Gods Need Prayer Badly: Difference between revisions
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(There's a duplicate paragraph about the Aztecs below.) |
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Make thankfulness your sacrifice to God,<br /> |
Make thankfulness your sacrifice to God,<br /> |
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and keep the vows you made to the Most High." }} |
and keep the vows you made to the Most High." }} |
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* The Aztec gods worked like this, except with human sacrifices. By consuming the hearts of the victims, offered up in a sacred ritual, the gods would gain the strength needed to keep the world running. |
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* The Neopagan scholar Isaac Bonewits describes gods as functioning basically as the trope says. He's not alone; this theogony is quite common, especially among Wiccans and Asatru (Norse-pagan revivalists). |
* The Neopagan scholar Isaac Bonewits describes gods as functioning basically as the trope says. He's not alone; this theogony is quite common, especially among Wiccans and Asatru (Norse-pagan revivalists). |
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* This trope is fairly common in real-world polytheisms, especially those with a substantial animist or pantheist component. Among modern religions, it is especially significant in the religions of the African diaspora in the New World (Vodoun, Santeria, Candomble, Umbanda), and in the Shinto animism of Japan. Historically it was an important though implicit idea in Hellenic- and Roman-era syncretism. |
* This trope is fairly common in real-world polytheisms, especially those with a substantial animist or pantheist component. Among modern religions, it is especially significant in the religions of the African diaspora in the New World (Vodoun, Santeria, Candomble, Umbanda), and in the Shinto animism of Japan. Historically it was an important though implicit idea in Hellenic- and Roman-era syncretism. |
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* Maltheists (those who believe in God, but believe that [[God Is Evil]]) often believe that God will die if nobody worships him. Which is what they hope will eventually happen, because they believe humanity cannot truly be free until God dies. |
* Maltheists (those who believe in God, but believe that [[God Is Evil]]) often believe that God will die if nobody worships him. Which is what they hope will eventually happen, because they believe humanity cannot truly be free until God dies. |
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* The state religion of the Aztec or Mexica Empire believed the gods are always hungry -- not for belief or prayer, but for human and animal sacrificial victims -- and that if they were not fed a steady diet of the hearts of brave warriors, they would surely destroy the world, as they had many times before. The whole Aztec political system was designed to prevent this by waging enough wars that there would always be plenty of [[PO Ws]] to sacrifice; in some cases, Tenochtitlan and another city-state would stage a set-piece "Flower War" with no objective but giving each side a chance to capture some of other's soldiers for sacrifice. (Not every state the Mexica forced to participate in this seems to have shared their level or form of piety on the matter -- a circumstance Cortez, when he arrived, found very useful to his purposes.) |
* The state religion of the Aztec or Mexica Empire believed the gods are always hungry -- not for belief or prayer, but for human and animal sacrificial victims -- and that if they were not fed a steady diet of the hearts of brave warriors, they would surely destroy the world, as they had many times before. The whole Aztec political system was designed to prevent this by waging enough wars that there would always be plenty of [[PO Ws]] to sacrifice; in some cases, Tenochtitlan and another city-state would stage a set-piece "Flower War" with no objective but giving each side a chance to capture some of other's soldiers for sacrifice. (Not every state the Mexica forced to participate in this seems to have shared their level or form of piety on the matter -- a circumstance Cortez, when he arrived, found very useful to his purposes.) |
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** To put it more bluntly, many of the Aztecs' neighbors, and particularly the less pious ones, saw them as a mixture of [[The Empire]] and The [[Religion of Evil]], seeing as the Aztecs had a habit of capturing whole villages for sacrifice and then moving into the vacated homes. |
** To put it more bluntly, many of the Aztecs' neighbors, and particularly the less pious ones, saw them as a mixture of [[The Empire]] and The [[Religion of Evil]], seeing as the Aztecs had a habit of capturing whole villages for sacrifice and then moving into the vacated homes. |
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== Tabletop Games == |
== Tabletop Games == |
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