Inspired by The Lord!

Links to very cool things
Before I start ranting I'd like to share a couple of links courtesy of Brainsturbator. Check this out while it lasts - free knowledge:
http://docquan.com/lib_dead.html
And also good suggestions of ways to kick society's arse, but in a nice way!
http://www.brainsturbator.com/site/comments/10_ways_you_can_fight_fascism_around_the_world/
I may write a little critique of this article myself at some point.

God
Anyway, to business (he says, clinking his glass), and to the bit where I really annoy my (few)monotheistic friends.

I have a MySpace friend known as The Lord (guess who he's satirizing) who recently sent out a bulletin. It was actually an excerpt from someone's blog which was used to ask a simple question: If you met God today, what question would you ask him? A good question? It was quite well responded to anyway, but there was one question conspicuous by its absence. So I asked it.

I would ask him to stop pretending to be the only god.

Okay, who have I upset?

Religious Dogma
Everyone who answered the question had a very clear idea of God (as if this is a name). It was the assumed model as taught by schools and parents across the western world for the last 1500 years. The omnipotent all-father, exclusive and entire. Even the ones that asked silly questions were making that assumption, that the concept of God is entirely singular.

It's pretty obvious why - we've been brought up in a monotheistic society and this is what has been taught. But at the same time everyone is taught about Pagan civilizations in history as part of a normal education. British education leans heavily towards Egypt, Greece and Rome in this case. We're taught from a very early age about Roman gods, although we aren't expected to consider their existence in the present day. We are taught that the god of the Bible exists now.

Obviously, until I came along, no Pagans had responded.

Anthropology
Anthropologists have an accepted and standardized evolutionary pattern for the development of religion. Basically it states that you begin with primitive animism, which is a belief that everything is alive in some way and that there are spirits all around. The next step is polytheism which has many gods, usually related to natural phenomena like rivers or thunder.
The final, and thus the highest, step is monotheism. This is the belief in one infinite, indivisible, omnipotent and omniscient God (note the capital letter).

Oh, yeah?
I believe that the anthropologists have got it wrong. The natural (ie. unforced from above) religion of human beings is a combination of animism and polytheism, and the rise of monotheism was due to political machination. In other words, war, violence and oppression

I can't prove any of this stuff, nor am I going to try. What I am going to do is put forward a basic model of what might have happened with some evidence to support it. I'm indebted to Prof EO James and his book "The Beginnings of Religion" for the inspiration.

Let's start with a simple polytheistic society. There are many gods who rule over various aspects of people's lives and many people worshipping them. Some people prefer some gods over others, even having patron deities. For instance, a midwife would normally be expected to be a devotee of a goddess of childbirth, a merchant would worship a god of trade. This doesn't mean that the other gods would be denied, simply that there would be a natural bias. This happens amongst Pagans even today - I have a patron deity in Dionysos, although what that says about me I'll leave the reader to decide.
It is also normal for certain tribes to have a patron deity, often considered the ancestor of that tribe. That, then is our picture of an ordinary polytheistic society in, say, the Middle East around 2000 BCE.

Now let's consider a particular tribe. A wandering and warlike group of people searching for a land in which to live, and willing to fight like demons to get and keep it. Just for the sake of argument, let's call this tribe of several thousand individuals the Hebrews. At this time the Hebrews are polytheistic although, as befits a people led by a fearsome warrior-priesthood, their prime deity is a thunder and mountain god. Let's call him Yahweh.
Because the cohesion of the Hebrews is based on male dominance, due to the need for physical strength and mobility which isn't available to pregnant women and nursing mothers, Yahweh's power increases. This isn't to say that Yahweh himself increases, but the political power of his priesthood. The worship of other deities such as Astarte, the queen of heaven, tends to become overlooked in favour of Yahweh, possibly being relegated to private rather than public worship.

Over a long period of time the worship of other gods would become proscribed. Strictly, this isn't Yahweh's fault, but that of his warrior-priests. If other gods are worshipped then there is a dissolution of political power via a multitude of temples, but if only one god is worshipped then the power to control a society through that god resides entirely with the priests of that god. Every now and then the people would turn back to the old gods, but this would be severely punished. Eventually the old gods would be all but forgotten and Yahweh would become not a god, but God.
Outside of that tribe, conquered people would be forced to acknowledge and worship the god of their conquerors, and in time the worship of their own gods would be forbidden to prevent revolt. There aren't many steps from "My god is bigger than your god" to "My God is the only God and yours doesn't even exist"

History is written by the winners
All of the above is conjecture, of course! It's interesting, though, how a cursory study of the bible can lead to some interesting polytheistic conclusions. Here are a few examples:

The word Elohim is plural, and God is said to make man in "our image".

There are multitudinous references to Baal, Moloch and Ashtoreth (Astarte) or the Ashtoreths, as well as other gods, with serious injunctions against their worship.

The first two commandments are prohibitions against the worship of other gods.

Other gods are often called "false", but does this mean non-existent or simply untruthful ("Your god tells fibs! Na na ne na na!")?

The episode of the Golden Calf (Exodus 32) almost stands all on its own. The people had their oppressive leadership removed for a while and immediately returned to their natural religion! The bible even calls the Hebrews stubborn, on a regular basis, because they don't want to do what Yahweh tells them.

The wisest man in the entire book, Solomon, turned from Yahweh to the worship of the gods of his wives' countries (1 Kings 11 - check it out!)

And finally, my favourite - Psalms 82:1-7
1God standeth in the congregation of the mighty; He judgeth among the gods.
2How long will ye judge unjustly and accept persons of the wicked? Selah
3Defend the poor and fatherless; do justice to the afflicted and needy.
4Deliver the poor and needy; rescue them out of the hand of the wicked.
5They know not, neither will they understand. They walk on in darkness: all the foundations of the earth are out of course.
6I have said, "Ye are gods, and all of you are children of the Most High."
7But ye shall die like men and fall like one of the princes.

The highlights are my own, and the whole thing has obviously been politicized to make other gods look bad, but it does look like the bible's editors missed a bit with this one!

A final prayer
So, with all the above in mind, I'd just like to say this:

Yahweh. Will you please stop thinking that you're the only god. Will you please accept your place as the mountain/thunder god of a middle-eastern tribe. If you do this you won't have anything to prove any more. You can be happy and content without world domination. There will even be other gods to talk to, when they eventually forgive you. Bullies like you are obviously compensating for feelings of inadequacy. Go and talk to your mother.

If I've offended anyone with this article, think only this - what the hell does he know?

Love,
Seán