GETTING STARTED 4: WORKING WITH THE DEITIES

 By Todd Covert, Chief of the Fellowship

“All men have need of the gods.”

Homer, The Odyssey

For well over two thousand years, people have grappled with apparently competing conceptions of how the universe—both outer and inner—is shaped and maintained.  A multitude of understandings of how the cosmos is ordered have emerged, evolved, contended thoughout this ongoing quest for understanding.  Sometimes the individual human has been left to stand alone at the center of an inscrutable universe, but—more often than not—mankind has been seen as inhabiting a world in which superhuman influence abounds, indeed is inextricably linked to all that is.

Historians of religion have remarked time and again on the many ways in which people in various cultures through various ages have identified the carriers of this preternatural influence.  Some have chosen simply to seen non-human entities in the natural world as possessed of their own spirits, worthy of respect as humans see themselves as being.  Others have gleaned the existence of still more powerful beings, existing perhaps within, but just as easily outside of, the natural environment.  Many words in many languages exist for such beings—and as many conceptions of them—but in our tongue we most often call them “gods.”

One of the greatest cleavages in the understanding of cosmic order lies between those who conceive of many individual gods (by which term we encompass for the moment beings male and female) and those who feel that there is only one entity truly worthy of being referred to my that term.  This is not the place to indulge in speculation as to whether the many gods worshipped by some humans are reflections of one or two overarching forces or entities.  However, in this case, we are going to address the path of polytheism, in which the universe—inner, outer, or both—is sustained by more than one being of influence worthy of veneration as a god.

The Old Gods Today

In spite of the vogue in Western culture for monotheism over the past two millennia, there are still many tens of thousands of Westerners who are drawn to the worship of multiple gods.  Many of those people—and you may well be among them—are still wrestling with an only partly-formed impulse to part the curtain of sameness of monotheism and to worship in ways of old.

What led you to the Gods of old?  If you are like many, it may have been a tale out of ancient myth or a poem from perhaps 150 years ago, celebrating the deities of days gone by.  But it just as easily may have been a vision born or trance or—as was unquestionably the case for many in ancient times—a dream of great clarity.  However the call to follow the ancient gods asserts itself, one or more of them entice the modern pagan.  Often this call is entirely intellectual or aesthetic, a matter of deep interest or taste that will not be denied.  Many modern polytheists are quite content to acknowledge that their personal deities are contemplated as much as experienced, while others develop strongly visual or auditory connections to the gods and goddesses with whom they work.  Neither is “right” or “wrong.”  The call to give honor to the deities—however they express themselves—is paramount.

What is a god, then, if so many forge connections to them in so many different ways—even in the midst of the same ritual of worship?  We can say of them at least that they are other than human, possessed of their own will, and influential.

Consider, though, the notion of “influence.”  Influences on daily life and personal choices made within it are myriad in number and nature.  The weather dictates choices…but so does our sense of taste.  Do we have any more control over the one than the other?  Might we, though, not wish to explore the presence of both of those influences in our lives and thereby become, if not more powerful, at least more conscious and active in our relationship with them?

Each polytheist reckons with his or her deities in his or her own way.  We can never know exactly how another person experiences the influence of the Gods.  However, we can join in community by recognizing and affirming our common celebration of the importance of the deities in our lives.  In particular, modern Druidic Pagans have found importance in not merely acknowledging the influence of gods in their lives, but also in making tangible gift offerings to them, strengthening their presence through the ancient bonds of sacrificial ritual.

Patrons and Matrons, Above and Below

Many modern polytheists profess special relationships with one or more deities; a god or goddess standing in such place of importance is very often referred to as one’s “patron” or “matron” deity.  For some, the deity has in some sense “claimed” them—they have come to be aware of the special place of a god in their world.  Others may have gone looking for a patron or matron, often based on one starts as an intellectual or aesthetic fascination based in literature.

Some modern Pagans express a sense of mild frustration or inadequacy when they do not develop a relationship of patronage or matronage —they shouldn’t.  There is no particular ancient precedent demanding such a relationship.  If the gods inspire you, they inspire you.  If this inspiration simply takes the form of a deep regard for the figures in myth and a desire to celebrate them in concrete ways in daily life, this is without question sufficient to lead a rich spiritual life.  (Following a desire to “keep up with the Joneses” in exploring one’s polytheism is a much less rich path.)

For some people, the pull to one deity may well be so strong that their polytheism takes on a character of something like henotheism, a belief system in which it is acknowledged that many gods exist, but one is venerated above the rest.  (This is in contrast to true monotheism, in which there is only one authentic deity…or monism, a common attitude among polytheist Neo-Pagans, which asserts that there is one unifying factor underlying all of the Cosmos, but not that this unity is an anthropomorphic god as such.)

The word “deity” has been used interchangeably with “god” up to this point and it is probably worth glancing at its origins and implications.  “Deity” is a good, sturdy Indo-European word that means, in essence, “Shining One.”  That phrase sums up the essential character of many gods and goddesses:  They are celestial beings, linked with (or even identified with) the bright, energetic heavenly bodies, such as the Sun and the Moon.  As such, they carry with them the qualities of shaping energies, but also the sort of cosmic order exemplified by the motion of the planets and stars.  The energy referred to here is not merely that of warmth and light, but the creative “fire in the head” shared by poet and shaman alike.  Celestial beings are well addressed through the sacrificial fire; the ancients of India, indeed, saw the altar fire as “priest of the Gods,” both “sacrificed and sacrificer.”

Not all gods and goddesses are found in the heavens and sought through the sacred Fire.  Many are subterranean.  Underworld deities—those dwelling in the Earth, particularly the deep places—are often referred to as chthonic.  For such beings, offerings might be poured into the soil or into a well, pool, or shaft.  (The Greeks had two different modes of the pouring out of libations to the Gods, depending on which sort of deity the drink was being offered to.)  We think of the Underworld as the abode of the Dead, but it is—in more than one culture—also the storehouse of riches.  For the ancients, metal ores and jewels were to be found underground; these days we might well add petroleum to the list.

Finding the Gods

How can one strengthen connections to the gods and goddesses with whom one wishes to build a relationship of mutual benefit?  And, for those new to the path of polytheism, how can one seek out the deities?  Here are some simple strategies.

--The simplest path is to start at the source.  Go back to the tales of the gods and goddesses, the myths that inspire so many modern Pagans.  It is in the tales, more than in any religious practices, that the deities have lived through many centuries of monotheist dominance, and it is there that they are immortal.  It is always good to summon back—if not the original mental images the tales created for you—at least the sense of joy at reading the exploits of the Gods.  There are a number of perfectly fine collections of Celtic myths, including on the Internet, at sites like sacred-texts.com.

--In the modern vogue for “meditation” and “shamanic journey,” we have perhaps lost sight of the importance of dreams for ancient Pagans.  Consider keeping a dream journal and contemplating the figures who walk with you in your nightly excursions to the Otherworlds.  If you do meditate or practice trance journey, recording or writing down the content of those exercises may help you build a clearer picture of the non-human beings you interact with.

--As you focus on specific deities, start to seek out icons and images to give shape to them.  These need not be literal:  Sometimes an animal figure will be the perfect evocation (and the Celts were very apt to see gods and goddesses in animal form).  Keeping such representations near a place, such as an altar, where you make offerings or practice contemplation or meditation will enhance your likelihood of building connection with the deities they embody.

--Jungian psychology, with its emphasis on images generated by the powerful, autonomous forces of our deepest unconscious known as archetypes, advocates for a process known as active imagination.  This is akin to purposeful daydreaming where the goal is to create a representation of the content of the inner landscape.  This is often a drawing or painting, but can just as easily be a piece of verse or song or an imagined, spontaneous dialogue with a mythic figure.  These representations generated by active imagination should not be forced into an easy, literal form:  Spiritual expression is not science and the truly religious artifact is known as much by its sense of the mysterious as by what it literally represents.

--If you have access to community, then share your images of the gods and goddesses.  You need not seek to move your individual images of the same deity toward some common ground, but rather may find surprising similarities that have been revealed to you in your personal explorations.  You may also agree on ways of making offerings to a deity you honor in common—even if the offering is only of praise.

--Finally…and above all…trust that the Gods are.  If you can talk about them…if they have meaning for you…then they have influence on you and that influence can be strengthened by acting as if you have the ability to strengthen it.  Pray to them.  Make offerings—whether of incense or ale or poetry or things of more substantial value—as long as that action feels productive to you.  If it doesn’t, then don’t.  But celebrate your path as a polytheist, as one who wishes to live in a world that is too diverse and simply full to contain only one god.

As you appreciate the diversity of the deities, you will—at the very least—come to value even more highly the diversity of humanity.