I do think you have a great idea, I just think the argument is stronger if it was limited to the institutionalization of religions rather than an allusion to something intrinsic.

I hope my post didn’t present a case for female supremacy or male supremacy. I basically think that the human creation of female gods(goddesses) was based on a false premise. That of the female being the sole creator of life.

I also think that when men became aware of their part in the biological process, that the human creation of male gods was also based on a false premise. That of the male being the sole creator of life.

It took until the mid 1800’s for biology to catch up with myth and we finally found out that to create biological life, both the male and the female need to contribute in order to create new life.

But by that time, patriarchy was well entrenched in many of our cultures, and the desire to hand over some of that economic, political and religious power was going to be extremely difficult. Afterall, there had been a couple of thousand years of male dominated culture to contend with.

So, I certainly don’t claim any position of supremacy based on gender. I think that both the creation of female and male gods was based on a lack of knowledge of biology. And where there is a lack of knowledge, there is inevitably a god concept to fill it.

RE: “For the most part I believe that todays mainstream religions are inherently patriarchal as a very simple result of the patriarchal culture that they had been apart of”

I agree. Religions indicate the socio-political construct from which they originate and the socio-political constructs are also influenced and moulded according to what constitutes knowledge for that time period.

So, if “the knowledge” of the time was that males were solely responsible for the creation of new life, (male humans and male animals), this would have been seen as evidence as to why males should, by this “special attribute”, have primary power.

If, for a couple of thousand years it is assumed that the male contributes ALL that is required to create new life, and that the female only provides the vessel for that new life, this would have been seem as a prima facie case for male supremacy.

And could have been a catalyst for systems based in patriarchy.

Be careful, however, about stepping into the myth of female supremacy. This is an idea that has been brought up by many neo-pagans with fairly poor evidence (of course, this is a conspiracy by the patriarchal institutions of the past and present they argue). I think your article stands by itself without speculating into the mysterious goddess worshipping. Archaeological evidence points in support of fertility goddesses and other ancient feminem deities that were usually just part of a whole arrangement of a pantheist structure. Very seldom, at never universally, was there a time - that we know of - in which man and woman worshipped a sole or dominant feminem deity.

Overall I am careful on my speculations for any sort of “grand narrative” type scheme which does sets a universal archetype of all religions - including how they come about. For the most part I believe that todays mainstream religions are inherently patriarchal as a very simple result of the patriarchal culture that they had been apart of - most of our religions are actually quite relatively young (ie. Buddhism, Christianity, Islam) and even others can be encapsulated into our known “history” rather than “prehistory” (although this is strongly debatable with Hinduism). One would have to speculate on how exactly the “male” part of our species came to dominate the “female” part in order to understand how our culture was developed.

A common theme I find as I study religion in relation to women is that the founder - male as a result of his patriarchal society - was often quite revolutionary and counter-cultural in relation to women. Once this “religious” movement becomes institutionalized, however, women are often the first target of oppression. This institutionalization often is secured in the form of the ruling government using religion to ensure its power. The “religious” movement then becames just another way that the government can control the people - ie. the opiate of the masses mentality. This is not to discredit any religion, but this is how a movement of truth can be hijacked by those in power - and those in power must stay in power through oppression of one or more section of the population (ie. women, prisoners of war, ethnic groups, poor, etc. etc. etc).

The Gods Must Be Crazy And The Gods Must Be Male
http://beepbeepitsme.blogspot.com/2006/11/gods-must-be-crazy-and-gods-must-be.html