ATHEISTS, have you ever looked at it/thought about it like this?......?

Question

waaaaay back in 6th grade, when my social studies teacher was teaching us about ancient civilizations (Mesopotamia, etc) the way she worded something while talking about an ancient religion or two got me thinking... was religion nothing more than possibly what started out as the smartest thing government has ever done?

she was discussing Greek gods, and she asked us something along the lines of "don't you think that's a good idea?... telling someone 'if you don't do this and that then Zeus will strike you down with a thunderbolt', so they'd all obey the law?..." i thought it was a pretty poor way of putting it (I’ve never given this lady any credit for being particularly smart), but she had a point... and when you look into the ten commandments and start to think about it, wouldn't that really make such a wonderful community? apart from no murdering... just no gossiping, no envying something someone else has, no lying, no stealing... i have almost nothing positive to say about

religion today, but from a political standpoint… a good way to ensure that the citizens behaved themselves, etc….

so, am I just crazy, or does anyone else agree with me? Has anyone else here ever thought of it like that… or, again, am I just a bit “off my rocker”?…

Answer 1

Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful.

Answer 2

Not off your rocker at all - if you lok at the development of the city-states, all of them, regardless of their religious basis, made not only laws about those common things, but religious rules as well. For quite a number of communities, the ruling class was considered to have been put in that position by the grace of their god - a condition that still exists in England today, and until the 1950s in several other countries, including China. Some were even considered gods themselves, blurring the lines of religion and government irrevocably - Japan, China, Korea, Egypt are just a few of the countries where their rulers were considered gods.

It is indeed a good threat - you do this crime, not only do you face secular penalties, you face the wrath of your local god. So even if you get away with a crime, you would live in constant fear of the gods taking their wrath out on you.

Youre teacher was very smart - and brave, to say such a thing in a public school. But then, teaching voncepts like that was easier 20-30 years ago than it is now.

Answer 3

If unquestionably look at human beings critically you will come to the inescapable end that the actual layout of folk disproves the assumption of smart layout . To my eyes human beings have been needless to say not designed for the surroundings that they could function in nor the lives a writer could know that they could unquestionably lead in the journey that your center temperature is going up or down 5 tiers you're lifeless 3 days w/o water and you're lifeless 3 minutes below water you're lifeless human beings are fairly liable to dying by microbes Our dermis is actual punctured and we bleed to dying actual Our brains are not extraordinarily properly secure against violent blows to our skulls Our imaginitive and prescient would not stay stable for our lifetimes -nor do our tooth I have no thought what toddler or maternal mortality would desire to have been previously cutting-side drugs replace into invented even even though it might have been horrendous All of which factors to the reality that there wasn't an intelligence at the back of the layout I have little doubt that in case you gave this difficulty to a team of bio-mechanical engineering grad pupils that they could arise with a lots greater suitable layout.

Answer 4

One doesn't need religion in order to have a good or peaceful community. The commandments can be traced to earlier laws. Laws of life and community. Being able to live in cohesive society. Look at all the laws today. Do people follow them all? No. Utopia will not be obtained in less everybody thinks and acts the same. Do we really want that?

Answer 5

I think that's a pessimistic way to view people. I believe that most people are generally good and do not need religions to tell them how to be good. It is true that different societies have used religion to control people, but they could have made good citizens of people by educating them as well. For the most part, governments that use religion as a tool of control use it to make people go to wars and fight for causes they normally wouldn't care about.

Answer 6

Hey rvsagf12345,

No you're not crazy. In fact, your theory about leaders using religion to control the people has many prominent backers.

How can you have order in a state without religion? For, when one man is dying of hunger near another who is ill of surfeit, he cannot resign himself to this difference unless there is an authority which declares, "God wills it thus." Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet.
— Napoleon Bonapart (1769-1821) Emperor of France

It is for the good of states that men should be deluded by religion.
— Marcus Terentius Varro, (B.C.E. 116-29)

Religion is the opiate of the masses.
— Karl Marx

Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.
— Napoleon Bonapart (1769-1821) Emperor of France

Since the masses of the people are inconstant, full of unruly desires, passionate and reckless of consequence, they must be filled with fears to keep them in order. The ancients did well, therefore, to invent gods, and the belief in punishment after death.
— Polybius, Histories (ca. B.C.E 125)

Answer 7

way back in the 6th grade, huh? you mean like last year?
interesting idea and funny quotes.
except for the FACT that governments and religion have warred for many centuries and civilizations. one is ALWAYS a cog in the others' wheel.
religion has been there before government because man has the innate desire to explain his existence, his evironment, and what lies beyond. the notion that it is a invention to control the masses is juvenile and limited. besides, governments have demonstrated well throughout history that control is best achieved at the tip of a sword, so to speak.

Answer 8

Nope, I always thought that religion and control went hand in hand. I'm agnostic, not an atheist, but I still believe the ten commandments are sensible rules for people who live amongst people.

What would the world be like if we all treated each other with respect and consideration??? Wow...

Answer 9

It should be no surprise that much of the ten commandments remain sound as a moral code. Morals ultimately derive from evolution, which applies to societies as well as to species; a society which lives by a sound moral code will survive preferably to one that does not. It is obvious that murder, theft, et cetera are inimical to most every society, and hence not surprising that the commandments have survived, unlike the Shakers and the Jonestown cults, which didn't.

Answer 10

Religion as a means of the powerful controlling the behavior of the masses? Wow! What a concept. It's been done since ancient times and is done today.

Answer 11

Fear is a good way to keep people in line, but it means you're too lazy or ignorant (or both) to find a better way.

It's a definition that fits religion to a T.