Gygaxian Religion

Religion as practiced in Gygaxia usually, although not always, involves a belief in gods. In the majority of cases, this belief in many gods is balanced with a worship of only one god (monolatry), although it is not considered odd to worship multiple deities simultaneously, and the occasional zealot may deny the divinity of gods other than his own. Atheism is not common, as the gods continue to make their presence known to what they see as lesser beings through various miracles and general meddling. However, gods of great power rarely feel the need to appear directly to anyone, and whether particular gods exist is occasionally the subject of debate. Further, many people choose not to devote themselves to the service of any god in particular. A few rare individuals do challenge the notion that gods are really as fundamentally different from mortals and deserving of the worship and sense of reverence they demand, although this view is considered extremely radical.

The actual nature of deities is rather unclear. Their origins are steeped in mystery, and for most them their power, while nothing to sneeze at, can certainly be (and usually is) exaggerated. They are as a rule obsessed with what power they have, however, and do whatever they can to obtain more. A god’s powers in the form of supernatural abilities derive from worship. The more worshippers a god has, the more abilities she has and the more impressive those abilities become. Gods derive further power from sending their followers on quests and inspiring their flocks to create social movements. This makes mortal beings immensely important to gods; as a result, divine culture is particularly obsessed with them.

Given their numbers and their powers, one might assume that the gods would have established a formal ruling structure and stamped out secularism in fairly short order long ago. The gods did have more such control over mortals in the first and second ages than in later years, after centuries of popular struggle resulted in less connection between religions and mortal systems such as government. Another impediment to divine control over mortals are their own power stuggles among themselves, which prevent them from uniting effectively. As mortals have became more sophisticated in their response to their deities, divine culture has increasingly devolved into a competition for worshippers. Most gods, therefore, devote their very long lives to convincing prospective idolizers that venerating them, as opposed to some other god, is more worthy of the effort. This often means offering a better “salvation package” than the god next door. Divine recruitment tactics vary from threatening or brainwashing to sending bands of charismatic theurgist prophets in search of followers or posting signs in a town square. Particularly unpopular gods might be reduced to going door to door personally, though as a rule gods are not hands-on kinds of folks and would much prefer to spend their time being fanned and fed ambrosial grapes by attractive young beings while someone else does their dirty work. Regardless, the pressure in divine society to be popular, powerful, and successful is great. It is unlikely that any recruiting tactic is too silly or debasing for some god not to swallow her pride and attempt it.

Whether or not a person chooses a religion, or indeed, whether or not she makes a point of sticking it to religious people, she isn’t exempt from being targeted for recruitment by other gods. You can bet, also, that even people who do their best to avoid the divine will have the occasional run-in with a deity’s evangelical followers. Individual religions might be considered subcultures, cults, movements, or hallucinations, but as a whole, religion is a pervasive element of practically every Gygaxian culture, and there’s no escaping it entirely.

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