What do you think sparked Ancient Greeks into believeing in polytheism?

Question

Did they just make it up? Do you think in their eyes there was a source of truth? What do you think sparked this belief system?

Answer 1

There are many speculations. The most common speculation is that the higher ups made them up in order to control thier people.

However in doing alot of research behind alot of ancient religions I have found alot of things that would denounce this therory.

The first interesting thing that i found out was most of the ancient religions were about 98% the same. Even there Gods were the same (different names, but exactly the same thing). This wouldn't be anything if the religions I looked at were close together, only a couple or today. However I am talking about every religion I have researched from all over the globe at pretty close to the exact same timeline.

If you want a real eye turner. Research the Aztec sun God, apolo, and a few other sun Gods of the time period. You will notice (if memory serves me correctly) blond hair, rides a horse drawn golden carriage, and is either the son or the brother of son of the God of Gods. This is not the only simularity; laws, culture, the relationship between Gods and men, and of cource thier wars (parrellel everywhere sun god vs war god as an example).

As you noticed I am mostly going to use Aztec compared to either Greek mythology or Egytion mythology for some of these points. The reason why is they are a great distance apart before there was an effective mode of travel between the two. In other words it would have been next to impossible for information to spred to the Aztecs.

The second point is again with the Aztec but now I will use the Egyptions. The wierd thing here is there temples. It can be explained many different ways, however to the extent that the pyramids and the Aztec temples are simular is amazing. In other words people saying that they are simular because of triangles are better for wind conditions and such are not really looking at the buildings. In just about every detail including the inside is to simular to explain away by chance.

I could go on and on about simularities. I've done alot of research on the subject but I thing you get this point. From beliefs, Gods, ect. ect., they are very much the same.

Now for what all this means. No, it does not mean that Gods ever exsisted there are many other kinds of explainations for this (some are more logical and some are down right absurd (however if they can not be explained away without a shadow of a doubt they need to be included with the causes).

1. The first cause is chance. In other words like the common therory which I think is absurd needs to be included. The leaders made up Gods in order to control the people. All of the simularities are mearly coinsidental.

2. There were the Gods. Again this is a really absurd idea. The reason i say this is because example: if Apollo was the Sun God of many different religions then why is there all of these different names for him. It could be because of different languages however no matter where I go in the world my name remains the same: James for example.

3. Aliens this is always going to be a on all of these topics as an alternative means for such a thing until we have scanned the entire universe or we meet them.

4. Sorry I forgot another way for a second. Atlantis or other technologies they had back then that we don't know they had back then. Another one that will not be answered until certain extreme circumstances is made; we start time traveling or we find those technologies/Atlantis. I know Atlantis is only 1 of a bunch of questionable cities. I just use it as an example.

5. My personal belief. All Gods are actually the same one and only God (even in todays time). This God shows him/herself in many different ways in order for many people to follow him/her. Some times he/she shows multiple for some people and none to others. However all are his/her people.

Which path is up to us to decide. However since I went onto this subject you should research even todays laws in religion and relize again that thier Gods say pretty much the exact same thing. Some have some extra laws and such, but the major laws are all the same.

And again I will repeat this of Athiests to make myself clear on the matter. If you are meant to be an Athiest then you are meant to be an Athiest. My God does not hate you or anything like that because you are an Athiest and no bad things will befowl upon you. In other words as long as you are good (most everybody knows the difference between what is right and what is wrong) then you will go to heavan. And if you are one of the people that don't know the difference my God will understand.

the reason I say my God instead of just God is to not offend anybody. In other words my beliefs are different then others so I am making that clarification.

If you have any questions e-mail me. I do not believe in converting or anything like that. I am just using the research I did a while ago to answer your question. I will answer any question asked of me with an openness and honesty.

Answer 2

Objectively, mythology just means tales about gods and how various things began, so it applies to all religions. Many religions have lost all of their followers in time, and this is what happened to the ancient Greek Olympic religion. Greece was conquered by Macedonia and then Rome, and conquerors often force their religions upon the conquered peoples. Rome had a religion with most gods corresponding to those of the Greeks, e.g. Zeus was Jupiter, his wife Hera was Juno, etc. They also added some Persian and Egyptian gods to their pantheon. Eventually, the Roman Emperor Constantine became a Christian and made that the state religion. The first answer is wrong to say the Hebrew relgion is superior to the Greek one. He mentions ridiculous fantasies in the Greek one, but he ignores fantasies just as ridiculous in the Hebrew one. Which religions survive involves some luck and public relations. No religion is anything more than fiction.

Answer 3

They were already into the polytheism. It wasn't until the unfortunate spread of catholicism thay they were forced to follow one of two ultimatums; die and keep believing in their multiple god system, or live on earth for the brand-new single MALE god theory.

It never was about them sparking an immediate interest in polytheism, it was their desire to keep their beliefs alive to this day, where the polythiestic belief system has endured.

Answer 4

Every ancient religion was politheistic; from Sumer on all the religions up to the 6th century BC (when Hebrews during their captivity in Babylon came up with the idea of a single male God) were politheistic. In the Bible too (Genesis) God says 'Behold, man has become one of US' and 'Let'S make man at OUR own image...'. Some Christians claim that the Bible refers to the Holy Trinity but that's historically ABSURD since the concept of Holy Trinity didn't exist at the time the Book of Genesis was written; it was instead 'created' at the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD, nearly 400 years after Genesis was compiled;)....The idea of a single God is much less plausible than that of several deities;)

Answer 5

I think that there has always been some need for people to believe in something just the same as there is now. There's never any real truth but I'm sure it was comforting to them as most modern day religion is to people now. It's like an adult Santa Claus.

Answer 6

Well it just makes sense doesn't it? In a time when science was primitive, the obvious thing to believe would be that there was some sort of being behind every natural phenomenon. I think it started with this and stemmed from there.

Answer 7

Polytheism is the attempt to explain natural phenomena and circumstances that exist outside of our limited sphere of control. In ancient Greece each thing (whether it was Zeus with the thunderbolts or Poseidon who controlled the seas) was assigned a god to explain the uncertainty of the phenomenon or element.

While the sea god Poseidon (brother of Zeus) and Zeus himself were the most powerful of the gods in Greece, ancient Egypt's most powerful gods revolved around different phenomena such as Ra god of the Sun. No thunderbolt or sea gods for them.

Many cultures began consolidating gods and creating monotheism. They began to make the gods into "angels" and roll them under one all powerful god like we see in Christianity, Islam and Judaism today.

Hinduism is an interesting religion. They have many gods but all are under Brahman the one true god. This is an interesting example of a polytheistic religion in transition to monotheism.

Answer 8

I think they were exposed to other cultures all the time. When you see a shift in the mythology, such as the Titans being overthrown by the Olympian gods, or Hestia giving up her seat for Dionysus, it usually means that another group came into power.

Answer 9

It wasn't until Judiasm that a monotheistic belief was followed. All previous cultures were polytheistic.

Answer 10

That belief has been around for so long.. I also wonder when that originated, and where. God of the Sun, God of the Moon, etc...