Let's step it up a notch shall we?
Religions are natural, interesting, powerful things.
They are the resultant of the pressure to survive in the face of harsh conditions. They are a by-product of circumstance.
Take away the internet. Take away grocery stores... take away a massive population and highway system. Get back to the beginning of the tribal mindset. Get back to a time when language was first coming to be.
What do you see?
I see a species beginning an abstract journey to comprehend and overcome their environmental challenges.
As language develops via the capacity and necessity for communication, certain things become evident.. like that some are stronger and some are smarter. Each of these however, needs the other to survive.
What bonds the tribe? What answers their questions? What unites them in the face of certain death? The smart or more powerful ones come to conclusions that fit their percieved circumstance and limited knowledge. They relate to their environment by projecting themselves onto it, as we do... with nothing else to go on, it's probably reasonable to presume that some being, obviously a being with powers beyond the scope of tribal comprehension, must be controlling things like the sun, weather, blah blah. what else could explain it?
further, by coming to a common conclusion for the tribe as to the explanation of the unexplainable, the tribe is united through a common understanding.. a common motivation. as time progressed, the beliefs of the predecessors pass from generation and so forth... each time being modified to meet the needs of an expanding comprehension of environment, or a common disspointment thereof. if there was no food this season, what must we have done to offend the controller? it would seem that grasping at straws of appeasement would be the only rational course of action. when it would seem to work, it would be accepted as the proper method and adopted as well, gospel - so to speak.
what's interesting to me here, is that through this graduated process, the ideas take on a "life of their own" so to speak. these abstracts that are passed from one generation to the next serve the purpose of survival as it is seen through the eyes of those who undertake it, though they may not be able to state it so plainly.
so...
religion is a function of evolution. it serves to bond and empower the tribe. ultimately it's an abstract expression of the trials of the history of the species. as generation after generation passed, it become formalized into tradition. each instance of religion of course, could and did definateley clash greatly with other versions of the story of life.
the basis of religion (the "truth" of its content) has little or nothing to do with its function and utility in evolutionary terms. obviously, it has continued function and utility even to this day.
bah, there's more but I'm spent at the moment. please pardon the lack of clarity, organization and perhaps a couple of non-sequiters.
IF jesus existed, I don't see him as more of a conman than any man trying to represent a cause. From the perspective that he is, I'd say anyone representing anything remotely altruistic or profitable must also be a conman.
