To be fair to Judaism

Submitted by Anne Julienne (Australia), Jun 20, 2008 at 17:45

"Judaism was the first religion where god helped and ecouraged killing and wiping out entire tribes."

I would say that Judaism marks the first instance in which such a phenomenon was clearly documented. It was happening well before that if you allow a secular (or non-sectarian) definition of god that goes well beyond Yahweh or Allah. Such a definition would treat these gods as an emblem of tribal or regional identification, perhaps even wider to a cultural identification.

In that case, every imperial or civilizational advance among humanity has been characterized by this phenomenon of showing no mercy to the victims who get in the way of this "progress". You could start with the ancient Egyptians and their idea of godlike kings from which, no doubt, the Hebrew idea of a kinglike god was derived.

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