The Axial Era

A History of Mankind (75)

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In every human society, religion appeared as an extension of ancestors' worship, the oldest kind of worship, due to the close relationship with one's parents, and the fact that we’re all sons and daughter of somebody else.

Religion slowly gained complexity as it became both an explainer of natural phenomena, which could easily be described as the gods’ doing, and consolation against the fact that humans are the only animal who knows the awful fact of death awaits in any case, whatever else may happen.

Different features of religion appeared in different regions, partially helped by the success of shamanism – originally created as a way to channel communication with deceased ancestors – in helping cure real or imagined illnesses, or at least making sure that people didn’t fake illnesses by scaring them off with brutally ineffective treatments[1]; and revolutionary monotheisms eventually took roots both in Persia and Palestine, having been first unsuccessfully tried as political expedients for power concentration in Egypt and, more briefly, Assyria.