Where Did This God Thing Come From
Some cave art like this is dated as much as 40,000 years ago. Until recently most of it was 15-18,000 years old. To put this in perspective our human-like ancestors go back 200,000 to 300,000 years. A scientist in the link believes even older cave art will be discovered in African in future years.
While I had a minor in anthropology in grad school, I don't want to portray myself as knowing a lot about it. But my curiosity remains about where customs and beliefs came from. Those who wrote the Bible had ancestors who lived in caves and drew pictures on walls. The thread from those in the cave to today continues.
Whether we are talking about isolated societies as recently as the 1500's or those of 40,000 years ago, artifacts and drawing depicted something similar. It is evidence our ancestors believed animals held spiritual powers. This evidence comes from many half man half animal depictions. They seem to reflect thinking that animals have power over humans.
There a depictions of shamans performing rituals involving animals. There are, as we know, sacrifices of animals in the Bible reflecting a link between animals and the spiritual world.
They is also evidence our ancestors saw the after world as being in the earth and not in the sky. By the time Greeks came along gods were sky gods as they remain today. But that was after societies had become stationary farmers and herders. Prior societies has to hunt animals and live in fear of being attacked by them. No wonder their minds were preoccupied with animals and the spirits they held.
We are just starting to understand how the gods we worship today came into our heads.
Whether we are talking about isolated societies as recently as the 1500's or those of 40,000 years ago, artifacts and drawing depicted something similar. It is evidence our ancestors believed animals held spiritual powers. This evidence comes from many half man half animal depictions. They seem to reflect thinking that animals have power over humans.
There a depictions of shamans performing rituals involving animals. There are, as we know, sacrifices of animals in the Bible reflecting a link between animals and the spiritual world.
They is also evidence our ancestors saw the after world as being in the earth and not in the sky. By the time Greeks came along gods were sky gods as they remain today. But that was after societies had become stationary farmers and herders. Prior societies has to hunt animals and live in fear of being attacked by them. No wonder their minds were preoccupied with animals and the spirits they held.
We are just starting to understand how the gods we worship today came into our heads.
Man's yearning for a spiritual experience dates back to Adam & Eve. God did not rule from a throne on earth such that all mankind could see or hear Him in the flesh. People have the capacity to know 'right' from 'wrong'. They know when to hide their shameful acts and when to be transparent about their normal or exemplary acts.
ReplyDeleteThen God became Man in Jesus Christ. He lived among mankind during an age where mass communication, video recording, audio recordings, etc. did not exist.
Apparently, He wants us to believe in Him and respond to His commands without the benefit of what non-believers would classify as proof. So be it.
Matt "Man's yearning for a spiritual experience dates back to Adam & Eve."
DeleteThat's what the blog is about, i.e., where did the idea of an Adam and Eve come from? The first the world heard about Adam and Eve was when the Old Testament was written. The was maybe 3,000 years ago. Human have been here for 200,00-300,000 years.
The evolution of man, homo sapiens, has a predominantly biological basis. At some point, God created the first man with a soul. He then created the first woman with a soul. When that took place is unknown to me. Also unknown to me is the evolution of man prior to Adam and Eve. It's something I hope to know after my race on earth is run and I can ask God.
DeleteThe idea for Adam and Eve came from God, who also inspired the writers of Genesis.
Are you sure the first humans didn't come about 199,000 years ago? Where did the first humans live?
as far as I know (admittedly not much) the only real scientific knowledge that we have of 200K old humans is a lot of bones. very few human artifacts. we, of course, are pushing our time lines farther back. maybe some day? one odd thing tho' it seems that quite a few hominoids were popping up at about the same time that we arrived on the scene. also, we do know that the Neanderthals buried then with some sense of reverence. and how old are the various Stonehenges around the world? as I recall, they don't date back 200-400k years. that said, there is one thing that stands out: the Jewish creation story is quite different than most of the creation stories that we know about.
Deletelooked it up. Stonehenge is a relative newcomer:3K-2K BC, Neolithic-bronze age. I think that the best guess as to the place of our origins is eastern Africa.
DeleteOnly unreasoning animals like apes don't understand the "God thing" and neither do their descendants. Since atheists claim to be the descendants of apes, then I can see why they don't understand God either. ;)
ReplyDeleteJon wants to know where the story of A&E came from. the short answer obviously is that it came from the Hebrew scriptures. I have read recently, however, that something of the story could be traced back to the mists of human origins. for what it's worth then: our remote ancestors slept in trees, went about naked, lived in small tribes, got their sustenance as gatherers, all in a congenial African climate. along came agriculture, towns and cities, more complex economies, migration, warfare and all things that Pandora let out of her jar. life was no longer a simple animal existence. got rather nasty in fact. so we were thrust out of our African Eden, had to toil and till the soil, wear clothing, live with conflict, live with a sense of alienation. you get the picture. for my part, I don't totally agree with this story. yet it does seem to make sense. and is very interesting besides. .
ReplyDeleteOf course atheists can't explain where DNA came from. A tiny particle invisible to the naked eye like God is, that contains all the genetic coding to form even one human being must in in our heads....at least according to Jon since he has no explanation for its existence or where it came from. So what's in the human mind is when people deny the only explanation for the design of even one human as being God, they make up hilarious ever-changing stories that can't be verified in reality and don't even make good fiction stories! But atheists love to live in their imaginations which now includes genders. ;) As for our ancestors, no they didn't live in trees, nor did they descend from imaginary un-named unreasoning animals, nor did they live for millions of years and coincidentally, only around the time that God created Adam did they become human beings.lol. But only in the secular world do badly written fiction stories make good true stories. ;)
ReplyDelete