Much to do about gods and religion

[Ghostman]

[ooc]This is a pretty messed up tangle of words I've written, so my apologies if it's hard to follow. Hopefully some bits of wisdom can be gleaned from it.[/ooc]

We just had some interesting ideas about religion brought up over at the Arcane vs Divine magic thread. I figured that time is right to start a new thread to discuss these matters more. Let's start with a quote by CC from the Cliches thread:

[blockquote=Cataclysmic Crow]- Proven Gods (many of you may have heard me rant along with others on this subject before)[/blockquote]
This comment led me to think about it's implications on my own setting. The longer I thought about it, the less and less workable the concept seemed. For example, Argyrian religion lacks a true distinction between 'god' and 'spirit', both being essentially similar entities (let's call them deities), and in addition also other types of divinities, such as deified heroes and ancestors. There is an extreme diversity of these beings, ranging from the fairly abstract and probably unprovable Fates, down to common nature spirits of flesh-and-blood forms such as Nymphs. Against this background, the idea of avoiding proven gods seemed to make little sense. Trying to enforce such a principle would essentially mean that characters would never find themselves face to face with minor spirits, daemons and the like.

Through my brainstorming I realized that CC's comment essentially assumes that there exists a clear-cut, black and white distinction between 'god' and 'non-god' entities. This raises a very interesting question: What, if anything, makes a god to be a god? In the context of the Savage Age setting there is no objective answer; deities are deities simply because people call then that. What passes as a deity to one person may not be that to another.

Let's explore this matter from the perspective of setting design.

A deity can be broadly defined as any being or entity that is accorded religious significance. They don't need to be venerated or worshiped - they could instead be feared, or simply acknowledged. In real religions deities appear in incredibly varied forms: All-encompassing universe gods, abstract unseen forces, physical manifestations as idols, animals, humans or monsters, all-powerful creators and destroyers, little midgets that live under your stove, ghosts of the dead, god-kings and pharaohs.

A fantasy setting might feature any or all of the above, and yet stranger forms of divinities. But where should you draw the line? Is there such a thing as an objective "godhood", and if so, how do you define it?

Suppose, for example, that we have a big fat dragon. Let's call him Bahamut for kicks. Bahamut is a god; he's got his own temples, clergy, teachings and faithful worshipers. Now let's say that a new religion arises, which states that Bahamut is no god, simply a dragon. The old religion continues to state that he is indeed a god. So, is he?

What is divinity but an OOC mechanic/descriptor? To a character living within a setting, should there be any way to tell the difference between a genuine deity and some powerful magical dude? Could there be any way? And if not, would it matter?

Suppose that we have a mighty Pharaoh, the son of a great god and a god in his own right. Suppose that he has magical powers, too. Is he really a deity or is he just a sorcerer? How can you tell?

I think someone somewhere wrote that atheism in a fantasy setting with active gods doesn't make sense. This is an interesting statement, and not at all as obvious as it might seem. After all, it's true that there is little point refuting the existence of the big fat dragon Bahamut when he's sitting right in front of your eyes - but you could still refute his godhood. (Though it might be wise to not do so to his face...) And if you can refute the godhood of a big fat dragon, why couldn't you refute the godhood of anything all the same?

[Lmns Crn]

A fantasy setting might feature any or all of the above, and yet stranger forms of divinities. But where should you draw the line? Is there such a thing as an objective "godhood", and if so, how do you define it?

After all, it's true that there is little point refuting the existence of the big fat dragon Bahamut when he's sitting right in front of your eyes - but you could still refute his godhood. (Though it might be wise to not do so to his face...)[/quote]one[/i] person can heal with a touch, that person might be worshiped as a god. In a high-magic world where many people can do the same thing, the standards are probably much higher.

In that vein, consider:

Suppose that we have a mighty Pharaoh, the son of a great god and a god in his own right. Suppose that he has magical powers, too. Is he really a deity or is he just a sorcerer? How can you tell?

I'd say that depends entirely on how others react to him.

[Ghostman]

Well there we have one method: letting people decide what deities are. So basically gods don't define religions, but religions define godhood. This results in a culture-specific, rather than setting-specific definition, since religions within the same setting can define divinity differently.

[O Senhor Leetz]

I would argue that what's considered religion in most RP settings is actually much more akin to a cult. Most fantasy religions focus on deities that are proven to exist (standard DnD, for instance). Religion, in my opinion, is based upon faith in a higher power, and you really can't have faith in something that is proven to exist. For instance, I cannot have faith that cookies exist, because they do. This is why RP religions are more like cults - people following a strong leader figure.

[Ghostman]

Do you mean cults of personality? The word cult as such doesn't mean belief in something mundade or provable. In historical context it can refer to the worship of deities from European and Middle-Eastern pre-christian and pre-islamic religions, eg. cult of Dionysos, cult of Cybele.

[Nomadic]

For instance, I cannot have faith that cookies exist, because they do.

Yes you can. Faith isn't belief in an unknowable thing. Faith is belief in the truth of something. Some things of course (like the existence of cookies) are easier to have faith in because you have concrete evidence. For example I might hold an aluminum tin up for you and offer you to open it and enjoy the cookies inside. If you liked cookies you're likely reaction would be to thank me and open the tin and take a cookie. That right there is faith in several things...

1: Faith that cookies are real things
2: Faith that they are delicious
3: Faith that I actually have some in the closed tin (your aforementioned faith in the unknown)

Faith can be something as simple as a belief that when you reach for the bottle of soda sitting on the counter that it won't spontaneously explode in a fireball, this being a faith from experience (soda has never done so before). If you didn't have that faith you would avoid reaching for the soda. It can also be a much less concrete concept like the belief in a supreme being. You might attribute things that happen to you to the being, where others might explain them with science or gods of their own. Each person in this case has a belief that their view of what force controls the cosmos is correct.

[Xeviat]

A clear cut line between deities and non-deities would be immortality. Deities are, by definition, immortal. They might be able to be killed or destroyed, but they are otherwise immortal.

This is a fundamental part of many stories, especially when you go back to mythology. Thus, I would use it as the line between god and mortal. It's a tenuous line, and one that can be faked, but that adds to some of the drama of a magical world. Heck, in our world people thought (and think) of some people and animals as deities, and that's without incredibly obvious magic (again, debated by believers).

But the idea of recognizing the existence of a god but not the divinity was something that was lost on me for some reason. It is the perfect way to color a polytheistic world. My own setting is similar to Ghostman's, btw, with its use of animism and multitudes of nature spirits, philosophical spirits, ancester spirits, and others.

[Kindling]

My, very brief, contribution, is that I think our modern/western concept of what a god or deity is is probably very different from how they were thought of in ancient times. Seeing as many religions in fantasy base themselves on ancient religions, they end up with the sort of problems that we are discussing in this thread, because they are to some degree imposing modern notions of godhood - possibly influenced by the Abrahamic desert faiths - onto somewhat incompatible theological and cosmological models.

[Ghostman]

Good point Kindling. The system of gods in Forgotten Realms for example gave me the impression that it was trying to be polytheistic and monotheistic at the same time.

[Hibou]

My current thoughts are that gods in this case would end up being looked at like forces of nature, or hell, maybe even celebrities - or a combination. Both of these assume that the gods are proven real, and maybe that they weren't there for all time; maybe that they're suddenly or gradually dropped into the world. But having all that power and causing all of that happiness or sorrow would make them globally important.

[Superfluous Crow]

I think we have to make an important metagame distinction between deification and apotheosis. A god in the roleplaying sense, and the common mythological sense, is one who is afforded godly powers or strength just by way of being a god (which might or might not be a consequence of faith). A deified persona will be nothing more than a common person/pharaoh/dragon but he will be observed as a god.
All the gods I know of where known to possess some kind of supernatural power (that is, powers above what is humanly or dragonly possible).
 
In the cultural sense, anything worshipped could be a god. Of course, there is a vast difference between a random river spirit and an omnipotent singular God-Creator. So one might wonder whether there is a certain level of power required to be divine. Or possibly it just has something to do with how they react to worship. Spirits are usually viewed as indifferent creatures (I think; please correct me if wrong) until you actually go about attempting to interact with them. Gods are often entities with actual agendas. But this might again just be a side-effect of their anthropomorphization and not something that was inherent when they were first envisioned. Or maybe the distinction is something about how the spirits are local while the gods are global?  
As to the immortality point, Pharaohs were considered gods in their own time but they were known to die. Of course, their spirit lived on, but I'd still consider that a tiny, tiny hole in the theory.
And I'm honored to have an (almost) entire thread built up around a thing i said :D even if it was because of a possible flaw in said comment. To clarify, when I talk about Proven Gods I mostly think about gods in the Faerunian sense, where they are both proven, active, and very powerful.

Also, I'd consider faith to be an extension of trust. We trust in the existence of an omnibenevolent entity or we trust that a cookie is as delicious as last time. This is also in accordance with some of the philosopher Hume's thoughts; he told of faith, or actually habit, where we were used to having the sun rise and set and therefore assumed, trusted, that it would always be so, but he argued that there was nothing really keeping it from not rising. We had just concluded it would from our  observations. We can never observe the cause, only the effect. This might be a slight-to-completely-inconsequent digression.

[LordVreeg]

Getting to the meat of the OP, one might want to seperate the GM/OOC definition and what is worshipped in-game.

And as to the second definition, there are differences between worshipping a religion and worshipping a god.  This can also affect the first definition, as a human religion that includes worshipping a god may or may not have much of a grip what they are worhipping.

Such is often the case in Celtricia, where the religions are created by mortals, and almost never include a true understanding of the deity  or deities in question.  Many of the churches venerate saints, pious, past worshippers that in most cases are beyond the pale of hearing or caring.

[Ghostman]

A god in the roleplaying sense, and the common mythological sense, is one who is afforded godly powers or strength just by way of being a god

This could be a chicken and the egg type of dilemma. Are they gods because they have godlike powers, or do they have godlike powers because they are gods?

Mythologies certainly have examples of ordinary mortals becoming gods. And even of gods becoming mortals.

Or maybe the distinction is something about how the spirits are local while the gods are global?

That could be applicable to some settings, but not all. Gods certainly don't have to be global (universal).

As to the immortality point, Pharaohs were considered gods in their own time but they were known to die. Of course, their spirit lived on, but I'd still consider that a tiny, tiny hole in the theory.

In Egyptian mythology gods could die too. The sun-god Re himself would die at the end of every day and go through the underworld, only to be reincarnated at each dawn.

[sparkletwist]

The system of gods in Forgotten Realms for example gave me the impression that it was trying to be polytheistic and monotheistic at the same time.

I think this is a phenomenon of most D&D in general, which would rather be polytheistic, but also draws its inspiration from a culture (medieval Europe) that was dominated by a powerful monotheistic church and elements of that monotheism affected the culture to the point that they had to be included as well.

Are they gods because they have godlike powers, or do they have godlike powers because they are gods?

require[/i] any of them.

[Scholar]

What is divinity but an OOC mechanic/descriptor? To a character living within a setting, should there be any way to tell the difference between a genuine deity and some powerful magical dude? Could there be any way? And if not, would it matter?

I'm only going from a dnd perspective here, but it's a god if your belief in grants you spells as a cleric. belief in cookies will not grant you access to the delicious pecan butter and choc-chip domains, while belief in big ole' bahamut will give you sth like valour domain and stuff. :)

my personal taste (i, too, have ranted on this^^) is to have distant or at least covert gods, not FR style pop-stars, but the concept of apotheosis is intrigueing. one the one hand it proves the existence of gods (you just made another), on the other it disproves their "divinity". if anyone can become a god, there's no real "divine mandate", they are just a bunch of powerful dicks who like to get adored and grant you spells for it.
for the relationship between deity and belief, i am a total fan of gaiman's american gods and the way he represents the life cycle of gods (it's also in sandman, especially when dream visits basset).

so, yeah. post kinda random, i guess. :)