In late 2016, I am beginning to lean towards being an agnostic i.e. I still believe there is “a” source of power, but of late I have been questioning everything I learn. In the past ,when I did not find answers, I would move on with the hope that I may find them later. But few questions have remained unanswered for a while, this has continued to pique my curiosity about the “unknown” and about our rational minds trying to make sense of this.

God may be an all knowing, omnipotent entity. He (or she) could take the form of another entity, an animal, a formless creature spread over the cosmos or, a pure form of consciousness or take another mere mortal form (avatar) with the goal of helping mankind or direct events on earth or sky with an endgame in mind.  But the all-knowing omnipotent one has not given me the wisdom nor the direction to find answers for my questions…

If I am too small to get the attention of the all-knowing one, can some reading this blog help me answer some of my own questions?

Ok, to make things a little better, maybe I will take a stab at answering this and you can help correct or update my assumptions

Why do we have so many religions in this planet?

Here is my attempt to answer this:

Each individual or a community of early settlers had their own set of beliefs, each community pondered over the eternal unanswered questions we (most of us) face, each community had its own rules, dos and dont’s.

Most communities may have had among them what we call a “hero”(or a heroine) or a bunch of them. These individuals may have been gods, kings, philosophers or they may have been considered as teachers or messengers carrying instructions from someone above them. They may also be considered as incarnations (avatars) of someone higher up. These charismatic individuals or groups of individuals defined their community’s way of life, mostly based on their own interpretation of morality. They added the “fear element” in to their books to bring the masses inline and put together a framework of what we call doctrines or rules of a particular community that they were part of. In my opinion, these individuals or groups of individuals created a cocktail of rules and beliefs and this, over time became a way of life a.k.a religion.

Is this organic i.e., did these individuals or small groups create this or did someone above them direct this (“The Matrix” analogy anyone?)

Originally written in 2017, edited for typos in 2021.