Scientists

Some of the modern scientists, who do not show any desire to stand on the guard of religion, say with conviction that ” primitive religions can not be considered only some attempts to bribe. The motives that led a person to practice religious worship were evidently derived from other needs, and not from a single need for food. A mental thirst, a desire to know the nature of the world in which man lives, and to place himself, as far as possible, in the highest order, an aesthetic need, a desire to deal with objects that occupy his imagination; a moral need, a desire not to be in a completely isolated position, but to submit to some authority, to feel some obligation-all this, though very vaguely, rather as a presentiment than as a clear consciousness, must have entered into the original worship of the forces of nature or mysterious spirits. This view has the advantage of portraying the development of religion as continuous from the very beginning, rather than presenting it at first as something exclusively egoistic, recognizing that attachment and piety entered religion only at further stages. If the nature of man is essentially religious, then everything that is part of religion must have been inherent in man from the very beginning, at least in an unconscious and primitive form” (Menzies, O. Pfleiderer).

The question of the original origin of religion in the human race may remain open for a long time. The beginning of religion is lost in such remote antiquity, from which we have not preserved not only any historical evidence, but probably even material monuments. The knowledge gained about the religious beliefs of various uncultured tribes is still too insufficient to solve such a large issue. And besides, knowledge of the history of religions alone, as we have said, is far from sufficient to restore the process of formation of primary religious beliefs. Here a detailed study of the psychological foundations of religion is necessary, and the very essence of religious feeling is elucidated; and in this respect very little has been done; only recently has serious attention been paid to the psychology of religion.

§10. The original form of religion
Since the question of the initial origin of religion in the human race is not resolved, it is difficult to approach the solution of the question of the original form of religion. How religious worship began: whether it began with the worship of natural phenomena, or whether the cult of dead ancestors first appeared, whether it was not preceded, even in the most rudimentary form, by a purer worship of the Supreme being – all these are questions to which no one dares to give a categorical answer. It is impossible to say with certainty whether religious worship began with one particular form among all men, or whether individual tribes followed an independent path in this respect, so that in one tribe religion was found initially in the form of the deification of natural phenomena, in another it began with the worship of ancestors, in others-with the veneration of the most insignificant objects, such as stones, animal teeth, shells, etc.