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To: RegulatorCountry
I’ve come to speculate that most ancient religions or belief systems outside Christianity and Judaism contain a portion of truth but from another perspective, that of the great men of old, men of reknown who founded them.

My take is a little different. Rather than thinking of founders, I think Judaism itself grew out of the more ancient faiths like Zoroastrianism and there are bound to be commonalities between the ancient faiths and Judaism/Christianity. Zoroastrianism for its part is said to have a lot in common with Hinduism.

12 posted on 12/15/2011 4:59:18 AM PST by JimWayne
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To: JimWayne
Zoroastrianism and Hinduism arise from the same Indo-European root

Ancient Irani and Indic religions (talking about Vedic and pre-Zoroastrian times around 1000 BC and prior) believed in two families of God: Asuras & Devas in indic and Ahuras and Daevas in iranic

incidently the other indo-europeans had the same -- the nordics had the aesir and vanir while the greeks made the Titans the ancestors of the Olympians

In Hinduism the earliest Veda, teh Rig Veda calls gods like Varuna and Agni as Asuras, but by the 700s the Asuras were lower-level, then became demonic by the time Christianity reached india (40 AD or so with St. thomas)

in Iran the opposite happened -- Ahuras were given a higher status. Zoroaster raised one - Ahura Mazda, the God of Light as the main god with the opposing force being Aingra Mainyu

incidently the hindus moved away from vedic hinduism post Buddhism's rise and fall and they moved to Brahmanical hinduism and stopped worshipping Indra etc. (well not stopped, but reduceD) and started Vishnu/Shiva worship and developed the hindu trinity (trilok? trinath something): Brahma-Vishnu-Shiva

16 posted on 12/15/2011 5:38:09 AM PST by Cronos (Nuke Mecca and Medina now..)
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