Well, no, the evidence points to the foundation as political in nature. I'm sure you're familiar with the
documentary hypothesis? It can be visually
demonstrated here.
The quick Christian summary: Moses wrote the Torah, per divine inspiration, and was included along with other divine revelations from prophets.
The historical summary: The linguistic dialect of Hebrew, the terminology used in Hebrew, consistency of statements, narrative flow of the writing, references to other books and the political motives, points to four main sources of the Torah;
Jahwist, or J (c. 900 BCE), the
Elohist, or E (c. 800 BCE), the
Deuteronomist, or D, (c. 600 BCE), and the
Priestly source, or P (c. 500 BCE).
Previous to 1750 BCE there is no evidence of monotheistic Judaism, and relatively all religions in Mesopotamia are polytheistic. In Canaan, modern-day Israel and surrounding area, previous to 1200 BCE, the
Canaanite religion was practiced, which we reconstructed from clay tablets in Ugarit, and included El Elyon the father of the other deities. It's in 950-850 BCE where J and E begin recording their separate accounts of the history of the people of Israel. El Elyon makes several appearances, like Deuteronomy 32:8, or in Genesis 12 where it says the Abraham worships
El Shaddai or when it mention that Jacob made El Elyon his
elohim or primary god of worship. (It's how we know that Abraham, Jacob and Isaac were pagans.) Other Canaanite gods like
Ba'al and
Asherah (Jeremiah 7:18) make appearances.
Yahweh in Deuteronomy 2 is the son of El Elyon (revisionists tried to smooth the polytheism over), originates in Edom, the region south of Judah. As a brief comment, Yahweh was considered the god of war (comparison Aries), while Ba'al and Asherah were gods of harvest and fertility, which does explain why the Old Testament tries to exemplify God as being so violent. God mauling children with bears, anyone? From there, like with Jacob and El Shaddai, Yahweh cults begin to form as much as we see in Greek mythology where we have different temples and orders.
Book and
book sources.
The Yahweh cultists gained a lot of political and religious clout in 750-700 BCE when the
Neo-Assyrian Empire invaded the
Kingdom of Israel, and forcing an Assyrian
mass diaspora of Israelites. Three prophets arose before this invasion -
Isaiah,
Amos and
Hosea - who called for complete devotion to Yahweh as a call for protection. Around the same time, the head priest of
Josiah, king of Judah (641–609 BC) found a scroll in the Temple in Jerusalem which was later revised into Deuteronomy, but I'm told that most scholars believe it to be a forgery created to centralize religious power by demanding
complete dedication to Yahweh, and the rejection of other gods. (Previous to Josiah, most kings had worshiped many gods, instead of just worshiping one the many gods while still recognizing many gods.) This is where D steps in a begins revisions of Joshua, Samuel, Kings, Judges and Exodus to create the idea that Yahweh had always been the God of Judah and the Israelites, and that God vitriolically hated the worship of other Gods.
When Josiah died, it sets in a turn of events, 610-520BCE, that leads to
Nebuchadnezzar II of the
Neo-Babylonian Empire capturing Jerusalem and bringing the Hebrew people into Babylon.
Jeremiah arises as a prophet, claiming the
invasion was a result of the continued worship of non-Yahweh gods.
Ezekiel follows as a prophet during the captivity of the Hebrew people, as they are beginning to be absolved into Babylonian culture, and it is during this time that another reaction revision begins to take place. The author P appends Isaiah 2 to the first Isaiah, writes Leviticus, and begins revisions in Exodus, Genesis and Numbers to say El Shaddai, El Elyon and Yahweh were the same God, and inserts stories like Genesis 1, a monotheistic revision of the Babylonian creation story. It's in 600 BCE that the Christian God is created.
tl;dr - Through various political motives, the Old Testament was revised from the polytheistic worship of gods to a monotheistic religion.
Sources: Wikipedia, Bible,
sources,
source.
From there if you go back and read the Bible after a bit more study, it makes a heck of a lot more sense. Even things such as the Ten Commandments. The first
four commandments:
1. You shall have no other gods before me.
2. You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God ...
3. You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
4. Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy, as the Lord your God has commanded you.
... is revisiting the holy books of the Hebrews to try to combat polytheism in political/cultural/religious attempts to preserve cultural identity, centralize religious power or gain notoriety. "You shall have no other gods," "shall not make for yourself an
image," "I am a jealous God," etc. make so much more sense.