8,000 BCE, making way for agriculturally based societies.

-  Communities where urbanized and place bound, had large numbers of people, and consisted of individuals with

   specific roles such as a carpenter or farm worker.

-  They started to build permanent structures during this time beginning in 3,000 BCE.

-  The individual, the role of the individual, and the individuals place in the class in regards to the importance of the

   individual in the community.

-  They used a class system as a form of measuring varying degrees of power in the community.

-  The social leader was the king, who was usually deified.

The development of agriculture is viewed as a great land mark in religion.  The transfer from the forest to the field meant the earth goddess grew in popularity and became the principle deity.  These religions where considered cosmological just as the hunter-gatherers, but with one main difference, the agricultural religions where polytheistic, meaning, they believed in many deities and gods.  They used the many different deities to symbolize differing forces in nature.  They where concerned with showing the relation of themselves to nature and the cosmos.  They worshipped nature as the highest spiritual power, but distanced themselves from the sacred realm without the actual separation of everyday life and their religion.  The realm of the dead and that of the living, where distinctly separate realms, with the living bound to earth, and the dead in the spirit world.  The ideals of life after death where popular during this time, because of the relationship of the seed that seemed to be dead, sprouting new life from its death, and is reborn into a plant or vegetable.  Because of this, spiritual life became more and more tied to the cycle of the seasons, marked by spring planting rites and the autumn harvest festivals.  They celebrated the turn of the seasons and places of special sacred power, like a temple.  They performed their rituals mainly for the planting and harvesting of the crops.  They also worshipped the sun, because it represented life for the agriculture, and without the sun, the agriculture would die, and thus the community would die.  They worshipped the elements, but water was at the top of their list.  Water was held sacred because it gave life to the people and to the agriculture.  Without agriculture, the people wouldn't exist.  Agriculture allowed flourishing communities to evolve into the great empires we know about today, like Egypt and Mesopotamia.