go WHOOP WHOOP and then the guys would go WOOMP WOOMP, it looked like a bunch of mating fucking simians to me... and I just laughed and laughed and laughed... oh yeah, we are SOooooooo evolved, so much better then monkeys and wolves and "lesser creatures" with our inventions of religion and rationalization... pathetic!