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"This book expands the current axiology of theism literature by assessing the axiological status of alternative conceptions of God and the divine. To date, most of the literature on the axiology of theism focuses almost exclusively on the axiological status of theism and atheism. Specifically, it focuses almost entirely on monotheism, typically Judeo-Christian conceptions of God, and atheism, usually construed as ontological naturalism. This volume features essays from prominent philosophers of religion, ethicists, and metaphysicians addressing the value impact of alternative views such as ultimism, polytheism, pantheism, panentheism, and idealism. Additionally, it reflects a wider trend in analytic philosophy of religion to broaden its scope beyond the Judeo-Christian tradition. Value Beyond Monotheism will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in the philosophy of religion, ethics, and metaphysics"--

The Axial Age, which lasted between 800 B. C. E. and 200 B. C. E., covers an era in which the spiritual foundations of humanity were laid simultaneously and independently in various geographic areas, and all three major monotheisms of Judaism, Christianity and Islam were born between 1200 B. C. E. and 622 C. E. in the Middle East. In this paper, I offer a taxonomy to comprehensively characterize the impact of monotheism on early economic development. Monotheist religions produced a paradigm shift in sociopolitical institutions because they (a) involve a strong degree of increasing returns to scale and the natural monopoly powers commensurate with it, (b) not only personalize the spiritual exchange relationship between the individual and the one deity, but also, due to the fact that this relationship extends into the afterlife as well, enhance individual accountability, and (c) expand their adherents' time horizon beyond biological life and impact the time discount between one's lifetime and the after-life. Taken together, these features suggest that the spread of monotheism ought to have promoted sociopolitical stability. Utilizing original historical data between 2500 B. C. E. and 1750 C. E. on 105 limited access orders, such as dynasties, kingdoms and empires, I show that monotheism had a positive and statistically significant impact on the length of reign as well as the average geographical size of social orders. Thus, I find empirical evidence that the birth and adoption of monotheistic religions aided early development both in the West and the Near East until the advent of the Industrial Revolution. -- Economic development ; religion ; institutions

Petersen reviews One True God. Historical Consequences of Monotheism by Rodney Stark.

"In a shrinking and globalizing world, with many conflicts stemming from religious and ideological differences, how are we to manage monotheism's potential for inspiring intolerant anti-pluralism?Discussions of monotheism's political consequences often emphasize either its intolerance of other gods and religions as a source of bigotry and conflict, on the one hand, or emphasize monotheism as a source of pacific, universalistic tolerance on the other. But both approaches fail to see the combined danger and liberation in monotheism's "intolerance." I argue that monotheism's intolerance opens up historic potentials that are both crucial to pluralistic coexistence and dangerous: it helped dissolve the ancient link between God and the political sphere and deepened concern for the victims of politics while it also made possible a uniquely absolutist violence. By comparison, polytheistic "tolerance" does not make for a liberating vision of inclusion and diversity. To argue this, I construct an account of monotheism's intolerance-as a "refusal to divinize victims" and a prohibition of representing the Absolute-and its relevance to politics today, using the mimetic theory of René Girard, the monotheistic scholarship of Jan Assmann et al, and the social theory of Chantal Mouffe"--

Part I: Overcoming the current crisis -- Monotheism, tolerance, and pluralism : the current impasse -- Learning from the past : introducing the thinkers of the religion of reason -- Part II: Mendelssohn : idolatry and indiscernability -- Mendelssohn and the repudiation of divine tyranny -- Monotheism and the indiscernible other -- Part III: Kant : religious tolerance -- Radical evil and the mire of unsocial sociability -- Kant and the religion of tolerance -- Part IV: Cohen : ethical intolerance -- Cohen and the monotheism of correlation -- Cohen, rational supererogation, and the suffering servant -- Conclusion: Revelation, reason, and the legacy of the Enlightenment