PREFACE If you were hoping to hear a course on the nuts and bolts of the world's major religions in this audiobook, you came to the wrong place. Any good anthology of Islam, Judaism, or Christianity could easily be volumes in size and might be more than a little boring to listen to. Instead, this course begins with why humans believe in anything at all and how we as a planet have evolved from traditional belief systems to the many major religions practiced in the world today. In this course, we will try to make sense of the earliest known formed religions and the traditional belief systems we know about – many that were practiced by human beings thousands to perhaps millions of years ago. The evolution of religion is fascinating enough; we will expand on this history to explore what the major theistic religions believe today, including how they are practiced. There are many more belief systems besides the major religions. You will hopefully learn what these are and the major components of each. We will lastly discuss what it means to be religious versus spiritual and how religion factors into a person's ethical decision-making. In chapter one of the course, you get to begin the study of theology by looking at why people believe in a divine being or beings in the first place. Is it hard-wired into us from an early age or is it taught to us in some way? At one point in our distant past, humans did not believe in anything – as far as we know, that is. Let's explore what science tells us about the purpose of having a belief in god. If there is a purpose for billions of believing people living on earth today, what might that be? Chapter two will help you understand the evolution of belief into a religion. Is anything a person believes considered a religion or is there more to it than that? If we pick apart what is and isn't religion, what do we find as the things all or most religions have in common? You will hear much about the differences between belief systems soon enough. This chapter will help you find a common framework or lens through which we can study the different ways people practice their faith on Earth.
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