Ancient Origins articles related to Religions, we investigate the creation beliefs of the major world religions and then address the controversies surrounding the account.
Laos is a country that we know little about, it is only in recent years that the nation has opened to the outside world. But the country has many important archaeological sites, amongst the most...
The Eye of Providence (known also as the all-seeing eye of God) is a well-known and popular symbol. This symbol has been used for centuries in both religious and secular contexts, and therefore its...
Our fascination with ghostly tales around Christmas time goes back thousands of years and is rooted in ancient celebrations of the winter solstice. In the depths of winter, pagan traditions included...
The Christianization of Anglo-Saxon England began towards the end of the 6 th century AD, and by the end of the succeeding century, all the kings of Anglo-Saxon England were Christian, at least...
Christianity, as one of the world’s most prominent and widely practiced religions, brings along a whole string of myths, stories, historical occurrences, and relics. From saints and their remains, to...
Who were the nephilim ? The word nephilim appears twice in the Old Testament of the Bible. They are first mentioned in chapter 6 of the book of Genesis and then again in Number 13:33. But their brief...
The White Lotus Society / Sect (written in Chinese as 白莲教, and Romanized as ‘Bai Lian Jiao’) was a millenarian movement that existed in imperial China. As a religious movement, the teachings of the...
The idea of the human soul has fascinated humankind for thousands of years. Cultures around the world have sought to explain the soul or spirit in a wide and fascinating variety of ways. The soul is...
Almost without exception, mythological and folkloric traditions around the ancient world were concerned with the matter of deep time and the earth’s creation. While creation myths exhibit great...
The Vision of the Valley of Dry Bones prophecy is one of the most powerful prophecies of the prophet Ezekiel . In this vision, Ezekiel finds himself in a valley full of dry human bones of Israelite...
According to tradition, the city of Carthage was founded in 814 BC by the legendary Queen Dido . The founder of this city was originally a princess from the Phoenician city of Tyre. She was, however...
For most of our history, scientists have primarily believed that the universe is eternal and unchanging. Aristotle in the fourth century BC asserted that the world is without beginning or end. But...
The Flower of Life is a name for a geometrical figure composed of seven or more evenly-spaced, overlapping circles. This figure, used as a decorative motif since ancient times, forms a flower-like...
As more and more people describe themselves as ‘spiritual’ rather than religious, experts expect eco-friendly pagan movements will continue to grow. Already there are perhaps a million pagans in the...
Amenhotep IV, also known as the Pharaoh Akhenaten, was destined to be remembered for his attempt at a religious conversion of ancient Egypt; one that saw the old gods put aside and replaced by a...
The Sumerian religion was polytheistic in nature, and the Sumerians worshipped a great number of deities. These deities were anthropomorphic beings, and were meant to represent the natural forces of...
My pious Baptist grandmother once shockingly confessed, at the ripe old age of 93, that she didn’t want to go to heaven. “Why,” we asked? “Well, I think it will be rather boring just sitting around...
In many ancient cultures and religious traditions, rulers and elite members of society not only had wives, they also had concubines. Concubines normally served a dual purpose – to increase a man’s...
Osiris, the green-skinned god of the underworld, lord of the afterlife and judge of the dead, is one of the best-known gods from ancient Egypt. His story provided his followers with reassurance for...
The Land of Nod is not just a place we go to catch a few winks but was mentioned in Genesis as the place where Cain, the firstborn son of Adam and Eve, was cast away after murdering his brother Abel...
New research using ancient DNA is rewriting the genetic history of two ancient peoples; the Hindus and the Jews - and it shows that their two religious civilizations are the result of multiple...
The Yazidis (also spelled as Yezidis) are a religious minority found primarily in northern Iraq. In recent years, the Yazidis have received the attention of the international media as a result of...
Although Jewish people usually, but not always, share a common gene pool, they are not a race because any non-Jew who converts to Judaism will be recognized as being Jewish by all those rabbis who...
A ritual based religion, Shintoism is defined as "the way of the gods" in Japan, from the Chinese Shendao. It is the indigenous religion of the country, and survives today as the state religion,...