(FB 1545522537 Timestamp)
THE OLDEST RELIGION?
—“Which is the world’s oldest religion? What is the evidence of it?”— Quora
The correct question is â??What is the oldest political religion?”, because that is the function of all surviving religions from the Axial period. Sumerians first wrote down their religions in 3500 BCE and most political religions evolved evolved from competition with theirs. We see evidence if organized religion in Anatolia from 8â??9,000 bc, predating stonehenge by 6000 years.
It appears we developed religious practices (what we call sacred, but is more correctly, suppression of all self interest, status signal, and dominance expression ) no less than 40k years ago. There was our first and longest dark age around 20â??21k bc. Then practices resumed, around 13k bc.
it wasnâ??t that long – about 8000 bc – until farming, and farming creates folk religions in an and around anatolia -still burial focused.
Around 5500 bc the indo europeans developed sacrificial religion, and spread it – man now bargaining with the gods.
And again, by 3300 we see the rapid development of political religion in every region of eurasia.
|Religion|: Burial > Sacrificial > Political > [Theraputic]