Have you met a God or Goddess?

Did you acheive this? What pantheon did you use? What were your impressions? What do you think they 'really' are?

I'd like to discuss this and share information.. even though I realize it might be rare that someone will know what I am talking about.

Nevertheless, all thoughts welcome

What are the god/esses of the world?

I often believe that the most simple explaination is that they are the facets of the greater spirit force of the universe that is in all things, including vacuum. The gods and goddesses are the human or animal faces and personalities we place on the divine to help us interact and try to understand the unfathomable mind of creation. I have experienced the following gods and goddesses in many ways:

Diana
Artemis
Thor
Mars
Freya
Skadi
Demeter/Ceres
Bast
Pan
Cerrunos
Rhiannon
The various death gods of many pantheons
Athena
The Great Mother
The Great Father

Often, however, I do not use individual dieties, but instead, the general essene represented by various dieties.

It's obvious which is your favorite Skadi

And I agree, they're all aspects of the same being which also IMO is the driving force behind the Universe, and of which the Universe (including ourselves), is also part of.

Furthermore some, (perhaps all or few) those beings could also be merely the creation of us humans. So they could be as the chaos magicians say, egregores or godforms (advanced thoughtforms).

Fantastic post, I like your theory. Due to my experience, my beliefs do differ somewhat, but I don't claim to be "conclusive" about these issues yet. I tend to beleive that each deity (the real verifiable ones) are actually ascended spirits. Masters of enlightment in their given fields. In that sense, they are individuals. Discarnate buddhas, if you will. I do not, however, attribute to them any works of creation. The Juda-Christian god is a difficult one to theorize about, but from what I've heard and in conjunction with Menguard's words, he is far more ascended than the others - possibly belonging to a previous generation of gods, who were around during the times of Earth's creation.

IMO the judeo-christian god, is also an aspect or personality, defined by humans which is also part of the bigger.... being..

I'm sorry I'll change the sentence when I have an easier way to explain it..


Something like a being which will appear to people in the way they would expect it to be.

Let me take an example from a fictional comic book creature...
Like in the DC comics, Galactus appeared to be in humanoid form to the human, and in amoeba like form to the Amoeba people. But both can't comprehend the exact way he exists in.

[edit on 8-7-2006 by TheBandit795]

I can't say that I have actually met a God so to speak. I have felt God with music, or by doing something good. Sorry that's boring but it's the best I have.

Originally posted by TheBandit795
It's obvious which is your favorite Skadi

And I agree, they're all aspects of the same being which also IMO is the driving force behind the Universe, and of which the Universe (including ourselves), is also part of.

Furthermore some, (perhaps all or few) those beings could also be merely the creation of us humans. So they could be as the chaos magicians say, egregores or godforms (advanced thoughtforms).

Another thought I have had, Bandit. Did we create the gods ourselves? Did the universe gain conciousness when we did? Perhaps it was a twoway street. They created us as we created them.

I have pondered chaos magick, and have thought of the idea of creating a new, more modern pantheon that is a bit more relevant to the moder day world. It would be a worthwhile experiment.

About creating--who created who?

I think certainly we are the egg and God is the chicken....

But the idea of images being reflections--without God would there be a reason for man and without man would there be a reason for God?!?

I think it is actually the highest form of a mutually beneficial symbiotic relationship.

*symbiotic* did I use the right word?

I worship my pets to me they are my gods and goddesses

My thoughts on those beings are rather different. I recognize them as being there(as do you) but my impressions of them are not that fond. They all "seem" to be exchanging something for your energy. I don't enjoy other beings nibbling on my soul in an uneven exchange.I have my reasons why I think this way too, we can talk about them if you want.

What are god(s) and godesses? I think this is the first question we should concentrate on before moving onto the rest.

To me the nature is the driving force of it all. Nature is made up from the 4 elements and these are what everything is made up from. Everything made up from the 4 elements is "god". People are gods themselves. Everything in the universe is made up from at least these 4 basic elements. You could say that these elements are "the force" of it all. The Hebrew spelling of God is IHVH where each letter is actually 1 of the 4 elements. Jesus is IHsVH where s is the letter Shin and stands for the 5th element Spirit. So you could say that Jesus is the 4 elements becoming aware of their godlike potential...mankind.

Now just because god(s)/godesses are not the omnipotent beings that created all, doesn't mean they are not real. Look at chaos magic where there are servitors and eggregores. Beings and conciousness created by the people themselves. This is also how I regard Christian-Judeic God/Satan/Mythological deities. People made a re-presentation to explain natural phenomena. People gave these re-presentations images and personality traits they could relate to. By praying, chanting, focussing energy into that imagery of a being you will eventually create an energetical awareness that had the potential of the god or such that one beliefs in.

However, such as a group eggregore, when there are so many people with wishes. The eggregore (God) will get conflicts in its tasks given and thus it is rendered helpless. Where as the deity Satan is worked with by a smaller group who have the same ideals and thus lesser conflict. In this regard you could say that "evil" is more potent and efficient then "good". This also shows the difference between a eggregore and servitor where one has lesser people and thus lesser conflicts and is able to be more efficient to work with. The only time a Eggregore is more efficient is when the group actually works and thinks as a unity.

Each servitor and eggregore is made up from energy that comes from God the Source. Which is the God that is talked about in the Bible. This God is complete and has no counterpart such as satan. In Hebrew there isn't even a mentioning of such a thing. The Christian god is full of flaws compared to the one God mentioned originally. According to Thelema everything is just a degree of the One.

Have I worked with "gods" and such. Well yes I have. Mainly with Gaia, one representation of God the Source. I've also worked with other pantheons. These energies presented themselves in the shapes and traits as given to them according to myths and lore. It makes sense because they are man-made after all. They do not exchange energy to get something in return. It might feel they are taking energy from you, but in fact this is due to YOU not being aware how to work with energy properly. By working with a god/deity you're also "worshipping" them, or at least putting energy into them as many people have done in the past willingly. If you summon something you're putting something of yourself into it. Like Christians do by prayer to their idea of a god and satan. It is the Christians upholding the eggregore called satan.

You can disbelief in satan, but the energies safed up in that name and image are real. So if something happens blame the ones that created satan.

We all meet gods every day, for we are all gods. Somewhere along the line religions were created and have kept us all from developing our full potentials.

Forgive me if I am on the wrong wavelength here, but I don't see how a discussion of gods and goddesses is part of the paranormal experience.
Seems to me to be a part of the religious experience.

Giving the benefit of the doubt. I am inclined to move this to BTS Faith, Spirituality & Theology, so
Please clue me in.....


[edit on 9-7-2006 by DontTreadOnMe]

It seems very paranormal to me, not faith/religion. Think about Magick for example, and other Occult orders. This subject has been part of many occult/paranormal experienments aswell.. but if Paranormal is just about 'ghosts and demons and other unexplained phenomena' then I will abide by your judgement... although I have to disagree.

I will give a shot at explaining the experience of a god as paranormal vs. religious.

By subscribing to a particular faith, you would follow the tenants of the faith and invoke the entity and level of faith would dictate your interaction. Take Gozar from Ghostbusters as example. The worshipers built the temple in the building and performed rites to try to bring Gozar to Earth. Had they succeeded it would be religious. The interaction between the ghostbusters and Gozar would definitely be paranormal as they interacted, yet none had any faith nor worship in Gozar.

As an aside, I have often joked that I am the Cat Elder God because even feral cats tend to come to me and even lazy or sleeping cats and kittens will have a reaction when I am around ranging from an overzealous need to interact to standing aloof almost shameful head-hanging.

To interact with an entity that you do not believe in could become a religious experience if the event changed your position. Say if you were to have a near death experience and meet Chareon instead of St. Peter at the gate and converted to a follower in part or whole of the Greek/Roman Pantheon.

While reading on Wicca, I personally found that the evocation that made sense to me would be the trinity of Artimus/Selene/Hecate. Some will argue that they are separate. Others say that they are the renaming of the same entity over time and geography and where they are commonly found. Still other will have other opinions.

If faith and followers are the basis for a gods continued existence, think of the story of Apollo on the original Star Trek series, then was Kirk's interaction paranormal from our viewpoint? To Kirk it was just another alien life form. How would you view it if the event was in NYC today instead of exploring a planet in the 23rd Century?

To question asked by the OP, yes I have met something. I do not know what/who it was and people have doubted the meeting because I was physically suffering from dehydration at the time. Most say it was my dying mind trying to save itself by shocking my awareness to survive by creating a hallucination that seemed to be a mystical reality. I could try to fill in the who/what/where/how of what happened but I would rather not cloud it with subjective answers and retain the memory as close to how it happened.

Was it Religious or Paranormal? I leave it as spiritual. In other words a bit of both but a whole lot of neither.

I think certainly we are the egg and God is the chicken....

But which came first?

IMO All paranormal occurances are spiritual and all spiritual occurances fall in the
realm of the paranormal. Both are subjective and directly related to the persons
state,condition and openness to receive them.

Originally posted by stalkingwolf

I think certainly we are the egg and God is the chicken....

But which came first?

Well, that's up to you!

"Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mindboggingly useful could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as the final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God. "The argument goes something like this: 'I refuse to prove that I exist,' says God, 'for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing.' "'But,' says Man, 'The Babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED.' "'Oh dear,' says God, 'I hadn't thought of that,' and promptly vanished in a puff of logic." -- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Lol.. Sorry I saw this topic and had to quote that. Have I met Gods/Goddesses... I don't want to be presumptious with it, and say yes i have... or no I haven't.. but my personal beleif is that we all have seen them and even talked to them from time to time. They come down and appear like normal people, and just mess with us. If your lucky and they identify themselves to you, then they must have something important in store for you.. otherwise, we are just here to entertain them.. yay us, we are reality tv for immortal deities... wonder when we will get cancelled? lol. ;-)

well i am a Kemetic Pagan and have never (in my short time) met any of my God's or Godesses. Although i would love too.

We have a vast amount of gods in out path, some more famiouse then others. The obiouse ones woulf be Osiris, Isis, Ra, Horus and so on.

Ohh BTW really good thread i have enjoyed the read.

Great, would you like to tell us about your Kemetic paganry?