Religious beliefs can be objectively false and also speak to permanent features of the human condition. We're never going to stop arguing about this--nor should we.
I think I could be persuaded that there is some sense in which “religious belief” is trans historical as a way of understanding mysterious experiences and dealing with loss suffering and death. But your footnote 1 defines “religious belief” as an omnipotent just deity, which is a version that no one would have signed on to before the late Bronze Age Empires at the earliest. And the version does seem a lot like an idealized version of those rulers.
I think I could be persuaded that there is some sense in which “religious belief” is trans historical as a way of understanding mysterious experiences and dealing with loss suffering and death. But your footnote 1 defines “religious belief” as an omnipotent just deity, which is a version that no one would have signed on to before the late Bronze Age Empires at the earliest. And the version does seem a lot like an idealized version of those rulers.