For readers just browsing, I would hope that they would open to chapter six in the book and specifically to the section on skull cults. This is the time in history, about 10,000 to 8,500 years ago, when ancestor worship had apparently reached its peak and the first gods were about to emerge. It was the time of the birth of the gods.The gradual shift from hunting and gathering to farming that had taken place between 12,000 and 7,000 years ago had brought about profound changes in the relationship between the living and the dead. A migratory lifestyle demands that the dead be buried wherever they die. A sedentary lifestyle, by contrast, allow for the burial of the deceased in the vicinity of the living and thus the accumulation of ancestors’ bodies over several generations. In southwest Asia it was common to bury the deceased directly beneath the family’s house and to exhume the body months later and remove the skull. The skulls were often lined up on the floor of the house along the wall. Over time it became common practice to paint some skulls. Other skulls were molded with lime, gypsum or mud plaster to resemble a human face, using seashells for eyes. There are suggestions that some plastered skulls were also adorned with hair.At least 90 plastered skulls have been excavated to date from widely scattered sites. The best of them are works of art as well as cult objects and the effect on the viewer is stunning. Archeologists describe the uncovering of plastered skulls as “a highly emotive experience…there are, literally, faces from the past.” I viewed two plastered skulls in the archeological museum in Ankara and was deeply moved. Such skulls most likely belonged to high-ranking ancestors, some of whom would soon break through the celestial celling and become the first gods.This book will not tell you whether God, or other gods, really exist – no book can do so. What I hope this book can do, however, is help readers think carefully about their theological beliefs. Gods are important and should not simply be dismissed by ridicule. Many people are troubled by their unresolved theological beliefs; insofar as this book helps them to achieve some resolution of belief, it will achieve its most important purpose.I also hope the book will shed some light on the ongoing god contests which I find troubling. Wars continue to be fought to determine whose god is the correct god. Such wars were fought between city-states in ancient Mesopotamia, and apparently contributed to the demise of the world’s first civilization. An Old Testament god contest familiar to many is the battle between the followers of Baal, the Canaanite fertility god, and the followers of Jehovah, the Israelite protector of God. Elijah, a prophet of Jehovah, prevailed and then had the 450 followers of Baal but to death.Finally, the book offers answers to many questions that have perplexed some people. For example, why don’t chimps speak? Why are they so similar to Homo sapiens in DNA yet so different cognitively? Why is it very unlikely that the Neanderthals had gods? And why were they wiped out so quickly when modern Homo sapiens encountered them? What is the meaning of the animals that adorn the painted caves? If Homo sapiens had acquired modern cognition attributes by about 35,000 years ago, why did it take more than 20,000 years more for the agricultural revolution to begin? The first gods only had responsibility for issues of food supply (life) and death; why did they later acquire political responsibilities? Just as the first gods appeared independently at several places in the world, why were most of the world’s major religions formalized in the brief period between 2800 and 2200 years ago?