Book Review - The Evolution of Gods - The Scientific Origin of Divinity And Religions

"The Evolution of Gods" - The Scientific origin of divinity and religions. Don't miss this book, just grab it. One of the best eye-opening book I have read in recent years. Title-subtitle combination is more than enough to capture readers attention.

Book Blurb

Is there really a God out there, or is it something that human created so we could have something or someone to fear in cases where we go wrong? This book asserts the it is the highly imaginative human mind that invented God using scientific research.For most people it is blind faith in a God that they believe existed, and for some there is doubt as to how this whole concept came about. This book takes you back to the era that was about 400,000 to 200,000 years ago when man and woman just came to existence. About 100,000 years ago, humans discovered language as a form of communication. This helped them analyse and think about the world around them. It makes sense that the things that they feared the most were what they would eventually worship. For example: they feared the cold, so they turned to the sun for help and in turn started to worship it. They felt threatened by thunder and lightening, so they worship the sky. Several years ago diseases came into being which brought about another God that served that purpose. This book sets apart religion and science. It tells us that there is a scientific reason for the creation of every God that is worshipped, and that it is the work of the humans themselves.

We accept the theory of evolution but never thought how religions came into existence. If we want to understand the evolution of religion, we have to start with the evolution of mankind. None of the religion came into existence overnight. It took the journey of centuries for religion to conceptualize. Surprisingly if you study various religion on the earth, you will find drastic commonality. If we apply scientific thought process, we will find reasons why that commonalities exist. Everything started from nomadic people, who started worshiping environment in one form or another. Their evolution and growth with time have given birth to organized religion today. Slowly and steadily author has explained this progress with scientific proofs. 

Things I liked about the book

1. Cover - Just loved the artwork.
2. Light and Steady Pace of the book.  
3. The simplicity of Writing - This book falls under factual or documentary genre, but the author has converted into a thought-provoking factual-fictional book.

Few points that I disliked or found lagging

1. Few points were repeatedly mentioned again and again. I think they would have been avoided.
2. Being factual non-fiction, this book should have more images.
3. Though the author was neutral while narrating the history of religions. But at end of the book, I found author's criticism of Hindu religion, I personally found it too much. It may be his first-hand experience which he may not have observed closely with other religions.
4. I don't want to start controversies. But the author has kept Islam untouched, I am not sure whether it was his decision or publishers, but readers would like to know about them as well.

This book is not for religious person nor it is written to doubt your faith. It just throws lights on few dark question we have about the origin of religions. It requires completely different pedagogy to explain the complex concept of religion, and I would say the author has done the commendable job. 

Talking about ratings:

1. Cover Page: 4.5/5
2. Content: 4/5
3. Concept : 4/5
4. Overall: 4/5

Book can be found at - Amazon & Flipkart
Review from other readers can be found at GoodReads