They're very much different kinds of religions than what once existed within mythology, but it's there to answer questions anyways. Most people aren't content in not knowing what happens after we die so they latch onto a religion that gives us a fleshed out answer filled with an entire process of judgement and punishment/reward. It's still answering questions, just different ones.
Of course it's answering questions; that's the point of philosophies and beliefs. But just because it provides a metaphysical answer to a metaphysical question does not mean that it's bad.
And people were pulling answers from the Bible long ago that can be explained by science. People believed for a long time that the Earth was the center of the universe because God said so. So many of those have just become debunked that it's become a game of semantics and most hardcore faiths latch onto the unprovable metaphysical questions.
Those "answers" were usually extrapolated from older stories. In the Bible, God never says anything like "this is the center of the universe," people just assumed it because it made sense to them that THE earth was central to creation. Scientific knowledge and reason were used to the best of their ability in such a time; people worked with what they had, and in the days before an established scientific method, that usually amounted to reading various histories, essays, philosophical treatises, and other literature (yes, including the Bible) and trying to interpret an answer that seemed to fit.
It's not as though the idea of Biblical non-literalism was invented by moderates as a response to the Scientific Revolution or Enlightenment. St. Augustine wrote this in
408AD:
It not infrequently happens that something about the earth, about the sky, about other elements of this world, about the motion and rotation or even the magnitude and distances of the stars, about definite eclipses of the sun and moon, about the passage of years and seasons, about the nature of animals, of fruits, of stones, and of other such things, may be known with the greatest certainty by reasoning or by experience, even by one who is not a Christian. It is too disgraceful and ruinous, though, and greatly to be avoided, that he [the non-Christian] should hear a Christian speaking so idiotically on these matters, and as if in accord with Christian writings, that he might say that he could scarcely keep from laughing when he saw how totally in error they are.
-The Literal Interpretation of Genesis
And in 410AD:
But the ambiguities of metaphorical words, about which I am next to speak, demand no ordinary care and diligence. In the first place, we must beware of taking a figurative expression literally. For the saying of the apostle applies in this case too: “The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.” For when what is said figuratively is taken as if it were said literally, it is understood in a carnal manner. And nothing is more fittingly called the death of the soul than when that in it which raises it above the brutes, the intelligence namely, is put in subjection to the flesh by a blind adherence to the letter. For he who follows the letter takes figurative words as if they were proper, and does not carry out what is indicated by a proper word into its secondary signification ; but, if he hears of the Sabbath, for example, thinks of nothing but the one day out of seven which recurs in constant succession; and when he hears of a sacrifice, does not carry his thoughts beyond the customary offerings of victims from the flock, and of the fruits of the earth.
-The City of God, Chapter 5, "It is a Wretched Slavery Which Takes the Figurative Expressions of Scripture in a Literal Sense."
Not to suggest that Augustine and other Christian doctors and writers didn't try to extrapolate scientific answers (which were obviously flawed) from the Bible; in City of God, Augustine also tries to argue that the earth is only around 6000 years old by pointing out contradictions between "pagan" Greek and Egyptian historical documents which referenced pagan deities, and concluded that by faith in the Bible as being God's Word, it must be most accurate. But as said before, that was the best they could come up with, equipped only with a bunch of texts varying in age from thousands of years to a scant few centuries. They were trying to be scientists by taking data and interpreting it with reason and experience, but didn't have the tools or methods.
Ah well, science is a self-correcting process that grows from its mistakes; errors and revisions are an indispensable part of the procedure. That's why the Vatican has had scientific academies and institutions for a long time, to improve understanding and make sure that it becomes more and more unlikely that such thinking will repeat; despite the embarrassing debacle with Galileo* at around the same time there were Vatican astronomers writing papers supporting heliocentricity as a valid theory, the Church has gotten a lot better. The current Pontifical Academy of Sciences, for example, doesn't care whether its members are Catholic, or even Christian, or even believe in God (Heck, Stephen Hawking is a member and one of the priests working there considers Richard Dawkins a friend), but only wants to aid in the furthering of science, to both increase the wealth of human knowledge and to keep the Holy See informed so that it doesn't make decisions based on outdated ideas.
*
spoiler (click to show/hide)
The "offense" was more about how Galileo seemed to claim that knowledge of the universe was capable without divine aid (remember that the scientific community at the time was mostly Church-run or sponsored), that he seemed to state his results as empirically proven, and he that accidentally came across as mocking of geocentric views during a section featuring a hypothetical debate between a helio- and geocentrist; he had done that before when he and a Jesuit got into an argument over comets which grew into a debate of Science, eventually ending in Galileo writing a scathing parody where he tore the Jesuit a new one... and wrote some things which made a lot Jesuits feel pretty insulted.
Honestly, that the Vatican was very interested in the debate, and Pope Urban VIII liked Galileo's work, even the one where he made fun of the Jesuit (he thought it was great). But Urban was more inclined to heliocentricism (remember, this was the 1600s when there was no definitive evidence either way, merely conjecture based on observations), and when Pope Urban asked that his views be put into the point-counterpoint section of the book, Galileo made heliocentrists (and by extension, the Pope) look a little stupid.
Not defending the Church for going wayyyyyyy out of line, getting butthurt, and bringing Galileo to trial; that was stupid and it's a damn good thing that they finally stopped doing stupid crap like that, and that John Paul II finally apologized for it.
I'm really not trying to convert anyone here, say that religion is faultless, or that modern faiths are wholly original; obviously there are a lot of imagery and ideas that aren't exactly original, and I am well aware that there is an ocean of human error and folly involved in their development. I'm just really interested in how religions developed and how they continue to develop with changing cultures and advances in science.
It just bothers me when a very simplistic view of the history of religion (which is complicated and nuanced, like all history) is put forth like something out of Zeitgeist, citing superficial similarities, mixing up different concepts, and making very general and flawed statements based on ignorance. I don't care if you're an atheist or not, but saying something like "Well, the concept of Heaven is obviously taken from the Greek Olympus, they're both cloudy places ruled by old guys with beards," or even something pro-Christian (but still false) like, "Jesus was the first to preach loving others before oneself, that means He was Son of God!" and I get peeved. It's like saying that the American democracy is basically stolen from Greek democracy, or that America is the best because it was the first country with representative government.
You're basically saying that if people don't practice Christianity the way you do or would practice it, they're not a not Christians. Honestly, this sounds like something a fundie would say. When people believe in God, believe his son walked on the Earth, and call themselves Christians, take their fucking word for it. There is no platonic ideal of religious worship. Religious expression is subjective.
I agree with you
in principle, but there are some limits. If a person believes in God and Jesus, but also believes that Jesus was an invisible pink unicorn or teapot floating in space (lol irony) who died to alleviate His own boredom, and calls themselves Christian, are they still? Obviously there are very few, if any, examples of this in the real world that are anywhere near as unorthodox, but you get what I mean. The First Church of Invisible Pink Unicorn Jesus could call themselves a special sect of Christianity, and I'll take their word for it that they honestly believe that, but still I can't help but think that they're somehow "doing it wrong." Not to say it's less "worthy" of a religion, but it'd a bit of a misnomer to call it Christianity.
