Tag Archives: polytheology

Paganism, Religion

Polytheology: Finding a relationship between cosmology and morality

Leave a comment

NOTE: This series is an exploration of my personal theology, which I tend to hold lightly. It is subject to change as I gain new insights. Also, no one should interpret anything I say as the “one true doctrine.”

I think we’re all familiar with stories about cosmic battles between good and evil. They often depict two great forces, one good and the other evil, in conflict, battling for something. Perhaps they battle for control of the universe. Maybe they battle for the souls of humans. No matter what the prize, such stories fill the human imagination, something our entertainment industry has profited from. I’ve lost count of all the movies and television shows that portray such a conflict, occasionally in interesting ways. And while I agree it makes for highly captivating and enjoyable entertainment, I wish there were other stories that portrayed other understandings of morality and cosmology.1

I think it’s important to understand how popular culture not only shapes how we see the real world around us, but helps shape it. So I think it’s important to consider how such a portrayals of cosmology and morality may not be beneficial when applied to real life. For starters, it allows us to think of “evil” as something driven by an external force rather than an entirely human issue. For example, I think the oppression and dehumanization of certain classes of people is unambiguously and morally reprehensible, but I think it’s motivated by entirely human impulses. In many ways, I think framing such injustice as something supernatural can be used to absolve humans of responsibility and avoid accountability. One example of this can be seen in the response of many white Christians who were indifferent to the Civil Rights movement or even opposed it. Even many Christians2 like Billy Graham, who acknowledged racial injustice was a “human heart issue,” suggested it was a problem that would not be resolved until Jesus’s return.3 This often became an excuse to do little or even nothing.

This is not to say that I think an understanding of cosmology — or theology in general — has nothing to say about morality, however. For starters, I think that my understanding of everything and everyone being bound together by shared wyrd underscores the need for morality. That interdependence is what inspires — even forces — us to consider how our actions affect one another. If there were no consequences for our actions, after all, there would be no need for morality. Simply doing whatever we want would be a perfectly acceptable way to live our lives.

Another problem that I see with the way the dominant culture in our society frames morality, theology, and cosmology is that it does so in highly anthropocentric ways. At face value, his makes sense. After all, human religion is a human construct trying to understand humans’ relationships with the numinous — whether we’re talking about the divine, the wider world, or both. As it’s intended to offer humans guidance, it makes sense that humans would be centered there.

However, I think this becomes problematic when we allow ourselves to assume that the rest of the universe shares our anthropocentric viewpoint. This is how we start to see every natural disaster and other hardship as a personal attack on the humans impacted by these events. It’s the point where we start to speculate about which target(s) of God’s wrath the hurricane was thrown at rather than simply accepting that the hurricane was a force of nature and some humans had the misfortune of being in its path.

I think that a more careful reading of many sacred stories could help alleviate that kind of thinking. As I’m most familiar with the Norse myths, I’ll once again use them as an example. Particularly, I find an examination of the Aesir’s relationship with the jotnar (“giants”) instructive. While many individual jotnar were seen as enemies of the Aesir because they posed a particular threat, they were not collectively seen as evil. In fact, a number of the Aesir were paired with jotnar.4 I’ve seen other Heathens suggest that even Thor, famous slayer of jotnar, only killed those who threatened the balance and/or safety of the world. Beyond that, the Aesir and the jotnar seem to leave one another alone, having different interests. I think it would be good for we humans to internalize a similar sense that there are forces (and possibly entities) in this world that do not share our interests. And sometimes, it means that our best response to them is to stay out of their way as much as possible and find ways to cope and mitigate harm when that is not possible.

Post History: I wrote the first draft of this post on November 17, 2024. I proofread, revised, and finalized it later the same day.

Footnotes

  1. It particularly bothers me when stories that draw on Pagan (either modern or ancient) themes fall into this trope. The reality is that if any such cosmic battle existed in certain cultures’ stories, they were often far more complicated and nuanced than “the good guys versus the bad guys.” ↩︎
  2. Lest anyone think I’m solely picking on white Christians for their frequent allegiance to white supremacy, let me acknowledge that modern Pagan and Heathen movements and organizations have their own struggles white supremacy. In fact, I’m currently reading Queering the Runes by Siri Vincent Plouff. In it, they go through a brief explanation of Heathenry’s dark history of white supremacy. Fortunately, they also have a web page with recommended resources for ensuring that your Heathen practice is anti-racist. ↩︎
  3. For an exact quote, check out chapter two of White Evangelical Racism by Anthea Butler. Then read the entire book. I highly recommend it. ↩︎
  4. Freyr’s marriage to Gerd and Njord’s marriage to Skadi are two famous examples. Also, the interesting thing to note about the marriage between Skadi and Njord is that it was arranged to make peace with Skadi after the Aesir had killed her father, Thiazi. Again, thissuggests a more complicated relationship to me than “good guys versus bad guys.” ↩︎
Paganism, Religion

Polytheology: Remaining in community with the ancestors

1 Comment

NOTE: This series is an exploration of my personal theology, which I tend to hold lightly. It is subject to change as I gain new insights. Also, no one should interpret anything I say as the “one true doctrine.”

Happy Monday, dear readers. For today’s polytheology post and in honor of Samhain/Winter Nights,1 I thought it would be good to talk about the importance of the ancestors in my theology. After all, not only are we in community with our fellow humans and our deities, we are still in community with those humans who went before us, who laid the foundations for the world we currently live in and continue to shape.

I originally became aware of the practice of some Pagans to honor the ancestors when I spent time in Ár nDraíocht Féin. In their rites, they welcome three groups of beings to join them: The gods, the ancestors, and the nature spirits, making offerings to each of them in turn. In time, I learned that more Pagan groups had similar traditions or practices.

As time went by, I came to understand why this was so important. I began to see that much of my Pagan spirituality was about being in community with others, including non-humans (and non-living humans). I came to understand that all of us — humans, ancestors, deities, and nature spirits — were meant to work in cooperation to shape the world we live in. I’ve written about this kind of mutual cooperation with our deities for such a goal:

I think this mutual need shapes a different kind of relationship between deities and humans than one suggested by religions that posit an all-powerful, authoritarian deity. Our deities must cooperate and even negotiate with us rather than handing down commandments from on high. This puts us on more equal footing and allows us to meaningfully consent to any relationship with them. It also suggests that we are all a part of that One Eternal Reality, trying to work communally to shape it into something beneficial for all.

So why is it important to have such a cooperative relationship with our ancestors? In my mind, the short answer to that question is “continuity.” After all, our ancestors began shaping wyrd long before we came along. They had a vision and I think that understanding and appreciating that vision is an important part of continuing the work that they began.

It’s important to note that our own vision for the world may not look the same as the one our ancestors had. That’s to be expected, as things have changed since them. And in some cases, I’m sure our ancestors’ vision was imperfect and not something to be continued.2 After all, if we do not think our deities are perfect sources of wisdom, why would we think better of our human forebears?

And yet, I also think their vision is not totally without merit. Sometimes, there is a fragment of something truly beautiful worth pulling out, embracing and expanding upon. Perhaps it’s an ideal that they expressed, but failed to live up to.3

I also think it’s necessary to understand their vision to understand how they created the world that they left for us. In understanding that, we can better figure out what to do with it, and even how to fix the flaws they left behind and/or created through their ignorance and prejudices. And sometimes, it’s necessary to understand why some things need to be dismantled and built over by starting with a better foundation.

In the end, I think that even when we dismantle certain things from the past, we honor our ancestors. In such acts, we acknowledge their humanity, complete with all its imperfections. And hopefully, it causes us to examine our own humanity and our own imperfections. May it be so and may it lead us to considering what foundations we leave our own descendants (both biological and otherwise) to work with in the future.

Post History: I wrote the first draft of this post on November 3, 2024. I proofread, revised, and finalized it on November 4, 204.

Footnotes

  1. One of the things that I love about Winter Nights is that it lasts for more than a single day. In fact, the way groups like The Troth calculate it, it lasts from one full moon to the following new moon. That’s a fortnight of ancestrally goodness! ↩︎
  2. For example, there’s no escaping the truth that a good number of my ancestors were colonizers. That is a vision I do not wish to continue and try to find ways to break away from. ↩︎
  3. Like those founding fathers who boldly stated “all men are created equal” while practicing slavery. What they said was true and valuable. We just need to practice it more fully than they did. ↩︎
Paganism, Religion

Polytheology: Human relationship with deities

1 Comment

NOTE: This series is an exploration of my personal theology, which I tend to hold lightly. It is subject to change as I gain new insights. Also, no one should interpret anything I say as the “one true doctrine.”

In my previous post in this series, I posited that I do not consider deities to be omnipotent. When I’ve mentioned this on various occasions, someone has often asked, “What’s the point in worshiping them?” I’m not sure whether the person asking the question has a limited understanding of what it means to worship a deity or honestly does not see the value in honoring and establishing a relationship with a being who, while not all-powerful, still might have much to offer. Either way, I think it suggests a misunderstanding of what having a relationship with a deity or deities means in my theology.

To me, my relationships with my deities are not about unquestioning obedience or fawning, which often seems to be what comes to mind when many people hear the word “worship.” This is why, as Moss Matthey noted in An Apostate’s Guide to WItchcraft, some witches prefer to say they “work with” their deities rather than worshiping them. I particularly like the idea of “working with deities,” as I’ve described at least one aspect of my relationship with my deities like that in a previous post:

But my relationship with Freyja and the other deities goes beyond devotion as well, just as my relationships with my husband and my friends do. We are also partners in a great effort — that effort to make the world a better and more just place. So we have discussions. We occasionally even have arguments. I’ve even been known to swear at my deities before. And again, they respect me for it. In the end, we are bound together in our desire to build community, a better world, and a better place.

Of course, I will note that this does not mean that I don’t show great honor to my deities. After all, while neither all-powerful nor all-knowing, they are typically smarter and capable of producing greater change than I am alone. I think a certain amount of appreciation for that is wise on my part. And this is where I favor Yvonne Aburrow’s efforts to reclaim the word “worship” and understand what it means in a more Pagan context.

Of course, i will note that I’m probably more interested in my deities’ wisdom than their power. That is my witch side influencing my theology. After all, I believe that we are empowered and capable of doing much on our own, rather than reduced to asking our deities to give us what we need and/or want.

This is also where Gardner’s writings have influenced my theology, as he once wrote that the gods of the witches wanted people to be happy, but needed people’s help to make that happen. This again suggests to me that our deities are as reliant on us as we are on them. Perhaps they rely on us even more than we them. After all, I think Terry Pratchett1 was on to something when he suggested that deities were only empowered through the faith their followers had in them in his book Small Gods.2 I think there’s a certain amount of sense in this line of thinking.

I think this mutual need shapes a different kind of relationship between deities and humans than one suggested by religions that posit an all-powerful, authoritarian deity. Our deities must cooperate and even negotiate with us rather than handing down commandments from on high. This puts us on more equal footing and allows us to meaningfully consent3 to any relationship with them. It also suggests that we are all a part of that One Eternal Reality, trying to work communally to shape it into something beneficial for all.

Post History: I wrote the first draft of this post on October 15, 2024. I proofread, revised, and finalized it on October 16, 2024.

Footnotes

  1. I’m not sure whether Pratchett would be honored, amused, or horrified (probably some combination of the three) by the suggestion, but I’d argue that the man was one of greatest theologians in my lifetime. ↩︎
  2. Yes, I’m taking theology from a fiction book. After all, what are the ancient myths but stories once told to convey important ideas and truths? I see no reason to not search modern stories for important ideas and truths as well. But for the record, I hope no one ever takes The Color of Magic as literal history. (Monstrous Regiment, on the other hand….) ↩︎
  3. After all, consent is only meaningful if it can be withheld and/or withdrawn without retribution. ↩︎
Paganism, Religion

Polytheology: The nature of deities

2 Comments

NOTE: This series is an exploration of my personal theology, which I tend to hold lightly. It is subject to change as I gain new insights. Also, no one should interpret anything I say as the “one true doctrine.”

Happy Monday, dear readers! After last week’s brief detour into a book review, I thought it’d be good to get back into my polytheology series. With that in mind, I wanted to write something about my views on deities and their nature. This topic is near and dear to my heart because I think that, thanks to living in a society that is soaking in Christian hegemony, most people have very Christian and/or monotheistic views about this topic. As a polytheist, I’d like to take a moment to push back against the assumptions this leads many people to hold and offer a different perspective (or more than one).

The first one that I want to tackle is the “omni” attributes of God espoused by Christianity and other monotheistic religions. As an evangelical Christian, I grew up being taught that God was omnipotent (all powerful), omniscient (all knowing), and omnipresent (all present). I’ve seen some people more recently talking about God being omnibenevolent (all good or all loving). While omnibenevolence was certainly something my church ascribed to God, we never used that word.

But in a polytheistic theology, I’m not sure attributing these traits to our deities makes much sense. After all, can you have more than one omnipotent deity? What if they disagree with one another? Who would win the argument? And why would omniscient deities disagree with one another? Wouldn’t they have the same infinite knowledge and therefore come to the same conclusions?

If you look at the Norse myths,1 you start to notice that they don’t really bear out these traits either. After all, the Aesir begin to age and grow weak when the Jotun Thjazi has Loki steal Idun and her life-sustaining apples.2 Apparently, without these magical fruits, even the Aesir are powerless against aging and death. And while one might argue that Odin may have eventually become all-knowing and all-wise,3 he had to gain that knowledge and wisdom through processes that involved things like learning seid-magic from Freyja, hanging himself on Yggdrasil in order to acquire knowledge of the runes, and sacrificing an eye in exchange for a single drink from Mimir’s well. As for omnibenevolence, I think that Loki’s mechanations to bring about Baldr’s death demonstrates that attribute to be not applicable to at least some of the Aesir.

Similarly, our deities are not necessarily uncreated, nor have they always existed. Indeed, the Norse myths talk regularly about the parents of the various Aesir, suggesting they were born into existence just like most living things. In fact, some polytheistic theologians suggest that deities may not have even started out as being deities at first. Many deities may have been a nature spirit or human ancestor that over time became deified.4 This idea draws me back to something I said in my post about the One Eternal Reality:

Of course, I’ll note that the One Eternal Reality goes beyond deities and encompasses humans as well.

This draws attention to the fact that while we and the deities are different, we are not quite as separate and unlike one another as other theologies might suggest. I hope to explore that thought more when I discuss the nature of relationships between humans and deities in my next post in this series.

Post History: I wrote the first draft of this post on October 6, 2024.

Footnotes

  1. I suspect this is true in myths from all around the world, but I’ll focus on those myths I’m most familiar with and which speak most directly to my own spiritual tradition. ↩︎
  2. It’s interesting to note that in the telling of this myth over at Norse Mythology for Smart People, the author notes that the original tale most likely involved not apples, but some other form of fruit or nut. ↩︎
  3. I’m not sure I’m counted among those people. While I believe the Allfather is extremely wise and knowledgeable, I’m not convinced he’s omnipotent even now. ↩︎
  4. Indeed, this is a question i keep coming back to and bringing up to others. What makes a deity a deity? What distinguishes them from an ancestral spirit, a nature spirit, or some other being? ↩︎
Paganism, Religion

Polytheology: The One Eternal Reality

1 Comment

NOTE: This series is an exploration of my personal theology, which I tend to hold lightly. it is subject to change as I gain new insights. Also, no one should interpret anything I say as the “one true doctrine.”

We were gathered around the altar in the center of the room. The ritual space was illuminated only by candles. I and the other coven member assisting me were standing. I held my hands over the plate of Ritz crackers we were using for cakes and ale, blessing them. i closed my blessing saying, “…always remembering that we are one and we are of The One.”

That was the scene the evening I unexpectedly added a new bit of liturgy1 to my non-initiatory coven’s ritual. It was a reference to an earlier part in our rite when we establish our circle and invite the powers to join us. After invoking the God and Goddess, we would say, “Hail to the One Eternal Reality, in whom we live and move and have our being.”2

I was always a fan of the concept of the One Eternal Reality (or simply the One). It may be the closest I come to the common belief among some Wiccans that “all gods are one God and all goddesses are one Goddess.”3 Of course, I’ll note that the One Eternal Reality goes beyond deities and encompasses humans as well. In fact, I’d go so far as to suggest that everything in existence is part of the One, so we might see the One as the universe itself.

This is also why I tend not to see the One as an conscious being. i see it as a force or energy. As I worked on this post, I realize that in my theology, the ideas of the One and wyrd are at least closely related. I’m still sorting through whether I think they are synonyms for the same thing or whether wyrd is a sort of result or byproduct of the One. But either way, it is clear to me that they both express this idea that we are all interconnected and our existence and actions impact one another. And this goes for deities, humans, and everything else that exists.

Also by linking this concept to wyrd, I bring in another important aspect of my understanding of the One Eternal Reality: I believe that it is ever changing rather than something static. Furthermore, this means that we as part of the One Eternal Reality and shapers of wyrd are actively changing it. And as I’ve said in other blog posts, this idea is central to both my religious views and my magical practice.4

Post History: I wrote the first draft of this post on September 21, 2024. I proofread, revised, and finalized this post later the same day.

Footnotes

  1. I tended to ad lib certain parts of our ritual, and the blessing of cakes and ale was no exception when that role fell to me. It always made things interesting when another coven member would occasionally like my word choice and want me to repeat it so they could start using it themselves. Of course, I often had trouble remembering whatever I had said in a moment of inspiration. Note to people who circle with me in the future: just record me if you think you might want to capture my words from such moments. ↩︎
  2. This echoes the apostle Paul’s statement about the Christian god, stating “in him we live and breathe and have our being.” I suspect this was an intentional choice, as the coven member who wrote our coven’s liturgy was a former Christian and has studied religion quite extensively during her long life. It’s also interesting to note that this statement is part of Paul’s speech to the people of Athens at the Areopagus. This suggests to me that even Paul acknowledged that this phrase would resonate with the pagans of his day. ↩︎
  3. Some people tend to think that this view is universal among Wiccans. Wiccan author Yvonne Aburrow has a wonderful video challenging this notion, however. Also, Yvonne’s video reminds me that my understanding of the One would probably be classified as monism. That may be helpful for my readers who love all the fancy terms. ↩︎
  4. I’d like to draw attention to the fact that I made it to the end of this post without making a single reference to the movie starring Jet Li. Please clap. ↩︎
Paganism, Religion

Introducing a blog series: Polytheology

2 Comments

Happy Monday, dear readers! Today, I would like to announce and introduce a new blog series I’ve decided to work on that I’m calling “polytheology.” This series is going to be an exploration of my theological views as a polytheist.

Theology is fairly important to me. After all, I am a theistic witch and a Norse Pagan/Heathen, so my deities are pretty important to me. So the process of thinking about my deities is pretty important to me as well. After all, I’ve offered a few thoughts about my patron goddess Freyja in the past. I’ve also shared more general thoughts about the nature of deities. To be honest, I think that anyone who spends any time worshiping, building a relationship with, or otherwise working with one or more deities tends to have a theology of some sort, even if they don’t realize it.1

So I decided to start writing down some of my theological thoughts, hence the birth of this series. But why did I decide to name it “polytheology?” For starers, because my theology is polytheistic in nature and I wanted to make it clear that this is different from the theology you might get from a lot of monotheists. Also, I found that more than a couple other polytheists have similarly used the term to refer to their own polytheistic takes on theology. And I think that’s another reason for the term: To acknowledge up front that there are actually multiple theologies within polytheology.

Then there’s the fact that I think my own theology is multi-layered and may represent more than a single theology. After all, i have theology about a specific deity2 and I have theology abut the nature of Divinity in general. These are theologies that operate on different levels, and acknowledging them both makes sense to me.

I think this idea that polytheology actually consists of multiple theologies also might help avoid dogma and strict authoritarianism, something that Yvonne Aburrow has pointed out as a common reason why many Pagans tend to be resistant to the idea of discussing theology in a Pagan context.3

I don’t know how often I will write a post in this blog series. Ideally, I’d love to make polytheology the focus of Monday posts for at least a month or two.4 But that might require a more structured approach to theology than I typically have. So for now, I hope to make this an open series that I will add to as inspiration hits. I hope you will follow along and even hop into the conversation in the comments section of each post, dear readers.

Post HIstory: I wrote the first draft of this post on September 15, 2024. I proofread, revised, and finalized it on September 16, 2024.

Footnotes

  1. This is an idea that Christian author and pastor Trey Ferguson pushed in his book Theologizin’ Bigger. He coined the term “theologizin'” to describe the kind of everyday and often informal thoughts people had about God ever day. ↩︎
  2. And why should a theology of Freyja be the same as a theology of Odin? They’re different deities and the kind of relationships that devotees have with each of them tend to be different, at least in my experience. ↩︎
  3. I also think that presenting and thinking of theology as an ongoing dialogue can help guard against becoming too restrictive and dogmatic as well, as Yvonne noted in their video I linked to above. ↩︎
  4. This is especially true since I’m also trying to put these ideas into a manuscript, which I’ve tentatively titled A Wyrd-Worker’s Guide to Polytheology. I’m hoping that if I ever finish that manuscript and get it published, my readers who end up enjoying this series will check it out. ↩︎