Its Strange Our Most Popular Religion Came From the Middle East


It's fun to speculate about "what if" things had turned our differently. Along with that, it's serious to look at why they did turn out as they are. I'm talking, of course, about religion.

In graduate school I became fascinated with the native groups who inhabited parts of what is now Mexico, Central and South America.  According to archaeology digs, the groups we know about existed about the same time as those written about in the Bible. There were at least 200 different peoples. Later the more commonly known empires of the Incas and Aztecs dominated the region. These latter groups, like the Jews, Greeks and Romans of the Bible, were conquered by yet others, the Spanish.

While it is obvious people of European heritage and religion came to the Americas and defeated the natives who lived here, it is not obvious why the social structure and religion of Europe and before that the Middle East continues of dominate the minds of people here. If native religion and customs worked well here for thousands of years, maybe even from before the time of the Bible, why would they not be helpful today?

From discoveries that are on going, it is apparent the native societies in the Americas around the time attributed to Jesus were complex and sophisticated in many ways. They mastered the engineering of massive building and moving water from place to place. In order the construct these massive projects some manner of societal order was developed and functioned successfully. There is evidence they placed great spiritual importance on the night time stars.

Whatever American native populations believed, their version of sin and gods was lost because it was not preserved on paper. Or, if it was it was destroyed by conquerors.

While the invading Europeans did record various aspects of those cultures, they have not been studied like Christianity. Their gods might have something helpful for us today.

The ground we stand on today. our continent, holds secrets we should know more about.

Comments

  1. mark anthonySeptember 29, 2018 at 2:15 PM

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    1. Jon LindgrenSeptember 29, 2018 at 2:46 PM

      Yes, knowledgeable and sophisticated groups in many ways. They did not use the wheel nor use animals to increase human productivity as most others. But, they had a lot of things figured out.

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