"Men are haunted by the vastness of eternity"

The opening line of the film "Troy" captures the tragic essence of personal mortality: ones' passing into oblivion and fading from all memory. Since the prehistoric dawn of humanity death has shadowed everyone's footsteps. Even into the current scientific era religion has long been the only defense, the sole comfort against oblivion offering a promise of new life or even immortality.

The Geologic Model of Religion is a sympathetic study of this defense from its ancient beginnings, drawing upon archaeology, anthropology and comparative...