The Akhenaten heresy

During the New Kingdom, a pharaoh will operate a real disruption in the religious thought. Amenhotep IV, who renamed himself Akhenaten, shook up the polytheistic pantheon and tried to impose a unique God: Aten. Obviously, the oppositions will be fierce. Akhenaten was considered by his contemporaries as a heretic and cursed pharaoh. So what are the reasons and the nature of this religious change? Is Akhenaten the inventor of the first historical monotheism ?