Religion/Philosophy of Your Conculture(s)

[Yačay256]

Hello New Board! :-D

I was just wondering what everyone's conreligions and conphilosophies are; Sa'u'o's are here.

[Itsuki Kohaku]

Not really a conreligion, The Zyn'n are real.. Anyways, The Makurungou are very devout Zyn'n. They follow every single tradition of them plus some indigenous beleifs. For example, In addition to The major Zyn'n gods, They also worship nature spirits they call: "Modru" and beileve that Modru can change the past AND future.

[Sankon]

Oh, god... (pun intended)

Where do I begin?

First off, this has been swirling around my head in the past couple of days, so there aren't any names or exact details. All this is hypothetical conhistory that most likely shall be changed, edited, and mashed into pieces. Meta-hypothesis, if you will. So if I do by any chance post a more fleshed-out conhistory later, don't expect it to be the same as the one set below.

You may be wondering why I'm saying history, instead of religion/philosophy. Well, in the Classical Age, there was a reign of philosopher-kings, each chosen by the populace based on their philosophy and ideals. You can well imagine that this would lead to a lot of confusion and debate, as each philosopher-king was quickly thrown out and another elected in, as other philosophers would vy for kingdom (or perhaps kingship?) and the people vote them in. A wise(ish) philosopher-king (name yet to be invented (NYTBI)), wishing to keep the throne, set up a council of philosophers elected by the general populace to advise the throne and help the king with lawmaking and the other things kings do. Well, this council never got anywhere, due to the nature of philosophical debate, and a rebellion arose from the poorer populace that was getting poorer by the day as the council would sit and debate, taking from the peasants' food and producing nothing of worth. So a peasant uprising arose, led by a militant and eloquent peasant (NYTBI) and overthrew the philosopher-king and his council forcefully, thus ending the reign of the philosophers.

[SLiV]

My greeklike concultures that live in the Lurionas, have a pretty straightforward classical moral. Although they are quite tolerant, one could find them sexist, as the roles of men and women are on almost every aspect seperated.

My conreligion consists of 2 hypergods, Eo (everything) and Nao (nothing), lots of not-yet-created subgods and most importantly the 7 main gods.

Drago is the God of Balance between Eo and Nao, life and death, good and evil etc;
Xótano is the God of Death and Earth;
Aktor is the God of War and Fire;
Hidor is the God of Wealth and Water;
Sivo is the God of Crafts, Air and Light;
Hasmo is the God of Life, Nature and Beauty;
Mao is the God of Wisdom and Night;

Also, each god has its own race of antropomorf creatures. E.g. Xótano is often personificated as a bovanter (minotaur), whilst Hasmo is sometimes accompanied and protected by hippanters (centaurs).

More information on these gods can be found here.

[Testyal]

The Fígra believe absolutely nothing, in fact, it's against the Fígövis črép (Fiigworld code) to even mention the very existence of gods.

[Itsuki Kohaku]

Are the Fígra a philosophical/scientific society?

[Testyal]

All of them are scientific

[Itsuki Kohaku]

I'm thinking about posting the conworld that the Makurungou live in on here, Should I?
Related to the topic:
A species of scientifics.. That's got to be quite alien to me. I guess to them the only miracles would be scientific breakthroughs.

[masako]

I guess to them the only miracles would be scientific breakthroughs.

The term "miracle" would not seem fitting in this situation, mayhaps 'significant happenings'?

[Sankon]

All of them are scientific

That is a very broad statement. What do you mean? Please elaborate.

[kadani]

Philosophically, postmodernism never happened. :-P

Religiously speaking, inikresaism is the result of putting taoism, the belief in mana, the shinto-like belief in natural kami and reincarnation in a blender and mix. Yes, it will blend, but not very well, the result is very different depending on where in Rejistania you are :-D

[clockworkbanana]

the result of putting taoism, the belief in mana, the shinto-like belief in natural kami and reincarnation in a blender and mix.

I don't see why those wouldn't mix.

[Itsuki Kohaku]

the result of putting taoism, the belief in mana, the shinto-like belief in natural kami and reincarnation in a blender and mix.

I don't see why those wouldn't mix.

They're very different.

[Etherman]

I really don't have much. The Vanyal kingdom (Iberian Goths) was originally Arian Christian. Although the Vanyals were able to repel the Moorish invasions in the 8th century, they eventually reached a peace and were united against the Catholic Christian Reconquista. Due to theological and philosophical trade between the Vanyals and Muslims, a kind of syncreticism arose in the Vanyal kingdom.

[LetoAtreides]

The Nolikans follow a code of conduct known as Hejam Warestan (Golden Order), which is believed to have been given from God to a prophet. It focuses on three virtues which are spiritual purity, courage (not necessarily in the military sense, but the Golden Order certainly does not advocate pacifism) and altruism (to the point of what liberals would call collectivism). Those who do not live up to its rules are shunned as dixkmek (people of frivolity).

[Ossicone]

The Inyauk have a deep belief in equality (within their own people) and all local governments are democratic -- including decision making and judiciary processes. This comes from the belief that "we are all created/possessed by the gods."

Possession and ownership is a big part of Inyauk culture. To assign possession over another is to put oneself on the level as the gods. The best example of this is saying 'I love you.*' Literally it means 'you are the owner of my love' and places the speaker in a place of subordination. The listener is equated with a demigod, holding power over another human.

Any foreigners are treated with a great deal of mistrust, most end up dead.
Dueling & Challenges are another important part of Inyauk society. Challenges are nonlethal fights for fun or pride or to settle disputes. Duels are fought to the death.

Inyauk have 4 main gods -- 2 of creation and 2 of destruction. They have created a modest empire. Any neighbors have learned to keep a distance or face absolute destruction. Every Inyauk adult has gone through 10 years of basic schooling and 5 years of mandatory military service.

* "fir fislu mitxmatxu"

[Yačay256]

@Ossicone: That is quite interesting, a close-knit egalitarian but xenophobic society; I am curious where you got the inspiration for this mix, as I cannot think of any egalitarian xenophobic societies on Earth that have risen above tribal [anthropologically] level.

[Ossicone]

@Ossicone: That is quite interesting, a close-knit egalitarian but xenophobic society; I am curious where you got the inspiration for this mix, as I cannot think of any egalitarian xenophobic societies on Earth that have risen above tribal [anthropologically] level.

I think the reason behind that is that logistically it is very difficult to enact democracy on a large scale. So local government for the Inyauk is democratic, but the Imperial government is more of a republic with individuals from the regions being chosen as representatives.

Mix is definitely the right word. I like taking little interesting this from all sorts of places and seeing how they would work together1, 2. The first thing I wanted above all else was for them to be egalitarian3. The second thing I wanted was for them to be intimidating, so I gave them entire population of trained fighters.

The Inyauk /i'ɲa͡uk/ may believe that they are equal under the gods, but do recognize that some people are better/smarter/stronger4 than others. So if one is particularly bright they are shipped of to an Academy /ni'sima/ rather than the Military /xa'ʧaur/5. There they do all sorts of fun math, science, astronomy and architecture. In my mind they are 20-50 years from an industrial revolution and have waning faith in their religion.

As for their xenophobia there are a couple of reasons. First is their language, it is completely different from those of the surrounding peoples. It is an isolate. They have a very hard time learning or understanding these languages.This is because of severe grammatical and cultural differences. To the Inyauk, the foreigners never say what they mean and are often less educated. Those foreigners that they did meet who were educated, were often from privileged classes. As such they had a belief in their own superiority that the Inyauk disliked even more than the ignorance of the others.

In addition, the Inyauk have created a fierce reputation. In the past, they were conquering new lands, they wiped out any people in their way. This is because they do not believe in slavery6, nor were they willing to let their enemies go free to fight another day. Captured people would be killed as sacrifices to the gods, however this is falling out of practice.

I just realized I didn't directly answer your question. See footnote 2.

1. Sometimes they just don't work out.
2. Some places I got ideas: Mayans, Sparta, a Bollywood movie, Medumba and shit I made up.
3. When I started on this I was writing a story with major class, race and gender issues. I wanted to create a different kind of conflict in society.
4. Harder, Better, Faster Stronger.
5. They still have some military training at the Academy.
6. They cannot possess another human. Also, they felt their work would be inferior.

[reizoukin]

I've been conceptualizing an idea for a story centered around a certain conphilosophy in modern Asia.
Any time I don't use big, concrete words on this website, I get worried that I'll sound stupid. D:

The basic idea of it is that there is a certain people in a remote area in Asia (presumably in China or near there) who stay in a single temple (like monks, and all male) with an isolated belief system. Originally, their belief centered around letting go of the world by imagining nothing. If you try to imagine nothing right now, you'll probably think of a big, dark, empty space. However, these people see that darkness is certainly something. So nothing, if you can imagine it, is certainly nothing at all. (In fact, I came up with this whole concept trying to imagine nothing, and its certainly enlightening when you can finally do it right.)

As I said, that was their original belief. At some point in time, one of the new monks*** went awry. He got to the point where he could imagine nothing, but instead of being enlightened about it, he tried to take it further, eventually convincing himself that nothing is actually a substance, and it is from that substance that all things are created. He then tried to create something out of nothing, and succeeded. So the majority of the monks converted to this belief, and only a few stayed to the true belief.

So the basic belief of these monks is that all things come from nothing, and they practice this belief by creating things from nothing. They also believe (and this derives from their original beliefs) that humans try too hard to complicate everything and give it a reason, and that all things simply exist as they are. A tree is not a life form consisting of a trunk, leaves, and bark, etc.. It isn't correctly thought of as "tree". It is simply what it is.

***New monks. Heh. They've been going on for centuries. Since nobody knows about this temple, the only way the monks can get more into their ranks is by kidnapping teenagers and forcing them into temple life.

[conlangconstructor]

The inhabitants of Paga have been in an "Age of Expression" for the past few hundred years, which has resulted in the abandonment of most traditional religions, destruction of most absolute monarchies, and the populus grasping and accepting scientific theories (and discoveries). Only three countries with state religions exist: Iricavi, Suet-Diins, and Ramor, while other states have turned to secularism or state atheism (Scevan Union of Socialist States).
While the numbers of religious people have no doubt drastically decreased in the last four-five hundred years, there are still a large number of people that do not consider themselves atheist, instead they simply do not actively practice a particular religion. Many of these people often share certain beliefs of their country's old religion (mainly superstition), but again, do not actively practice the religion.
I've set the worldwide percentages to the following: out of 9.2 billion people: 53% are part of a particular religion (with 35% devout); 42% are not religious (with 29% atheist); 5% no answer/unknown (no study can provide results of the entire populus ;))
The most "un-religious" country is Penzala, with an estimated 75% unreligious/atheist.

I haven't really wrote much about religion in Paga. The two main religions I have wrote about are: the Ogorok religion and the Lucitacious Shama religion. Ogorok practicers believe in several gods while Shama practicers believe in a god (without the mini-gods that monotheism usually leads to).
I've thought of several other religions, mainly for Abrinician and Coronoric cultures, but I haven't done any writing on that yet...