Monotheism and polytheism, various religions and doctrines.

Monotheism is simply defined as the belief in one God and is generally positioned as the polar opposite of polytheism, the belief in many gods.
However, the term monotheism is relatively modern having been coined in the mid-17th century. 

It comes from the Greek words, manos (one) and Theo's (god). In the Western tradition, this 'belief in one God' refers specifically to the God of the Bible; the God of Judaism, Christianity and Islam (and always written with a capital G). 

Anyway! In the ancient world, monotheism was not thought of as we believe or think of it today. In ancient times the belief about monotheism was different, they were polytheists; All ancient people were polytheists. They may have exalted one God as superior to others (henotheism) but still acknowledged the existence of divine plurality.

The creation

fr Lawrence Liu, O.P (CC BY-NC-ND)

For the ancients, the concept of the universe consisted of three realms: akasha (heaven); earth (man); and the underworld (sometimes known as the netherworld or simply the 'land of the dead'). 

The sky was the domain of the gods and was crowded with many divinities understood in gradients of power. Many ancient civilizations had a dominant god, or king of the gods, with other gods in charge of various aspects of life, acting as a court of advisers, or simply as messengers to the people below. Many of these energies may pass into the lower world in various manifestations. 

They could also travel to the underworld, and those manifestations were known as chthonic (underworld energy). Some lesser gods, known as daemons, were over time considered evil (demons). These powers are believed to possess humans and serve as explanations for disease and mental disorders.

Faith, Belief and Religion

There was no central authority (like the Vatican) to dictate the consistency of belief and practice.

The modern concept of monotheism also embraces two other concepts namely 'belief' and 'belief'. The problem with understanding religions in ancient times is not that they didn't believe in things or that they lacked faith in gods and goddesses. 

However, it is often not expressed or expressed in the way it is supposed to be in our religious system. Unlike post-Christian religions, there was no comparable religion among the various ethnic religions in the Mediterranean basin.

The closest equivalents to shared knowledge are found in the myths of Homer (Iliad; Odyssey), Hesiod (Theogony; Works and Days) and the Bards, the basis of creation stories and works of gods and heroes. There was no central authority (like the Vatican) to regulate beliefs and practices. Each ethnic group developed rituals and practices necessary for worship (with sacrifices) that were passed down from the gods to their ancestors. It was very important to perform these rituals without mistakes.

Ancient roots of monotheism

Although the term monotheism itself is modern, scholars have attempted to uncover the ancient roots of monotheistic belief in the ancient world. At the top of the list is the Egyptian pharaoh Akhenaten (1353-1336 BCE), often called the first monotheist. 

During the Amarna period, Akhenaten promoted the worship of Aten, the sun symbol, as the supreme worship and excluded the worship of Amon-Ra, who was the dominant deity at the time, at Luxor. 

However, Amon-Ra's attempts to destroy temples, statues, and priesthoods would nevertheless indicate a belief in the existence (and influence) of this deity. At the same time, there is no evidence that Akhenaten tried to suppress or eliminate other gods/goddesses of Egyptian religion, nor did he try to eliminate the numerous religious festivals or afterlife beliefs throughout Egypt.

Roots for ancient monotheism can be found in Zoroastrianism, which became the state religion of ancient Persia. Zoroaster was a prophet (dated somewhere between 1000-600 BC) who preached the worship of a supreme deity, Ahura Mazda, who was the creator of everything in the universe. Nevertheless, Ahura Mazda produced the six primary amnesia spentas (spiritual forces) as well as other yajata (abstract forces) that were opposites of other forces (such as true versus evil thought). 

The extreme opposite of Ahura Mazda was the Druze, or 'chaos', personified as Angra Mainu. As such, the existence of a force opposed to all creation eventually gave rise to later Jewish, Christian and Islamic concepts of 'Satan'. Despite the extremes of pure good versus pure evil (or the concept known as dualism), modern Zoroastrians claim to be the true originators of monotheism, as all things originate from the 'One'.

Ancient Judaism continues to receive the most attention as the origin of monotheism in the Western tradition. More recently some scholars have been applying the term 'monolatry', a system that recognizes the existence of other gods but chooses to worship only one. Like their neighbors, the ancient Jews conceived of a hierarchy of powers in heaven: "sons of God" (Genesis 6), angels, archangels (God's messengers who communicate God's will to man), cherubim, and seraphim. The Jews also recognized the existence of demons, whose ministry has many examples in the Gospels as exorcists.

The Jews could pray to angels and other powers in heaven, but they were only to offer sacrifices to the God of Israel.

Scholars have tried perennially to analyze Genesis 1:26: "Then God said, 'Let us make man in our image, in our likeness...'" Who is God speaking to? "Us" is "Royal We?" Suggestions include ancient and comparative ideas in ancient cultures that heaven reflects social structure on earth; Kings usually had a court of advisers and thus a heavenly court as well.

The origin of the idea that the Jews were monotheistic is when Moses received God's command on Mount Sinai: "I am the Lord your God... you shall have no other gods before me." The Hebrew can be translated as "there is no other god besides me". This does not indicate that other gods do not exist; It is a commandment that the Jews are not to worship any other gods. Worship in the ancient world always meant sacrifice. Jews could pray to angels and other powers in heaven, but they could only sacrifice to the God of Israel.

Jewish scriptures consistently refer to the existence of gentile (ethnic group) gods: Deuteronomy 6:14 ("Do not follow other gods"); 29:18 ("to serve the gods of that nation"); 32:43 ("Praise the heavens, his people, all you worship the gods!"); Isaiah 36:20 ("Who among the gods of these nations has saved their nation?"); Psalm 821 ("God presides over great assemblies; he renders judgment among the gods"). In the story of the exodus of the Jews from Egypt, God fights against the gods of Egypt to show who controls nature. It makes little sense if their existence is not recognized: "... I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt." (Exodus 12:12)

Moses and the Parting of the Red Sea

Providence Lithograph Company (Public Domain)

Although the Jews offered sacrifices only to the gods of Israel, they shared a common belief that all gods should be honored; It was dangerous to anger the other gods. Exodus 22:28 commanded the Jews never to blaspheme the gods of the nations. With the destruction of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 AD, ritual sacrifice was no longer possible. Later, leaders of Judaism, the rabbis began a long process of reinterpreting worship as a focus on "the One" that would lead to the ultimate concept of the existence of a single God in the universe.

Under persecution by the Seleucid Greeks (which resulted in the Maccabean Revolt in 167 BC), those who died for refusing to worship the Greek gods were believed to be rewarded by being taken immediately to God in heaven as martyrs ('witnesses').Philosophical monotheism

With the rise of schools of Greek philosophy c. In Miletus around 600 BC, philosophical speculation about the universe and man's place in it began to spread throughout the Mediterranean basin. Many philosophers gathered students around them (disciples) and these students often wrote down the teachings and passed them down to the next generation. 

Philosophy was also associated with the upper classes, as only the wealthy had the time and leisure to devote to such higher education. Not just ivory tower speculation, philosophy, like ancient religions, teaches a way of life, offering its own moral and spiritual interpretation.

The schools of Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics taught ways to deal with the vicissitudes of life, concerned more with the state of one's soul than with worldly externals. One focus was on how the soul could return to its origin in the higher realms after death, reuniting with "God Most High." For Plato, this supreme God was uncreated, immutable (not subject to change), and pure essence (not matter and therefore not subject to decay). Through the metaphorical device, abstractions of reality emanate from the mind of God, like the light of a candle. This God also invented the logos, or principle of rationality, which organized the physical world.

Plato

Mark Cartwright (CC BY-NC-SA)

Aristotle (384-322 BCE) worked on metaphysics or first principles of existence. The Supreme Deity is the first of all substances, the "immovable mover", which causes the motion of the spheres, the planets. For the Stoics, the universe was a single being driven by an immanent, divine rational force that ordered the universe according to natural laws. They taught that all should live by accepting both good and evil, disciplining themselves to ultimately achieve harmony with this divine force.

Many schools have criticized traditional Greek mythology and its anthropomorphism (humanizing the gods), although few have directly condemned traditional sacrifices or called for the elimination of traditional rituals. Through their writings, philosophy contributed to the ultimate vision of monotheism for both Christian theologians and later rabbis.

Christianity

Our earliest evidence for the Christian community, the letters of Paul (c. . 50-60 CE), demonstrates the same Jewish recognition of the power of the universe many manifestations of the divine were received in the same gradient of power, but only the God of Israel was worshipped: "Though there be so-called gods in heaven or on earth—in reality, there are many lords—yet to us there is one God, the Father" (1 Corinthians 8:5). Paul often railed against the gods of others who hindered his mission (2 Corinthians 4:4). Their existence was real.

Paul the Apostle

RomanZ (CC BY-NC-SA)

However, early Christianity became complicated about the concept of a God when a new concept was introduced. From the very beginning (in the post-Easter experience of the apostles), Christians began to claim that in addition to Jesus' resurrection from the dead, he was "exalted" into heaven and given a seat at the "right hand of God" (Acts 7:56). 1 Peter 3:21-22 states that: "It [baptism] saves you through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, having been made subject to angels, authorities, and powers."

Until the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, the first followers of Jesus obeyed the Jewish commandment that only sacrifices could be made to the God of Israel. We also know that these early followers began with other elements of worship associated with Jesus: baptizing people in Jesus' name; Healing and exorcisms in His name; Expanding on the idea of ​​forgiving sins in his name; Prayer and praise directed to Jesus.

An early hymn recited by Paul is found in Phil. 2:9-11:

who, being the god of nature, thought nothing of using equality with God to his advantage; Rather, he made himself nothing, taking on the nature of a servant, being made in the likeness of men. And found in appearing as a man, He humbled Himself by being compelled to die—even death on a cross! Therefore, God also exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. , glory to God the Father.

That "every knee should bend" meant worship, in the ancient concept of bowing before the images of various gods. The idea that Jesus pre-existed in heaven before appearing as a man on earth is reinforced in the Gospel of John, where he claims that Jesus is the Logos who took flesh to teach us about God and salvation. This concept was later recognized as the incarnation of Jesus.

Trinity Road

When former pagans converted to Christianity, they adopted the Jewish concept of refusing to worship other gods. This led to persecution as such refusal was construed as treason to the Roman Empire; Not pleasing the gods means you don't want the empire to prosper and may bring disaster. Treason was always a capital offense, and so Christians were executed in the arena.

Many Christian writers appealed to the emperors that they should grant the same exception to the customary sacrifices as the Jews (during the reign of Julius Caesar). Christians claimed that they were 'true Jews' and not a new religion, using metaphors to show that they had an ancient connection through the Jewish scriptures. They argued that wherever God is mentioned, it is a form of the pre-existent Christ. Technically, then, like the Jews, they worshiped only one God. Rome always responded that Christians were not circumcised and therefore neither were Jews.

Holy Trinity   

French Laurence Liu, OP( CC in- NC- ND)   

In 312 announcement, Emperor Constantine came a Christian and legalized Christianity to end the persecution. still, Christian thinkers still batted the relationship between God and Jesus. 

An elder in the church of Alexandria, Arius began to educate that if God created everything in the macrocosm, he must have created Christ at some point. It means that Christ was under God. This led to screams in Alexandria and other metropolises of the conglomerate.   

The first council of Nicaea assembled to settle the matter; They determined that God and Christ were identical in substance and that Christ was the incarnation of God Himself on earth.

We believe in one God, the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, of all effects visible and unnoticeable. We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, light from light, true God from true God, not begotten, not made, one with the Father. 

Everything was created through him. For us men and our deliverance, he came down from heaven in the power of the Holy Spirit, he was born of the Virgin Mary and came man. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son. He's worshiped and glorified with the Father and the Son.   

This creed was revised several times in the following decades and a docked interpretation came popular and is generally known as the Apostles' Creed. The conception of the Trinity asserts that God is one, but with three instantiations or personalities God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit. Absorbing ideas from both Jewish and Greek idol religions, Christians began meeting at the sepultures of killers to supplicate their prayers. 

The rise of religions of saints combined Jewish martyrdom and ancient Greek idol religions where people gathered at the sepultures of icons . The Greco- Roman conception of patron gods goddesses of a particular ethnical group or megacity intermingled with Christian patron saints in heaven who came intercessors between man and God. 

Islam

In the 6th century, a prophet appeared in Saudi Arabia, Muhammad, who became the founder of Islam. He was essentially a reformer, claiming that both Judaism and Christianity had been corrupted by false teachings. Using Jewish scriptures, he emphasizes the oneness of God (Allah); Associating Allah with any other power is considered 'shirk', equivalent to idolatry. Nevertheless, Islam recognizes gradients of power.

God created three types of intelligent beings: angels, jinn (equivalent to demons) and humans. Angels did not have free will (they are pure reason) and therefore could not sin, but jinn and humans could choose between good and evil. When God created Adam, He commanded all the angels to bow down to him. An angel, Iblis (Satan, Satan) refused to do so and was cast into Hell. He was given God's permission to tempt people, but his authority will ultimately be destroyed on Judgment Day.

Hagia Sophia interior

Mark Cartwright (CC BY-NC-SA)

After Muhammad's death, his followers split into two major factions over succession. Those who supported his son-in-law Ali became Shias, while the majority are known as Sunnis. Shias honor their great teachers, the Imams, with similar pilgrimages and rituals. Sunnis claim this is tantamount to Christian worship of saints and compromises the oneness of God.