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Full Idea
Much of ancient mythology is a legal contract in which humans promise everlasting devotion to the gods in exchange for mastery over plants and animals.
Gist of Idea
Mythologies are usual contracts with the gods, exchanging devotion for control of nature
Source
Yuval Noah Harari (Sapiens: brief history of humankind [2014], 12 'Silencing')
Book Ref
Harari,Yuval Noah: 'Sapiens: a brief history of Humankind' [Vintage 2014], p.236
A Reaction
[He cites the first book of Genesis] So how readily do you swith allegiance, if someone else's gods are more successful? Why be loyal a loser. It should be like shopping - but I bet it wasn't.
| 1742 | Thales said the gods know our wrong thoughts as well as our evil actions [Thales, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 15659 | Purifying yourself with blood is as crazy as using mud to wash off mud [Heraclitus] |
| 1522 | It is wretched not to want to think clearly about the gods [Empedocles] |
| 12097 | There are as many eternal unmovable substances as there are movements of the stars [Aristotle] |
| 22729 | The concepts of gods arose from observing the soul, and the cosmos [Aristotle, by Sext.Empiricus] |
| 9287 | Bruno said that ancient Egyptian magic was the true religion [Bruno, by Yates] |
| 14827 | The Greeks saw the gods not as their masters, but as idealised versions of themselves [Nietzsche] |
| 7208 | Paganism is a form of thanking and affirming life? [Nietzsche] |
| 14864 | The Greeks lack a normative theology: each person has their own poetic view of things [Nietzsche] |
| 7348 | The Jews sharply distinguish human and divine, but the Greeks pull them closer together [Johnson,P] |
| 20666 | Most polytheist recognise one supreme power or law, behind the various gods [Harari] |
| 20667 | Polytheism is open-minded, and rarely persecutes opponents [Harari] |
| 20665 | Mythologies are usual contracts with the gods, exchanging devotion for control of nature [Harari] |