When did the first large religious wars begin?

Question

From what I can see, without looking at many sources, the larger religious wars began with the Christians. Is it not strange that the religion that preaches love above all was the first to create such a monstrosity such as a religious war?

(I consider Christianity an offshoot of Judaism so don't say it began with them, I'm talking about large scale wars)

Answer 1

I think you'll find that religious wars began long before Christianity. Go back to ancient Egypt. You'll find that as soon as a pharoah decided that there was a single god, he was under seige from his own ministers.

It seems that religions which tolerated many gods were less likely to fight about religion, but even then, there were skirmishes. Often it was hard to distinguish that a war was strictly about religion as it occurred during or after an invasion when the conquerors attempted to eliminate the previous culture, including the previous religious beliefs.

Religion causes powerful emotions, but war is almost never strictly about religion. Religion may be the pretext, but usually, there are political reasons for the war. Look into the religious wars you're thinking of, and you'll see the political undertones which drove the war. The crusades are a perfect example. Granted, the idea of driving the infidel from the holy places was a powerful incentive for the nobles and commoners who went off to the Holy Land. But, under all of that, you had a society which was in the throes of political and social change, and the crusade was a handy way to direct all that anger.

Answer 2

religious wars probably started as soon as there was more than one religion.

But the scale of these things are relative. If you have a religious war between two small city states, it may not seem big to you, but at the time a city state was the biggest political entity around.

Answer 3

They began when Og the caveman bonked his brother Gog on the head because Og believed in the sun god and Gog believed in the moon god.

Seriously, there have been religious-based wars since man was created. Remember the first murder in the Bible was between two brothers over how to properly worship God.

Answer 4

Babel.....

Old testament....


your sister,
Ginger