I always thought the basis of well established religions was pretty obvious. Their creation came in a time where you had a very poor population with a small, elite, extremely wealthy ruling class. How do you convince your poor population they should toil away their entire lives to sustain your wealth? How do you keep them from overthrowing you and distributing your wealth among the population? Invent a god that they are afraid of, connect yourself with that god (paintings of past monarchs/rulers often involve them hanging out with the saints, Jesus or the Spaghetti Monster). Make people believe in eternal life that they will only get if they slave away for you obediently. A life that involves 30 years of hard labor every day is much more acceptable for someone who thinks they are headed to 'heaven' after than to someone who believes that when they die that's it. When you need people to go to war for you to gain further wealth, tell them god is commanding your people to go to war for him.
Pretty clever, and easy to pull off on an uneducated/poor population. What they are today is obviously nowhere close to that, but if I was a king back then I'm sure I would have thought it was a good idea.
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