Could a polytheistic faith develop into one/more monotheistic religion(s)?

During the history of the Roman Empire. It seemed that the Emperors, in addition to the Imperial Cult (the concept that the Emperor was a demigod or even a god in human form), there were also various other cults, some taken from other polytheisms (Isis from Egyptian mythos, Cybele from Greek, Mithra from Persian, Sol from Roman et.al.), that focused almost exclusively one one god/goddess as the central god/goddess.

I ask, could such cults develop into a monotheistic religion?
 
Actually, Sol Invictis was an Imperial cult. Don't confuse civic cults that could revolve around the emperor, and imperial-supported cults (Mithra, Sol, Apollo, Christianity).

These weren't really monotheistic or even attempted to overthrow the classical hellenistic pantheon, but rather were "reference" cults.
As for unifying the army around Mithra's cult particularly (search for a political unity if not an esprit de corps, for a social group that more than often overthrew emperors), or unifying ideologically political classes.

That's what prevented them, eventually, to turn a main religion as Christianism : it was socially cloistered and contrary to Christianism that had a popular (if minoritary) basis, it wasn't the case for them.
And popular cults, as Asclepsios' (which shared many features with Early Christianity) weren't monotheists or even monothelists, but a "personal cult".

I don't think that monotheism is a natural step of religion, going immediatly after monothelism. There's no real incitative for the Roman cults (meaning provincial, hellenistic, civic or imperial) to enforce a sole worship. It could not only damage a possible popular support but critically the worshipper of such wannabe monotheism that themselves didn't felt cloistered by worshiping one god.

That said, formal monotheism was a thing among some intellectual elites (critically in rivality with Christianism to proove they were pure-er spirituals). I could see monotheistic Roman sects, but without a great popular support and more or less treated as vegetarians were in the XIXth century : innofensive weirdos.
 
During the history of the Roman Empire. It seemed that the Emperors, in addition to the Imperial Cult (the concept that the Emperor was a demigod or even a god in human form), there were also various other cults, some taken from other polytheisms (Isis from Egyptian mythos, Cybele from Greek, Mithra from Persian, Sol from Roman et.al.), that focused almost exclusively one one god/goddess as the central god/goddess.

I ask, could such cults develop into a monotheistic religion?

It is possible but probably pretty rare. In OTL Judaism was originated from sect of polytheist religion and developed as monotheist religion after Assyrian invasion.

In Egypt too was bit similar development before Ekhnaton's regime. Without Ekhnaton or with more moderate pharaoh Egyptian religion had chance become monotheist religion. But that kind of process are very long and last even longer when religion is purely monotheist.
 
So would it be possible to become more widespread if it were to say, develop out of that cultist mentality, LS?

That would be...hard, at least outside towns.
Keep in mind it asked for a really focused religious policy to make countrysides, where rites mixing pre-roman and roman beliefs were predominants, being christianized. And that's with cities where bishops were main political features of urban life.

Let's assume Late Roman Empire survives : I'd say no, at least for the foressable future. With secular imperial structures still largely in place (while curias were out, you'd still have an important countal/magister/patrician rule), there's less of a focus to religious unification.

Not that you didn't have popular philosophy tied up with elite's beliefs, but that wasn't really a belief network that was more about rationalised suspertitio with genuine disparate beliefs. If it was closer to a modern settings, then think religion in Japan.

It doesn't mean an emperor couldn't adopt personally and try to enforce one particular sect. But without real nobiliar and popular support, it would likely fail : Christianity managed to get imposed eventually because you had already and a popular basis and a nobiliar support (due to its "humanist" message, rather than "classist").

Heck, most of elitists sects weren't interested at all being more popular : their elitism was the sign they were really good, as the vulgar didn't agreed with them.

Assuming Late Roman Empire still falls...Then, provincial rites have even of a better chance to stand on, with possibly a post-hellenistic pantheon favoured by the new rulers (meaning a more "rationalised", aristotelicianized and/or platonized pantheon).

Sort of a monotheism could still appear from all of it, but honestly, it does have equal chances to not to, if not less.
 
Indeed, one of the standard names of God in the Old Testament is "Elohim" - which is a plural form.

In Genesis, it's even 'Adonai Elohim' which is sometimes translated as 'Lord of the Gods' (Elohim meaning essentially 'gods' or 'the gods').

Some theologians even see some biblical stories as 'sure, you guys have gods, but they are lousy, and ours is way better/stronger/whatever'. There's a reason the commandment says 'thou shalt have no other gods before me' - it's monotheism by choice, not just cause there aren't any others.
 
I think the exemple is a bit irrelevant, anyway. It took millenias in order to have a strict monotheism emerging from another local favoured deity, not that dissimilar than neighbour's.
It emerged thanks to an History involving fierce rivalty, huge cultural influences from Mesopotamia, Egypt, other semitic people and maybe even IE peoples to have something looking like this.

Assuming that the really diverse Roman cults and whorships (provincial and local rites, civic rites, imperial rites, specific religions and widespread suspertitions) could do the same in what would be a blink of an eye seems...Well, quite ultra-structuralist for me : it's not like monotheism was the next and superior step of religious tought.

I mean look at religious history : how many monotheist religious can't be traced back to Abrahamic religions?

And even going for monotheist/monist teaching (while they were more widespread) doesn't lead too far either. It's either a tentative to enforce a local/dynastical political grasp trough the elevation of a local god (or attempt so) as it was attempted with Marduk or Aten, for exemple.

At this point, the Roman political hegemony was strong enough to not really use such (critically from a so diverse religious set of practices, that is barely reached by Late Bronze Age/Iron Age civilisations); which let only the dynastical power which was attempted IOTL.

Except trough Christianism, trough, it didn't much worked (Egalbalus, someone?) and that's mostly because it was already a more or less unified and exclusive set of practices and teaching that was widespread enough socially.

How many chances to see one cult in particular evolves from one set of practice that is existing non-exclusively among another, spontaneously transform as an equivalent of Christianism for the sake of it? I'd say these would be low.
 
In Genesis, it's even 'Adonai Elohim' which is sometimes translated as 'Lord of the Gods' (Elohim meaning essentially 'gods' or 'the gods').

Some theologians even see some biblical stories as 'sure, you guys have gods, but they are lousy, and ours is way better/stronger/whatever'. There's a reason the commandment says 'thou shalt have no other gods before me' - it's monotheism by choice, not just cause there aren't any others.

My favourite example of this is the exodus story. There are multiple times that translations would suggest Yahweh is literally at odds with and warring with the gods of Egypt.
 
My personal opinion is that the idea of Monotheism was introduced to various Canaanite groups by immigrants from Egypt (said immigrants later being turned in legend into the Biblical Exodus), who told their new neighbors stories of Atenism. Over the following centuries, concluding around the time of the Babylonian Exile, the proto-Hebrews' originally fully polytheistic religion was transformed into the Hebrew faith as we understand it today.
 

fi11222

Banned
I broadly agree with those like LSCatilina who think that a late roman empire monotheistic development based on Mithras, Sol, Serapis, etc. is extremely unlikely. Those deities although relatively "new" were already established brand names. How are you going to convince your own devotees (not to mention those of other cults) that they should suddenly start to deny the existence of other gods while you have been perfectly happy (and even eager) to acknowledge their existence for 100 years or more ? The problem with the syncretistic approach shared by all these late-roman religious currents is that, while it is very efficient at building a sizable devotee base in a relatively short time, it precludes you from making the truly fresh start that monotheism requires. If you have been attracting devotees with claims such as "Sol is like Apollo" or "Serapis is like Zeus + Apis", etc. you are stuck with that baggage for ever. You cannot thereafter claim that Appollo, Zeus and Appis "do not exist".

The transition from polytheism to monotheism is only possible among very small communities during, or just after, periods of major stress. For example, it seems likely that Jews became truly monotheistic only after their return from the Babylonian exile. At the time, it is likely that the returnees numbered only a few thousand. It is only in the following centuries that the monotheist Jewish headcount grew through natural population growth and conversion. That growth itself was indeed probably bolstered by religious factors. Newly minted monotheism is a very dynamic and expansive phenomenon. If we use the terminology of population dynamics, we might say that there is a very strong founder effect (a narrow population bottleneck) involved in the emergence of monotheism but that a population carrying such a cultural trait enjoys a strong competitive advantage thereafter. All this seems to be quite obviously applicable in the case of Judaism, Christianity and Islam but also probably in that of Zorostrianism and even of protestantism (seen as a monotheistic re-foundation of Christianity out of a a "polytheistic" catholic / orthodox substrate).

In the Roman context, all this points towards the early Rome rather than the late Empire. And indeed there is an early Roman event that looks suspiciously like a "monotheistic" reform : the suppression of Kingship and the establishment of the Republic. The earliest accounts we have of this episode were written at the end of the republican period, more than 5 centuries after the fact, by members of the senatorial class who had grown accustomed to think primarily in political rather than religious terms mostly under Greek influence. As a result, the "establishment of the Republic" is presented chiefly as being politically (and morally) motivated. However, there are some elements in the traditional account that betray the presence of strong religious forces at work. For example, we are told that the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus (the chief temple in Rome until Constantine) was just being built in its first incarnation precisely at that time. Before that, the Capitoline hill was covered by a myriad of shrines to local spirits and deities. Upon the construction of the Jupiter temple, all these shrines were destroyed and not simply to make space. Not only those lying on the top of the hill were removed, which would have been sufficient, but also those located on the slopes. Also we know through archaeology that a complex of temples (the Sant'Omobono area) built at the base of the Capitoline hill was abandoned (and maybe destroyed) at about the same time. Finally, it seems that in its early republican form, the senatorial class was much more a religious institution than a political one. Even in the late republic and the Empire, the members of this class had a hereditary monopoly on most of the high priestly functions of the Roman religion.

In other words, it seems that early republican Rome was quite similar to post-exilic Jerusalem. In both cases "polytheistic" shrines were being removed while a big temple was being built, on the top of a hill, in the honor of a single, all powerful male God (Yahweh / Jupiter). In both cases, this was being done under the direction of a hereditary priestly class (levites / senatorial class) governed by a council of elders (Sanhedrin / Senate) headed by a chief priest (Kohen Gadol / Flamen Dialis). The main differences seems to be that Roman early republican "monotheism" was not aniconic and, probably most importantly, did not develop a canon of scripture. Thus it was much more flexible than its Jewish counterpart as its (oral) history could be "re-written" at will to fit changing circumstances and new influences.

Starting from this, I believe it would be quite fun to try and develop a TL with a fully monotheistic Rome from the start of its (republican) history. What about, for example, a reversal of the roles of Rome and Jerusalem ? A (pagan) Jewish empire encompassing all of the Mediterranean basin and oppressing a tiny monotheistic Roman state ?

We could imagine Jewish religion "reverting" to paganism for some reason and have a Temple of Yaweh / Asherah / Astarte on the top of mount Zion (paralleling the temple of Jupiter / Juno / Minerva of mid-republican Rome) by 500 BC. Imagine that ! And the rest is history ...
 
There are numerous examples of monotheistic religions which grew out of Hinduism. Sikhism is by far the most famous. Ravidassia is another example. Three of the four main Hindu branches (Shaivism, Shaktism, and Vaishnavism) are arguably monotheistic.

Also Tenrikyo developed out of polytheistic Shintoism in Japan.
 
It happened in OTL several times... Zoroastrianism emerged from Indo-Iranian polytheism, Judaism developed from West Semitic polytheistic traditions, Hinduism produced several monotheistic offshoots, even ancient Egyptian religion produced Atenism.
 
In Genesis, it's even 'Adonai Elohim' which is sometimes translated as 'Lord of the Gods' (Elohim meaning essentially 'gods' or 'the gods').

Some theologians even see some biblical stories as 'sure, you guys have gods, but they are lousy, and ours is way better/stronger/whatever'. There's a reason the commandment says 'thou shalt have no other gods before me' - it's monotheism by choice, not just cause there aren't any others.

I thought the term was "henotheism", but actually it's "monolatry".

Henotheism is you accept the existence of other gods, but only worship one yourself, while being cool with other people worshipping other gods.

Monlatry is where you acknowledge the existence of other gods, but say they are not worthy of worship.
 
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