Oh no, not a religious discussion

[3EyedCrowsEye]

I don't know if there is already one, but I'm going to talk about the religions of the world of ASoIaF (which off topically leads me to think if there is a name for their planet, I think I've heard 'em say Earth). Like what is your favorite religion, which one makes better people (ie.Cersei and Davos) and cause the most damage or development. Which ones are just bunk and which ones are truly real. Holy; are there truly holy people/animals like Melisandre Damphir or even the Direwolves and Dragons. The Wizards/Priests of Qqarth and Asshai. How bout characters who really seem to be quite secular (Tywin) or think they're God (Euron). The world of ASoFaI is heavily influenced by the tales and lore of The Old Gods, The Seven and many more. I think there is plenty to talk about The Gods and followers and worshippers and sinners and blasphemers and the crazies.

R'hllor. That's the one I now believe to be real, at first I thought is was BS but once Mel got to the Wall I started to think different. I wanted Mel to die real bad, but know I love her. R'hllor seems to be one of the few religions that actually seems to prove itself true Though I guess you can say so do the Old Gods if you think about it.

Well that's it for now I guess, just remember, What is dead may never die, but rises again, harder and stronger.

 

[C Of K]

I'm with the Great Other. You''ve got t' get yerself right with the gods.

 

[juleska]

The drowned god is absolute bunk in my opinion, as are The Seven. R'hollor is the real thing but real creepy and not what I would call a favorite. The Many Faced God is intriguing, but as for me.....I keep the Old Gods.

 

[Needle]

Glad someone finally put this up. Think we talked about doing so, but did we? My brain these days is practicing to be swiss cheese!
Some thoughts:

I think The Seven have left the building!

I kinda relate The Drowned God to Poseidon, the real deal but not the Boss.

Rhallor and The Great Other are manisfestations (sorry can't spell!) of overall Light and Dark or Good and Evil if you prefer. Real? Maybe. Plain old magic? Maybe.

In the end the only God is The God of Many Faces. All answer to him regardless of their faith, because no faith is required, you will have proof soon enough!

Personally, I second juleska's motion, I keep to the Old Gods. This is faith at it's purest. No priests to tell you what God thinks or wants from you, no rule book, just faith that they are there and watching out for you.

 

[3EyedCrowsEye]

The Others are clearly spawns of The Dark One, that seems legit to me.
who do you think is the strongest priest/priestess? My moneys on Melisandre though Aeron has great influence as well, I still say Mel, because she is actually guarded by her God.

 

[Ursa major]

An alternative way of looking at it is that they are all bunk, but that some of them have incorporated in their beliefs activities and procedures that happen to work. And because the world on which ASoIaF is one in which magic is real, the religions can appear to demonstrate, in practical ways, that they are the "true" religion**.

I think it helps these religions' cause (to appear valid) that magic had been waning for quite a while before the events of AGoT, but is now on the up. Each of the religions whose adherents practice magic will say that this is their doing.

With the followers of R'hllor we've seen this: Thoros of Myr using wildfire; Melisandre using her "powders". But now the magic aspects of their faith seem to be working: the resurrections, the visions, both of them the result of magic's return.


Looking at things this way explains why, for instance, we might think the Drowned God and the Seven "have left the building". They do not use magic as part of their shtick and so now look irrelevant in terms of getting things done. But there's no reason that a priest of the Seven couldn't use magic: it's a practical thing, not a badge of faith. (Otherwise why did the wildfire become more effective? Have the Guild of Alchemists changed faith?)




** - The followers of the Many Faced God does this in spades: their trick is to say that their god is behind all the religions: anything that makes, say, R'hllor (or should that be RR'hllor?) look valid makes their god look valid. One might suspect that this goes to prove that their faith is basically one big con.

 

[3EyedCrowsEye]

An alternative way of looking at it is that they are all bunk, but that some of them have incorporated in their beliefs activities and procedures that happen to work. And because the world on which ASoIaF is one in which magic is real, the religions can appear to demonstrate, in practical ways, that they are the "true" religion**.

I think it helps these religions' cause (to appear valid) that magic had been waning for quite a while before the events of AGoT, but is now on the up. Each of the religions whose adherents practice magic will say that this is their doing.

With the followers of R'hllor we've seen this: Thoros of Myr using wildfire; Melisandre using her "powders". But now the magic aspects of their faith seem to be working: the resurrections, the visions, both of them the result of magic's return.


Looking at things this way explains why, for instance, we might think the Drowned God and the Seven "have left the building". They do not use magic as part of their shtick and so now look irrelevant in terms of getting things done. But there's no reason that a priest of the Seven couldn't use magic: it's a practical thing, not a badge of faith. (Otherwise why did the wildfire become more effective? Have the Guild of Alchemists changed faith?)




** - The followers of the Many Faced God does this in spades: their trick is to say that their god is behind all the religions: anything that makes, say, R'hllor (or should that be RR'hllor?) look valid makes their god look valid. One might suspect that this goes to prove that their faith is basically one big con.

Very Interesting, very right you seem to be, though magic now has made a big comeback since the return of Dragons, is there any God in relation to dragons?.I don't recall there was, almost like Dragons themselves are some sort of god

 

[juleska]

The Targaryens only seem to worship themselves as far as I can tell.

 

[3EyedCrowsEye]

Im gonna guess nobody likes the Harpys

 

[Pilpel]

Very Interesting, very right you seem to be, though magic now has made a big comeback since the return of Dragons, is there any God in relation to dragons?.I don't recall there was, almost like Dragons themselves are some sort of god

Sorry, but this demands a philosophical question, what is a god? Some being that grants you special powers? Can a god be defined simply by having followers and believers?
And if you look at dragons as gods, suddenly it's something you can see and touch, unlike the previous definitions, that are more personal, and exist only in people's minds.
Just something to think about

My thoughts on the subject are similar to Ursa Major's. The world of asoiaf has different powers that certain people can access. I assume that once people found out about those powers, many years ago, they tried to understand them, define them, and came up with the different gods. R'hllor could have just as easily been called Torch and the Drowned God Spongebob. Religions are man-made, I've seen nothing to prove otherwise - no godly manifestations or anything that actually proves that a god/s exist. Although seeing things from certain characters' perspectives sure makes me doubt myself (Damphair, Mel, Arya, Bran etc.)

Great idea for a discussion!

 

[Mesanna]

Couple of thoughts:

The Drowned God: I would have agreed that he was bunk too, but I'm sure there was some discussion recently that Patchface came into contact with him. The same Patchface who predicted the Red Wedding and other things amongst his ramblings. Although I think his brain is partially scrambled, he has clearly gained some sort of information or insight somewhere.

The Old Gods: I'm no longer 100% convinced about them. After seeing how Bran can view events and "whisper on the wind", I think this could explain any mythology around the trees. Although, is it a god or plain old magic that gives this power in the first place?

Rh'llor/The Others: These two are just the flip side of each other, in a yin & yang kind of way, and they both create "life" after death (though Rh'llor's zombies seem a little more evolved than the wights).

I keep wondering if many of the gods are just the same god but with a different name depending on locale, e.g. the Iron Men's Drowned God could be the Many-faced God. And aren't the Seven really just different aspects of the same god too? Those could possibly all be the same god.

I'm not a religious person in the real world (quite the opposite, tbh), but I think I would be a little disappointed if the gods in AOIAF were no more than stories. But, as others have touched on, magic can go a long way to explaining god-like powers.

 

[Ursa major]

If it helps, Mesanna, you could fall back on something we do know: that in ASoIaF, the only god is RRh'llor....

 

[The Imp]

This has always been a topic that I've thought abou and have been intrested in. I'm glad it got posted. I'll try to express my thoughts without repeating too much of what others have said.

I think it's worth noting in this discussion that while GRRM was brought up Catholic, he is non-practicing. To be honest though, i have no idea if he follows any religion now, but I would guess, based on his writing, that he'd lean towards some sort of paganisim, perhaps Wicca, but I'm not guessing or suggesting that this is what he believes.

GRRM uses the two major forms ofrelgious belief- Monotheism and Polytheism, but he also sort of has a third, which is Monotheirsitc but recognizes Ploytheism and incorporates all Gods into one.

The two main Monothesitic Gods are the Drowned God and R'hllor. I'm not sure what to make of the Great Other, so i hesitate to include "it" in this catagory. The main Monotheistic religions are The Faith (of the Seven), and The Old Gods. Of all of those, The Seven seem the most bogus to me. I've never read of any evidence that would suggest that any of The Seven have ever done anything for any of their followers. Trial by combat is obviously a joke (as an example). I don't hold The Drwoned God in any higher regard. I do think That R'hllor exists, as do the old Gods. it may be that the Great Other turns out to be only one of The Old Gods, and that we will see evidence of them. Perhaps bran is on his way to becoming one.

If I was going to pick any one to follow right now it would be The Old Gods, although R'hllor is very tempting

 

[The Imp]

Check out the 46.30 (give or take a few seconds) minute mark of this interview. Actually, if you haven't heard it, the entire interivew is great. GRRM talks about relgion as it relates to aSoIaF.

 

[Needle]

Looking at things this way explains why, for instance, we might think the Drowned God and the Seven "have left the building". They do not use magic as part of their shtick and so now look irrelevant in terms of getting things done. But there's no reason that a priest of the Seven couldn't use magic: it's a practical thing, not a badge of faith. (Otherwise why did the wildfire become more effective? Have the Guild of Alchemists changed faith?)
.

Good point about the Alchemists Ursa. I partially withdraw my comment about the Seven!

 

[3EyedCrowsEye]

Trial by combat is obviously a joke (as an example).

Yes, I agree, as does seem The Guest Right (not completely ruling it out yet though, think Manderly) because obviously the same thing that happened to the Rat Cook didn't happen to Frey.

That reminds me of the Beric/Hound fight when Arya clearly sees the fault in trial by combat when The Hound wins. Though I guess it could be argued that The Hound killed Mycah but in the eyes of the Gods, he was only doing what he had to do (follow royal orders) and the true guilty party of Mycah's death was Cercei or Joff.



also, The Patchface theory (that he did meet The Drowned God) was one I completely forgot about and as of now I don't have anything reasonable to say about that, hopefully soon though.

 

[3EyedCrowsEye]

Also regarding Trial by Combat, I think the next book will help further by belief (or disbelief) of at least The Seven. one thing I think might happen is Cersei will obviously win her trial by combat (which will prove that The Seven don't really exist or at least are not Just) and Margery Tyrell might get proven guilty and executed which will start and all out war between the Tyrells and Lannisters.

 

[Alayne Stone]

R'hllorism is like Zoroastrianism, it's dualist. But I can't stand R'hllor, nor Mel.

The Drowned God is just Cthulhu.

I'm with the Old Gods and the Many Faced God. Death seems to be the most appropriate thing to worship in this world. Also, valar morghulis is just the kind of prayer I like, short and simple, and I can just make a list of idiot politicians who're ruining my country right now, and add valar morghulis after that.

 

[The Imp]

Also regarding Trial by Combat, I think the next book will help further by belief (or disbelief) of at least The Seven. one thing I think might happen is Cersei will obviously win her trial by combat (which will prove that The Seven don't really exist or at least are not Just) and Margery Tyrell might get proven guilty and executed which will start and all out war between the Tyrells and Lannisters.

Wasn't that already proven when Obyren got his skull crushed by Gregor?

 

[3EyedCrowsEye]

Wasn't that already proven when Obyren got his skull crushed by Gregor?

oh, yes that is true, but I say he still kinda won cause he did kill Gregor, so it can be argued that Gods had both men killed for their sins.