Why were religions invented?

Religion must have been dreamt up by males, as no female could create such crazy rubbish. All religions have some ridicules sexual rituals, such a male and female circumcision. It is crazy and should be band.

to fill a god shaped hole

even the Atheists Religion began in August 2006

I think it was because everybody has different ways of teaching things or believing and not everybody believes in one god so then they split up and went their separate ways.

Religions are primarily based on a literal interpretation of the metaphorical and allegorical myths that taught and reinforced expected social behavior by and of a particular group, clan, tribe or family.

The original idea was for the listerner to see him or herself as the "hero" of the story, as the one venturing out on the "journey", which was always about self discovery and then bringing back that knowledge to share it with the collective.

As the stories were passed down from one generation to the next and the society and culture began to shift from the hunter/gather clans to more organized societies based around agriculture the people hearing the tales could no longer directly relate to the old stories because they tell of "hunter" who dare to go out in the unknown to face their fears, etc. The farmers did not do such things as they stayed at home and tended to the crops.

With these changes, both personal and cultural, the idea of the listener being the hero was lost and the same allegorical and mataphorical stories were intrepreted to be about long gone anscestors who were thought to have literally carried out the exploits of the myths.

The further removed the hears of the stories became with each successive generation the more ritualized the telling of the stories became, usually with a single story teller, a shaman or holy person who had memorized them, even if they had never learned their true meaning.

The shaman/story teller taught his or her apprentice to tell the stories and an exacting oral tradition began. The stories became "sacred" and stylized and, eventually, written down into a book of "sacred" or "holy" stories that were seen as absolute truth that hade been given to them by the people in the stories, who were so marvelous and wonderful or amazing that they could not have been mere mortals like the listeners of the tells. If they were not mortals then surely they must be "the gods".

The stories now were the "answers" and told where things came from and how the god interacted with one another and with the world...except for those occasions when even the stories were unable to answer the questions, so some questions, such as questioning the stories became forbidden.

The shamans found that they had a good deal of control over the people because they were the ones everyone looked to to tell the stories and the ones who decided what they meant. As they were so important to the culture, the society had to support them...

And so religions came into being....and have become what they are today.

To give drug dealers alternate employment when drug supplies dwindle. They can sell the opiate of the masses.

I think you will find this article interesting. The below link talks about why there are so many religions. (may have to copy/paste it into url)

I would rather think that the different religious sects were formed because people with similar beliefs wanted to re-enforce their beliefs by sharing them with people with the same beliefs. Like the atheists and christians here do. The atheists like to challenge the christians and the christians take the bait and try to defend themselves knowing full well they can't win. But they can bait the atheists and they do and the atheists know they can't change the minds of the christians but taunt them anyway. And so the banter continues. Like good versus evil, up or down, left or right, black or white. Man is a social animal and we also like to hunt.

Questions asked by everyone,

Where do we come from

What is ourcpurpose for being here,

Where do we go after we die.

To control the masses.

To teach morality.