The subject of religion tends to get lumped in with the belief in God. ( I have never seen a description of God that was not pathetic.) However, "religion" means way of life, the natives of Rapa Nui had a religion even without those stone images, so its important to make that distinction.

The big three religions, that are said to originate with someone named Abraham, have a conceited claim that one of these Gods is a better idea than the several they replaced. Of course you cannot use math or logic to support this notion, but for the average person's use, it probably seemed more convenient to have the Cosmos run by a king than a committee, back when Abraham assured his surrounding tribe that he alone was on intimate terms with this "King." Fortunately, for us all, social progress and public education have led to the spread of critical-thinking, so on average, people are not as easily convinced as they once were.

The two main types of Abrahmic God proponents are the "lay down the law" by what previous zealots wrote, and the glassy-eyed self-appointed representatives of God on Earth.
The human psyche, as exhibited so far, seems to have a penchant this second type of "God" fixation. To the average, rather uncomplicated person, these people seem charismatic, and I would guess they include Abraham, Jesus, Mohamed, Joseph"Mormon" Smith, and Jim "Kool-Aid" Jones.

Another parallel theme in the Big Three is that you cannot be a "good" or moral person unless you agree with them. That demand is used by all the Zealots, Prophets and assorted Holy men. Just how they pursue that claim is where Christianity and Mohammedanism diverge, and without making this comparison anymore long-winded, the differences are cultural. Its like real estate, its location, location, location. The tribes of the Islamic world are primitive and avoid progress. Christians, for what they have become, are heavily influence by 500 years of evolving Western social progress and attitudes.

Religio is from the Latin for binding together.

It has always been the pre-national, universal and almost eternal social binding. It still is, even though we now have other bindings like citizenship (a relatively recent development).

Poo-pooing it is just silly because we got here, on the back of thousands of years of religion. To dismiss it out of hand is like dismissing one's entire ancestry. Silly.

Frank wrote on Mar 26^th, 2018 at 6:44pm:


Exactly. Religion, times 3 Monotheisms, is based on Ancestry. The Jewish peoples of Judaism. The Muslim of Mohommedism and the detached Christians of Christianity.

Even Hinduism, Budhism scrap in as Religion due to their 'texts' - but their 'belief' system is not based upon a 'realistic' peoples - more, just another Mythology like Norse, Roman, Greek and USA SuperHeroes! 

Religion=Writing=Book=Religion

Aboriginal Dreamtime is NOT a Religion. It's a Mythology.
Egyptian beliefs are also a Mythology.

Religion of Judaism, Christianity & Mohommedism had a basis of 'fact' ...of people.

issuevoter wrote on Mar 26^th, 2018 at 12:28pm:


Do you think Christianity itself may have influenced that "500 years of evolving Western social progress and attitudes"?

Do you think it was progressive 2000 years ago?

Jasin are you playing a word association game that you forgot to tell us about?

"My invisible friend is better than your invisible friend. But at least they are both invisible friends".

Jasin, if you have ever bothered to read the facebook newspaper sites' comment section, you would notice the number of people who write in to express counterclaims to the newspaper articles. We don't believe everything that is shown to us.

Frank wrote on Mar 27^th, 2018 at 9:19pm:


Tsk, tsk, no source?  How unusual for you, Soren.

It is  Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason.