What I am suggesting is that the gods have an underlying reality. The concept is not woven from thin air but has always been a marker for something real. This is what Pound meant when he said the gods are eternal states of mind. Something encountered and named not something invented wholesale.
Note that this does not imply transcendence.
I don't think they were invented, but nor do i think they were encountered either. they were *developed* along with the increasing technical organisation of society. It wasn't a conscious process, but neither have most things been in history.