not necessarily,
if you're talking about polytheism, then islam is quite clear,
divine unity and tawhid are the core principles
What religions have you studied apart from Islam?
I simply ask because I wonder if we are speaking the same language here. I doubt we are.
I view religion as a natural phenomenon, a part of our human evolution and development. Prior to the development of organized religion, animism – the attribution of spirits to non-human entities like plants, mountains, animals, etc. – was quite prevalent. It is still prevalent amongst some indigenous tribal peoples as a very natural way of navigating their world.
Polytheism, as a broad term, representing essentially an extension of animism, is a very natural next step in this process. The point that is worth calling out here is that the idea of
many gods, or many divine entities, appears to be a fairly normal thing across cultures. Again, this would be a normal and very human way of experiencing the world. It's also worth calling out here as well that this would represent the majority of human existence from a timescale perspective.
Monotheism begins not necessarily with YHWH, but with the consolidation of the powers of the gods into specific supreme gods. Enter Sun gods, Moon gods, Sea gods, etc. As the correlation between gods and
power begins to develop as humans gather into civilizations and societies, a priestly class begins to emerge whose sole purpose is to “interpret the will of the gods” and exert power over the masses in accordance with this “will.”
This again, becomes evident across multiple cultures and civilizations, from the Mayans to the Egyptians. To consolidate the Gods was to consolidate power. Akhenaten, the first “monotheistic” Egyptian pharaoh, is a perfect example of this. By eliminating the Egyptian gods and focusing on one deity, with whom only he himself could communicate, he assured his absolute control over society.
the pharaoh "disbanded the priesthoods of all the other gods...and diverted the income from these [other] cults to support the Aten". To emphasize his complete allegiance to the Aten, the king officially changed his name from Amenhotep IV to Akhenaten or 'Living Spirit of Aten.'
It is no wonder, then, that after his death, the class of priests that he had disenfranchised sought to undo what he had done and reinstate the gods of Egypt.
The fact that prophets and kings began capitalizing on this monopoly they could claim with a particular deity, and the fact that they would decry and denounce other deities as “false” in the strongest terms would not be a surprising development as human empires emerge. Not to sound too Game of Thrones right now, but the crown and the faith have always gone hand in hand.
Generally speaking, what I believe we are seeing in the Muslim world today is essentially the theology of a collapsed empire struggling to figure out what its place in the world will be. Will Allah go the way of Zeus, Baal, and Aten? I don’t know. He is a fairly new development and a fairly recent way of reflecting human spirituality.
In short, yes, spirituality is a very natural, human thing. It has helped us navigate our world in numerous beneficial ways. It has helped us to organize, given us a sense of purpose and identity, and helped us to cope with the world in which we find ourselves.
Because I enjoy a bit of mystery myself, I’m open to the idea that beneath all of the different ways that humans have manifested their spirituality over the ages, there might actually be some underlying force that unites it all. I might even go as far as to call that God if I was in the right mood. But we must admit we have no way of wrapping our heads around it, let alone any way of proving it.
Topic: What type of muslim were you?