Many people find polytheism strange, I don't, I find it refreshing, what I don't understand is why so many people gave it up for montheism?
Many people find polytheism strange, I don't, I find it refreshing, what I don't understand is why so many people gave it up for montheism?
Monotheism came first. God (one) created the universe. All the other so called gods are actually fallen angels and I must advise against any contact with them. They are happy to decieve and make you join them in misery. We have free choice though, which God gave us and if we want to we can choose evil. It's worth remembering that that truth that we seek, especially us autistic people, is a person - God. There is only one truth and only one reality.
Why not give monotheism a chance? Isn't it infinitely more exiciting to know that one loving Father created all of creation. You as an individual were created for a purpose only you can fulfill. You are unique and important in His eyes. He loves you more than you can imagine and is always with you. If you want to know Him, he will let you and you will never regret it as the happiness of knowing Him is better than anything the world can offer. If you spend some time in the quiet and ask Him to let you know His presence He will do.... most often very gently as a feeling of intense well being and love. Aren't we made for truth? why seek the lies of the fallen angels. Lies are boring.
Monotheism came first.
The earliest known example of monotheism was introduced by the Pharaoh Akhenaten in ancient Egypt, around 1350 BCE, as far as we know archaeologically and historically at least. All known records of monotheism occur after the 1300’s BCE, seemingly around 600 BCE with Zoroastrianism, and 200 BCE with Judaism.
God (one) created the universe.
I take it you have not studied the book of Genesis so much, given that God said, "Let there be light" and so on and so forth with the expanse, water and land etcetera, and then further more ~ God said, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness . . . ” in that the God of gods El was talking with his divine consort the Goddess Ashera; and the divine council collectively referred to as being the ‘Elohim’, which is normally transliterated out in English as being ‘The Lord God’.
Also, the Greek texts use at minimum masculine, feminine and androgyne grammar, so Genesis can be transliterated so that God and the Goddess created the heavens and the earth, and as such the Goddess said, "Let there be light" and [on account of God] there was light, and so on ~ which of course goes a long way for those who have had it up to the back teeth with secular and or religious misogyny.
Further more, in Psalm 82, it states, (1) God presides in the great assembly; he gives judgement among the “gods”. So monotheism did not come first in the bible either, with the book of Psalms having been compiled in the last thousand years preceding up to the Christ event, and the last text having been composed about 500 years before hand.
All the other so called gods are actually fallen angels and I must advise against any contact with them.
The pantheon of the Gods became as far as humans account for them as being the hierarchy of the Angels, all of whom did not side with Lucifer in the rebellion, and most polytheists treat their pantheon of gods as being representatives of nature and as such the spirit of life (i.e., God) and practice in ceremonies and make offering just as Christians and Catholic do with Easter, which was originally and still is a polytheistic tradition also.
I was told that "Ashera" was female and linked to olive groves, I don't know enough about it to say if it has any truth to it. I've know that Elohim was plural and possibly female for years, it's one of those things which pops up every now and again when discussing these things.
I've never heard of 'The pantheon of the Gods [becoming] the hierarchy of the Angels who did not side with Lucifer in the rebellion...'. Thats a new one on me, where did you read that, I'd be interested in reading that for myself?
I think seeing a pantheon as being just, 'representatives of nature..' a bit limiting, I guess it depends on which or who's pantheon you're talking about, many are much much more than that.
The passages you have quoted from the OT are part of why I find Christianity so confusing, as the NT is supposed to be a sort of new begining, but it relies heavily on the OT for it's creation stories etc, which are mostly a hi/story of the Jews.
If we have been created from whatever led to sentient life on earth, I suppose it is possible that God/s came into being at that time. I often wonder how my mind came to inhabit my body. Ancient ancestor worship seemed to be a bit of a stretch too far to seriously consider in prehistoric cave burials, but nothing can rule it out.
I think that’s highly likely, as there is a long history of people drifting away and some of the church’s motives were suspect to say the least. Christians would say that the church is made up of imperfect people, but it never ceases to amaze me how some practices are so remote from the Jesus in the Gospels, in which Jesus enjoyed the company of women and other people who were considered outcasts.
I couldn’t help noticing that the Sistine Chapel in Rome was filled mostly with males today at the joint service in which the Pope and the King prayed. It didn’t look a welcoming place for women.
I think that the Gods came into being with the Universe and are maybe it's conciousness. But then I'm not entirely convinced about the Big Bang Theory either, it's a patched and tattered thing, I know there are plenty of people here who disagree with me on this.
There do seem to be a lot of commonalities between ancient religions, so I think the Gods have been with us since our begining. I know it's currently trendy to believe that humans created Gods and before that there was ancestor worship, but this to me seems an absurd and circular argument.
Sorry got to go and sort dinner out, back tomorow
I think people have a choice of what to believe, but sometimes they are trapped by circumstances in a very controlling kind of religion and belief.
Personally, I can’t get beyond the idea of a loving God allowing so much suffering in the world, and the question of who or what created God is the other major block that prevents me having faith.
I do believe that many have a yearning for something better than obliteration at death. Even though astronomy has proposed theories that can answer how our world came about, many have had a need for a powerful being (God) to have created the world that we see. Perhaps that is how religion developed in our earliest human ancestors, and like them, groups have divided and taken different paths around the world or in the form of religion.
I wonder if some Christians didn't like being told that they'd drifted away from what Jesus/God intended? I mean I don't think Jesus wanted the apparatus of the Roman state running his church, or at least he didn't say he did?
I wonder if some Christians didn't like being told that they'd drifted away from what Jesus/God intended? I mean I don't think Jesus wanted the apparatus of the Roman state running his church, or at least he didn't say he did?
I think that’s highly likely, as there is a long history of people drifting away and some of the church’s motives were suspect to say the least. Christians would say that the church is made up of imperfect people, but it never ceases to amaze me how some practices are so remote from the Jesus in the Gospels, in which Jesus enjoyed the company of women and other people who were considered outcasts.
I couldn’t help noticing that the Sistine Chapel in Rome was filled mostly with males today at the joint service in which the Pope and the King prayed. It didn’t look a welcoming place for women.