Reddit reviews The Evolution of God

for an overview of what it presents, go here. Video version. Basically the concept of Yaheweh evolved over about 6 centuries out of the old caananite pantheon, which included el, ashera (el's lover) and baal. Due to a combination of xeonphobia (thanks to being invaded over and over) and political unrest, certain prophets were given sounding boxes more than others, while other prophets were silenced.

Editors and redactors then went in and changed certain historical details or laws present in the torah and history books (see my previous post on Genesis 1 vs Genesis 2), king Josiah 'discovered' the book of deuteronomy (read: wrote a new set of more-totalitarian laws to unite the kingdom), and created stories and myths that made it seem like Israel's biggest problem was always turning to false gods, away from Yahweh (who merged personalities with El), the war god.

another good read that is the archaeological parallel to the karen armstrong book is "The Bible Unearthed" by Finklestein. It points out the archaeological findings of the transformation from polytheism, to monolateralism (belief in multiple gods but showing preference to one), to monotheism. It also points out the fact that there is no credible evidence for a large portion of the 'history' in the bible, such as the exodus, the wandering in the desert, the mass genocides; "Israel" was a people group that was already there, and just gained a new national identify thanks to very creative myth-weavers.

Finally, I'm currently reading "The Evolution of God" by Robert Wright (a journalist) who pulls together and condenses a lot of this information into one. He's an expert at literature surveying and information condensing.

Because no one has said it yet, The Evolution of God by Robert Wright (http://www.amazon.com/The-Evolution-God-Robert-Wright/dp/0316734918) is a great book that covers this topic thoroughly.

Everybody in this post needs to read The Evolution of God by [Robert Wright](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Wright_(journalist). It's the tale of the evolution of Judaic religion from polytheism through monolatry to monotheism, the evidence for this theological evolution that still exists in the Bible and from archaeology, and so on. For anyone wanting actual non-circular references for their positions. As I recall, all archaeological evidence points to the Israelite culture and kingdoms evolving in Israel, not from somewhere else.

Inb4 it's some anti-Semitic work, because it's not.

edit: a link.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Evolution-God-Robert-Wright/dp/0316734918

The book I linked explores that possibility. Some of the things the author goes into is how Yahweh started as simply one god in a large pantheon, and then the Jews started to worship him more than the other gods (the other gods still being recognized and significant) until the Jews turned to monotheism. Fascinating book.

Well, you're trying to believe in the god of your times. Go back, way back, to even primitive hunter-gatherer societies, and start tracing the evolution of god from that point.

You'll have a better appreciation for what god has been to different people over the years, and you won't be so bound to the particular flavor of god you were indoctrinated with. You may end up deriving a different belief in god, or no belief at all.

Whoa. There is a lot here.

1. I was experiencing panic attacks. I tried various ways of dealing with it, but as it turned out, I think I just needed something constant in mylife reminding me that its not all about me... if that makes sense.
   
   
2. I don't really understand what you mean by not believing in souls, you have no spiritual needs. Spirituality to me is just human, from superstitions (e.g. fortune cookies, beards for the playoffs) to full on shamanism. For me, its not about magic or souls or anything like that. Its about having a structure and mechanism, for tapping into that spiritual side.
   
   
3. Yes. I read this book. I also have some exposure to Buddhism, albeit 15 years ago.
   
   
4. Well nothing in particular. Laziness I suppose. I am convinced that most "spiritual" people who don't attend church don't because they like having Sunday mornings to themselves.
   
   There is a lot of chest-beating on the part of the religious right; nobody misses an opportunity to feel superior (kind of like r/atheism here). I'm sure that would turn a lot of people off. For the most part, however, I think that real thoughtfulness is just not incentivized in modern American society. So people just don't consider church important, even if they call themselves religious. And I fell into that category. I just fell into an egocentric mode.

https://www.amazon.com/Evolution-God-Robert-Wright/dp/0316734918

From the Stone Age to the Information Age, Robert Wright unveils an astonishing discovery: there is a hidden pattern that the great monotheistic faiths have followed as they have evolved. Through the prisms of archaeology, theology, and evolutionary psychology, Wright's findings overturn basic assumptions about Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and are sure to cause controversy.

If you are honestly interested in this, I highly recommend reading The Evolution of God by Robert Wright. This book reviews much of what historians know about how the modern idea of the christian god came to be. It regularly compares what the bible says to what historians think really happened in history. It is a great read and is written in a way that probably wont offend a christian who appreciates good scholarly work.

Ok, first off I'm not trolling nor am I a theist dumb dumb but here me out.

I'd argue that Atheism IS a form of religion and is in fact the next logical progression after Christianity.

I recently read an interesting book that got me thinking about this, The Evolution of God (http://www.amazon.ca/Evolution-God-Robert-Wright/dp/0316734918). The author talks about the progress from caveman religions all the way up to the modern day Christianity. In each religious iteration there is a reordering of the deities, a streamlining of the gods if you will. First we started out with many many gods that each control there respected domains and each time the major religions simplify these down. From multiple pagan gods to the set of gods worshiped in the roman/greek times to the set of god/angles/saints of the catholic religion to modern religions that just believe in a single divine god down to atheism that have cut out a single god all together.

However reason I would say the atheism is still a religion is that many of the beliefs from Christianity are still present but there is a lack of a single point of worship (unless you count Dawkins for some). Atheists still have the need to congregate together and to share there belief system and even try to convert others to their belief (for example putting atheist signs on buses, sticks in bibles at book stores, even arguing with your teacher when they bring up atheism is a religion, etc).

This is just something I've been pondering for the last while and its not intended to piss anyone off, what do you guys think?