Was Religion Created to save Mankind

Does anyone think that religion was created to keep mankind from destroying itself. If religion had not been created where would we be without it when most of our rules and laws are based on it. I feel that man would implode upon itself if it was not for these religious rules. If there is no Wrong what would we have and did our religious forfathers understand this?

Ethjics, mainly the religious kind, always seems to guide the rules and law of the land. Would the American Forefathers have written the Declaration any differently if, say, Norse mythology was the main instead of Catholicism?

I think we would still have our laws, though... people know what is right and wrong, they don't need a priest to tell them.

I am not sure people do know right and wrong. If you look at societies that are undevloped in any way the only rules are survival and if it feels good do it. Now with the recent trend in society to denounce religion we will revert to the if it feels good do it theory of survival of the fitest and annimal behavior.

Originally posted by factfinder38
I am not sure people do know right and wrong. If you look at societies that are undevloped in any way the only rules are survival and if it feels good do it. Now with the recent trend in society to denounce religion we will revert to the if it feels good do it theory of survival of the fitest and annimal behavior.

I looked at those "underdeveloped" societies, and I have never had that idea of how it works. They seem to know right from wrong and probably live more peacefully amongst themselves than we do. Apart from war with other tribes and such, which is as common with our society.

Originally posted by factfinder38
I am not sure people do know right and wrong. If you look at societies that are undevloped in any way the only rules are survival and if it feels good do it. Now with the recent trend in society to denounce religion we will revert to the if it feels good do it theory of survival of the fitest and annimal behavior.

I have to disagree with your statement that undeveloped societies are athiestic in nature. If you know of any, please point them out.
Most, if not all, 3rd world nations, that I am aware of, are overly driven by fundamentalist religious beliefs. They are also the ones who tend to be more violent and oppressive, because of their religious practices and beliefs.

It is usually progress and development, that leads societies away from superstition and fundamentalism and towards reason and spiritualism.

To my knowledge, religion has never lead to the ultimate benefit of the societies under its influence. History has repeatedly demonstrated religion's ability to be destructive and detrimental to mankind.

I don't think it was created to save man, but more to control him

I don�t know who coined the fraise �Religion was created to control the masses�. and I believe it

[edit on 7-7-2004 by Sauron]

Only one point, if religion was created to save mankind, why has it been the cause of so many wars, and other such pointless events, which have only lead to more bloodyshed.

I dont think it was created to save humanity, only to form a foundation for change.

i think religion was originally created for the benifit of mankind but it eventually got mixed in with politics and eventually turned into a means to enslave the masses in the way it does so now.

Or was mankind created to save religion?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't most if not all wars and monstrous acts against humanity directly related to religion?

If anything, I'd say religion is the cause of alot of the problems within the human population of this planet.

Check your history and you'll see that of all people killed over the last 2000 years, in war or by "lawfull" execution, a huge percentage of them have died for some religious conflict or inquisition.

Even Jesus died because his belief or religion was different from the romans and jews.

I have to agree that religion has caused more harm than good the only reasons we had a period of history called the dark age is because the Roman church had such a tight grip on the masses that they didnt allow any scientific progress that disproved the existance of 'god'.

Not forgetting countless individuals killed because they had differnt veiws about their 'god' etc also fleecing the poor peasant for his hard earnings

i surpose its what religion you are talking off i guessed it as catholisium.

Hindu i belive is probably the best of the mainstream religions as far as im aware there is no such thing as a group of people going on a crusade or jihad for the sake of an hindu idealists.

Was Religion Created to save Mankind


Are you kidding, religion has been the main reason for most war in the world. No, religion has been known to opress mankind and stunt countries grow. Due to the interpretations that we human had given to pursue personal agendas on power.

Most of the rules and codes in religion are all morally instilled in everybody. Its instictive to know you SHOULDN'T kill somebody, because your instincts are saying that your species (Humanity) needs people to live to survive, and therefore humanity's seed may be passed in greater quantities. Ofcourse people do infact kill, sure, but thats simply because theyre blocking out their instinctive morals (I.e. Conscious.) Religion was simply made as a tool by man to help instill moral values earlier at life and give parents (back in the day) a good tool to raise their kids. And this tool relied on scare tactics. ("ooooh. If you lie to your parents your going to hell, a place where you are forever tortured and burned in fire.")

As for saving Mankind, those that follow religion have done more destruction then any non-follower of any religion. And you may dispute that with me, but the facts are in History. The cruscades, Jihads, wars based on religious persecution, witch burnings, crucifixions, suicide bombings, wars based on differences in religious beliefs; this list goes on. It's a simple and well known fact that religion has caused major destruction of the world and humanity by its zealot followers, and in the end, has become a major corrupted institution. As for saving mankind no, I fear that it will ultimately destroy it.

The reason religion causes war is because politicians and terrorists twist it for their own sick plans. Also if we listened to most religions we would be in a peaceful world. Anger leads to war yet anger is a sin. In fact just about everything wrong with society is against many religions for example. Robberies, teen pregnancies, abortion, violence, corruption, politicians lying to get into office, lawyers. If everybody read their Bible or Koran or whatever holy book they read and listened to it we wouldn't be in such an imperfect world.

Religion is a control device.

Before tv, radio, phones, printing presses, etc... it was easier for one entity to control a scattered population through religion. Make the rules then pass it on to the priests/leaders in each region and they in turn enforce those rules on the faithful population in that region. So if I'm the Leader, for instance, I can keep control over thousands of people scattered over an entire continent. All I have to do is train and deploy a bunch of religious leaders to take over the different towns and cities. I want to make a change, I send messengers with those changes. Or I have a meeting and call all the leaders back to headquarters with their new marching orders for the faithful then send them back to introduce and enforce the new rules.

If there's another group with a different belief system in place that doesn't fall under my rule, I try to convert them. If that doesn't work, I set up a campaign of terror and begin eliminating them until the survivors give in and become part of my fold.

It's really just about efficiently controlling a large group of people and thereby controlling their activities and money. Least that's how I've always seen it.

1. (Yours) Religion was created to SAVE mankind
2. Religion was created to DESTROY mankind
3. Religion was created to CONTROL mankind
4. Religion comes from some INATE BIOLOGICAL MECHANISM, much like our inate tendency towards language communication

Note: if 4 is true then other beings, people, awarnesses may attempt to utilize that tendency to any of the above and perhaps other possibilities.

I don't know where you get your info on third world countries.. but even the littlist most secluded tribe has religion and rules... yes they may be vastly different but it's the case.

Religion has two reasons for being...

One is the need of people to try to understand what they don't have the technology to understand as a science... why the sun shines.

The other is to CONTROL people... it quickly turns from the first into the second.

The key to a society working in harmony is morals, a set of rules where people can work together. Plato knew this in ancient Greece. Religion took these rules and tarted them up into stories to make them easily readable (also by making them into stories, they could be open to interpretation).

We have modern equivalent rules today - Highway Code allows us to drive cars in relative safety (which ironically sells more than the bible each year in the UK). These rules haven't been handed down by God (I don't think).

Also when quoting the number of people killed by religion, lets not forget the subjugation of the common people and the stamping out of science at various points in history - that could have saved hundreds and thousands of lives if science had understood e.g. plague/good hygenie earlier.

Can anyone name one law that is not in some way related to a religious veiw. And once again without religion we would be nothing more than animals with no morals and no respect for life of others. Call it control or whatever but the fact remains some form of religion is a must for society to survive.

The only reason most of our laws are "based" off of christian-judeo (sp?) religion beliefs are because:
1) The forefathers were extremist exiles from England with strong religious beliefs
2) The core roots of all laws ARENT from religion but common sense and the instictive moral values of man that help keep humanity alive. Religion isnt what keeps us apart from the animals (and we really arent higher then them, we're more voilent then them, we just have an ego, something they do not.) is that it is a survival instinct to have such moral values to keep the species alive.

Religion was a fictious institution of guidelines to give a basic law on how to survive. All of the rules are based on common sense and natural instinct and nothing more. Religion was made because people were afraid of the darkness at night and the unknown beyond, and needed a comforting feeling of the afterlife.