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The Globe
PART FOUR
Nineteenth- and twentieth-century scientists examined aspects of primitive and conservative tribes in Australia, Latin America, and Africa in order to prove certain facts in terms of religious thought and faith among those tribes.
Albeit in our ancient Middle East, human development was witnessed faster and people with knowledge, later called priests, emerged who could supposedly analyze natural forces and phenomena that threatened the existence of mankind. This knowledge had no academic background and the conclusions and observations learned from it were passed from one generation to another.
Nonetheless, the job of those priests was a magical one that could comfort and re-encourage the individuals or the people who suffered fortunate and unfortunate incidents. Primarily, they would analyze those incidents and give them some kind of meaning so that the affected would contend and have peace of mind. However, it did not stop there. Later in the years, these priests began predictions and foretelling in efforts to enable the continuity and existence of mankind on earth. Undoubtedly, magic was a necessity of those days and had a big role in the life of man. However, it could never experimentally prove things.
Individual and group experience later in the days proved the limited power and narrow perspective of magic in real life. Ironically, this later paved the way for the emergence of legends and myths about adventures and victories of individuals and groups. Moreover, some made-up stories about creatures that never existed made their way into the human mind. Demons, fairies, and monsters are the outcome of these developments in human faith.
Reading epics and legends shows us that man has always been in an adversary role with demons who outpowered him. And then and always, a hero would come about to defeat those demons. Why? Because it was important to believe that eventual victory is for mankind only. On the other hand, research by archaeologists and anthropologists has proven with evidences that this stage in human life continued over several thousand years.
In that particular period, the magical concepts and beliefs merged with human thinking and understanding of things. These developments accompanied the physical changes that the human body experienced. Whether we like it or not, as animals such as lions, tigers, leopards, and cats come from the same feline species despite their difference in size and shape, man is a descendant from the monkey tribe. Dogs, wolves, jackals, and foxes, on the other hand, come from different species.
The physical changes that man experienced were witnessed in the hands and legs, straightening of the back, and further rounding of the head. Meanwhile, man's linguistic abilities made progress and concepts crystallized in the brain that in effect helped the process of language enrichment. And thus, the intellectual and linguistic growth accompanied the physical development, which was followed by reorganization of life and obtaining the necessary tools to survive. All these developments shared the same timeline. Therefore, the initial stages of language acquisition and the emergence of analytical concepts to explain the world that the man dreaded started right from there.
It goes with no arguments that magic and superstition were never the right tools for man to analyze and understand that world he wanted to know. And thus, magical thought and superstitious culture could not bring humanity closer to each other. Instead, they lead to the disintegration of earth's human population into smaller groups and communities here and there. Natural phenomena such as droughts, floods, rain, earthquakes, volcanoes, and fatal diseases had to be analyzed. There had to be explanations for these challenges that needed solutions. Solutions, on the other hand, required knowledge and the only sources for knowledge were these superstitious thoughts.
In the early stages of acquiring knowledge by mankind, these irrational thoughts became deeply rooted in the human conscious and they still contribute to the process of knowledge acquirement to the present day. This explains why some literate people still believe in demons, fairies, and myths. As human societies have developed from one generation to the next, these unconscious thoughts have been passed on too. None of us has a choice when we come to this world where we are taught to believe in things that might not necessarily be rational. One of the characteristics of human beings is getting used to things to survive.
Religion is another aspect of human intellectual development that was preceded by magic and myths. The emergence of religion was a severe blow as far as magic, myths, and knowledge were concerned. Nearly 6,000 to 8,000 years before the birth of Islam, there was the Judaic religion. The Old Testament narrates that early messengers of Israel were always at odds with magical and superstitious thoughts. The Judaic doctrines believed that superstition could not bring about security for all for mankind to live peacefully together. Abraham's sacrificing his son Isaac for God for the sake of humanity signaled an important aspect in religion versus other kinds of beliefs.
Before Abraham, other priests thought that there was more than just one God. They thought there was a God for each and every kind of catastrophe. Moreover, mankind across the world believed that the God of each calamity was requesting blood and therefore the most important human value, which was blood, had to be dedicated to God. In early days the best looking boy or girl would be sacrificed for this purpose, but later in the days, only women were victimized. In some places, they would drink some blood or eat some part of the victim's body. In Egypt, for example, they sacrificed women and threw their bodies into the Nile River.
The generation of Israel was challenging magic and wizardry. This dispute continued until the time in which prophet Moses emerged with his Judaic teachings. Following Moses, other messengers came and added to the religion. For the first time in history, the concept of God was identified as a supreme authority and only creator of all living above us. From a Judaic point of view, God cannot been seen but the voice of God can be heard from messengers. As the religion developed over years and years, things were added to it.
This human development in terms of religious thought was important and it helped people of the same belief to stick together to work in favor of human development. Meanwhile, social knowledge was increased and philosophical approaches came into being. Questions were asked as to what the universe was? Judaic religion would answer that the powerful God had created the universe. Questions were asked as to why. Judaic religion would answer because he liked to do so. Moreover, they would then narrate the first human mistake done by Adam and Eve that expelled them from paradise and brought them to inhabit the earth.
This very story was later transferred to both Islamic and Christian religions. Followers of both religions respect this belief. Therefore, the first religion that called for worshipping one God was the Judaic religion. Ironically, this religion did not make it outside Israelis and it did not become a universal faith. It stayed as the unique religion of several generations of Israelis who were always in conflict with their neighbors. One of the most outstanding doctrines of this religion was that Israelis were the best creatures of God and decided that they were the people who should eventually dominate the whole world. Nonetheless, their world did not exceed what is situated between the Nile and Euphrates rivers and all of the adventures mentioned in their Old Testament occurred in the Judaic mountain of contemporary Kurdistan. The boundaries of the Judaic world start from the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and continue to the land of the pharaohs in Egypt; from there it goes back to the Holy Land where contemporary Hamas and Jews murder each other, Jerusalem. Followers of Judaic religion were not united. There have been frequent cases when they stood against their own religion until a new reformist would come to give advice. This explains why they have so many messengers, all of which have been certified by Islam.
Our region witnessed numerous changes, such as the emergence of new powers, all of which were rejected by followers of the Judaic religion. As a result, once new authorities were strong enough, they began crushing supporters of this religion. As we can see now, Jews are everywhere. When there was colonialism, some Jews resettled on the American continent.