yeah
To be fair Judaism didn’t really steal their ideas, I’d personally go on a limb and say they adopted it since Yahweh was part of the Canaanite religion and the followers of Judaism were a branch of that to begin with.
Yeah they altered it quite a few times from Yahweh being a minor God to being their chief God (while acknowledging his family) to completely removing them, the Canaanite lore kept the understanding that the Creator God of Canaanite’s religion gave to his sons parts of the region and Yahweh was given Israel in which to become his domain which for a while they kept belief in until later in which personally I can’t really figure out what caused the change if it was priests or an invasion, etc.
However, I never heard of Egyptians stealing their religion from another group.
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Not every polytheistic religion was peaceful and tolerant. The Romans had some views on others religions that could be considered very offensive and sometimes they were very destructive. Romans also had religious practices such as self-flagellation. They also had a very sexist view of Women at time (Ovid in his work ‘Ars Amatoria’ even suggests rape as a technique of seduction, referencing a religious tale if I remember correctly). But I don’t blame their Gods for that, much of it is the works of humans. I don’t believe all of the Poetic Edda are the works of the Norse Gods either, it’s poetry. Much of the bible is also complete fiction. Almost all of it (If not all of it) was written by anonymous authors (Some of which probably never meant for it to be taken literally). There’s absolutely no historical evidence that the Jews ever came out of Egypt, or that there ever was such a mass exodus (It would have completely collapsed Egypt considering the population, plus they would most definitely have written about it. And the authors don’t even know the Pharaoh’s name, they just call him “Pharaoh”). Judaism used to be a polytheistic religion too, but people changed that as well, only after the Babylonian exile at that. I don’t think YHWH agrees with much of it at all.
Similarly, under the Nazi regime many adopted Germanic Paganism with a very racist view (And there are many modern Neo-Nazi Germanic Pagan groups today), but you get Viking cults in Nigeria that work with the Gods without issue. More than you think is from humans.
Ancient Israel was actually quite technologically advanced its time for various aspects. Technology also continue to advance post-Christianization in the Roman Empire and later on in Europe. Many of History’s ‘Great Inventors’ and many scientists were Christian. A Christian astrologer in the Renaissance also discovered that the Sun revolved around the Earth after very complex calculations, followed by other scientists. The Catholic Church actually sponsored much of this research, it was mostly the Protestants who were against it (And Protestants have always had absolutely terrible theology at that).
Witch hunting was also a per-dominantly Protestant activity, and Protestantism formed just cause a guy wanted to divorce his wife lol. But it is true that those accused of Witchcraft were persecuted by Christians, just as they are persecuted in many African Pagans, and in various Hindu places, and all kinds of Polytheistic religions. But you also got many Christian Occultists, and Judaism and Christianity are the reason why the 72 Demons of the Goetia and beings such as Satan and Lucifer are worshiped today.
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It could also be argued, that modern civilisation owes an awful lot to Christianity and to a lesser extent, Judaism. The emphasis on the individual and individual betterment as opposed to the collectivism of most other religions is very much at the heart of what makes the West so successful. Some historians, like Niall Ferguson, would actually argue, that some of the principles contained within Western Christianity, and particularly, Protestantism, have led to the rise of the West between 1500-2000.
He also notes, that as Christianity has declined in the West, so has its prosperity and orderliness, whereas in parts of Asia, Christianity (again, mostly Protestantism) is booming and expanding at a considerable rate (Korea, Japan, China, Thailand, Singapore etc…) and parallel to this phenomenon, these societies are getting wealthier and more developed with each passing year, in stark contrast to the West, which is experiencing stagnation or outright decline.
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Sadly hedonistic and pleasure-oriented lifestyles can have a very negative effect on society, and I do believe it is leading to collapse of various western countries (In many western countries that haven’t had wars or much economic difficult in many years are actually experience a decrease in population). Perhaps it also has to do with the Nihilism that Nietzsche spoke of. But these days everyone hates each other in modern society and there’s just too much tension. You should check out the ‘Mouse Utopia’ experiment that @Lady_Eva spoke about here:
I believe the Olympic Spirits know well the forces needed to sustain society, and how they have weakened in various societies.
At least Paganism is rapidly reviving in an attempt for people to try and find meaning in this meaningless way of living that revolves around corporatism. I do think this life is worth living, hopefully things will become more peaceful eventually. It seems things will probably collapse in the future (If the population keeps on decreasing, that is pretty much inevitable), so perhaps after that it will hopefully go to a healthier system.
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I’m not convinced, that embracing paganism on a large scale would improve things (and it is a very broad term after all), just look at India…
I’m more inclined to believe the Puranic view of the world, that is that we are in the midst of the Kali Yuga, which leads to a gradual decline in religion, spirituality, moderation in all things, self-control, family, traditional gender roles and so on. The prophecy says, that by the end of this dark age, humans will become completely feral, stupid, immoral, violent and generally animalistic in their social relations and the way they relate to each other.
That post by Lady Eva you linked to was interesting, it reminded me of a seminal antropological work, whose title escapes me, but documents the decline, social and cultural collapse of an African tribe that is cut off from its normal food source by government policies and regresses into a feral, animalistic state, where all social conventions and mores (such as parents taking care of their children) collapse and disappear.
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I feel as though paganism as a reconstruction in today’s age makes little sense mainly because things like druidism and shamanism now go under paganism (in some cases) and many of which were in a constant state of reconstruction even back then. Yes christianity has made some good strides, but the world shifting to paganism as a whole…I don’t know, wiccans have been in my time growing up the most close minded people, cant believe in demons because then you believe in hell and “we wiccans don’t believe in satan or hell” lol.
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