Welcome to Gaia! :: View User's Journal | Gaia Journals

I'm working on a tutorial on creating gods and religions for use in stories, RPGs, etc., and I would like some input. Did I miss anything? Where should I go into the most depth? (Where are the common trouble spots?) And should I make two versions? A crash course and a more in-depth version?

Currently, I'm planning on including:

+ Intro

+ Why religions are important

+ An Overview of Types of Religion:
Monotheistic
Polytheistic
Naturalistic
And a bit about mixing different types.

+ The Birth of Religion
Primitive superstitions become religions

+ Evolution of Religion
How to get from Campfire to En Flambe

+ How Culture Influences Gods
With a list of basic civilization types and gods that would likely be present
(Mention worship of elements and their lack of morals. Eg. “We hate murder but the god doesn’t care what feeds it”)
The effects of a society’s morals on its gods

+ The Effects of the Type of God on:
Duties (Area on responsibility, e.g. weather, crops
Domain (where the god is worshiped/ powerful)
Personality
Gender
Appearance
Manifestations and Avatars
Symbols (And how people view them)
(For effects on the priesthood, see "Religious Staff" wink

+ Deities as Characters
Adding flaws (And reasons not to)
Interactions with other gods
How worshipers' behavior affects their god(s)

+ Gods in Daily Life
Practice
Temples
Teachings
Taboos
Offerings
Angering gods
- The results of angering gods

+ Interactions with the Government

+ Interactions with Other Religions

+ Religious Staff
Are priests appropriate?
Staff Gender (Match-the-God, Culture's dominant gender, mixed according to calling, etc.)
Responsibilities of clergy
Religious warriors

+ Variation Across the World
Worship of different gods
Differences in practice

+ When They are Gone
How old religions affect future religions and cultures.

+ Things to keep in mind:
Where did your world come from?
What does your world look like?
Where do your gods come from?
Where do your gods live? (Influenced by type of god)

Why not make an organic "crash course?" Start from the ground up: illustrate how primitive observations can become superstitions and how superstitions can grow into full-blown religions. How a culture's ideals of what is admirable or permissible can influence what kind of gods they will have. I wrote something to a similar effect here.

Another thing you could add is common deity flaws. In a lot of cultures, certain gods/godesses have some character flaw. For example, they can be easily angered, such as the Norse deity Thor. Loneliness is another example (though it's not so much a flaw as it is a personality thing), if you look at the myth of Hades and Persephone. To referene Norse mythology once more, Loki has the flaw of being extremely ingenuitive, but lacks the wisdom to use this ingenuity effectively.

Gods and goddesses worldwide have flaws, so it's only fair if you try to include a brief mention of them, right?

@ Syera Miktayee

So rather than just cutting the tutorial down, use a different approach? Instead of my. . . bulletlike organization, do it more chronologically?


@ SiggyChan

Good point! I added a section. In addition, do you think that there is a possibility of having "perfect" gods as well as more realistic ones, gods that embody their culture's ideals? I can't think of any RL examples right now, but...

It really depends on the society and the religion. Some religions describe their gods as perfect whereas others have flaws. You'll have to do some research on that one, I think.

This looks interesting. I'll be watching this as reference for my fictional religion.

I have come to realize that when creating religions, one of the most important things is the practice. How is the religion practiced, how it affects peoples daily lives, what that religion teaches, is something absolutely forbidden by it, how it sees other religions, etc... Perhaps you should give a mention on those subjects.

What about the worship of forces or powers that cannot communicate, or perhaps simply don't have, a set of rules, laws or morals? Like a civilization that worships magic or one that follows fire. The religious leaders would have to interpret rules and guidelines and then convince the people to follow.

That seems odd. I don't believe anyone ever worshiped a force of nature for its own sake (at least, not for long), but rather an entity they believed the force personified. Fire would have been the manifestation of the deity, not the deity itself.

If they believed that the fire was a deity in and of itself, it wouldn't have been long before they started assigning it human characteristics and tried to figure out what would make it the happiest and most inclined to help the people. (What are its favorite 'foods'? Does it prefer one wood over another? Does it like human flesh?)

The ruling class would eventually take advantage of this god in order to make ruling the people easier. (EG, "The great god En Flambe demands you pay your taxes or it shall consume you all in the night!" )

@IcyWolfling: Yes, something like that.

Pup, I think whoever mentioned doing it chronologically had a good idea. A religion doesn't go from primitive (how do i explain that? what just happened?) to ultra-supreme-being (The God En Flambe....) you know? When creating religions, you have to create it in tune with the people. As you said, a culture isn't going to have a god of philosophy until it's advanced enough on its own to comprehend the idea of philosophy.

That's at least how I see it. I suggest that in your tutorial you reference cultures who had those types of gods. When the culture and the people were primitive, what were their gods like, you know? Then see how in history that happened. Use that as a basis for your tutorial. I dunno, that's how I'd do it.

Lau

@ Siggy Chan

(Research? What’s that?) xd Yep. I think that this project will involve a lot of it. I’ve found a handful of good essays on making gods, but most of the pages on RL religions were a bit… fluffy. (There’s not much info for the amount of text.) Do you know any good sources on religions that you could link me to? Anything related to the topic, really.


@ Heki Gazou and [draken]

You two are making me blush. I hope I live up to your expectations.


@ Tesa Tezemeda

True. I do need to go into that. :/ This topic is so open ended! I don’t want the essay to get into the TLDR department, but that will certainly get mentioned, and I might split the article and give that part its own.


@ Heki Gazou

Yes, but like Syera Miktayee said, it’d be fiddly. I’ll likely mention it, but not go into much detail. (I was planning on writing a small article on divine characters—looks like that’s out the window biggrin )


@ [draken]

Very true. Especially when the world is huge and practice and beliefs are exactly the same as well.


@ EliTiTra

The problem with citing the very beginnings of religion and civilizations with budding gods is that we don't have records that reach back that far. By the time civilizations get writing to record their religions with, they are usually past "Look at the warm fire-god, it has rabbit toasting magicks!" and into "The Great Lord Thoth, Scribe of the Heavens, has given us these writings, on the Eighth Day after the Flooding of the Divine River, in the Fifteenth Year of the reign of Amunaten, Son of Ra, Overlord of the Upper and Lower Kingdoms."

I can make up examples, but I don't think I'll be able to use many RL examples of the more primitive gods and religions.

(Sorry about the freakishly long sentences. razz )


@ Everyone

Thanks hugely for your input! These are all very helpful comments.

Perhaps things they associate with/calling cards and the context they take within world? Athena had her owl and as a result owls symbolize wisdom.