Human Sacrifice Is Linked To Social Hierarchies In New Study

[Angel Martin]

8. Interesting

at the core of philosopher Henri Girard's theory of the origins of human culture and human religion is a "foundational murder", where everyone in a primitive human group participates in the unanimous slaughter of a single human scapegoat.

The unanimous scapegoating unites the group and establishes the first human created culture based on unanimous participation in a single act.

A religion is created which both illustrates the origin and creation of the community, and sustains the unity of the community.

The religion is based on repeated human sacrifice, which celebrates the creation and unity of the community by re-enacting the foundational murder.

A hierarchy is established in the community. A priesthood is created to lead the community by organizing the human sacrifices.

Girard was a philosopher and literature professor who got all this out of an analysis of the commonalities in archaic myths and legends across different societies.

It is interesting to me that anthropologists looking at the correlation between human sacrifice and hierarchy, are coming up with a similar explanation.

http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/Girard,+Rene