On the origin of religion

[Mr Greene]

As I've stated elsewhere searching for the origin point of religions led to Lascaux and the Venus figurines of 40,000 years ago. This would tend to indicate some form of shamanism and shamanism is widespread across the planet being found on all populated continents.
Further thoughts flag up those areas where shamanism isn't generally found - civilizations.
Extrapolating from this it would appear that shamanism and civilization are somehow incompatible and civilization forces beliefs to mutate forming organised religions.

[Angrboda]

Huh? Say wut?

[The Grand Nudger]

Linking the origins of religion to a -type- of religion is tenuous.  The origin point of religious behavior predates -any- figurines anywhere, in any case, so....? Further, shamanism persisted well into the calcification of civilization (and exists today, no less).

[Mr Greene]

It exists in tribal societies but doesn't penetrate civilizations to any great extent, these being the domain of the organised religions.
In essence I'm speculating that shamanism is the natural belief system of our hunter-gatherer ancestors but found itself ill adapted to the civilized world.
In effect the organised religions equate to evolutionary adaptations in order to survive in a hostile environment of which the polytheistic variety appear to be the more stable.

[The Grand Nudger]

Whats the diving line between shamanism and organized religion, in your estimation? Were the plains religions -not- organized, along with the existence of shamans and shamanism, for example? Or, conversely, did the oglala or teton not qualify as civilization? How about any of the other pre or post columbian cultures?

[Mr Greene]

The cultures of the North American plains do not qualify as civilizations no.
The origin points of civilization AFAIK are Mesopotamia, Indus Valley, Yellow River and Moche. All subsequent civilizations can trace their origins to one of these.

[The Grand Nudger]

-okay.....and in these civilizations (obviously excluding north american civilizations.....for reasons....), and their religious traditions, is there a point at which it is no longer shamanism?  What point, specifically?  When, and how, does a shaman become a priest, definitively?

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

It seems plain enough that science, engineering and religion all had the same genesis [pun definitely intended]: Oog got tired of Nature shitting on him on a more or less regular basis and asked himself, 'What makes this happen to me? What can I do to make it happen less?' Oog may have noticed that Skrg - for example - threw things at the sky to make it stop raining on her. Sometimes, it appeared to work. Maybe there was something in the sky that made the rain, and it could be threatened or cajoled to make the rain stop (or at least rain at a more propitious time). If flinging sticks and other bits of rubbish at the Make-It-Rain thing didn't work, perhaps something else would. Maybe the Make-It-Rain thing was hungry, and if it was fed it would feel better and stop the rain.

Giving extra food to the MIR thing worked sometimes, sometimes not. But Oog also noticed that he got less rain on him when he was under the trees. Since lugging the forest about with him on the off chance of a thunderstorm wasn't practical, there might be a way to make a little forest he could run to when the MIR thing went all drippy, sacrifices or no sacrifices.

And so on and so on and so on up to the present day, where everyone is consumed with clickbait.

Boru

[The Grand Nudger]

It seems , honestly, like it was less practical and more theoretical.  There was nothing immediately useful about a red ochre burial...and yet. Sure, they filled the graves with practical goods...but not for any immediately discernible practical reason.

[Mr Greene]

My guess would be that when beliefs become recorded in written form it forces an alteration in the concepts and ideas of authority.