Techniques for worldbuilding a pantheon of fantasy gods!

So you've decided to create a polytheistic religion for your fantasy world, but how do create a church? Handle church politics? Build a pantheon? Most importantly, drive the story! Let's explore how to build a pantheon.

Chapters:
0:00​​ Intro
1:44 Models of Polytheism
6:32 Creating Portfolios & Gods
9:46 Origin Myths & the Evolution of the Gods
13:15 Rites & Rituals
15:06 Magic & Polytheism
17:19 How to build the churches
19:41 The Gods as Plot Devices

References:

#justintimeworlds #mariemullany #pantheon

[JustInTimeWorldbuilding]

Would you like to explore godly natures more? Or maybe how to create churches? Or maybe you want to talk about how to create a religious history? Let me know and I'll do my best to cover it in future videos :D

[mullac]

I would like to learn more about how churches work!

[Crisopeia]

Kinda late here but amazing video! I love when you gave examples, especially the Occidental vs Oriental Polytheism, one being more personification/human like and fhe other being forces/elements.

[doctahwhoopass]

One other aspect of polytheism that happens is ascendancy. Sometimes its simply impossible, and all the gods are immutable and always alive, or theres a path somehow for mortals to become gods (or at least god like!) either through just adding or usurping them. I know a lot of peoples D&D worlds tend to do this, since most pantheons are polytheistic.

[tumazformosa]

In Taiwan the traditional religion is alive. The portfolios of gods are changing, the gods do whatever the believers believe they can. For example the water goddess Mazu, other than sailing and rain, she also blesses people with their businesses and scholarships.
Also the festive rituals is changing very quickly. We have dancers dressing as lesser gods dancing to electronic music. It's all about the creativity of the believers.

[pabillidge]

yet another great video, Thank you very much!!!. I think It would be interesting a type of theocracy based on the godhead of the godheads like Zeus. maybe that could lead to a plot in which followers of lesser gods want their god to be the foundation of a new theocracy because they belive that what their god represents is best (and also they don't want their god to keep being considered "lesser"), so like a theocracy based on Zeus and the worshipers of Ares want a military-state-like theocracy so that's why the want to revolt or they want to create their own state in a different land at least, all of this would mean that the conflict could not just be religious but social, political and legislative.

[jerryg]

I'd love a breakdown on church creation, as I need some help fleshing out the "cults" of the various gods.

[Witheringdawn]

I know this is an old video but the Roman gods are NOT just copied and renamed Greek gods, though I understand putting it that way for this video. However I think it would be interesting from a worldbuilding perspective to take inspiration from that - how do different cultures interpret the gods (if they exist and make themselves known) and do different cultures have different perspectives of the gods (e.g. a just war god for one culture is the evil god in another)? Are there similarities between gods that cause syncretism in cultures that have contact with each other like what happened with the Greek and Roman gods? This can also open up misunderstandings due to assumptions of sameness that could lead to very interesting politics, wars, cultural shifts, etc.

Also it can be very interesting to have multiple gods share a domain of influence but approach it in different ways, for example Ares and Athena both being war gods. Ares embodies the violence, chaos and bloodlust of battle as well as the 'madness' (PTSD) after it. Athena as a goddess of wisdom applies that to war as a goddess of battle strategy, and the skill and discipline of soldiers, as well as the 'noble' reasons for war such as protection or justice.

My last note is that the labeled vs individual thing is reflected IRL in soft vs hard polytheism, which can be researched for further inspiration.

[subhamraj]

As a hindu, I sometime do not seem to understand differences between the domains of gods unless they're from the Vedic tradition. Why don't people use this more.

[drpigglesnuudelworte]

Actually no Jupiter and Zeus were not the same god, they were different gods (with the same origin in proto indo European mythology) it’s just that the Romans equated Zeus with Jupiter, the way they equated Thor with Jupiter and Odin with Mercury. The Romans had their own DISTINCT religion and believed that the gods of other cultures were just *their* gods under another name. And the Romans DEEPLY respected Greek culture and religion so no other culture had more influence on their deities and religious practice. Venus was already a minor fertility goddess but the Roman’s saw her in Aphrodite and she became elevated

[BJGvideos]

I have an issue trying to build my pantheon that wasn't covered by the video. What do you suggest doing when the gods don't really embody anything, people just decided they did?

[elchiponr]

what if the gods didn't shape the world, but are born from the believers that worship them into existence? :))