"We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity has ever believed in.
Some of us just go one god further."
-- Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion
There are a startling number of gods and goddesses who have inhabited the human imagination at one point or another. Here's a partial list, alphabetically organized. As 21st century Judeo-Christian Americans, we easily dismiss these deities as "mythological" and "false". Most of them are no longer worshipped by anyone, and their statues and shrines have been degraded and lost by time. Some of the gods, like those in Hinduism, still have faithful followers. About 1/7th of the world are Hindu -- a billion people.
Can a billion people be wrong?
Sure, but which billion?
Religious populations of the world were estimated at (2007 figures):
- Christianity: 2.1 billion
- Islam: 1.5 billion
- Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
- Hinduism: 900 million
- Chinese traditional religion: 394 million
- Buddhism: 376 million
- primal-indigenous: 300 million
- African Traditional & Diasporic: 100 million
- Sikhism: 23 million
- Juche: 19 million
- Spiritism: 15 million
- Judaism: 14 million
- Baha'i: 7 million
- Jainism: 4.2 million
- Shinto: 4 million
- Cao Dai: 4 million
- Zoroastrianism: 2.6 million
- Tenrikyo: 2 million
- Neo-Paganism: 1 million
- Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand
- Rastafarianism: 600 thousand
- Scientology: 500 thousand
Some of the above religious are non-exclusive and allow room for "other truths," but many aren't. They believe everyone else on the list is wrong, and some believe that if you're wrong, you're pretty much, well...toast.
Who has it right?
As Dawkins says above, we are all atheists of a sort. As a Jew, I have always been atheist to the Greek, Roman, Mayan, Aztec and Hindu gods. After all, as the great declaration of Judaism states, God is One. Not many -- one.
Christians are also atheists when it comes these gods, just as the believers of those religions are non-believers in our Torah/Bible based God.
Which kind of atheist are you?
I believe that we create and maintain belief in our own God(s) out of our experience, family history and culture - and common sense. In that sense, a person's god is "Mythological and True" -- for him. What is a religious act for one, may be wierd, unwise or stupid to others. I believe that hen it comes to religion, there is no "Truth" - only opinion.
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