isn't religion and belief more about what is wanted to be true, rather than what is?

Question

if we shut our eyes and say it enough, will it materialize and reality as we know it change?

can beliefs shape history? has history been shaped by belief?

Answer 1

Yes, to the overall question. Good insight.

Beliefs do change reality, but no amount of belief in gods will produce gods. It'll only produce more believers.

Answer 2

Not necessiarily.Sometimes but not always. While there are many false religions and false beliefs, there are many beliefs that are based on eternal absolutes and facts. Most religions are man-made but there is only one that is true because it comes from The One who is true - Jesus Christ.
But man has a free will and he can come up with a lot of different beliefs and religions. All the man made religions have one thing in common - it's all about man. Man doing something to better himself; man reaching up to God; man trying to be good, etc. Christianity is the only religion where God reaches down to man. And it's the only one that has good news.

Yes, beliefs do affect our choices and our choices do affect history - even if those choices aren't based in truth.

Answer 3

No, you are describing the difference between desire and belief. Desire is what you wish were true, belief is what you are experiencing to be true. The trick is to marry the two. It takes more than wishful thinking, to grow an idea into a belief. And yes, what individuals feel to be true shapes their actions, and thus their private and public history. And of course, their experienced daily lives, then reinforce, what they feel to be true.(their beliefs)

Answer 4

Things will only be understood as far as one with fear will believe them. What is true is all about you but with your eyes shut how will you know it?

History is past made into words how you understand it is how you hear the words! If you listen and read and do not let the words speak then you will only hear what you want to hear based on the fear of your belief. However if you hear without your fear then will the words show themselves for you to understand.

what sunman and zentrinity say is very true

Answer 5

Good question, Resource. All religions are man-made institutions that are trying to explain the inexplicable--God. While these religions are very different, they almost always share two things in common with each other: each one believes it alone has the full truth; and each one makes a separation between God and us.

Because they are all man-made institutions, all their rules, their laws (their do's and don'ts) are also man-made. Look at any religion, and you will see the restrictions and demands imposed--not by God or the gods--but by people who claim that these things have been revealed to them by God. What is interesting is that if all religions are truly revealed by God and not made-up by people, then that God described by all these religions is something very strange, because of all the contraditions.

For example, why is it considered seriously sinful to eat pork in Judaism and Islam, while it is okay to do so in Christianity? The Torah prohibits eating oysters. Until the 1960s, the Catholic Church taught that it was a mortal sin to wilfully eat meat on Fridays. When Catholics pray to Mary, the mother of Jesus, many non-Catholics are upset because they think of it as idolatry. Islam allows up to four wives, if the husband can afford to care for them equally. Christianity says one wife (at a time). While we're on this one, some religions allow divorce; others claim divorce is sinful. Some religions teach a woman should be subservient to the husband. Others teach that men and women are equal. The contradictions are endless.

Secondly, each religion creates a separation between us and God, either by claiming to have endowed its priests with powers that ordinary folks don't have, or by creating a whole series of rituals and ceremonies and prayers that are used to get God's attention and favor, as though God could be bribed by a dead lamb, a victim's heart, a bunch of money, chanting, incense, or constantly repeated prayers.

However, it is these sincere, but irrational, beliefs about what is God's will that definitely affect people's behavior, and therefore shape history, since history is simply an accounting of human behavior.

Look at the present world today. What you see are different religious factions killing each other left-and-right, and supposedly because it is God's will. Look at the 9/11 terrorists who killed nearly 3,000 people in New York in the name of a merciful and loving God--and crazy as it may seem, they did it in the name of God.

But Christians, too, have a long history of killing each other, and anybody else who didn't believe as they believed, in the name of a loving and merciful God. Look at the history of Europe: the spread of Christianity throughout Europe and the persecution of those who held on to the old religions; the spread of Islam through parts of Europe at the expense of the 'infidel' Christians; the Crusades, where both sides slaughtered in the name of God/Allah. Christians nearly wiped out the whole native populations of Central and South America. Missionaries spread their ignorance at the point of guns and swords across the Americas. The missionaries were dedicated people acting on what they believed to be true--that they alone could offer the savages salvation from the fires of hell. Religions have long been used to justify destroying other civilizations. Even Judaism used the belief in one God toclaim what they called the Promised Land, and to slaughter non-believers and to take Jerusalem from its original occupants, the Jebusites.

Religions have a long and bloody trail across the pages of history, and it can be argued that more wars and more violence have been done in the name of religion than anything else--except maybe for greed. But greedy people do use religion to gain power over others, too.

But as negative as I sound, the fact is that religions have also done some good in the world and helped to change history in positive ways, too. For example, in Europe monasteries became centers of learning, and many of the great universities of Europe began as monastic schools. Hospitals and care for the sick and dying were set up through religion. Religious people have inspired great literature and poetry and art. Islamic scholars preserved the writings of the ancient Greek writers and philosophers, without which the world would be poorer, indeed.

So, for good and for bad, religious beliefs do shape history.

Answer 6

that is an interesting angle on things. it is true that our beliefs are partially wishful projections, but also religions can be stuck in the past, stuck in the words and not focus on the intention of where the words are pointing.

history is shaped by beliefs. so is your future. you create your experiences and we co-create the world through our beliefs.

ask and it is given. the law of attraction. what ever you believe will be so- will be so. the trick is to focus on one thing- and not to keep choosing different things.

peace

Answer 7

History has definitely been shaped by belief, as beliefs have been used for justification for human actions for thousands of years. Justification of the worst sort of human actions, too.

Answer 8

No, it's about what the people at the top of the belief system want to be true, never poor are they?

Answer 9

your first question makes sense but the others don't.

yes that is how religious ideas were formed, because of people's hopes and imagination trying to create an alternate reality

Answer 10

sure the katholiek believe is the most killing ones off them all they did everything to make there bilieve number 1, many left there live for that