According to the available historical sources, most of humanity practiced some form of paganism until the 6th Century BCE.
Many peoples and cultures in the ancient world had rich mythological beliefs from which they drew spiritual practices into their lives.
When trying to understand the powerful pull towards idolatry that permeated the ancient world, most scholars come to the erroneous conclusion that the humans of that era were superstitious primitives less advanced than modern man.
But the truth might actually be that the humans of that era were having a radically different experience than what we’re familiar with today.
In ancient times, we see the prophets of Israel railing against the dangers of idolatry. But one thing we see no record of is the prophets ever critiquing atheism.
This is because the prophets existed during a period in which the Sh’khina (Divine Presence) rested openly in the world and was experientially felt to the extent that any atheist ideas would have been readily contradicted by humanity’s lived experience.
In contrast to modern times, humans in what we can call the age of mythology had a visceral perception of the Divine. The central question they often struggled with was how to interpret that experience – which god to worship. Some cultures deified the forces of nature. Others creates a pantheon of humanlike gods. But none were atheist.
Then something happened during the 6th Century BCE that appears to have impacted most of the known world.
In Greece, at the time of the Athenian leader Pericles, the first philosophers appeared.
At the same time in Persia, Zarathustra created Zoroastrianism.
Further east, the Buddha led a spiritual revolution in India against classic Hinduism.
In China, Lao-Tse preached Taoism and Confucius preached Confucianism.
The historic record shows the emergence of several new ideas in different locations to explain the world. But what could have caused this?
We should look at this shift in human consciousness as a process that began when the Babylonian Empire destroyed Jerusalem’s First Temple in 586 BCE and displaced most of the Judean Kingdom.
A couple decades before the First Temple was destroyed, the prophet Yirmiyahu addressed what would take place.
“HaShem, my Strength, my Stronghold, and my Refuge on the day of distress! To You nations will come from the ends of the earth and say: ‘It was all falsehood that our ancestors inherited, futility that has no purpose. Can a man make gods for himself? – they are not gods!” (Yirmiyahu 16:19)
Yirmiyahu foresaw that a day would come where the nations would cease believing in the mythologies of their parents – as a result of the confusion caused by the withdrawal of the Sh’khina and the sudden decrease in humanity’s spiritual experience.
After 70 years of exile, many Israelites returned home and began to rebuild their country and the Temple.
During this time, the Men of the Great Assembly – including the last Israelite prophets – were active in Jerusalem. This should be understood as the historical transition between the age of mythology and the age of human wisdom. The new philosophies and religions that began to emerge all over the world arose in parallel to the decline of prophecy in Israel.
Ezra the Scribe requested to annul the pull towards idolatry that had been considered one of the underlying causes for the First Temple’s destruction. The Creator granted this request and gave Ezra the power to do with this desire as he saw fit. Our sages teach us that the desire for idolatry was “slain” and “placed” in a lead tub – but then appeared as a lion cub of fire leaving the Holy of Holies of the Second Temple.
Until this point, the Sh’khina rested openly and we enjoyed a powerful spiritual experience. Israelites with the strength, knowledge and discipline to properly channel this light attained some level of prophecy (the Rambam describes eleven levels of prophecy in his Guide for the Perplexed). But those who were weak often succumbed to idolatry – similar to a drug addict needing a quick fix and abandoning all self-control despite knowing he’s harming himself.
Once the intensity of Divine light was reduced in the world, the Sh’khina was no longer overtly perceptible. Within Israel, this resulted in the departure of both prophecy and the pull towards idolatry. Amongst the nations, paganism was weakened (although it continued to be used by rulers to unify the peoples under them).
The withdrawal of the Sh’khina – the lowering of the volume on humanity’s spiritual experience – took place across the world. This decrease in the intensity of the Divine light created space for humans to utilize their intellectual powers to construct their own ideas to interpret the world. The most powerful of the religions became widespread and popular while the philosophies of Greece laid the intellectual foundation for Western civilization.
A major difference between the Greek and Israelite approaches to this transition from the age of mythology to the age of wisdom was that the Greeks assumed the previous generations to be primitive fools (similar to the position held by modern academia when addressing this issue) while the Judeans understood their ancestors to have had a real experience that departed the world but would one day return.
It’s important to appreciate that our perception of the world around us greatly impacts how we experience it (the brakhot we recite all day, for example, are meant to increase our perception of HaShem’s active involvement in our lives). Protecting us from the pull towards idolatry required a decrease in humanity’s spiritual experience, which in turn deprived us of prophecy.
At least for the time being.
