What's the chronological order of the inception of each religion? I've got a very rough idea of some but here's an ill-informed guess....
Egyptian Gods - 3,500 years ago? Greek/Roman Gods - 3,000 years ago? Buddhism - 2,500 years ago? (OK, not strictly a religion) Judaism - 2,200 yrs? Chrisitanity - 2,000 years ago (easy one) Islam - 1,500 years ago Protestantism - 600 years ago Mormenism - 200 yrs?
Feeble effort, I know, with many omissions and inaccuracies displaying my paltry grasp of elementary history. Can anyone improve upon it?
Originally posted by Combover: What's the chronological order of the inception of each religion? I've got a very rough idea of some but here's an ill-informed guess....
Egyptian Gods - 3,500 years ago? Greek/Roman Gods - 3,000 years ago? Buddhism - 2,500 years ago? (OK, not strictly a religion) Judaism - 2,200 yrs? Chrisitanity - 2,000 years ago (easy one) Islam - 1,500 years ago Protestantism - 600 years ago Mormenism - 200 yrs?
Feeble effort, I know, with many omissions and inaccuracies displaying my paltry grasp of elementary history. Can anyone improve upon it?
Oldest 'religion': Judaism, now about 4000 years old. If you want to classify worship of Eyptian 'gods' religion, then they start about 3000BC.
Ergo, the world's oldest practicing religion is Judaism, which kinda makes sense bearing in mind Christianity, Catholicism, Islam et al all branch from it.
I think the Sumerian religion pre-dates the Egyptians, plus archeologists claim to have found evidence of religious godess worship going back at least 20,000 years.
Originally posted by Greenjack: I think the Sumerian religion pre-dates the Egyptians, plus archeologists claim to have found evidence of religious godess worship going back at least 20,000 years.
Wow. 20,000 years is impressive although, of course, some religions would've started way before that....and probably died out way before that, too. But actual evidence for 20,000 years ago is remarkable. Anyway, with a meagre amount of research, here's an updated list...
Confucianism - 7,000 yrs - 'I Ching' possibly derived from 7,000 yr old divination technique but more certainly 5,000 years old. Confuscious himself was born about 2,500 yrs ago. Egyptian Gods - 5,000 yrs Judaism - 4,000 yrs (Abraham born about then although Moses, Judaism founder, was 500 yrs later) Zoroastrianism - 3,500 yrs Hinduism - 3,500 yrs - The Rig Veda originated. Hinduism may have origins much earler than this. Greek/Roman Gods - 3,000 yrs??? Jainism - 2,600 yrs - Mahavira, founder Shintoism - 2,500 yrs - although has its derivations much earlier. Buddhism - 2,500 yrs - Buddha born Christianity - 2,000 yrs Islam - 1,300 yrs Sikhism - 600 yrs Protestantism - 600 yrs Unitarianism - 500 yrs Mormonism - 170 yrs Jehova's Witness - 130 yrs Rastafarism - 75 yrs
I got most of my data from the excellent potted histories on the BBC site... http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/index.shtml ...although the sites provided by 600cc earlier in this thread are good, too. Just think, only ONE of these religions is right. Or maybe even that one isn't quite right and we're all going to perish...aaaaaaaahhh!
It depends what you are measuring I suppose. For instance, Judaism/Christianity, you could say it dates back to 4004BC (Bishop Ushers date for the creation).
However historically the first archeological dateable event is probably King Davids time, somewhere around 1000BC.
The first drafts of the Bible are most probably started around 700BC...
Forgive me, I'm not totally au-fait with the 'history' on these pages, but are you sincere in your 'beliefs' or just a wind-up merchant?
Even if one believes that Jimi Hendrix created the Universe in between songs, surely you should accept that there is the slightest possibility that you may actually be wrong, no?
I'm a secular sort who likes reasoned evidence for explanations of anything and everything. Perhaps you would like to try it?
Would these very early tribal religions be termed superstitions? And how would you define paganism? A number of people call themselves pagans now. Is it any religion that is not Christianity, or a religion with multiple gods?
I would say that Protestantism, Mormons (Church of Christ of the Latter Day Saints), Jehovah's Witnesses etc etc, are all branches of the Christian church - why haven't you included Roman Catholicism? Nazarenes?(before Catholicism)
The Sumerians worshipped many gods, chief and most powerful of which was En-lil. There is a very interesting book called "From Sumer to Jerusalem" by John Sassoon, putting forward that idea that the Jews were decended from the Sumerians. Worth a read if you are interested.
Originally posted by pepinouska: There is a very interesting book called "From Sumer to Jerusalem" by John Sassoon, putting forward that idea that the Jews were decended from the Sumerians. Worth a read if you are interested.
Definitely interested, thanks!!
I think you should include all religions i.e. pagan, abrahamic etc. After all each one considers itself to be e real religion. It's not for one group to decide which are real or not.
Originally posted by Greenjack: ..................... .........I think you should include all religions i.e. pagan, abrahamic etc. After all each one considers itself to be e real religion. It's not for one group to decide which are real or not.
Good point. We're all going to be well miffed if it turns out Zeus and his gang are the real ones, aren't we? As I said above, only one of all these religions can possibly be right, and it doesn't take much imagination to think that even that one isn't quite the ticket.
Oldest 'religion': Judaism, now about 4000 years old.
Weird... I could have sworn it came up in Trivial Pursuit once that Hinduism was the oldest still being practiced.
Don't think so - earliest known Hindu god about 3.5k BC
So the prize for the oldest religion still being practiced is.....
Errrrmmm, Judaism or Hinduism. I'd probably plump for Hinduism although it's probably evolved a bit from its origins whereas Judaism has maybe been more recognisably the same for longer.
Anyway, that wasn't my main objective. The main thrust was to put all the religions into a kind of perspective to make it clear that none of them is exceptional. These faiths pop up all the time and it's simply extraordinary that each set of adherents think that their faith is THE one. If you presented a Martian with all the data on all the religions I wonder which one he'd choose to follow (assuming you could persuade him that there was anything in it at all).
Hinduism is the oldest religion and the Vedic teachings have been followed for thousands of years. Many remains have been found of humans that were millions of years old and so did not fit into the theory of evolution.
Our scripture details just how old it really is:
“At the present moment we have just passed through five thousand years of the Kali-yuga, which lasts 432,000 years. Before this there was the Dvapara-yuga (800,000 years), and before that there was Treta-yuga (1,200,000 years). Thus, some 2,005,000 years ago, Manu spoke the Bhagavad-gita to his disciple and son Maharaja Iksvaku, the king of this planet earth.”
Because it is the oldest it does not have one founder like Christianity and Islam. And also the vedic texts are very specific and provide the most detailed descriptions of God and his activities.
Also, someone in this thread wrote "earliest known Hindu god about 3.5k BC" but this is nonsense. The Bhagavad Gita was spoken by Lord Shri Krishna and that was 5000 years ago. Also some of the earliest settle ments have been found in India, showing that the civilastions that lived there were not premative but highly advanced.
Please chant 'Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare. Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare'.
Originally posted by Prakash333: .... Also some of the earliest settle ments have been found in India, showing that the civilastions that lived there were not premative but highly advanced.
Thanks Prak' Do you have any referrences? I have read suggestions that there have been advanced civilisations pre-dating our current one (I use the term loosely ) for which evidence has virtually dissapeared. Sounds quite feasible if you fit it into a 2 million year time frame.
) for which evidence has virtually dissapeared. Sounds quite feasible if you fit it into a 2 million year time frame.
