What material and social conditions are associated with primal/indigenous religions? What are the distinctive characteristics of those religions?

What material and social conditions are associated with primal/indigenous religions? What are the distinctive characteristics of those religions? (Refer to readings and lectures for Week One.) What material and social conditions are associated with early state-organized sacrificial cults and their mythologies? Compare and contrast the sacrificial cults and mythologies with primal/indigenous religion. (Refer to readings and lectures for Week Two.) Describe the cosmological model associated with the civilizations of the ancient Near East (how did they believe the cosmos was arranged?) How does the “primordial combat myth” relate to that cosmology? (Your answer should make reference to the contrast between “chaos” and “cosmos.”) How does the primordial combat myth relate to the widespread global myth of the Flood, and what message does the flood myth convey about the function or purpose of ancient religion? (Refer to readings and lectures for Week Two) What are the distinctive characteristics of Abrahamic Monotheism? Compare and contrast it with the ancient sacrificial cults. (Refer to readings and lectures for Week Three) Explain the concept of the Covenant between God and the Children of Israel at Sinai — your focus should be not on specific rules, but rather on the significance of those rules for Jewish faith and identity. (Refer to readings and lectures for Week Three).