Actually the Jade emperor comes up as the most powerful for China. In Japan there were a pair of deities, who created everything, including the kami. In india you had a trinity of deities, who created, and then destroyed everything.

Amongst native americans there were several who believed once again is the "Father" deity. It's almost universal amongst early cultures, believe me, I've studied this for years and years.

Mind you that asia had religions that changed as fast as people could be born come up with new stuff, and then die. It gets freaking crazy. lol.

Feyona: I try not to be serious all the time, but I get all intellectual when a subject is proposed. But I think if I were serious all the time I wouldn't be as good a writer as I am right now. Like... I tried doing a serious series once and it was like... "BAAAAAAAW.... I'm so DEPRESSED! BAAAAAAAAW!"

So now I write about cute cannibals and boys who kiss each other.


Sarofset: Perhaps they are seen as major deities by us westerners, but for the practitioners its different. Its a pantheon of Gods, not a hierarchy. In fact, I do believe that Zeus is only one of three major gods. Zeus may be seen as the God of the Sky, but there are also Poseidon and Hades. Equally, Hera is the mother of all the Gods and is worshipped on an equal level as the three brother gods.

You are speaking of Izanami and Izanagi, are you not? They were responsible for creating much of the physical world, and some of the Kamii that went with the tangible aspects of it, but they were not the source of the first Kamii. The first Kamii came out of an explosion that closely correlates with the scientific account of the big bang.

I don't know why I didn't think about this before: Hinduism. There's a pantheon that's alive and kicking. Some people worship Vishnu, some people worship Kali, some people worship different ones at different times. Very fluid religion, Hindu.

Very fluid. And with a continuous history that is nothing short of impressive.

I love looking at the temples. They're so elaborate. It was one of the most interesting parts of my Asian Art History course.

Have you ever read Michael Wood's India? Interesting over all, and with tasty tidbits about the architecture in there as well.

Hinduism changes like the winds.

In Greek mythology Zeus was king, and by far the most powerful of the gods. Hera was only worshiped as an equal by some small sects. Hades was not so much on the power. He was invisible, and whined a lot. Poseidon was powerful, but not nearly as powerful a Zeus. ...Also Zeus was called father, by a lot of religious texts.

My favorite thing about Greek gods, was the temple they always had for any gods they were unaware of. lol. I find it amusing.

I love the conversations that go on in this thread.

The way I see it, many of the moder monotheistic religions may worship only one god, but it seems like they never really discount all the others. My mom does a lot of research into things like this for fun, and I learned from her that one of the lines in the Christian Bible is "Thou shalt not worship any God before me." I'm not sure about the actual meaning of this and I've never actually read it in context, but to me it means that while God is worshipped as the only god, he/she doesn't outright say that no other gods exist. It could easily be that the angels in Christianity came from the old gods of polythesitic religions.

I don't really have a religion, but I like to consider my beliefs as being in the polythesitic area. Mostly out of logic; it doesn't seem all that practical to me that there's only one god controlling everything. If there was, he/she'd have one helluva migraine. To me, there being multiple gods at multiple levels of power makes more sense and would probably keep things running smoothly, kind of like a chain of command. There's one or two or three at the top (like the commanding officer of a ship), then the ones right below them (like the executive officer), and then so on and so forth. And of course this all trickles down to us humans. I don't know if this makes any sense at all, but that's the way I think it works.

Well, that's just hedging their bets. In an uncertain world, it made sense. Amusing though, yes.
You are really big on the "father" thing today, aren't you Saro?

In a pantheon it makes perfect sense to switch who you worship. I think that's the point of a pantheon: whoever you need to evoke, you evoke. For a calm sea, you pray to Poseidon. For a good war, you pray to Athena. That's how pantheons work.

Biggles: I don't believe I have read that book. What can you tell me about it?

It's a wide sweeping look at the history of India, by noted scholar Michael Wood, who always creates an engaging reading experience, due to his knowledgeable enthusiasm. It's something you can pick up after putting it down for a bit, and still get the same learning mileage out of it.

I'll have to look into it. Put that on the list of things to do when I finally finish The Bend... >_>

...several years from now.

I love to study religion in case you couldn't tell. :) The father theory is one that has piqued my interest. It seems logical, and since it's very old it has more claim to truth, than say... scientology. which is just crazy talk. lol.

Haha. It will be there. Waiting.

Well, old things don't automatically have validity. It just gives them an interesting/intriguing patina.
To be honest, in my research I've come up with more deep seeded references to mother deities than fathers. And more motherlands than fatherlands, for that matter.
But I don't truly understand that premise of assigning genders to deities, who are supposed to be more than us...

What exactly is your major, sarofset? That's another one of those things I keep meaning to ask but always end up forgetting.

I think people assign gender because its easier to understand. Ancient Greeks designed their pantheon to reflect Greek High Society.

Yes, but it's not very high minded...
Anyway, this has been truly fascinating, and I was happy to be a part of it, but I have to attend to other things today.

Religion wasn't exactly created for those of a higher mind. xD

See you later, Biggles. I still have a page to ink. xD

I'm not sure why gods have genders either. Like I said, I don't really have a religion, but I prefer to observe that there's not just a higher power, but mutliple. I don't know how many though, and wouldn't like to assume I know.

I think that there are some people that still observe ancient pantheons though. I'm not entirely sure on that though. On the subject of ancient pantheons in modern day, a good series to read if you're into mythology would be the Dark-Hunter books my Sherryln Kenyon; she's done a LOT of research into mythology, not just Greek (which the books mostly center around). It also brings in the legends of Atlantis. Yes, there's a lot of sex in the books, but I don't read it for that and neither does my mom. On a mythological standpoint they're really good and really accurate.

Also Percy Jackson series. <3

One of my roommates associated herself with Athena while I was living with her. Joel seems to be evoking the spirit of Hermes at the moment, despite his main deity being Poseidon.

My life is a colorful one...

That doesn't mean it isn't interesting though. I've only seen the Lighting Theif movie, but it's teased me into wanting to read the entire Percy Jackson series. My mom's even waiting for The Last Olympian to come out in paperback. If the books are anything like Lightening Theif, then it's far more than worth reading.

... >>

The movies are NOTHING like the books. There's a ton more development, the characters are rounder, the foreshadowing is more subtle.

Hyena: You ask about once a week, and I keep telling you, I haven't picked yet. lol. I love history, and anthropology, and geology, and languages, so I'm not sure which to pick yet. lol. I might just wait and figure it out, based on which I'm closest to getting a degree in. I've had friends do that.

Aha... see. You have to forgive me. I talk to a lot of people about this and its sort of hard to keep track of who is who.

lol. no problem. :)