Neo-Paganism – The Pagan Deities

Neopagan communities are defined not by adherence to creeds or beliefs but by experience, ritual and common goals. That they have no dogma does not mean that they have no beliefs. It means that they will never enforce these beliefs on anyone else. The choice not to believe commonly held positions is acceptable.

Most pagans are animists, believing that all things are `imbued with vitality’ (Adler: 25). They `revere the divine (life) force which is contained … within every part of the universe’ (Pagan Alliance: 6). There is no separation of the animate from the inanimate; the earth is one with humans. The drawing power of this belief is that people can participate in nature much more fully and naturally `in a way that is not possible for most westerners after childhood’ (Adler: 25).

The worshipper who stands in front of a grove of trees does not worship the trees but sees in them a divinity. They are ‘transparent windows to experience’ (Adler: 27). The art of animism is simply to see the sacred in the profane. Many pagans are also pantheists. Since divinity cannot be separated from nature, deity is present in nature and humans are divine. Some pagans realise their divinity in ritual, others, such as those in the Church of All Worlds, who greet each other with `Thou art God’, see themselves as divine at all times.

Most neopagans affirm the existence of a pantheon of gods. Unlike the ancient gods, these gods are not in competition with each other but are archetypes of one god. This is the view of Essa,[8] a Wiccan high priestess:

Ultimately all gods are one god. The manifold personifications of the One God allow many to seek truth in their own way. Whether that is through God, Goddess, Gaia, Great Spirit or the Universal Principal is immaterial. To further complicate the issue, the many aspects of god can each be honoured in their own way, too. As one of my students once said, `The concept of God is too big for a mortal to contemplate in one lifetime, unless it is broken down into manageable pieces’. - Source: (personal email, 3/9/01)

This seems to be the majority view of pagans. Anthony Kemp, a British pagan, writes:

Over the centuries she [the goddess] has had many names: Diana, Isis, Astarte, Rhiannion, Cerridwen, Freya, Hecate, Ceres, Dana. The list is seemingly endless. Each goddess has her legends and her worshippers, but at base each remains an aspect of the primordial Earth Mother-she was, is and always will be. All versions of the goddess stem from her. (78)

Pagans are quite happy to invoke any gods that will help them; often they are indigenous spirits. Each god has his/her own individual characteristic. The god Pan, for instance, comes with a warning: `He [Pan] is not a god to be trifled with or invoked in vain; if awakened, his power can unleash all sorts of misfortunes on unwise magicians’ (Kemp: 81).[9]

Some neopagans believe that the gods are not real personalities but symbols (Adler: 35). Since the divine is beyond human understanding, humans create archetypes which reveal aspects of the truth. The archetype can come as myth in the forms of Herne, Diana, Mercury and Merlin, or of symbol as in Tarot, or in fantasy and science fiction.[10] These imaginary symbols `become endowed with power through centuries of worship and ritual’ (Kemp: 77). Thus it is possible to worship the goddess and not actually believe in her. Some pagans see the archetypal god as a symbol for the divinity of self. The real reason for creating their own divinities is that `we create mental steps for ourselves, up which we can mount toward realizing ourselves as divine’ (Adler: 173). Other pagans see the goddess as a real supernatural identity (Kemp: 76). While some Wiccans see themselves as ‘duotheists’,[11] the feminist Wicca group could be called monotheist, honouring only the goddess.

Christians have often mocked polytheistic and animistic views as primitive, but Margot Alder, an American pagan, sees polytheism as the superior world view (26). Animistic polytheism is the ‘default’ and foundational view for almost all ancient and tribal cultures. Monotheism is seen as an aberration but `particularly useful in history when small groups of people wanted to control large numbers of people’. She claims that monotheism `has been responsible for more human misery than any other idea in known history’ (35).

Neo-Paganism Dialogue: What is Neo-Paganism?
Neo-Paganism – Neopaganism as nonauthoritarian, anarchic

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 •  This page was first posted: Jul. 31, 2006
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