other monotheisms

Would Manicheanism (sic.) be classed as monotheistic? :confused:

In spite of its dualism, it could be seen as monotheistic.

However, it absorbed so many Christian and Gnostic influences, that it's a syncretic offshoot of the Abrahamic and Iranian traditions rather than a monotheistic tradition that developed independantly from the Abrahamic tradition.
 
the monotheistic traditions of today all derive from the Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition - but I wonder were there other monotheistic impulses in other parts of the world? Something not related to the J-C-I tradition? if such a religion (or religions) survived and thrived, how would the meeting of two (or more) diffrerent monotheistic civilizations have gone - would they have reconciled and come to some agreement that they're in the end talking about the same One God, or would there have been conflict?
Zoroastrianism. If that managed to maintain its hold on Persia instead of getting lost in the Hellenistic shuffles and finally all-but-destroyed by Islam, it might very well have become one of the world's major monotheistic religions, and certain one of the big religions in the world.

Or, if the Romans kept syncretisizing their gods, a, let's say, "Sol Invicticism" could arise.
An even older POD could be Atenism succeeding in Egypt.
 
Shinto has a primary goddess, Amaterasu. Under Buddhist or other influences, could she become the only deity, others being lesser beings?

Somebody here had a thread with a Northwest Indian religion arising in the 19th century, I think a Crow religion.

Coyote might have become a dominant figure in a new religion influenced by the West.

The Spider was important in many African religions. A spider has eight legs, Buddhism has the eight-fold path...:D Just brainstorming, here...:D:rolleyes:
 

NomadicSky

Banned
and you know this - how?

I know many people who follow the Mormon faith I talk to them and I've talked to the Mormon missionaries and even gone to church before at my local LDS church (just visted didn't want to become one). Mormons will tell you that their faith is a monotheistic one. I guess it is just as much as the major Christian faith is.

One god who is eternal has a flesh and bone body just like us. That's the major one and then Jesus is his son distict from God but still a part of God.
 
I doubt you'd be able to find a single Christian who believes Lucifer/the Devil/whatever to be a god/God. Lucifer is a supernatural being, sure, but no Christian believes that his power is anywhere near equivilent to God's.

And this is why i am atheist. I think it unfair that the embodiement of EVIL is second best. Its probably just wishful thinking on the Judeo/Christian faiths, just so that they can be certain that God can rescue them from damnation should they repent. If the entires in the bible of Lucifer/the Devil/Satan, turns out to be propaganda by God or the Bible Authors to downplay Satans power, then I would regain my faith. While i would not wish to live in hell forever, i like things to be equal. Besides, if Lucifer was a god, then some stuff in the bible would make a lot more sense. Like how the snake got into the Garden, or How Evil came into existance in the first place, and didnt just appear out of thin air w/o Gods knowledge.

If Lucifer turns out to be a small fry and he has a boss, then he/shes the one who this is directed to.

It be funny if Both Yaweh and (insert evil gods name here), were so powerful that they just decided to take turns fiddling with shit in the universe. God made the first move with Creation. Evil the second move with turning Lucifer. Esentially an endless game of chess, with noone ever get checkmate because the king pieces are the ones playing!
 
Shinto has a primary goddess, Amaterasu. Under Buddhist or other influences, could she become the only deity, others being lesser beings?

Somebody here had a thread with a Northwest Indian religion arising in the 19th century, I think a Crow religion.

The Crow religion was a Gnostic religion, which is not what the thread is looking for.

That is a very interesting idea with the Shinto though, something that hasn't been thought of before (AFAIK). There was an official Japanese religion that was a combination of Shintoism and Buddhism (called Shinbutsu Shūgō). So maybe the Buddhist influence causes the syncreatic religion to be monotheistic.. I wonder when that would happen though?
 
Hinduism is monotheistic, kinda. Although it probably wouldn't be if it weren't for Islam.

Hinduism shouldn't count because there are so many varieties of it- it's impossible to actually pin down. And most of the varieties are monistic rather than monotheistic.
 
Because the question is about major non Jewish-derived monotheistic religions. :rolleyes:

Anyway, X-ianity is certainly monotheistic. Father-son-holy ghost is more of a personality divide than a trio of gods.

I don't understand your last comment. Are you saying that Europe shouldn't be Christian because X-ianity originated in the ME? :confused:

Non-Protestant Christianity is pretty non-monotheistic, even if you do make the rather large exemption for the Trinity. Mary and the saints are all pretty much worshipped. Many pagan pantheons more or less had a supreme deity with all the others just subsidiary to the point that they were equivalent to saints.
 
I would disagree that Christian saints, even in their most extreme form, are "godlets". At most they might be considered something like the Greek Heros - and after all Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all admit to the existence of created supernatural beings beside the one true God such as angels and demons.

This is an interesting thread and it really does make you think how the spread of Christianity and Islam has perhaps created the common perception that monotheism is a natural evolution of polytheism. Other than Zorastrianism (which is really a dualism, and which itself may have influenced the Abrahamic faiths) and the cult of Aten, I can think of no other monotheistic faith which did not either evolve directly from Christianity (LDS, Deism, etc), or Islam (Baha'i), or evolve as a synchretic movement from a polytheistic, animist, or pantheistic as a result of Chriistian or Moslem influence (Sihkism, the Native American Church, and other synchretisms).

Also, one needs to be very suspicious of 16th Spanish accounts that Mesoamerican religion was either evolving in a monotheistic way, or that the cults of certain gods were monotheistic. After spending 50 years crushing native faiths, the friars and monks then spent another 50 years looking for ways to depict Aztec religion in a more favorable light (sort of like a debased Christianity) - seeking out and highlighting similarities between it and Catholicism.
 
Judaism doesn't really treat the "devil" as a "fallen angel." He's simply God's D.A (ala "Law and Order"). God's the judge. Sadly He doesn't provide us with a defense attorney; instead we have to do that ourselves.
 
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