Fantasy Faiths (part 2)
Faith:
1. Confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing.
2. Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence.
3. Loyalty to a person or thing; allegiance: keeping faith with one's supporters.
There are a couple other definitions, subtle variations where the word actually applies to a specific set of beliefs or a religion or somesuch. But I feel a need to look at these from the perspective of a fantasy-world worshipper.
1. Faith in a deity means believing it (and probably the dogma of the clergy if such exists). What the god says is believed true. This is generally basic and easy. If a god is bothering to tell a follower something, there's little room to doubt. Though sometimes messages are cryptic and may be misinterpretted. But... I'll return to this in a minute.
3. Faith as allegiance seems... trivial. You can have faith in your faction superior, king, or country as readily as a god.
2. This is something that I have a little issue with - Faith as belief in absence of proof. I'm going to step out on a limb briefly and say that most real-world religions are based on faith in this sense (and others, too). An individual may have experiences that verify the existence of the divine to them, but if such experiences aren't repeatable and perceivable by others, then they aren't really "proof." If there was such proof, there wouldn't be so much doubt in the existence of God (or the specific divinity/power of your choice).
In a fantasy world, there usually is proof. Gods smite, gods lend power to heal or harm, gods bless crops and lands... gods (and their direct agents) do things that have material effect on the world. Such effects are often repeatable and obvious to any witnesses. So, in this sense, worshippers really don't - can't - have faith in their god(s). With undead/ressurections, even the afterlife is often known rather than believed. But this brings gods down to the level of "really frickin' powerful entities." In some settings, they may even be overshadowed in power by ambitious mortals.
Once you get there, even a follower of a god could perceive the deity as fallable. This is especially true in settings where gods can be killed. If a god can die, it's not omnipotent. Is it, then, really omniscient? This gets back to point #1.
I suppose the "answer" could be that faith in such a setting is believing in the god even though they may be fallable. People believe more sketchy things every day, but it just doesn't seem right to me.
1. Confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing.
2. Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence.
3. Loyalty to a person or thing; allegiance: keeping faith with one's supporters.
There are a couple other definitions, subtle variations where the word actually applies to a specific set of beliefs or a religion or somesuch. But I feel a need to look at these from the perspective of a fantasy-world worshipper.
1. Faith in a deity means believing it (and probably the dogma of the clergy if such exists). What the god says is believed true. This is generally basic and easy. If a god is bothering to tell a follower something, there's little room to doubt. Though sometimes messages are cryptic and may be misinterpretted. But... I'll return to this in a minute.
3. Faith as allegiance seems... trivial. You can have faith in your faction superior, king, or country as readily as a god.
2. This is something that I have a little issue with - Faith as belief in absence of proof. I'm going to step out on a limb briefly and say that most real-world religions are based on faith in this sense (and others, too). An individual may have experiences that verify the existence of the divine to them, but if such experiences aren't repeatable and perceivable by others, then they aren't really "proof." If there was such proof, there wouldn't be so much doubt in the existence of God (or the specific divinity/power of your choice).
In a fantasy world, there usually is proof. Gods smite, gods lend power to heal or harm, gods bless crops and lands... gods (and their direct agents) do things that have material effect on the world. Such effects are often repeatable and obvious to any witnesses. So, in this sense, worshippers really don't - can't - have faith in their god(s). With undead/ressurections, even the afterlife is often known rather than believed. But this brings gods down to the level of "really frickin' powerful entities." In some settings, they may even be overshadowed in power by ambitious mortals.
Once you get there, even a follower of a god could perceive the deity as fallable. This is especially true in settings where gods can be killed. If a god can die, it's not omnipotent. Is it, then, really omniscient? This gets back to point #1.
I suppose the "answer" could be that faith in such a setting is believing in the god even though they may be fallable. People believe more sketchy things every day, but it just doesn't seem right to me.
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