I know Jack shit about religion and I want to become a more religious

>>2954420
Read the poetic Edda. Or specify what religion you want to know about. The guy in this pic. could be jesus or just some random dude.

Start by Chaturvedas.
Most ancient text.
Written in Sanskrit btw.

>>2954420

Read the bible paying lots of attention to how evil and unjust the god of that religion is.

>>2954420
Read the New Testament, specifically the Sermon on the Mount, see if you can justify it for yourself.

>>2954420
All religions are controlled and a trap, you're better off believing in The Creator of All and not being in a religion,

>>2954420
Go with academic Religious Studies instead of just theology. For that angle, I highly reccomend Wilfred Cantwell Smith's "The Meaning and End of Religion," Berger's "The Sacred Canopy" and Bell's "Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice." Valantasis' "The Making of the Self: Ancient and Modern Asceticism" is excellent for understanding what motivates people to radically change their lives and engage in extreme behavior for their beliefs.
Take anything you read written by Westerners about religions from Asia, Africa, etc with a grain of salt; more like a pound when the text is from the 19th or early 20th century. TL;DR version is that a combination of scholarship based on bad translations, missing cultural context, and Eurocentrism did a real number on accurately understanding what the people actually believe. Hinduism is a key example, the British practically invented it by lumping together every Indian who wasn't Christian or Muslim into one category despite the many beliefs under that label often being completely incompatible.

>>2954420
Read Campbell's "Myths to Live By".

Mircea Eliade's A History of Religious Ideas in 3 volumes is BY FAR the best read on the subject
nothing stands even close, man

Read the entire Bible, trying to take it from the perspective of a Jew, a Gentile, and an atheist. Once you finish that, you can delve more into the archaeology and history and mythology around Biblical studies, but you need to read the real thing first. Front to back, Genesis to Revelations, no shortcuts.