bangodyl on Nostr: Coinage first appeared during the Axial age, a time in which “all civilizations ...

Coinage first appeared during the Axial age, a time in which “all civilizations developed along parallel lines, even when there was no commercial contact. There was a new prosperity that led to the rise of a merchant class. Power was shifting from king and priest, temple and palace, to the marketplace. The new wealth led to intellectual and cultural florescence and also to the development of the individual conscience. Inequality and exploitation become more apparent as the pace of change accelerated in the cities and people began to realize that their own behavior could affect future generations. Each region developed a distinctive ideology to address these problems and concerns. Taoism and Confucianism in China, Hinduism and Buddhism in India and philosophical rationalism in Europe. The Middle East did not produce a uniform solution, but in Iran and Israel, Zoroaster and the Hebrew prophets respectively evolved different versions of monotheism. Strange as it may seem, the idea of “God,” like the other great religious insights of the period, developed in a market economy in a spirit of aggressive capitalism.”

A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam by Karen Armstrong