MPD: Multiple Personality Deity
Jeff Lilly has asked a question that can not be answered objectively.
Oh, I do so enjoy the questions that I can answer both objectively and subjectively.
Yet, there doesn’t seem to be much market in objective questions right now. I suppose that I can just pretend that someone asks why the grass is green so that I can demonstrate that there is a lot of subjectivity in such an objective answer… Maybe later, though. 
Jeff’s question is deceptively simple… yet it delves into the inner recesses of the human psyche and the nature of the departmentalization of conscious thought.
Jeff asks,
You know how people say things like “Diana is an aspect of the Goddess”, or “the God appeared in his Trickster aspect“, and so forth? Well, what does that really mean?
Are the “lower” deities like costumes that are worn by the “higher” deities? Or is it more like the slightly different personalities we have at work vs. at home? Or is each “aspect” more like a lens through which we view the higher deity?
And since I’ve got you on the line, let me ask an even deeper question: why do the higher deities even have aspects?
Since I like answering questions out of order, I’ll address the last question first. From what I understand of popular pagan culture, where the most interchangeable aspects of divinity are found, the most obvious answer as to why deities have different aspects is so that the original deities from which modern paganism is based can be seamlessly integrated into a duo-theistic religion.
Most of these assigned aspects come from the vast de-centralization of Wicca, and from tying all of the different traditions together into one cohesive model. More conservative traditions, such as the Alexandrian and Gardnerian traditions, don’t have this separation of aspects, simply because these conservative traditions are what the newer traditions draw their deity base from. The separation didn’t really come until some of the Dianic traditions emphasized a singular Goddess, from which the eclectic traditions inferred a singular God, making Eclectic Wicca a duo-theistic religion.
To confuse matters even more, the vast majority of people who turned to Wicca later in life came from a firm monotheistic background, specifically Christianity. (Some would argue that Christianity is tri-theistic or duo-theistic, with one extremely large and powerful sect being very polytheistic, with the deities they worship directly being duo-theistic, including a Goddess, accepting that everybody has the potential to become deities in their own right.) Perhaps the idea of deities being able to have separate aspects, yet still remain one deity sprang from a common Christian view of the Trinity.
That’s about as much history as I’m going to give, though. Even though the idea of separate aspects of the same deities sprang from relatively mundane roots, these aspects do have a very real spiritual meaning.
Religion is, generally speaking, mankind’s attempt to explain the unknowable. The reason why it is unknowable is because each person views spiritual matters differently… People’s differences in experiences simply do not allow everyone to view even the mundane world the same, much less the highly subjective spiritual world. I have done an experiment in the past where I created a pantheon of gods, and these gods actually started acting in my life… This is an experience which few people share, so naturally the set of symbols that I have in my mind regarding this experience would be difficult to communicate.
This makes religion the language of spirituality. People in the same religion share a common language that is different from other religions, and would be analogous to different dialects when comparing different sects/traditions/denominations. To a pagan who has studied the European pantheons, Diana brings up a whole different set of mental imagery and concepts than it brings up in Eastern or Arabic religions. On the other hand, being immersed in water has a completely different set of symbols associated with it in Arabic religions than it does in European or Asian religions, because of the importance of water in the middle east. In fact, baptism in Arabic religions is roughly analogous to uniting an athame and a chalice in European religions, although I do enjoy the explicitness of Asians, using an actual sex organ such as a flower, or just doing the act outright in Tantric rituals.
People who have studied sympathetic magic(k) know the value of mental symbols. Religion, being a language of spirituality, makes it easy to convey the mental symbols quickly between those who share their religion. Magic(k), at its heart, can be summed up as a slightly different take on the Law of Attraction (LoA). The LoA says that the thoughts that you hold create reality. I would argue that these thoughts need some sort of power behind them in order to manifest, which is most easily generated by getting up and doing what you want done. Clear mental symbols help to add power to your thoughts, which is where sympathetic magic gets its power.
This is where our multiple personality deities come back to the picture. Each deity exists to explain a complex set of human conditions and personalities, encapsulating these complex symbols into an easy to speak package. Rather than telling a story of a god who enjoys playing tricks on everybody and everything, no matter how malicious those tricks become, I could just say the name Loki and those familiar with Norse mythology instantly recall the important personality traits and activities.
What sets Eclectic Wicca apart from religions that share many different and distinctly separate deities is that Eclectic Wicca’s organization is very specific in terms of the purpose of its gods. That purpose is to educate us mortals so that we may one day become deities as well. The different aspects of the God and Goddess in Wicca exist to teach us different lessons. This clear in the typical view of the triple Goddess, Maiden, Mother, and Crone. The Maiden teaches us about beauty while the Mother teaches us about compassion and the Crone teaches us how to deal with suffering. They have the same purpose, as do all Goddess aspects, but the lessons are taught in different ways. The God is the same way, with the Oak and Holly King teaching us about bounty and want, and the different life cycles of God as seen through the Wheel of the Year teaches us specific lessons as well.
Is this grouping of divinity into aspects of the same being right or wrong? Well, that only depends on your own point of view and what you want from religion. Is there an all-encompassing purpose to life which a unified divinity can supply, or are there different purposes which are best represented by distinctly separate gods and goddesses? I can’t answer this, only you can.
Consider this, also…
Why does God choose to express itself through billions of aspects — US?
Many believe that the Hindu worship many gods. My understanding is that the Hindu religion calls each aspect of God by a different name. In reading your article, the following ideas came to me. By naming each aspect of God, you are breaking down your beliefs about who God is into smaller more manageable chunks that you can disect and then put back together as a whole. The more you understand the aspects, the more you can understand the whole. I hope that makes sense. I am on a journey of discovery and tonight what I discovered was your site and Damien’s which lead me here. Please keep writing. I will keep reading and thinking.
What a tremendous article, Adam. It’s taken me this long to reply because I’ve had to somehow get my thoughts in order…
This was an awesomely clear exposition of a very complex subject. Hat off to you!! THANK YOU for tackling it!
So it seems that there is a couple of very clear social reasons why Wicca in particular has the “aspectual” system of polytheism: (1) in order to incorporate the symbolism of many polytheistic systems into a duotheistic one, and (2) the firm former monotheism of many of its practitioners. Maybe that’s enough.
But strictly from the point of view of having lessons to teach, it doesn’t appear that the “aspectual” system has any advantages over a purely polytheistic one. That is, if you need to learn about Compassion, you can see the Mother as an aspect of Goddess, or you can see her as a separate being entirely — functionally they are equivalent. Is that the case?
I wonder, too, if the “aspectual” system subconsciously encourages the sort of “very shallow” polytheism you hear some Pagans complain about. The story goes that there are too many Wiccans who don’t really believe in the gods — they just believe in archetypes or something. (No criticism from me — I believed that myself until last fall.) I can see how thinking of the gods in terms of symbolism, as opposed to a fully fleshed-out personality, could lead to that mind set. Your thoughts?
Slade! I don’t think you can ask that question in druidism.
Translating into my own current belief system, your question would be, “Why is Spirit multifaceted instead of homogenous?” And the answer is, “Because it’s prettier that way.”
Well, yes… there certainly are a lot of people who treat Wicca as paganism-on-training-wheels… both from members of Wicca and from other pagan religions. Those people who treat Wicca as the easy way, though, are also the most likely to attack Christians without provocation, rather than to do the christian thing and turn the other cheek. (Yes, the irony is intentional.)
Deep down, there really are no advantages of having a truly pantheistic/polytheistic religion compared to a duotheistic aspectual religion or even a trinity/monotheistic religion. They are all equal. What matters is how willing a person is to look within their own soul and honestly recognize what is contained therein. The different religious organizations are there to entice this inner reflection… The extremes, monotheism and pantheism, are ‘harder’ ways than “aspectheism” in that you can not turn off consequences by no longer recognizing an aspect of a god, but “aspectheism” offers a bridge so that people can communicate across the different religions, allowing ideas from one religious culture to be tried, improved upon, or rejected by the other religious culture. It would be like the Norman invasions of Britain, which brought many French words and concepts to the English speakers. Now, English has many concepts that French doesn’t have, but French has very few concepts that English doesn’t have. I’m not a great historian or linguist, but knowing how the mind works, I’m quite certain that there was a bridge language forming between French and English while the Normans still believed that they were recognized by France as citizens.
Now, Christianity has a lot of concepts that aren’t easy to talk about in a ‘purely’ pagan framework, with eternal damnation being one of the most extreme differences. Most pagans roll their eyes at the very mention of Hell, and are very likely to take any comment that includes the word Hell as a deeply personal insult. Fear, though, is an excellent teacher for people who are subject to the whims of the ego, which, I’m sorry to say, is just as prevalent in ‘pure’ paganism as in monotheism… Even I’m still affected by it. While the use of fear is very harmful to individuals, learning about it is very beneficial. Maybe that’s not how Christianity intended to use Hell, but then, the French never intended their ‘computer,’ originally “to add up,” to be the name of a mechanical counting machine. (I know, it’s a stretch, but it shows how seemingly unrelated concepts can be combined to form a greater understanding.)
Adam, your linguistic analogies are very helpful for me!
- Yes, there was a bridge language in England at the time; it was the ancestor of Middle English.
- Your analogy with ‘computer’ makes perfect sense.
Let me carry the analogy a little further and challenge what you say about each of these belief systems being equivalent “deep down”. I’ve argued before that I think it’s very likely that polytheism — and by that I mean “hard” polytheism — is a more natural fit for the architecture of the human mind. There are three basic reasons I think this: (1) polytheism is more structurally similar to human language, and is therefore probably more intuitive; (2) children are natural polytheists; and (3) over very long spans of time, non-polytheistic religions take on more and more aspects of polytheistic religions.
Fear: while Wicca has no Hell or Satan, older polytheistic traditions DO provide plenty of things that go bump in the night. Arguably the Norse mythological cycle, with the ultimate defeat of the Gods at Ragnarok, is much more fearful — the believer is called on to continue to do the Right Thing and follow the gods despite the fact that no eternal salvation is offered!
It seems to me that the more your religion encourages you to step back and intellectualize about religious concepts (like “Trinity” or “archetype”) rather than step into direct religious experience, the harder it is to foster the willingness to look into your own soul with honesty (which as you say is the most important goal here).