You never see animals going through the absurd and often horrible fooleries of magic and religion... Dogs do not ritually urinate in the hope of persuading heaven to do the same and send down rain. Asses do not bray a liturgy to cloudless skies. Nor do cats attmpt, by abstinence from cat's meat, to wheedle the feline spirits into benevolence. Only man behaves with such gratuitous folly. It is the price he has to pay for being intelligent but not, as yet, quite intelligent enough.
Aldous Huxley
The amazing diversity of humanity is most apparent in the study of religion. This complex and contradictory mass of confusion exemplifies the extreme lengths to which mortals go to cling to their fragile perceptions of the Universe.
Every major culture has its own set of philosophical beliefs and stories by which they attempt to explain the nature of the Universe around them. Populating these stories are a host of spiritual beings that comprise a veritable pantheon unique to that culture and betraying the qualities of those that make it up.
Religion is replete with creeds, cults, faiths, persuasions, sects, denominations, schisms and other variations and divisions. This is further complicated by holy wars, crusades, religious persecution and more. The serious scholar of religion must accept that this discipline does not lend itself to any form of organization.
On the continent of Ithria alone, there are hundreds of distinct cultures worshipping thousands of different deities under the guise of as many religions.
Any attempt to define such a concept as a "god" is bound to meet with failure due to the endless variety in what each major religion conceives a god to be. Most would agree that a god must have great powers at his disposal. Most gods are said to have great knowledge, knowledge of the future, infinite power, magical abilities and more. But the one defining quality that all must have is that they are not bound by the physicality of the body. They are immortal and have, in some way, transcended the concept of life and death.
The various faiths may refer to their gods as "greater gods" or "lesser gods" but ultimately such terminology is meaningless. Most faiths will claim that their god is the one true god and all others are false idols. Even within a single culture, there may be disagreement between the priests as to which is the greatest god.
This page last updated Monday, October 08, 2007. Copyright 1990-2008 David M. Roomes.