What if Europe was still PAGAN? Alt-History

What if Europe was still pagan? What if Christianity wasn't the majority religion in Europe, and history went differently?

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#history #alternatehistory #polytheism #zeus #jupiter #mars #map

[sergeantdornan]

It would be important to note that Christianity had also spread to non Roman regions like Ethiopia, Persia, and India so there would be a chance it would develop into a more “Oriental” religion

[ChaoMung-tu]

So basically Greco-Roman syncretism mirroring Hinduism/Chinese Syncretism?

[Sol_nvictus]

Imagine large temples to Jupiter across Europe, quite interesting to think of how they'd be worshipped.

[Christophe-Manga]

I like this soft view on religion mostly because it means that nations could choose independent state religions to futher their unique culture and smaller communes could have their local cults. Anything is better than the endless fighting over how everyone interprets the same text

[urnad]

What if Christian Gnosticism won out and it became more similar to Buddhism as a result?

If you don’t know Gnosticism is basically the matrix with angels

[LadrixiaThorne]

To add a bit of nuance to it: you either forgot about the Hungarians or assume they would forsake their religion in time. I think this Europe would be more tolerant with other religions, which doesn't present a unifying force against smaller religious groups and peoples. So there is less or no political isolation against the Táltosist/Tengri Hungarians and no pressure to convert.

[NoManDan]

I think that the impact of Islam on Europe would be super interesting in this scenario, we already know of Islam's impact on other polytheistic regions throughout the world so it would be interesting to look at how this alternate Europe is affected.

I think the absence of Christianity as a dominant religion would definitely alter European perception of Islam, whether this would make European nations vehemently opposed to diplomacy and trade with Muslim nations due to even greater differences in belief, or more receptive to negotiations and averting conflict is impossible to know for certain (although considering islam is a staunchly monotheistic religion I would imagine that any European converts to islam would likely be persecuted just like many European christians in this timeline which may or may not effect how Muslim countries engage with Europe).

Another interesting element is how changes in European Identity would influence invasions from the Rashidun, Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphates. Would these invasions have about as much success as in our timeline, less of an impact, or would larger parts of Europe experience a similar fate to Iran/Persia? Would Islam replace Christianity as the dominant monotheistic religion of Europe or would it have even less of an affect than in our timeline?

[nicholasbrooks]

Now I wonder how no Abrahamic regions ever would play out, I'd have a feeling it'd have massive ripple effects.

[modmaker]

"Pagan" was a slur used by Christians to forcefully convert Europeans.

I think "Indigenous European Religions" is better term. Christianity isn't natively European but Middle-Eastern.

[pnkcnlng]

Northern Italy would be a mix of Celtic, Roman and Germanic paganism

[itstaylor]

I wanna live in this timeline
Could you do a part 2 where you explore how this would impact Europes effects on the rest of the world - ex colonization

[lexi]

5:08 how doesn’t Greece have a religion? Helenisum is right there.

[velociraptor]

Marvellous video mate, this was an interesting one. May the gods watch over you and I bid you vale.

[elygolden]

I think that the other Abrahamic religions would be quite different in this scenario. With regards to the Jewish religion, it's very much possible that the lack of Christian domination in a declining Roman empire would provide an impetus for the Jews to return to their homeland in antiquity, and it is likely that they would have rebuilt the temple in Jerusalem and as such the evolution of the Jewish people would mirror that of the other European and Mediterranean peoples in the region, except that the religion would remain strictly monotheist. The situation would likely mirror your alternative Greece, but with a ritualistic hybrid form of Temple and Rabinnical Judaism being dominant instead of Greek polytheism. More educated people in the Jewish lands would probably syncretize neoplatonic, deistic, and atheistic ideas with Jewish practice in a similar manner to what the educated European pagans would do. Samaritanism would be far more prevalent than it is in our world, and Christianity would also maintain a presence.

As for Islam, it's doubtful it would ever come to be. The Arabs would continue to be pagan much like their European counterparts, and perhaps non Jewish Canaanite paganism might still exist. Though it's possible that an equivalent Abrahamic faith would spring up in Arabia, it's hard to say for sure. Zoroastrianism would also surely be far more influential in Persia and the surrounding lands compared to in our world.

[AdaraAltern]

The impact of Christianity is huge, one of the example is the abolishment of pretty boy pet(i forgot what's that called) that are done by many roman emperor

[ediosmollai]

im a bit confused about the greek's not having our own religion in this alternate world, if christianity does not spread what would stop us from worshiping the gods of olympus again like the greeks of old did, cause the main reason we stopped worshiping the greek gods was because christianity essentially made it ileegal, and persecuted those who practiced, but without it there what is there to stop us from worshiping our own VERY well known gods? im honestly just curious about the answer.

[MonsieurDean]

I remember I did one of these back. Julian the Apostate might’ve been another interesting point of divergence.

[coquimarinero]

I can appreciate how difficult this scenario must have been, considering how different the world would have to be. Surprised how this would impact the rest of the world never came up, given the role Jesuits played in places like Japan. The idea of Nostradamus and Hegel being born in this completely different world is pretty funny, though. I wonder what a Joseph Smith equivalent would be

[jensstaal]

Rome was in general very religiously tolerant. A temple for "all gods" (pantheon) in the center, even Egyptian Temples in Rome. The reason Christians were prosecuted was political: they were not covered by the "ancestral religion" exemptions that Jews had. They were thus expected to partake in Roman rituals for the emperor.

One correction in this video would be that if Rome did not go Christian 300 CE, would islam be invented 600 CE? It is very possible that what is now known as the "Arab world" would look very different too with many pagan faiths.

[Da-Greekofficial]

You need to do what if a different successor state unified the Byzantine Empire in 1261 instead of the empire of Nicaea. Like the Despotate of Epirus of the Empire of Trabizond. That would be interesting.