Polytheism

[tatonca]

Reading through this thread, there are certainly many original ideas. It occurs to me that there is some commonality which if you permit, I will explore below.

The main thing that strikes me is that the formation of the gods themselves is secondary to the story that is being told for which theses characters take a part. This can also be said for the gods of ancient religions. Religion fulfilled two important needs in ancient times: a forum to explain the unexplainable, and a vessel for conotizing the traditions and laws which held together their community. This was achieved by providing divine figures that the populace could relate too and therefore believe in .

The strength of any pantheon, from a believibility or authenticity stand point then could be said to be directly relational to the amount of detail and humanity given it's members - or how much like us they are. So although they are ascribed incredible powers that keep the universe in motion, we relate to them because they are like us. After a hard day of chariot racing across the sky, Ra comes home and finds his wife bedding some other guy. Suddenly my back breaking day of lugging monolithic stones around is more palatable to me.

I also found it interesting that someone suggested using catholisism as a template for polytheistic belief system. Catholisism itself is paterned after the roman pagan gods, in an attempt to woo the roman populace into conforming with the choosen religion of its leader. Kinda like "Mars gets a new set a clothes and starts calling himself Peter" Most of the Roman gods map in portfolio to catholic saints. This symbolic metamorphosis is a good example of what I mean. As the needs of the populace changed, or were forced to change, so too did the belief system. What better way to get people to worship Jesus and revere his disciples, then to have you pray on the same day for the same thing in the same place to the same statue, just given a different name? Or to celebrate festivals on the same days with new meaning? As long as the holiday remains, who really notices that the meaning has changed?

Using this concept, as an example, how would the egyptian gods have been changed if a volcano had cast a decade long blanket over the sky, blocking out the face of Ra? What god would rise in his place?

So historical context becomes a key factor as well.

The last piece, when ascribing these things within the concept of a game is the required element of conflict. After all who wants to adventure in a world where everyone gets along? The conflict though is really between cultures embodied by their divinity. The natural rivalry between dwarves and elves in Tolkien's works is ascribed to the belief by both parties that they were the first race on middle earth. The "historical/mythical" text makes them both right - the god of the dwarves created the dwarves first, but was out of turn and therefore was forced to let them "sleep under the mountains" until their time was to come, appropriately after the elves. This provides for both races to have thier own interpretations. This is another piece these religions have in common : the already mentioned internal inconcsistencies - though I prefer to say interpretations. My suggestion here is that these internal inconsistencies should be inate to the overall cosmology as oppose to intrisic - born naturally of it not directly for it.

How does this all tie together? Well I would imagine, if I were to create a Pantheon, I would start with the story, at the beginning - the creation if you will. Take into account the nature of the world I wanted to create - had it always been? or was it spontaneously created? Are there themes that will carry through my adventures that I can make a part of my world? Are my characters destined to become part of this story or merely adventure within in it? Is this a place of high magic, or ebbing power giving way to a modern age? Then I would make the Gods human in some way - a flaw, a goal and a purpose. These things will shape the types of characters that populate the world and the heavens.

 

[fusangite]

A thought I'd like to add:

One of the aspects of the Runequest style of deities that hasn't necessarily been coming through in our discussions: the role of the actual cults/sects. In modern times, when most of our social organization is secular, we tend to focus our discussion and conception of gods on issues of morality and cosmology. But in fact, morality and cosmology are relatively minor compared to the important functions religions perform in my campaign.

Membership in a religion is usually required to purchase magic items, especially those that are custom-ordered -- even if magic items are sold elsewhere, they are sold at a much higher rate. Access to arcane spell books, similarly is something that is regulated by religious hierarchy. Membership in certain cults is often a precondition for positions in civic government and similarly, membership in a religion can be used as a kind of passport for characters entering a new community. Major priests sometimes produce letters of introduction for characters. Also, a temple can be a place of refuge for an adherent who is facing persecution. Scarce goods are sometimes stockpiled by temples and many religions raise separate militia or armies which co-operate with but do not amalgamate with large state forces.

Cosmology is interesting, yes, but a truly polytheistic culture will involve regular interactions with religious officials and discrimination (both negative and positive) based on religion -- also it will involve channeling into certain occupations -- not just character classes but trades from farmers to mathematicians. Because years of playing Runequest drilled this into me, I don't produce a lot of documentation about it but my players are sometimes mystified that their religion matters as often as it does. While alignment change isn't a big thing for me, cults in my game will blackball certain members based on their conduct which is, in a sense, a more impactful consquence of inconsistent behaviour.

 

[Tuerny]

After reading through this thread I think I have a pretty good idea of how I am going to handle the polytheistic faith of the next region I am detailing for my setting.

My previous one, Ral-Auth, mostly had deities as expressions of abstract forces of the universe. They rarely intervened and existed more as an easy symbol for the human mind to conceptualize than anything else. And while that was interesting, I want to try something new for my next setting.

As such I am going to be taking the ideas expressed here combined with some stuff from Exalted and my own fevered concious to create an Imperial Cult of sorts that was formed during the creation of the Ban Gali Imperium. The Ban Gali had their own native gods, but they also were pragmatic enough to accept other gods into the mix. Whenever they conquered a people they would have members of the Imperial Temple come in and assess the local deities and determine if they were aspects of one of the pre-existing deities, new deities worthy of worship, or demons.

The assumption of deities was as much a political consideration as a theological one, but it resulted in the Imperial Temple having, at its height, almost thirty members of its pantheon with numerous aspects of these core thirty members. With the fall of the Ban Gali Imperium the worship of these deities has become a bit more localized. Each area had deities it favored before the fall of the Imperium, due to shared values or origin, and has, since then, essentially adopted these deities or their aspects as their local "pantheon"

Just because two different locations worship the same deity doesn't mean that they have the same worship practices. Worship of Hulloth among the honorable soldiers of Mur'dosh varies greatly with that among the human sacrificing slave lords of Ullosh.

The Imperial Cult, a descendant of the Imperial Temple, still exists in some respects, and these priests serve more as pantheonic priests, worshipping great divinities in general rather than any one in particular. They are popular in trade centers and in areas that have had problems with angry gods in the past.

Also in existance are animistic priests who venerate the little gods. They are very well aware of the spirits that are present in everything and make sure that it keeps working and venerate them in exchange for their own brand of power. (Druids)

The Imperial Temple maintained "official myths" that changed as new gods were added or changed. Due to the great size of the Empire these myths were never update outside of the Ban Gali Province and the area around the Holy Mountain. At the time of the Imperium's fall there was thus a number of contradictory myths spread throughout the Imperium, myths which further diverged with time and the reinstating of territortial independance. This results in frequently contradictory myths in areas that are only a few dozen miles from each other.

Anyway, with this basis I think I am going to cook up 20 or 30 gods and demon lords and use that as a basis for the religion in the region. The remaining ones will be left blank for future development as needed.

Any thoughts?

 

[Nellisir]

Humor is another important tool. In "real history", people gave gods bawdy nicknames and habits. If your entire pantheon is glum and gray, it's not very exciting, and not very realistic. Some glumness is expected, but levity is good too. Your gaming group is important here too -- some people just can't handle innuendo without going overboard.

Nell
Who just gave the goddess of drunks a goblet called "One too Many".

 

[corzican]

Actually that is quite interesting. Would you mind posting these finer details you mentioned?

So would priests of the gods of the earth be just normal members of the various classes?

How do wizards/sorcerers/psions and alternate forms of magic work into your cosmology?

Sorry about taking so long to respond. My computer has been acting up the last couple of days. I've managed to get it working with some duct tape, but I'm not sure how long it will stay up. I'll try to be quick in case it blows up again.

I've called this religion Solonism after the continent it originated from (Solonia)(Note: Looking for a better name for this). The priests of the gods of earth (Annunnaki) are all people of non-clerical classes. In this religion, only the gods of heaven (Innaki) are able to grant spells and powers directly to their followers. The priests of the Annunnaki do not choose one particular patron, either. A priest will ask for the blessing of Tammuzi(agriculture in general) at the beginning of the planting season for a farmer, ask for Geshtina (motherhood, specifically childbirth) to ease labor pains for a particularly difficult pregnancy, or Eluk(athletes) during a wrestling meet to hope that every leaves as healthy as they came.

Now, the way this eventually worked out was rather interesting. This religion originated on an island continent far enough from other civilized lands that they did not meet until ships for long-distance travel were developed. Worship of the Innaki in the city-states (essentially large temples) stayed strong, and clerics are powerful rulers within and near the city-states. The number of the Innaki doesn't increase and neither will the number of city-states, so the spread of that portion of the faith has remained close to it's ancestral lands.

Worship of the Annunnaki, though, has spread fairly far. A nation which I'm still calling "The Hobgoblin Imperium" since I haven't found a better name for it has adapted the religion, merging it with their ancestor worship. There is no central organizing agency for the worship of the Annunnaki, and divine ascension in exchange for piety and victory is very tempting. I figure that there are two movements in the one religion, one for the rulers and one for the common folk.

Relationships with other religions varies. Though people may have small personal totems for the Annunnaki in the city-states, no public temple or shrine can be built in the city-states for any other god besides the city-state's patron. No shrines or temples for the Innaki are to be built outside the city-states either (though some clerics may have small personal shrines should they have to travel). The priests of the Annunnaki can have shrines anywhere except the city-states, and will even share a building with another religious group provided they are similarly tolerant and don't have to compete for space during holy days.

The only religion in my world which consistantly causes problems with them is a monotheistic religion I've called the Krataen Faith, which has in their doctrine that all other religions are just fiend worship. This is particularly rough between the two, since the creation myths of the Solonists described their gods emerging from Apsu, and the creation myths of the Krataens have fiends emerging from Apsu in order to destroy the Mother Goddess and the light she has brought to the world.

As for how wizards, sorcerers, and other various magic users fit into the cosmology, that's a question I've tried to refuse to answer. Well, not quite. I haven't said "wizards know how to cast spells because of they tap the Heart of Magic" or something as such. The few Solonist myths have mortals and monster both using magic like it was growing on trees, and the only story I've concocted of how mortals learned how to make crafts is the origin where they were created for servitude. I haven't even thought about this for the Krataens; considering how hostile I've played them towards any magic-user (divine or otherwise) who was not dedicated to Krata, I would imagine their tales would say that these were the gifts of fiends to ensnare mortals souls. The different religions don't even agree on the planar "geography" of the universe, so the fact that I don't have an answer for where magic comes from doesn't bother me too much. It's just there and as far as the players its always been there.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

high clergy

There's a little bit in the Kingdom's of Kalamar that I always thought added a strange bit to the eternal why do the many gods care question.

In most answers the assumption is the gods want quality/quantity of worshippers of mana.

In Kalamar, the claim was the gods were really after high level clerics.

This intrigued me because there are some mythology's where someone figure out how to be a priest without the gods telling him or her how. A lot of shamanistic cults have a similar phenomena where the priest has a personal power that enables him or her to relate to god better, not a power that comes from god.

I always wanted to see a DnD scenario where someone worked out exactly what that would do for adventuring priests.

My thought would be that in a polytheistic cosmology this would definitely make your local gifted cleric a serious comodity as the only person who could both talk to the gods and be reasonably certain they would listen.

Way more than a medic.