The Bible--Wars, Culture, Faith, and Inspiration

[S'mon]

What would make for some good material also is the "competition" (for lack of a better word) of the Churches of Mithras and Isis versus early christianity. Mithras particularly has similar techings to Christianity, though I seem to recall that Isis was more popular with wealthier citizens of the empire. In Mithraism, wasn't there some sort of baptism-like ritual involving the blood of a bull for its followers?

I'm pretty sure Roman Christianity incorporated large chunks of Mithraism as it evolved towards being the official church of the Empire - hence "muscular Christianity" Early Roman Christianity seems to have been strongly pacifistic and with a strong role for women, despite Paul's efforts.

 

[Rashak Mani]

I'm actually quite surprised anyone would bring christianity into their game worlds.

First it seems quite dangerous personal religion wise. Especially if the DM nudges things around a bit to suit their world and some overly religious gamer objects. I suppose Wiccan or Hindus might obect to if their beliefs are over simplified for gaming "mythos".

Second Monotheism ryhmes with boring to me in a Fantasy World. Having PCs from different faiths and viewpoints makes for interesting interaction and variety. D&D is about escapism too. Going to a different world and existance... bringing along real world stuff kind of spoils it. No ?

Last of course is that Jesus' pacifist teachings seem quite hard to follow in combat heavy and loot rich D&D regular fare ! Do orcs have souls ?

Naturally D&D has a lot of stuff with biblical references like the Sticks to snakes of former times... riders of the apocalypse. Still I think its a no no proposition. The fact that I'm very much against these religions might be clouding me to the possibilities of course. To each his own I suppose.

 

[S'mon]

I'm actually quite surprised anyone would bring christianity into their game worlds.

First it seems quite dangerous personal religion wise. Especially if the DM nudges things around a bit to suit their world and some overly religious gamer objects. I suppose Wiccan or Hindus might obect to if their beliefs are over simplified for gaming "mythos".

You can have religions based on real-world religions in a game without necessarily making judgements of the "Odinism is the One True Faith" type. I have a Christian player in my game and a Church of Crisos based loosely on real-word Christianity, but the Christian player doesn't play Crisans, he plays elves, or occasionally dwarves. I don't make in-game value judgments about the truth or rightness of any religion, IMC all religions and world-views are competing for adherents. Some are arguably better than others (Crisos is certainly preferable to Graz'zt IMO!) but that's basically for PCs & NPCs to judge.

 

[S'mon]

Slightly OT, I had a very similar experience that was nothing to do with religion - IMC there's a culture loosely based on Norse Vikings of the 'dark ages Norway' type. A certain annoying poster on Randonlings insisted on butting into all my posts about this culture to explain that I was "spelling words wrong" or otherwise being inaccurate in portraying this culture. *grrr* - it's a _fantasy_ game!!! If I want my fantasy Vikings to wear horned helmets, they damn well wear horned helmets! If I want my Gnostic Crisan Monks to be butt-kicking martial artists out of "Kung Fu", likewise.

 

[S'mon]

Wicca is an interesting example - D&D was originally based largely off medieval Catholic worldview, so "witches" would most likely be found in covens of evil demon-summoners worshipping Asmodeus or Graz'zt. OTOH you can take the internal aspect of Wicca and have Witches be nature-worshipping Druids as in 3e. And, being a fantasy game, you can have evil Satanic witches and good or neutral Druidical witches within the same campaign setting!

 

[Jupp]

Heh, this thread remembered me of this t-shirt here:

http://www.jinx.com/scripts/details.asp?affid=-1&productID=283

 

[Bloodstone Press]

For example, I have a book--an Encyclopedia of Who's Who in the Bible--it is indexed and cross-referenced with the Bible--and details every person mentioned throughout the Bible. Let me tell you--that's a lot of names! From the Bible, besides names, I have also been inspired by some legal details, cultural customs, clothing, food, and treasures described within the Bible. Excellent stuff, I assure you.

cool.

a few months ago, someone gave me a book called "The Atlas of the Bible." its basically a history/archeology book that traces the history of the bible and is full of dozens of awesome maps.

Naturally, I've been looking forward to running some biblical games lately. The recent release of Green Ronin’s Testament on RPGnow is also timely....

some of the most inspiring things I've read in the Atlas of the Bible deal with ancient civilizations and stories about the Arc of the Covenant. The travels of Abraham are also interesting. The wars with the philistines and all the stuff about the two kingdoms is great for political intrigue. I've learned a lot about the times of King David as well.

 

[Tonguez]

I'm actually quite surprised anyone would bring christianity into their game worlds.

Second Monotheism ryhmes with boring to me in a Fantasy World. Having PCs from different faiths and viewpoints makes for interesting interaction and variety.

ever hear of a guy named Friar Tuck? or the about Crusades or the Cathars or the Inquisition?

or indeed about the Reformation, the Eastern Orthodox Church, Roman Catholic Church the Nestorians etc

Monotheism doesn't automatically imply the same viewpoint and is definitely not boring!

many don't realise that the target of many of the crusades were 'christians' with a different viewpoint than Catholic Church which domianted Europe at the time and of course the Inquistion targetted a number of Christian heresies (not just witches, muslims and jews)

I once ran a game with a monotheistic church in which the PCs were all associated of a particular mendicant order. The game initially revolved around the recovery of holy artifacts and a few pilgramages (where the PCS went as bodyguards to the pilgrims). The Legends of the Saints makes for great roleplaying ideas and I used an NPC blantantly named Aquinas (and based on St Tomas Aquinas). I was eventually gonna have the PCs go off and search for the Kingdom of Prester John (but the game folded before we got there)

 

[fusangite]

I'm actually quite surprised anyone would bring christianity into their game worlds.

Actually our ideas about all religions in D&D are completely conditioned by our understanding of Christianity anyway. There was no such category, no such idea as religion before Christianity. Ideas like faith and heresy, while extant before the second century were radically changed and foregrounded by the emergence of this thing called religion which was inextricably linked to the emergence of Christianity.

First it seems quite dangerous personal religion wise. Especially if the DM nudges things around a bit to suit their world and some overly religious gamer objects.

This is certainly a potential problem -- a DM must be sensitive and do audience-appropriate things but I think you over-estimate the number of Christians who will react negatively to a fantasy relgion inspired by ideas from their faith.

Second Monotheism ryhmes with boring to me in a Fantasy World. Having PCs from different faiths and viewpoints makes for interesting interaction and variety.

The idea of heresy is basically non-existent except in monotheistic systems. People can only be infidels or heretics if they claim to be worshipping the same god as you. Religious conflict rarely arises unless people make specific claims of exclusivity.

D&D is about escapism too. Going to a different world and existance... bringing along real world stuff kind of spoils it. No ?

Swords are real. Spears are real. Humans are real. The building blocks of fantasy worlds come in three kinds (a) things that are real (b) things people used to believe were real (c) things that have been made up inspired by (a) and (b).

Last of course is that Jesus' pacifist teachings seem quite hard to follow in combat heavy and loot rich D&D regular fare !

With all the Old Testament references earlier in this thread, I don't think anyone is talking about the parts of the Judeo-Christian tradition that encompass pacifism. The Old Testament is full of war, genocide and even stuff blowing up. Besides, even the Jesus-centred Christianity of the West still managed to produce the Crusades, Reformation, Justinian's Reconquest, the Carolingian Empire, etc.

Do orcs have souls ?

According to the rules they do. If your soul can end up on an outer plane, you must have had one in the first place.

Naturally D&D has a lot of stuff with biblical references like the Sticks to snakes of former times... riders of the apocalypse. Still I think its a no no proposition.

You mean the rules made a mistake by including such things?

 

[fusangite]

I'm pretty sure Roman Christianity incorporated large chunks of Mithraism as it evolved towards being the official church of the Empire - hence "muscular Christianity"

There's no evidence of this. There were many strong influences on Christianity in the fourth century after its legalization but there is no evidence that Mithraism was one of them. There is actually far more evidence of Mithraism incorporating originally Christian elements than the reverse.

Early Roman Christianity seems to have been strongly pacifistic and with a strong role for women, despite Paul's efforts.

An important thing to remember is that there were a lot of competing Christianities until the legalization of the faith. Irenaeus' impressive list of "heresies" was not created by a powerful central church dealing with dissidents; it was created by one Christian faction among many. It might have been a large faction but it was just that. It's a real mistake to talk about a normative Christianity before the fourth century.