Are religious people more or less inclined to believe in ASOIAF Gods?

[Lord Bronn Stokeworth]

I read an interesting thread yesterday with a discussion about whether the Gods in ASOIAF exsist, or that the is 'just' magic and natural forces, and the Gods are just invented to explain them.

Some people believe one thing, and some the other, and it made me wonder whether people who are religious are more inclined to believe in true religions in ASOIAF. It can work both ways; if you already are religious, it might make you more open to the possibility of real gods in the books, but on the other hand it could make it harder to believe that there can be any other god besides your own, even in books.

I think a true atheist, might never want to accept the possibility of any sort of God, but an agnost might be very open to it.

So I would like to invite people to discuss here if they're religious themselves, and if they believe in ASOIAF Gods.

I personally am not religious, nor have I been raised that way, but I'm not a real atheist either. I see myself more like an agnost, and think there might be something more, but I see it more like a natural power/power of life, than like any religion described in books.

And that is exactly how I see the magic in the books. Powers that cannot be explained, but aren't necessarily divine. I think all religions eventually are the same thing; an explanation for the forces and magic of nature. Yes, even R'hllor. No doubt there is power (in the books) in fire and blood, but I think it's a 'natural' force, with no actual thinking god behind it.

So I'm looking forward to find out whether personal religion influences your view on book religion or not :)

PS. I really want no religion-bashing or anything like that here. I hope everyone can respect each others personal beliefs, nobody is stupid or naive for believing something different than you!

I'm a straight up atheist. I assume some sort of god(s) exist in the ASoIaF universe. I don't think any religion has it correct. My personal theory is the Drowned and Storm gods are real, but are not what the Ironborn think (though they got the Storm god being a the bad one right). My guess is based on the fact that the Storm God appears in another legend and Patchface. I can't think of another instance of other gods appearing outside their worship. R'Hollor and the Other may or may not be the same gods under different names. I admit, this isn't hard evidence.

[Julian Rayne]

My position on religion does inform my view on the existence of the god(s) in ASoIaF.

I'm a strong atheist who doesn't believe that gods are logically possible at all. Not even if the laws of physics were different. Not even in a fictional universe with magic. I just believe the concept of the supernatural is logically inconsistent. Even if magic exists, it would be a part of the natural world and subject to scientific inquiry. I cannot actually see the difference between a god (no matter how it is defined) and either (a) an alien or (b ) an natural aspect of the natural world. In neither case would I apply the term "god" to it.

So I obviously don't believe that the ASoIaF god(s) are real. Any of them.

[ambi76]

It woudn't surprise me, because as an atheist every time somebody talks about Westerosi gods as if they were real, I have a headscratcher. Yes, I know this is a fantasy story, but not in the sense of halfgods roaming amongst the mortals or gods comming down from "heaven" to seduce fair maidens. So I have to call bullshit to all Westerosi gods too.

[Gurkhal]

Agnostic here and I'm kind of agnostic to the Westeros gods as well. May or may not exist.

[SeanF]

I'm a Christian. I don't expect we'll get any definitive answer to this question.

In-universe, we have evidence for the existence of magic, and some kind of existence after death. But, these things can take place with, or without the existence of gods.

[The Drunkard]

Atheist here, and I don't believe there are any gods on Planetos. I've seen evidence for magic, but not any evidence for there being a god or gods behind it. I imagine gods like R'hllor and the Drowned God came about in the same way Jupiter and Neptune did, people attributing the forces of nature they didn't understand to some sentient being.

[muffinpoodle]

I'm sort of agnostic, sort of maybe pagan - just call me "spiritual" I guess - and I think there is a higher power at play in ASOIAF. I think the Old Gods have power, quite possibly R'hllor too. Though the Braavosi may be on the right track witht heir Many-Faced God - and that is an idea similar to the one I revolve towards in real life; that no one religion's idea of a deity or deities is totally correct or necessarily incorrect, but there are "higher powers" or "supernatural forces" that science hasn't explained and that different cultures have simply experienced and interpreted differently.

Whether there are Gods in ASOIAF the sense of big people up in the sky/on another plane with personalities and personal motivations, dunno. Maybe magic/spirituality is just a kind of "force of nature" in balance with the universe or...some crap like that. Haha. Long story short: yes, I believe there's something to the belief in ASOIAF Gods.

[Bearson]

Similar to the OP, I think GRRM intended for that to be an open question. Melisandre in particular leads me to believe that R'hllor is someone who the followers believe exists because of their magics, but that their magics don't neccesarily have to come from a god. They just learn a specific type of magic, and attribute that power to their god. However, even if R'hllor was real, he/she/it would be also be part of the natural world, even if he/she/it was the cause of the natural world (though we don't actually know if R'hllor is attributed with having created the series world/universe or not). I'd also question the assumption that even if the gods were real, they needed to be worshipped.

If I knew there actually was a real sun god, and I was a peasant in asoif, I'd just as soon tell him to get his act together and hurry up with some spring warmth instead of slacking it off while everyone else was working hard. :commie:

[Arakan]

First of all, this thread is a great read. Thanks to the OP :).

I was raised Orthodox Christian and while I believe (in some way at least) in God, I am very much opposed to the Institution that is "Religion".

For me personally i make a clear distinction between "Belief" and "Religion".

With this personal background i think that the Faith and the Religion of R'hllor are man-made. As someone already put it very nicely:

The Faith is a perfect Religion for a hierarchical, feudal society (just as the Orthodox, Lutherian and Catholic churches have been for Europe up to World War 1).

The Old Gods i cannot see as a Religion but more or less as a personal, very vague belief system.

I think some man from the 19th century already expressed the issue about an institutionalized Religion very well so i would like to quote him:

The foundation of irreligious criticism is: Man makes religion, religion does not make man. Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the world of man state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they are an inverted world. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point dhonneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion.

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.

Criticism has plucked the imaginary flowers on the chain not in order that man shall continue to bear that chain without fantasy or consolation, but so that he shall throw off the chain and pluck the living flower. The criticism of religion disillusions man, so that he will think, act, and fashion his reality like a man who has discarded his illusions and regained his senses, so that he will move around himself as his own true Sun. Religion is only the illusory Sun which revolves around man as long as he does not revolve around himself.

[The Weirwoods Eyes]

I don't believe in any supreme higher beings in real life, but was raised in a religious household.

I don't believe there are any gods in ASOIAF either, but if the story was written with real gods I'd accept it. I just don't see that there is any evidence in universe to imply any of them are real.

The seven is just like real life religion its all blind faith there is no proof. But the religion facilitates the hierarchical structure of their society and controls the masses.

The Old Gods have my vote for most true religion, it would seem they worship their ancestors who have gone into the weirwoods. Not actual gods in the modern traditional sense but 1st men and CoTF who were able to utalise the inherent magic in universe to carry on in the trees and use their abilities to influence & protect their descendants.

It would seem that many magical abilities in universe are associated with 1st men blood and the old gods religion, green sight, green dreams, skinchanging, prophesy.

The Others who it appears can raise the dead in the form of cold zombie like reanimated corpses.

It may or may not be associated with a religion we;ve never been told.

R'hllor, well I for one don't buy that he exists in the form of a higher power. I believe that the church harvest children with innate magical ability, through purchasing slaves and taking in unwanted children, who are then screened for any abillity, those who have it become priests and those who do not join the fiery hands and the temple prostitutes.

The powers we see manifested by their priests are foresight within the flames, resurrection, shadow assassins, and the abillity to sustain their own life without sustenance or sleep. And the "healing" of Victarions arm.

We discover through Mels POV that the arts are worked at and take great effort and we find out from Mirri that in Ashai one can be tought many magics. Mel has as we know spent a great deal of time in Ashai, so much that she presents herself as a native Ashai'i. hough she is not.

We also know through her that the red priests use trickery in the form of powders to bedazzle the masses into believing. This is apparently a widely practised ploy by the red priests as we see Bennerro doing the same thing outside of a temple in Volantis.

We know that Thoros has seen the fiery kiss performed many times but did not expect it to work, we also know that he was gifted to the temple and not a purchase. Mel Moqorro, Beric and LS all appear to be capable of living without food or drink and rest. But Thoros does not have this ability he was a big feaster and drinker at Roberts court.

The shadow babies Mel produces do not apear to be a standard R'hllorian tool and I am inclined to believe she picked this particular talent up in Ashai. The flame reading is IMO no different to Mother Mole and the Ghost of high Hearts abilities. They dream their the red priests stare at fires. I don't think either are gifted by gods but are an in world magical abillity.

So to sum up for me magic is real and exists across Planetos religion seems to perform much the same role in universe as in real life, and some religions utalise the existence of magic to bring weight to their religion.

[grand old duke of stark]

Kudos to the OP for this thought-provoking topic.

I believe, but in practice am mainly spiritual. Having read English at university, I would never let my own beliefs affect my assessment of a book's/author's religious cosmogony. I am grateful for GRRM's clear-headed decision to create all these religions and belief systems without endorsing or confirming any. Certainly, they add richess and complexity to his inaginary universe and the characters' actions. All in all, I find the Old Gods most convincing. (That is part because the 'hero' family, the Starks, adhere to their worship.) More importantly, whether BR or the CotF or whoever are really gods or not, it is close to nature worship. In RL, nature worship was widespread before more organised religions took hold. In contrast, the Faith of the Seven seems very manmade. It certainly resembles Catholicism in its organisation, rituals, rules, military orders, ties to rulers, etc. We get to see a fair amount of the politics and hypocrisy that attend to almost any organised religion, so the whole thing loses is credibility to me as a modern And the Lord of Light, which is somewhat analogous to Islam (R'hllor even sounds like an Arabic word), seems inextricably bound to magic. It's hard to know where one begins and the other ends. The human sacrifice aspect is off-putting, to say the least. But it, like Old Gods worship, has at least shown some supernatural power. The Faith seems like an inert, fossilised institution used to keep order.

[Rhymes with Weak]

People believe what they want to believe. You should try to put personal bias aside when dealing with a series like ASOIAF but we all know that's pretty much impossible. As a Baha'i, I tend to believe that deities exist in the universe. What other explanation for Stannis Baratheon is there?

[Good King Daemon]

First of all compliments to the OP for the excellent thread. I'm a Christian and its probably influenced my own interpretation of the story as the only gods I think might exist in the series are the seven. This is primarily based on Davos' vision of the mother and the path it sets him on (saving Edric) and by extension Stannis. I like to think the seven might be real because of this because that's how I imagine God in real life subtley tweaking things every now and then just to make sure things aren't going completely to shit. I think the other religions are more based around magic.

[Arya kiddin']

No, this thread makes no sense to me. I'm a monotheist, but this doesn't mean I'm not capable of rational thinking, or understanding where other theological philosophies are coming from.

[SeanF]

I don't believe in any supreme higher beings in real life, but was raised in a religious household.

I don't believe there are any gods in ASOIAF either, but if the story was written with real gods I'd accept it. I just don't see that there is any evidence in universe to imply any of them are real.

The seven is just like real life religion its all blind faith there is no proof. But the religion facilitates the hierarchical structure of their society and controls the masses.

The Old Gods have my vote for most true religion, it would seem they worship their ancestors who have gone into the weirwoods. Not actual gods in the modern traditional sense but 1st men and CoTF who were able to utalise the inherent magic in universe to carry on in the trees and use their abilities to influence & protect their descendants.

It would seem that many magical abilities in universe are associated with 1st men blood and the old gods religion, green sight, green dreams, skinchanging, prophesy.

The Others who it appears can raise the dead in the form of cold zombie like reanimated corpses.

It may or may not be associated with a religion we;ve never been told.

R'hllor, well I for one don't buy that he exists in the form of a higher power. I believe that the church harvest children with innate magical ability, through purchasing slaves and taking in unwanted children, who are then screened for any abillity, those who have it become priests and those who do not join the fiery hands and the temple prostitutes.

The powers we see manifested by their priests are foresight within the flames, resurrection, shadow assassins, and the abillity to sustain their own life without sustenance or sleep. And the "healing" of Victarions arm.

We discover through Mels POV that the arts are worked at and take great effort and we find out from Mirri

that in Ashai one can be tought many magics. Mel has as we know spent a great deal of time in Ashai, so much that she presents herself as a native Ashai'i. hough she is not.

We also know through her that the red priests use trickery in the form of powders to bedazzle the masses into believing. This is apparently a widely practised ploy by the red priests as we see Bennerro doing the same thing outside of a temple in Volantis.

We know that Thoros has seen the fiery kiss performed many times but did not expect it to work, we also know that he was gifted to the temple and not a purchase. Mel Moqorro, Beric and LS all appear to be capable of living without food or drink and rest. But Thoros does not have this ability he was a big feaster and drinker at Roberts court.

The shadow babies Mel produces do not apear to be a standard R'hllorian tool and I am inclined to believe she picked this particular talent up in Ashai. The flame reading is IMO no different to Mother Mole and the Ghost of high Hearts abilities. They dream their the red priests stare at fires. I don't think either are gifted by gods but are an in world magical abillity.

So to sum up for me magic is real and exists across Planetos religion seems to perform much the same role in universe as in real life, and some religions utalise the existence of magic to bring weight to their religion.

Human sacrifice by burning seems to release power that an adept, such as Melisandre or Moqorro, can use to their advantage, to provide a fair wind, for example.

Dany used that power (more intuitively) to hatch dragons' eggs.

I agree that shadow-binding is a separate skill. There's probably more to it than producing shadow babies. Perhaps the spirits of the dead can be bound into the service of the shadow-binder.

[The Weirwoods Eyes]

Yes SeanF I've always thought we're yet to see just exactly what shadow binding can do.

And the human sacrifice by fire thing is seemingly effective. I don't think we can definitively say the burning caused the winds or the dragons but I'm open to the possibility they may have, winds blow and the dragons hatching MAY have been less about Miiri burning and more about Daenarys dragon blood. I aren't saying I think this just that I'm undecided and open to either option.

really cool idea about shades of the dead being bound to the sorcerer using the shadow binding magic. I'm intrigued by the Ashai'i magics.

[Queen‍‍‍‍‍‍ Alysanne‍‍™]

GRRM said none of the gods in ASOIAF will be answering any prayers, he will leave it to us to find out which ones are real.

Due to that since Red priests get their prayers answered in some way, that mean Rhollor doesnt exist.

My two coins go to the idea that the supernatural occurences of Rhollor are just Valyrian magic rooted in fire and blood.

[CelticAggression]

There's a theory that God is the same in all faiths, people just see it differently. Polytheists see God broken up into different aspects, like when you see a rainbow through a prisim, while monotheists only see certain aspects or all of them in one god. I think it's called the prism theory. If you follow that, you could look at God as the 7, Lord of Light, Horse, etc. Kind of like the Many-Faced God.

[The Mother of The Others]

Don't worry, atheists! You're not at risk! If you feel guilty about reading a series with sexy sexy gods in it, as if they're tempting you back into the dark ages of religious ecstasy, it's okay! None of your atheistic friends are here to judge you, it's just you, all alone with these gods, and this can be your special alone time. Enjoy them! It's fantasy, so take a vacation from real world non-belief. Use this opportunity to get re-impregnated with that sense of wonder you've been missing. What have we replaced gods with, really? Self esteem? Trigonometry? Those are more elusive than gods! Fill that empty spot in your gut where myth used to live, baby, yeah! Worship these false gods in print until they become real for you! Worship them hard and unrepentantly as you pray to your glowing tablet of forbidden esoteric truths! Yes! Imbibe salt-rimed beverages to appease the Damphair's murky master! (Yes!) Then as Winter comes, come harder: Turn on the fake fireplace in your livingroom and pretend to see stuff in the flames! It eventually works! For example, I see my grandmother burning in hell!

(Edit: much like Melisandre, I was mistaken about this vision of grandma--it turned out that she was merely seated at the dinette table in the next room, but from my vantage point she was visible through the glass fireplace, so it looked like she was writhing in hellfire when in actuality she was merely putting my mom through hell via tedious conversation. Although, I reserve the possibiIity that my vision may yet come to pass: when grandma dies, who's to say for sure that she won't be hellbound?) Also, for those of you who prefer to orgy-worship massive numbers of deities as they do in the house of black n' white, I've found that it boosts the quality of your fireplace hallucinations if you've already worhipped Tyrion's wine god first, and for the love of God don't save the Seven till last--get them out of the way early in morning, or else those buggers will tire you out. Remembering late at night that you still have to pray to ALL of them is like walking into your bedroom exhausted at 3:00 AM only to see that you've forgotten to fold a massive pile of laundry.

I hope this helps!

[Mladen]

Well, I am Christian Orthodox, but I have a bit different view on religion and deities than it is expected of me.

1. I don't believe in idea of one true God. I simply don't believe that one religion got it right, and the others are simply wrong. I do believe in God, but I don't believe that Orthodox God is any more real or more powerful than Muslim, or Jew God, or whatever people believe in. So, although I believe in "something more", for me religions are institutions created by men. And as such, I respect them.

2. beside being religious, one could also call me humanist. I don't believe in some preachings of my religion, some regarding people of other beliefs, some regarding women, and some regarding LGBT population. I try to live by some moral codes my religion and my parents installed in me, but at the end, no priest would ever be able to convince me that any human being is cursed by God because of their sexual or religious orientation

So, when it comes to ASOIAF religion, I think everybody on this forum know where I stand. I truly believe that there is no one true God, that neither R'hllor nor Seven nor Old Gods nor any other deity is the right one, and that the others should be dismissed. I believe in freedom of choice, and that is how I look at it. I also can\t comprehend the idea of good and evil Gods. Remember, everything that is done in ASOIAF is done by humans. Humans, not Gods, are those that either good or evil. And their religious belief in one way also reflects on God in whose name they act upon. So, when Melisandre burns someone, it is her vile act, not R'hllor's.