Religion v/s Evolution
I recently started reading the book Sapiens- A brief history of humankind[1]. And this post is inspired from the book.
In the book “Sapiens” there is a comparison of evolution alongside religion. According to almost all the religions, humans were the epitome of creation, completely different, superior than the animal kind. But according to the theory of evolution species similar to us walked the facets of Earth long before the evolution of Homo Sapiens. Some of them are Homo Neanderthalensis who lived in Europe and Asia, humans of Denisova, etc.
A question was, in the later stages of evolution when Homo Sapiens were evolving on the different part of the world and after migration when the met their half-brothers, how they might have reacted?
Two possible theories are discussed in the book:
Whatever might be the reason of vanishing of other human tribes from the face of Earth, both the theories contradict with the teachings of most of the religious texts. All most all the religions of the world consider humans to be the epitome of creation, far superior to the other organisms and enjoying special privileges from “God” making them completely different from the animal kingdom. Most of the religions teach us that we all popped out of nothingness and enjoyed the supremacy over other organisms.
We have concrete proof of evolution, and there is no denying that millions of years ago organisms similar to humans resided on Earth. Now the question is how did the so-called “Gods” of the different mythologies had regarded of the earlier human civilizations. Because the problem is, primitive humans didn’t know how the worship the idols of the deities.
The concept of God looks a total scam to me. I will personally talk about the Hindu mythology here. Let roll back to the time of the Sadhus. There is no denying that a lot of very brilliant people were present at that time. What might have happened was they would have discovered a lot of ways to make the life more easier by following a lot of practices which required a lot of dedication and patience but those practices paved the roads for a healthier and more prosperous life. Now, the problem was to convince the majority to follow these practices. It would have been tough to convince a large group of people, so over time they created a supernatural entity to create a fear in the hearts of people and to make them follow what is right. And over time this fictional fear was engraved so deep in the minds of people that now, people are ready to even kill others for them.
The best example for this is Harry Potter. Let’s suppose a group of people started believing that Hogwarts is real and Hogwarts Express awaits wizards and witches on the platform 9 3/4 of the King’s Cross Station to take them on the journey to a magical realm. And slowly the population of these “believers” started expanding, and over time they became aggressive and started murdering people who claim that it doesn’t exist. Now, a time will come when the only people left on Earth to breathe are those who believe that wizards and witches dwell the world. This fictional story will be fueled for ages by a lot of rumor spreading personnel and it will never cease to exist. So, over time the imagination of J.K. Rowling will become real. Something like this might have happened in case of say Ramayana, Mahabharata, etc.
Again these are all theories, and if someone is watching over us or not, no one knows. So, just do whatever you feel is right!
:)