Gods, planes, afterlife, and the common man

[Ahnehnois]

In most D&D, gods physically exist and interact with mortals. Even if Joe Commoner hasn't met a god, I think about the "how many handshakes it takes to get around the world" example. Even if only a small number of people have directly observed deities doing deific things, that direct knowledge spreads easily.

In some settings, many (or all) deities are ascended mortal beings.

Furthermore, a lot more people will have seen a celestial being or demon or similar direct agent of deities in their lifetime.

Beyond that, as others have said, plenty enough people will devote their lives to a deity without direct knowledge of that deity.

 

[The Shaman]

Plane Shift to the appropriate plane?

"Yeah, I've been to the Happy Hunting Grounds. Your mom says hi."

 

[Orius]

I think we're really overanalyzing here. Isn't it really the DM's place to decide just how active the gods are in his or her world and by extension how strong the people's faith is? This is an element of campaign design.

And there's some stuff on the topic here:

Flat Earth Atheist - Television Tropes & Idioms

 

[Saeviomagy]

This idea that people in a D&D world "know" as "fact" that there is an afterlife, there are other planes to which their souls go for reward or punishment. That the gods are real and active.

My question was not based on how do people believe this stuff, but how can they know it for fact?

The discussions on how raise dead-type spells would change a world -- politically, religiously, etc. -- always start with the basic concept of "everyone knows for a fact" how the game rules [spells] work. My point on this is that only the Players sitting around the table know these "facts" because they've read the rule books. The normal people in the game world don't have the mechanics of the universe written down and published for all to read.

The average Joe doesn't know for a fact that nuclear weapons work, has never seen one detonated, most likely doesn't know anyone who's seen one detonated and only really knows what is told to him by those in power and those who know, and yet the threat of nuclear extinction drove politics for a very long time, and shapes it even now. (sub in any number of modern things that shape society but are actually very limited in the number of direct witnesses to them).

Hell, most people who understand nuclear physics should readily admit that their confidence that a nuclear weapon works is theoretical and isn't backed up by direct observation.

So no, average Joe probably doesn't know for a fact that there is an afterlife and that there are planes that his soul goes to when he dies, or that his god is real and active, but he's most likely told this on a very regular basis by people who do know and who can provide some fairly showy demonstrations.

 

[Mesh Hong]

I think the problem here is that you are trying to apply modern scientific reasoning from the real world to a pseudo-medieval fantasy setting in an imagined world.

Really in my opinion the burden of proof and the threshold of acceptance of fact are significantly different in a world where practically anything is possible with magic, and when someone goes missing in the woods it is actually possible that a beast from a different plane of existence actually ate them.

The basic setting assumes a world where magic and gods exist. These are leant facts for civilised society. Gods are both the ideals to strive for and a threat to discourage antisocial behaviour. This of course is exactly what the concept of gods is like in the real world but without all the uncertainty of faith and burden of proof.

Essentially Joe peasant is told Erathis exists and from birth Erathis’s teachings are woven completely into Joe peasants day to day life. I am simplifying this here but Joe peasant is primed and taught to accept this as fact as everything in his life reinforces the prescribed view. It is possible that Joe peasant at some point will wonder if all the teachings are correct, and if he does a cleric could “prove” Erathis’s existence in many ways. Usually though these would boil down to “I am a vessel of Erathis’s power, see how I heal you (or perform any other divine powered action) by channelling her wisdom and love of the community”.

The above is not fact (or proof) though it is merely reinforcement of fact through pronounced action or in other words “I say that a god gives me this power, everything you know about the world makes this completely plausible”.

I am not sure if this is in line with this thread or not but here is another god related thought I posted a while back that didn’t seem to spark anyones interest, maybe it will here:

The problem (?) with divinity in D&D is that it isn’t really about faith at all, it is more about affinity.

In D&D you know the gods exist, you can even go and visit them in their ‘heaven’ if you like. So it’s not really faith at all, you don’t have a choice about whether you believe that the Raven Queen is the god of death or not, she is, and she is literally in the shadowfell sorting souls. The question is whether you think you have a special connection to a gods motivations and domains and whether you identify with a god enough to invest enough commitment to become its willing ally. This commitment manifests in the ability to activate attuned magical items, or assume certain paragon paths and epic destinies.

As I have said before in a world where the gods are very real and active it is highly probable that most people will honour a pantheon of gods. However it would probably be usual that individuals would hold one god in higher esteem than the others, and that one god would be an icon of their own core beliefs and help define them.

An interesting thing that to my knowledge is never really discussed in the books is what do the gods do with the souls they collect?

We know:
- The Raven Queen is responsible for collecting them and sending them on.
- Devils and Demons use them as a source of power, or manifest them as slaves.
- Tiamat collects them and stores them as a writhing pit of maggots which is her most prized possession.
- A select few souls live on in astral domains as a gift from the appropriate gods.

But that’s it really. What really happens?

In my opinion the gods aren’t really that different to demons and devils, put bluntly they harvest souls as a power source to maintain their domains and power their abilities. It is the hidden truth behind the curtain of dogma and propaganda, and the reason behind their reliance (and the importance of) the middle world.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

The average Joe doesn't know for a fact that nuclear weapons work, has never seen one detonated, most likely doesn't know anyone who's seen one detonated and only really knows what is told to him by those in power and those who know, and yet the threat of nuclear extinction drove politics for a very long time, and shapes it even now. (sub in any number of modern things that shape society but are actually very limited in the number of direct witnesses to them).

Hell, most people who understand nuclear physics should readily admit that their confidence that a nuclear weapon works is theoretical and isn't backed up by direct observation.

So no, average Joe probably doesn't know for a fact that there is an afterlife and that there are planes that his soul goes to when he dies, or that his god is real and active, but he's most likely told this on a very regular basis by people who do know and who can provide some fairly showy demonstrations.

This but I was going to use gravity and quantum entanglement as my examples.

I do think that the you (Bullgrit) are looking for a standard of knowing from the D&D commoner that is more rigourous than actually applies to the common person in the real world.
Even scientists in the real world only know what they have experimented on and that knowing rests on a body of knowledge that is accepted as true based on the current scientific world view.
This is usually safe enough since any new scientific world view has to explain the current oberservations at least as well as the existing one.

If you take the Forgotten Realms for instance, it was not that long ago when the gods were fighting in the streets and in multiple locations.

 

[I'm A Banana]

This is actually a really core concept to a monotheistic D&D setting I've had in the background for a while.

The upthrust is that it draws from monotheistic religious works as its "fantasy milieu." The Divine Comedy, Paradise Lost, Islamic poetry, Jewish rabbinical tradition, and more exotic mystical groups, like Kabbalah, Crowleyan occultism, Sufis, Gnostics, Snake-Handlers, etc., etc. And then I bring in various things to play off that triumvirate: animists, athiests, Buddhist mystics, Hindu kingdoms....

The idea is, basically, that, using divine magic, powerful religious figures throughout history have found there to be contradictory truths, and which ones you "pick" define your belief system.

Characters high enough level to gain these truths are legendary, so as contradictory as they are, most people have no way of verifying the tale or not. The best they can do is trust those with more authority than themselves. And there's nothing binding these people to honesty.

However, it is clear to most that Heaven exists: angels have been seen by many. And Hell, too: there's a major, religiously diverse city called "Jerusalem" close to the entrance. Clerics are summoning something, and it is serving them. And it is clearly different from arcane magic (which is competitive in some places with divine magic like science and religion), and psionics (which is mystical, and often considered heretical), and primal power (which is usually "demonic" in nature, at least according to the authorities).

Anyway, I love the idea. A shame something like that could never be published for all the nasty letters from sensitive, serious, people it would probably get.

 

[Umbran]

This but I was going to use gravity and quantum entanglement as my examples.

*Umbran picks up an apple, holds it several feet above the floor, and releases it. It falls to the floor.*

The action of gravity is verifiable. Your everyday life depends upon it. You may question the mechanism (not being able to see gravitons with your unassisted eyes), but the fact that it happens is pretty well established by everyone on the planet.

I know nuclear physics, but have not watched the assembly of a nuclear weapon from the mining of the ore of fissile material through construction to detonation. However, I have seen documentation of such well beyond "word of mouth" stories.

Quantum entanglement is interesting - I haven't personally witnessed the experiments that verify it. But it is a natural and unavoidable consequence of things that I have seen verified.

So, three different situations, three different levels of proofiness. Human belief is interesting stuff.

 

[Bullgrit]

I do think that the you (Bullgrit) are looking for a standard of knowing from the D&D commoner that is more rigourous than actually applies to the common person in the real world.

It's not really me looking for a standard of knowing. I'm questioning the persons, here, who say there is factual knowing on this in the D&D world.

Because knowing for a fact about the gods and how the universe operates can lead to some strange things.

Ghosts exist in D&D. All kinds of undead exist, from wispy shades to flesh-eating monsters. Are the common commoners as sure about undead -- not just superstitious or worried, but absolutely certain of the facts that undead do, indeed exist -- as they are about the gods, other planes, and returning to life from death?

If the common commoner is as certain about all the other, more common things in D&D reality (ghosts, goblins, dragons, general monsters) as they are about things related to the divine, then fear of caves and forests and graveyards would not be seen by other commoners as unwarranted.

"I dare you to walk through the old graveyard after sundown."

"That's stupid. I'll be eaten by a ghoul."

"A ghoul!? Woooo, booga, booga! There's no such thing as ghouls."

"Um, yeah there are ghouls. The priest turned two last month. So everyone knows they're still over there."

"You're just a scardy cat."

"You're an idiot. Ghouls!"

The above conversation is like daring someone to jump off a 60' cliff.

Bullgrit

 

[UngainlyTitan]

*Umbran picks up an apple, holds it several feet above the floor, and releases it. It falls to the floor.*

The action of gravity is verifiable. Your everyday life depends upon it. You may question the mechanism (not being able to see gravitons with your unassisted eyes), but the fact that it happens is pretty well established by everyone on the planet.

I know nuclear physics, but have not watched the assembly of a nuclear weapon from the mining of the ore of fissile material through construction to detonation. However, I have seen documentation of such well beyond "word of mouth" stories.

Quantum entanglement is interesting - I haven't personally witnessed the experiments that verify it. But it is a natural and unavoidable consequence of things that I have seen verified.

So, three different situations, three different levels of proofiness. Human belief is interesting stuff.

On the apple falling to the ground, it is consisent with gravity but not necessarily proof, apples were falling to the ground long before anyone though of gravity or even felt the need for the concept.
The need for the concept came about because of the existance of observations (some pretty non trivial ones at that) that required something to operate.
Not that I am disputing gravity but what does a non physist know, a lot of this is part of the lore of the world but if you ask because? you will get a lot of blank looks.
The nuclear weapons, to me is again something I have seen pretty strong documentation but I have not verifyied any of the underlying physics experiments.
As for quantum entanglement, well when I heard about it my maths was no longer of the standard to personally verify the theories behind it nor do I find it compelling to do so. I'm willing to go along with the prevaling consensus as detailed to me by the popular scientific press.

I guess the point I am trying to make is that a lot of stuff is accepted because it is part of the cultural baggage.