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Originally Posted by devilsadvocate
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Originally Posted by DMcCunney
The early Hebrews were polytheists, and the early conceptions have God as one of a number of elohim. He didn't claim to be the only god. He simply required his followers to put him first in their worship. (Moses besting the Pharoah's magicians has a strong flavor of "My god can beat your gods!") I was curious about the transition, and how he went from "the god that is our god" to "the only god that exists."
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There were multiple natural phenomena to explain away, so it stands to reason that there was a pantheon in early Judaism. |
Yes. I believe YHWH was originally a god of lightning and storms.
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Further, Judaism is not only fractious now but probably started as a combination of beliefs meeting at the crossroads which was Caanan. From what I can see it appears to be at least partially the result of an exposure to Zoroastrianism, which appears to have still more in common with Christianity.
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That may be the case. Certainly, Christianity had internal battles about various issues raised by Zoroastrianism.
IIRC, one flavor of Zoroastrianism believed that Ormuzd (the good spirit) and Ahriman (the bad spirit) were equally powerful, and it was not a foregone conclusion that good would triumph over evil. There's a Christian heresy (whose name I'm forgetting), that had similar ideas, and was a cause of controversy in the early church. They may have gotten the notion from the Zoroastrians.
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Dennis