Mathematics abstracted and idealized concrete mathematics, exemplified in Euclid’s The Elements. Religion around the same time or earlier, abstracted the concrete representation of deities. Are there similarities in the problem solving approaches?
Plato, who preceded but for a couple of decades overlapped with Euclid, dealt in abstractions (e.g. forms) but seems to have swung both ways in respect of the literality of gods. However, Pythagoras preceded them both by several hundred years and advanced geometry from measurement practices to abstract generalizations. Yet he appears to have believed in the gods of the Greek pantheon. So it seems that abstraction in Greek mathematics emerged well before abstraction in monotheistic-religion-related phenomena. But these are vague observations. The concept of abstraction and how it applies in the two domains needs to be clarified before a credible answer can be given.
Perhaps there may be structural analogies but we should not forget the difference: biblical monotheism is not a system of pure symbols. The authors of the biblical texts did not shy away from anthropomorphism. We find Israel’s god loving his creatures and especially his people; sometimes he is angry or regrets his fury. I never heard of mathematical symbols or formulas in love…
As far as I can tell, both areas, mathematics and religion, were and are about the abstraction of a perfect sphere. This is certainly expressed in Pythagoras, in the question and the dispute about the center of the universe (sun or earth or a fire), which has been going on since 1000 BC to this day and in the question of the perfectly circular planetary orbits. Christianity has had to cede the place of the earth as the central deity to mathematics.....
Two years back I read the following Russian article "Where does Physics begin and what could surprise Thales and Euclid?" by Gennady Gorelik in Russian (independent) monthly newspaper for Science and Humanities audience "Trinity option - Science" (numb. 4 (323), February 23, 2021, available at https://elementy.ru/nauchno-populyarnaya_biblioteka/435771/S_chego_nachinaetsya_Fizika_i_chto_moglo_udivit_Falesa_i_Evklida).
Since that time I strongly believe that the emergence of axiomatic method in classical Greek mathematics and in monotheistic religion are definitely related phenomena.
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