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My world has two main religions, one evil, one based off of Christianity. I’m having difficulty with the second one, in particular naming the God, and figuring out how in depth to go as it’s not the main plot, as well as wondering how to avoid accidently falling into heresy. Does anyone have any tips for fantasy religions?
To err is human; to arr is pirate.
Tips? I’m not sure. I’m not super experiened in this. I’ll share my thoughts though.
The books that I liked their fictional reresentation of God are Narnia, Wingfeather, Wilderking, Mistmantle, and Kingdom’s Dawn/Knights of Aerethtrae. Some books that I didn’t like the “Christian”/religious rep inlcude Dragon Slippers andWhen Creation Groans.
Dragon Slippers was a fun story… But not only did the “Christian-ish” religion feel very polytheistic, but it was often irreverent. The “Tri-Unity” was mainly presented as powerless, without any guiding hand in what happened. The one character called devout was an antagonist. Overall, it seemed to hold a lot of bitterness and disrespect toward God that was not fun to read.
When Creation Groans was such a fun book with so many profound possibilities, but when the figure for God ended up being another animal, and the author got into a whole theological treatise about it, it really turned me off. It wasn’t that the author seemed to believe that God is actually a winged stag with writing scarred into his flanks, but it was just… not great. I felt like her idea of God wasn’t big – powerful and beautiful – enough to be significant, no matter how many dialogues there were about sacrifice and divine love.
So, write out of your own relationship with God. Some of the best advice on this for me personally came from an old KP article. Basically, don’t just retell the gospel. Tell what God has been for you. If God has been a protector or a provider, then weave that into the themes of your book and into the focus of interactions with this mirror of God. And in my experience, this is what the books in my first list all did. They focused on an aspect of God that was important to the author. Unlike others, they did not limit God to an aspect in music culture or a plot hole fixer, but instead, Alsan, The Maker, The One God, Heart, and the King/Prince are all reresentations of God that profoundly shape the story, and are as Biblically accurate as the authors’ own understandings of God.
As for names, here’s what I’ve seen and what I have wanted to see more of. Look at “nicknames” or epethets for God in the Bible, and in hymns. Then see how that or maybe a form of that fits your world. Mistmantle got it’s name for God from an old Irish hymn, Heart of My Heart. (I think the song is “Be Thou My Vision”, but I’m not sure.)This metaphorical term for God fit so well with the animal fantasy and the themes in the books that the author was able to weave it in beautifully all throughout the series. On the other hand, Lewis took a Turkish word for lion and named the Lion of Judah with it because it fit Narnia so well. (I guess. He might have had many reasons, but that’s probably one of them.)
Personally, I have two series with fictional representations of God. Heirs of Eagles has Ra’ahdoni, Shepherd of the Heavens. This series also has an evil religion similar to old Rus pagan stuff with a god and two godesses. Other than their titles The War, The Plenty, and The Keeper, only the last has a proper name right now: Kleho. Shattered Kingdoms is more LotR/Knights of Aerethtrae in feel, and the figure for God is called Elesai… I think. I’ll have to check the spelling. XD Anyway, it’s a Hebrew variant that means roughly the same thing as Jesus, just without YHW in it.
Anyway, that’s a ton. I hope some of it helped! I’m still figuring it all out myself.
You have listened to fears, child. Come, let me breathe on you... Are you brave again? -Aslan
I can only contribute with this, which is immediately what comes to mind. XD
"If I don't like something, it's probably sanctification. Ugh." -E.C.S.
We’ll see if KP lets me post the link or not, but I actually have a blog post all about how to approach the creation of allegorical/pseudo-allegorical religions!
Speculative fiction author. Mythology nerd. Singer. Worldbuilding enthusiast.
Oh, that’s a great article! Thank you for sharing. It gave me several ideas. (As did your article on false religions, which I read right after that one.)
Also, it’s so good to see you around here again!
You have listened to fears, child. Come, let me breathe on you... Are you brave again? -Aslan
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