Not all pagans are the same. Americans have been more familiar with the European branch.
Traditional Western pagan gods tend to be just glorified human beings. They have all the character flaws of the humans they order around. They are like omnipotent infants. They have power with no self control. Gaia has a tantrum and we suffer an earthquake. Venus cries and we have a flood. Vulcan loses his temper and lava flows. Mars gets rejected by a maiden and he turns her into a turtle. The list goes on. Read your Greek mythology if you think I am just making that up. Or just read any modern fantasy. I just read a story where a sorcerer told a jewel that was on the end of the hero’s sword to stop pouting. This jewel representing half of the total power and wisdom of the universe (aka Ying or Yang), was pouting on the end of a sword and was confronted on this immature behavior by an old man.
This is one of the reasons I have a hard time with fantasy as a genre. The beings that are presented as gods are really just people with extreme power or Star Trek aliens with superior wisdom. It is almost laughable as these creations of limited human beings try to share some eternal wisdom that the author just made up. It is kind of like people who get excited about the wisdom of children. It only exists when you are on an emotional trip.
On the stage we call it Deux ex Machina. In modern fantasy it is called wisdom. They can pull a previously unknown superpower out of the box and fix everything. Or you have the all knowing, eternal gods who just forgot they could do that. Cool. All you need to do is sacrifice enough virgins and life will be good. It is really just a belief in the ultimate power in the human potential.
How is it working for you?
To be continued...
homo unius libri
I wonder where you can find virgins these days?
ReplyDeleteI didn't want to say that. Maybe that is why the pagan god Molak demanded infant sacrifice.
DeleteGrace and peace.