The Evolution of God
(By Robert Wright)
- A Review
& Synopsis by Vimal Kodai -
After having written The
Moral Animal, Robert Wright strikes back with yet another compelling
and very appealing book; this one is entitled, The Evolution of God—a
book which talks and relates quite entirely about the history of religion and
the future of religious beliefs on our planet. The author desires and wishes to
provide the events that precede and preclude the several worldviews on the
credible existence of a divine being. His interest is directed towards the
notion of survival of divine beliefs with the evolution of time and along with
the coming of a scientific and technologically oriented world. He pinpoints the
ways psychological well-being has improved in the course of time with the
arrival of science and technology. Robert Wright also suggests and highlights
with much sense of recognition that his book is an attempt to adapt to the
survival of religious beliefs while trying to work side by side with the
advances and marvels of science over the ages. He certainly does not claim to
have the answers to many beliefs that exist with regards to all the religions
that have been permanent on our planet since the beginning of time. His
personal guidance and the attempts of his (from this present book) will
assuredly lead to a concise and thorough worldview about the evolution of religions
on our planet: he states that he wishes to foresee that the worldviews on
religion and on religious beliefs with rapid globalization and scientific advancement
will hopefully ease and lessen global unrest.
The
Evolution of God initiates
itself with the following basic fundamental themes; these are namely: I - The Birth and Growth of Gods, II - The Emergence of Abrahamic Monotheism,
III - The Invention of Christianity,
IV - The Triumph of Islam, and V - God Goes Global (Or, Doesn’t).
I - The
Birth and Growth of Gods
Wright displays a very strong emphasis and a
bright scope on the ways primitive societies used to have their beliefs passed on
to the next generations with their religious faiths being “not the result of
deep thought.” Wright even suggests and maintains that rituals and
superstitions were the highlights of these primitive societies and that the
latter were hunter-gatherers or agrarians. He brings up examples, such as those
of the Chukchee people of Siberia, The Klamath hunter-gatherer of Oregon, The
Haida Native Americans of the North Pacific Coast, The Mbuti pygmies of
Africa’s Congo region, The Kung Bushman of the Kalahari Desert, and, The Semang
hunter-gatherers of Southeast Asia which he compares and contrasts to the rise
of a Biblical and stable belief on the fronts of an Abrahamic Lineage in the
Jewish, Christian, and Islamic faiths.
Rituals in Primitive Societies
Evolution of Religious Beliefs
The writer of The
Evolution of God explores religious practices in primitive societies by
implying that the latter’s peoples’ beliefs rested on the following:
observations on the natural quest for inner peace, the moral dimension of
religious bodies, the brotherly and sisterly love, fear of the divine being’s
presence, their stately rituals were very manipulative, and, the jumble of
spirits and deities doing implausible acts to maintain control over their parts
of the world was always prevailing with sacrifices and ritual correctness. Wright
also states that the modern Darwinian theories somehow deflate religion and
religious beliefs while cognitively and psychologically undermining the answers
susceptible to certain kinds of adaptive formulae with respect to the existence
of a divine being. However, he admits that evolutionary psychologists dictate
that the two innate mechanisms which are bound to be found in primitive
societies are as follows: kin selection which leads to sacrifice for close
relatives, and nonkin selection which leads to reciprocal altruism or
considerate/cooperative relationships. These are the two separate categories
which make the hunter-gatherers differ in their decency.
Polynesian Gods
While, he talks and
relates about the Gods of Polynesia and about the Age of Chiefdom, the writer
(Robert Wright) explores all the traces, be it: scientific, exploratory,
evolutionary, social, cognitive, cohesive, political or religious. As he
targets countries and islands, such as: Tonga ,
Galapagos Islands, Samoa, Marquesas Islands, Tahiti, etc., he even mentions that
key religious beliefs and principles guided the people of Polynesia .
These were Tapu and Mana. Tapu refers to the forbidden part of things, such as: violating
rules and principles that may result in being punished through social
disapproval. Whereas, Mana, refers to
the a secular meaning derived from the magical and the divine powers through a
supernatural electricity that is mundane, effective, efficacious, and
successful in attaining wishes and desires.
The writer provides a
very elaborative description of how the Polynesian religion might have been
austere and tense with their moralistic and ritualistic obligations that led to
performance anxiety. The Polynesian chiefdoms featured several religious
sentiments that could be paralleled with our modern legal, political and
economic systems in terms of the efficacy. Mr. Wright strongly documents the
fact that in chiefdoms, Gods were the guardians of political power, supervisors
of economic performance, and supporters of social norms that would help in the
promotion of grouping people while living together despite their comprising of
large numbers of hunter-gatherers groups and tribes.
Ishtar (The Goddess of Love)
Enki (The Sun God)
Enlil (The God of Creation)
As he crosses the
many frontiers that bind the various Gods in the Ancient States of Mesopotamia—the
Gods and Goddesses; such as: Ishtar (The
Goddess of Love), Enlil (God of Creation) in Nipur, Enki (Sun God) in Eridu, Inanna
(Goddess), etc., the author of The Evolution of God eventually
leads his readers to understand what led to the instatement of Monotheism and
to its complete foundation. He has a very brief and thorough written plot on
the Epic of Creation and how the
Mesopotamian and Egyptian, and Babylonian intellectuals made way to the drifts
that bonded technology and scientific rationalism.
King Hammurabi
Marduk
Marduk
The Gods of Babylon
He turns towards Polytheism and Monotheism as he gets into the realms of the many lists
of Gods that made their impact in those bodies of societies which were heading
towards a civilized way of living. With such themes in mind, he brings up the
idea of how political bodies and politicians emerged and how economic
strategies came into being. Many key figures that were considered to have given
rise to a formal and stable way of leading a governing body of politicians were
the following: The King Hammurabi and
Marduk. These two latter
personalities had the empowered capacities of making laws, and thereafter, they
made sure that these were followed and well-observed with strong understanding
of their purposes in coming into being. Finally, the writer enters the gateway
of Moral Progress, where he depicts the idea of having a single God as being
really eminent. He introduces Moses and the Judeo-Christian civilization as he
lets go of the ideal that was once built on the grounds of Polytheism and the
acceptance of many Gods and Goddesses.
II - The
Emergence of Abrahamic Monotheism, III - The Invention of Christianity
The crucial messages from the Hebrew Bible led
to the emergence of an establishment of Religion and religious beliefs in
Ancient Israel. The Old Testament (Or, the Hebrew Bible) was a landmark in
taking history of religions to a better naturalistic and moralistic stand.
Monotheism was made more credible and the eventual lineage of the Abrahamic
religions adhered to the refusal of a belligerent society and that of a
violence-driven age. The author of The Evolution of God shapes his next
few chapters by addressing the ways by which the Bible was translated and what
led to its ongoing transliteration. As such, he supports the fact that the
Hebrew Bible was a beginning point in the restoration of a factual and set
foundation of a rigid and credible religious foundation in the Middle East . He maintains that the ancient world relied
on many superstitions and ritualistic ceremonies, whereby the Hebrew Bible
relayed a bright and enlightening glow towards a better portrayal of the divine
being’s presence—known as El (term
often used in Hebrew which means, God—in
English). The story of Elijah, the Book of Hosea, the birth of the Israelites, The story of King Josiah of Judah
Jesus of Nazareth
whose purpose was served on the soils of Israel
Jesus (The Messiah)
JESUS OF NAZARETH (Jesus Christ)
The Gospel and the
Books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are all accounted for with “validity”
and “credibility” as the basis and foundations of the life and words of Jesus. The
Apostles and their impacts on Christianity, the moral terms that regards their
missions and the exercise of this very religion, Christianity, are all
well-framed and put in place by stating why Jesus became to be known as the
saviour.
Middle East (The Land of Babylonian Gods, the land where rose Judaism, Christianity & Islam)
IV - The
Triumph of Islam, and V - God Goes
Global (Or, Doesn’t).
The other few chapters relate on how Islam came
into being. How the prophet Muhammad became an influential figure and that he
was the one who basically set forth the principles and routes devout for
Muslims and other believers in the Post-Hebrew Bible and Post-Christian Bible
era. The writer also gives a glimpse on the future of the evolution of
religions and religious beliefs on our planet. He highlights the many other
sides of other religions; such as, Buddhism under the influence of the emperor Ashoka, Hinduism with the worship of
Hindu Gods, Atheism and the world of atheists, the experience of a heavenly and
Godly feeling in the genes of humans, the expansion of the moral imagination
over the millennial, what good does “God” do to traditional believers, Truths
and Consequences, Thinking and Feeling about the views of religious origins,
and, Varieties of Religious experiences that consist of a crude learning of a
mechanism in the human brain leading to perceptions in various religions.
The Emperor Ashoka
Prior to his
appendix, Wright provides an Afterword which concludes itself with one of the
scenes known as The Ultimate reality of
Science. The latter portrays how a believer perceives the modern world
while recognizing that there is God at its source—that moral order and the
moral dimension to life on Earth has “God” as the topmost responsible party of
its evolution.
Robert Wright’s The
Evolution of God is book that is very scholarly and it has the tools
and assets that could dictate factual events and circumstances that pertain to
the evolution of religion on our planet. The Evolution of God is also a book
that explains with clarity how some major events in the history of religion
were misplaced and misunderstood due to the ways these same events manifested
themselves and that they came to be put in the ancient manuscripts and
scriptures. The Evolution of God takes us to the depth of the evolution of
religions with a certain major emphasis being brought to the nature of the divine
being’s portrait to the primitive societies. It also leans upon the many facets
of religious beliefs as they manifested themselves during the millennia. The
Evolution of God is a book that is well-written, well-researched,
well-analyzed and well-set. It brings a very profound and bright look at the
scope of the evolution of God (or, Gods) while displaying magnificent ways to
covey how the latter came to being known as the one who was revealed through
the famous sacred scriptures known to humankind.
