Where did the great world religions come from?

Over Christmas, I bought “The Times Concise History Of The World” which is a wonderful book to browse, full of colour maps and fascinating facts.

It is interesting – and no coincidence – that the great religions of humankind originated in the same part of the world and a number of them were either established or radically reformulated around the same time.

  • All the great world religions originated in Asia and three of them – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – developed in the same small region.
  • The outstanding prophets and reformers of Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Confucianism and Taoism all lived in the 6th century.

It seems that rising empires needed more universal creeds than local deities could provide which underlines the central fact that – in my view – religion is man-made (I use the gender deliberately) rather than God-made.


 




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