World Design/Multi-Cultural Fictional Settings/Sacred Narrative
World Design
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Narrative, the telling of stories, has been a part of human life since our earliest ancestors learned to speak, long before the invention of writing. Some stories have always been mundane, about the everyday facts of the world. Others, usually the better and more exciting ones, have always been stories about the hidden secrets of the universe. These sacred stories explored the world's creation and its eventual destruction, the nature of other worlds, and the source and eventual destination of human life. These explorations make up the most basic and important underpinnings of religion, the sacred or mythic narrative. Sacred because it is true, narrative because it is spoken, myth tells the human truth about the cosmos.
Religious stories are a central part of every religion that feels right, whether real or invented. They explain the structure of the wheel of myth which we explored in The Religious Mindset. Religious stories describe the distant past, the present, and the future of the world. They are an important part of mortal religion, perhaps the most important part.
However, for many people story writing is difficult and scary. Real-world religions already have myths and legends. There is no need to invent them. However, when you invent a religion for your campaign you get to write the stories. For many people this is a tough job. In this chapter I want to reveal some secrets that help to make it easy and fun. Don't worry if you're usually intimidated by writing stories. Myths and Legends follow definite, formal patterns. Imitations are easy to write. All you have to do is fill in the dots.
Definitions
In The Religious Mindset we laid out the basic idea of mythic time. Let's review it for a minute. Mythic time occurred somewhere outside of the flow of linear time, before linear time began. During the mythic time the acts of the gods carved mythic acts in the wheel of myth, like symbols on a giant cylindrical seal. With the end of mythic time and the beginning of linear time this wheel swung into motion and rolled forwards, stamping history with the symbolism of myth. Thus everything in linear time happens at two times, at the linear time at which it occurs, and at the mythic time to which it corresponds. This rolling wheel, the eternal return of the mythic happening, is necessary to understand myth and legend.
Myth
Myth is a sacred narrative involving divinities and other sacred beings set in a primordial time.
A Sacred Narrative
Remember myth does not mean falsehood, it means sacred story. The topics of myth, set in the beginning of time, concern the beginnings of things. The beginnings of the world, of the sun, the stars, and the planets, cosmic beginnings are the province of myth. The beginnings of people, our people that is and not those animals over the hill, are also myth's province. Myth tells of the creation of all good things, and by mapping their beginning it lays down the pattern they will follow. Since myth catalogs the beginnings of all sacred and good things it lists what is profane or evil by what it leaves out.
Involving Divinities and Other Sacred Beings
Gods, deities, spirits, angels, demons, and the monsters of myth are real entities that exist outside of average everyday experience. These beings created the cosmos with their actions in the mythic realm and set in myth the patterns which future time will follow. They created the world.
Set in a Primordial Time.
Myth always takes place in the mythic time that precedes linear time. Myths may identify themselves as myths by a formulaic statement that places the action in this primordial period. Examples of such a formula could include "in the beginning," "before time began," "once upon a time," or "one day long ago, when the world was young." When you see a formula such as these ones look out for a myth.
The supreme function of the myth is to "fix" the paradigmatic models for all rites and all significant human activities--eating, sexuality, work, education, and so on.
Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane
Myth is not a lie or a folktale, it is not a creation of one person, it is an understanding of the nature of reality reached by a culture. Telling the myth, or writing it down, can be a creative activity, but the myth is not invented, when someone recognizes it, it appears to have always been present, it precedes the recognition of itself.
Schroedinger's cat is a representation of the nature of reality. It is true. Yet you cannot prove that a cat in a box would actually be indeterminate depending on the state of a quantum entity; it's a statistical trick. Likewise, modern physics assumes the big bang theory is true, that an infinitely large amount of matter was once compressed to an infinitely small point, and that it expanded. It is unprovable. It seems crazy. Yet it explains the universe better than any competing theory. The big bang hypothesis is a myth in the anthropological sense.
So is the left-brain/right-brain myth, the artist versus scientist myth, and so on. Some of these myths have not been expressed in a form so that we recognize them as myths, they have not been formalized as dogma, but that doesn't mean they aren't myths, true because they are useful, self-evident as soon as they are realized.
Legend
Legends, like Myths, are sacred stories which are regarded as true and which are set during linear time, in a relatively recent time which is much like the present. Legends can be religious or secular. Medieval saints' tales, the stories of Sufi masters, and records of the divine descent of kings are all religious legends. Stories of migrations, war and conquest, heroes and chiefs, and the stories of dynasties are secular legends. George Washington's incident with the cherry tree is an American legend, as is the story in which Abraham Lincoln walked twenty miles to return a penny. They aren't legends because of truth or falsehood, they are legends because they are important.
Folktale
Folktales, nursery tales, fairy tales, these are fictional stories told for fun. They may involve the same characters as a myth or legend but are told for amusement. Unlike legends and myths, folktales are not believed to be true. Examples include Aesop's fables, tall tales, trickster tales, and shaggy dog stories.
Sacred Patterns
Myths and legends fit into a pattern. Myth and legend occur in the past and fit into the religious world-view, which states that those things that happened once will happen again in the future. Events repeat themselves. The universe continues the same activities again and again and again, and mortals can best live by cooperating with those cycles. Mythic and legendary patterns are tragic. Doom is always a part of the pattern. They include birth and death, creation and destruction, beginning and end. Pieces of the pattern can be left out of individual myths, but for completeness and usefulness in the game try to get the whole tragic cycle down.
Cosmic Cycle
Decide on the cosmic creation myth first, before you write any other myths or legends for a religion. The cosmic myth sets the primordial pattern for all other patterns. This includes other myths and legends. The cosmic cycle sets the pattern that other myths recreate.
The Emptiness
Before the cosmos existed there was a place for it to be. This place was empty or full of some useless substance. When inventing your myth first think about cultural values. Choose a substance that people in the culture you are writing for think of as being infinite in supply. Desert nomads might think of sand, arctic dwellers of ice, and islanders or those who live in a river valley might think of water. Other people are likely to look up at the night sky and think that the darkness of space is infinite in supply. Whatever it is, this primordial emptiness will be superseded by the Cosmos once the creation is over.
Examples
- An infinite ocean of water, no land anywhere.
- Ice stretching forever in all directions.
- An infinite, black, empty space.
- A bubbling, infinite, oozing gray sea of chaos.
- An infinite plain of bare cold stone.
- Illusions and appearance everywhere, no reality.
The Creator
Before the emptiness could be filled with the cosmos there was a creator, something which provided the motive force for the cosmos. The form of the creator will be reflected in the form of every other entity. If the creator is described as a spirit then the spirit is the first and most important part of every other entity. If the creator is described as a collection of impersonal forces then impersonal forces define every entity. If the creator is an emotion such as love then love will be the most important and primary characteristic for all entities.
Examples
- A spiritual being.
- A hermaphroditic being.
- An infinitely small object of infinitely large mass.
- A man with a long, white beard.
- The mother of everything.
- A spider.
- An egg.
- Twins, opposites in every way, male and female, white and black, etc.
- Animals.
CreationCreation
This is the actual process of creation. It involves building a habitable world from the raw materials in the primordial emptiness, or somehow causing everything to come into being. Not only is the world created by this story, but it also explains light and dark, the alternate reality, sun and moon, plants, animals, insects, fish, divinities, spirits, demons and angels, and all the mortal races. The creator is the one who produces everything that exists.
Examples
- Creates by uttering sacred words.
- Creates by dividing the uniform emptiness into distinct pieces.
- Hatches the universe from an egg.
- Creates by rotting, generating first maggot-like beings.
- Creates by disgorging.
- Creates through sexual reproduction.
- Creates by giving birth, without sexual contact.
- Dives for dirt at the bottom of sea, returns with enough to make land.
- Creates by performing sacred rituals.
- Creates with own blood, by bleeding self.
- Creates by weaving the world.
Judgment and Cataclysm
After the cosmos has come to be it will go along for some period of time. Various things will happen, and at the end of the cycle of myth someone, it could be the creator, an evil divinity, fate, or even the mortal races determines that the cosmos has existed for long enough, and it is time to cause the troubles at the end of time. In some stories the creator looks at all creation and sees that people are not obeying the laws, so they must be punished and the world destroyed. In other stories fate or some other universal law, such as gravity, chooses the end of time. In other stories, evil demons escape from the gods' confinement and go on a rampage which destroys the world. In other stories self-important mortals overreach their abilities and harness powers that they cannot control, and through the action of divine laws of retribution these forces destroy the world.
Examples
- World destroyed in a flood.
- World destroyed in a cataclysm of fire and ashes.
- World destroyed in a war of the gods.
- World destroyed by evil demons.
- World destroyed accidentally by foolish mortals.
- World dies by slowly freezing solid.
- Cosmos cools until all matter is still and dead.
- Cosmos destroyed by massive implosion.
Though a universal cataclysm may sound depressing and tragic, most religions teach that it has already happened in the past and that some people lived through it. People survived after the cataclysmic end of the cosmos, and recreated it following the same patterns established by the creation. As it happened then, so shall it happen again. Thus the ultimate end of the universe leaves room for hope, for as it was created once so it shall be created again.
Cycle of Nations
The mythic cycle that describes a nation follows the same stages as a person's life. It starts with imprisonment in a place apart from the world, then passage into the world, just as a child stays in the womb until it enters the world through the birth canal. Next, like a young person establishing a role in the world the people claim land as their nation. Maturity and empire follow. A people may produce offshoots in the same way that a parent produces children. As with children in myth, an empire's children are fractious and rebellious, and may desire nothing more than to kill their own parent. Sometimes they do. After empire a gradual decline sets in, finally followed by extinction as the people loses its identity. That is the cycle of a people as described in myth and legend.
Note that this model of the rise and fall of empires is not all that historically accurate. Modern-day historians would not accept it as truthful or interesting. However, not all that long ago Edward Gibbon based his masterwork The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire on this mythic cycle.
Imprisonment and Escape
The people live in a place or state in which they cannot reach their potential. It may be a boring place, without light or food or the delights of life, which they leave for excitement. It may be an animal paradise from which they are expelled once they become intelligent. They may leave from curiosity, fear, or greed, but they find a way to the new world. They exit into the new world through a small hole, either dropping down from the sky or crawling out of the ground.
Examples
- Living with a pack of wolves.
- Living in a dark, silent underworld.
- Living in a land where they were oppressed.
- Living as non-intelligent animals.
Borders of the World
Once they have escaped to the world, the people choose and claim a territory as their home. They survey the borders of their nation. They establish a site of worship in the center of the territory, to mark the center of the world, and then conquer and civilize the land around it. This may require a divine being's help, warfare, or the land may be free for the taking. Often this culminates with the establishment of a capital city in the center of the territory. This land is the world, and outside it is chaos, the home of chaos demons and non-humans.
Examples
- Survey and mark the borders of the land.
- The god walks the extent of the land, marks it.
- The god gives "everything you can see" from the top of a mountain.
- Build a city.
Empire, Degeneration, and Extinction
In myth, after establishing their identity by claiming territory as their own, nations follow a natural life path. They expand for some time, until they reach the limits of their power. They may conquer an empire of many other nations, or they may be conquered and become a piece of an empire. At some time they reach the limits of their ability to expand, and then degeneration sets in. Morality declines, youths no longer follow society's traditional values, and the nation slowly weakens. It may maintain its wealth and empire for a long time after it loses the drive to expand any more. Eventually the moral weakness and degeneracy becomes obvious as society falls apart and vigorous young barbarian peoples who have yet to reach their imperial stage strike at the heart of the empire. Bloated and rotting, the ancient empire collapses more of its own weight and incompetence than of any single attack. In the aftermath of this social fall some old citizens may dream of imperial glories long gone, while others adopt other ways of life, attaching themselves to other societies and adopting their myths and legends.
Signs of National Degeneracy
- Loss of religion.
- Loss of morality.
- Mercenary rather than citizen armies.
- Inhuman government.
- Children disobey their parents.
- Many ghosts.
- Evil omens.
- Dogs and cats living together.
Heroic Cycle
A hero is an individual who makes a great difference in society, transforming society and self with an accomplishment of mythic stature. The most common form of the hero's legend borrows its structure from the initiation of the sacred king, husband of the mother goddess. Dionysus, Osiris, and Orpheus are mythical analogs of the sacred king. As a matter of fact, in Greek "Hero" refers to one who is sacrificed to Hera, Zeus' wife and the mother of the gods. Heroes whose stories fit this form include Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, Heracles, Arthur, and Charlemagne. While the hero is most commonly male, female heroes can be found in legends and folktales, from Saint Joan of Arc to Sleeping Beauty.
Joseph Campbell advanced the idea of the "Monomyth" in his classic work on hero stories, The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Broken down to its simplest divisions, the heroic monomyth involves separation, initiation, and return. First, the hero leaves the familiar world. Then the hero becomes initiated into divine secrets. Finally, the hero returns to the familiar world with secrets that restore life, love, and energy to the world. For example, Prometheus climbed to the sky, stole the sun's fire, and returned with his prize to earth. King Arthur Pendragon was separated from his family and kingship at birth, came into his power by pulling the sword from the stone, and restored his royal stature by conquering the Saxons. Both these legendary figures reflect the monomyth. We will divide Campbell's three basic sections into several paragraphs each, which describe finer gradations in the form of the heroic cycle.
Separation
Supernatural or Mysterious Origin
The parentage of the young hero may be uncertain. Most commonly, the hero is fathered by a disguised god or some other supernatural figure upon a virgin mother.
Portents at Birth
Cosmic omens, a bright new star, a comet, terrible storms, prolific harvests, announce the hero's birth. Unusual visitors, wise men or women, priests, wizards, fairy godmothers or godfathers, visit the infant and confirm his heroic stature.
Perils Menace Infancy
Perils menace the life of the young hero: A snake in the crib; a cruel autocrat's plan to exterminate newborns; abandonment in the wilderness; adoption by wild animals; etc.
Refusal of the Call
Sometimes a possible hero refuses to pay attention to his destiny as a hero, and hides away. In general this makes things get even worse. Whatever the terrible situation that requires a hero, the hero's call becomes even more desperate. If the hero finally accepts the call then things may still turn out well, but if he continues to resist tragedy will follow.
Supernatural Aid
The young hero makes friends in the most unusual places. Somehow he befriends someone who gifts him with an item or a secret that in his hands can make his later initiation a sure thing.
The Crossing of the First Threshold
The young hero finally leaves home. The heroes of fairy tales often are the last children left at home. Either they have no desire to become heroes, or the parents, alarmed by the portents at the hero's birth, try to protect the hero by keeping him safe and at home.
The Passage Into Darkness
The young hero journeys into danger. At this time he realizes both the intolerable situation that must be righted and the beginnings of his power to right it.
Initiation
Distant Wandering
The nascent hero wanders far afield while finishing his initiation into many different mysteries. Alchemically he combines the secrets he learns into a new mixture, evolving a new mystery which is uniquely his own.
The Road of Trials
The hero wanders through the world overcoming all manner of challenges. Dangerous monsters, sublime riddles, mind-blasting knowledge, and feats of incredible athleticism do not faze the hero. Contact with the divine is dangerous, and only the well practiced hero can survive it.
The Meeting with the Goddess
The hero meets the earth goddess, who may be a beautiful maiden, a bountiful matron, or a wizened hag. She is a mother-figure to the hero. She is wise and instructs the hero in secrets that may allow him to survive her husband's tests.
Woman as the Temptress
Sometimes the hero meets with a woman who wants him to fail. She attempts to lead him off his path. She will be beautiful. She may be actively evil or merely foolish.
Atonement with the Father
The hero meets the sky god, who may be a sinewy youth, giant, muscular man of full growth, a wise elder, or any sort of man. The sky god is a father figure for the hero, and puts the hero through tests that are sure to kill any normal mortal, but through luck, skill, or strength the hero overcomes all the challenges, and is accepted as his father's son.
Apotheosis
The hero becomes divine. The powers inherent in him from his divine father lead him to breeze past further challenges. A light shines from him. His charisma makes everyone love him.
The Ultimate Boon
Finally the hero receives the boon that he went searching for. The boon will be able to reverse the infertility, lack of energy, and poor spirits that blight the lands. It will bring fertility, the principle of growth, energy, and divine grace to the land. It is a thing most devoutly to be wished for. It is the holy grail, the sacred fire of the sun, the immortality potion, the secret of healing.
Return
Refusal of the Return
Sometimes the hero refuses to return from the divine land to everyday life. Alternately, perhaps he refuses to use his gift wisely, like Phaeton driving his father's chariot all over the sky until Zeus had to kill him in order to save the world from burning up. As is the case whenever the hero resists destiny the results of this can be tragic indeed.
The Magic Flight
The hero flies out of the divine land with magical pursuit close on his tail. He may be saved by gifts given him by the guide or earth goddess figures, or through his boon, or even his own cleverness.
Rescue From Without
Sometimes the hero cannot escape from the otherworld on his own. He must be rescued by assistants.
Crossing the Return Threshold
The hero who returns from the otherworld, boon in hand, is obviously divine. He shines with sacred power. Even his touch of his hand is dangerous. His voice is persuasive, his appearance is beautiful to behold.
Magical Contest
At the height of his power the hero opposes and by opposing ends the intolerable situation that forced him to be a hero. This may be a natural phenomenon such as drought or the reign of a tyrant. By his actions the hero brings energy, love, life, and growth back into the world.
Trial or Persecution
After achieving the goal that has shaped his life, the hero is persecuted. He may earn it with his own pride and hubris, for instance by becoming a new tyrant as bad as the one he deposed, or it may be undeserved prosecution by jealous enemies.
Last Scene
In a set piece, the hero bids farewell to his friends and students. The hero knows he is going to die and charges his companions with tasks that he wanted to complete but knows he cannot. He also charges them with the task of spreading the mysteries revealed through his initiation and wanderings.
Violent or Mysterious Death
The hero dies in battle or in some mysterious manner. If he doesn't die in warfare he may simply disappear, ascend into the sky, descend into the earth, or be executed through the machinations of persecutors. He may be torn apart by wild animals or violent ecstatics, as with Orpheus and Dionysos.
Resurrection or Ascension
After his death or disappearance the hero becomes fully divine. Now he can appear to acquaintances as a spirit, or he can be reached through worship. The hero is now a sacred, divine being.
Examples
Here are a few example myths and legends that help demonstrate the way that the patterns work.
The Maori Myth of the World's Creation
The Maori are a tribal people who live in New Guinea, which is near the west coast of Australia. The following example is a Maori myth of the creation of the world. Io is the Maori name for the creator of the world and the universe.
Io dwelt within the breathing-space of immensity.
The Universe was in darkness, with water everywhere.
There was no glimmer of dawn, no clearness, no light.
And he began by saying these words,---
That He might cease remaining inactive:
´Darkness become a light-possessing darkness.'
And at once light appeared.
(He) then repeated those self-same words in this manner.
That He might cease becoming inactive:
´Light, become a darkness-possessing light.'
And again an intense darkness supervened.
Then a third time He spake saying:
´Let there be one darkness above,
Let there be one darkness below.
.................................
Let there be one light above,
Let there be one light below.
.................................
A dominion of light,
A bright light.'
And now a great light prevailed.
(Io) then looked to the waters which compassed him about, and spake a fourth time, saying:
´Ye waters of Tai-kama, be ye separate.
Heaven be formed.' Then the sky became suspended.
´Bring forth though Tupua-horo-nuku.'
And at once the moving earth lay stretched abroad.
Hare Hongi, ´A Maori Cosmogony,' Journal of the Polynesian Society, XVI (1907), pp. 113-14
Io, the Maori Creator, created the world as a way of freeing Himself from His own inactivity, which was shackling Him, binding Him. Not only was the world a gift to the people who followed, but so were His words. In the process of world creation He spoke several formulaic sayings which became key pieces of every Maori ritual. These sayings would be used to quicken a barren womb, to begin a new settlement, before planting a new field, and in other instances of creation. The Maori priests recited them from memory by formula:
The ancient and original sayings.
The ancient and original words.
The ancient and original cosmic wisdom (wananga).
Which caused growth from the void,
The limitless space-filling void,
As witness the tidal-waters,
The evolved heaven,
The birth-given evolved earth.
Ibid.
The Birth of Huitzilopochtli, the Aztec War God
Here's an example of a sacred story that exhibits many of the features of myths and legends. It is a story from Aztec tradition that describes the birth of Huitzilopochtli, the Aztec god of war, and his first battle, which set the mythic pattern for Aztec warfare and also for his worship.
This is a story of Coatlicue, the Lady of the Serpent Skirt, her son Huitzilopochtli, and her four hundred ungrateful children.
One day long ago on Coatepec, the Serpent Mountain, Coatlicue, the mother of the gods, was sweeping out the temple. A beautiful cluster of feathers fell from the sky onto her. Charmed by the windblown treasure she put it in her bosom. Later, she noticed it had disappeared, and at the same time realized she was with child.
When her children, the four hundred southerners or centzon huitznahua, heard the news they were frightened and very angry. Coyolxauhqui, the warrior sister, incited them against their mother. Coyolxauhqui said they must kill their mother before she bore a child of the sky, a god who would kill them all. Alarmed, the four hundred southerners distributed their armaments, their armor of paper, their sharp pointed arrows, their nettles and lances. They assembled in ranks, and led by the fierce warrior Coyolxauhqui, they marched to make war on the Serpent Mountain.
Coatlicue saw their advance and was frightened. And a voice spoke from her womb, saying "have no fear, already I know what I must do."
The army, led by Coyolxauhqui, charged the mountaintop. As they were in the fury of their attack, poised to destroy their mother, the god Huitzilopochtli leaped from his mother's womb, full grown and dressed as a warrior, and opposed his brothers and sisters in battle. He seized a serpent of fire in one hand, charged his sister Coyolxauhqui, and beheaded her at the first stroke. He kicked her body and she went crashing down the mountainside, her body falling to pieces on the way down. Her body separated into many parts, legs, arms, torso, liver, head, hands, heart, feet. The four hundred southerners were afraid.
Then Huitzilopochtli turned upon them. He was in a fierce rage and he attacked his siblings. He drove them down the mountain, humiliated them, utterly destroyed them. At the end of the day only the young god was left. Huitzilopochtli had annihilated the four hundred southerners. He was the conquering god, drenched in the blood of his enemies.
That is the story of the birth of Huitzilopochtli on the serpent mountain, Coatepec.
This bloodthirsty story operates on several levels. First of all, it's a gripping tale that explains the personality that Aztecs perceive in warfare. The story of the birth of the god of war demonstrates how war was invented, how it was created and defined by the god of war, the most proficient killer of all time. Secondly, it is also a legend with historical roots. Ancient Aztec records mention a key battle at a mountain called Coatepec in which a leader named Huitzilopochtli fought and beheaded an enemy woman warrior named Coyolxauhqui. Third, the Aztecs called their main temple Coatepec, El Templo Mayor. The structure of the mountain in this story, with the temple on top of serpent mountain, and Coyolxauhqui who is beheaded on the top yet rolls to the bottom, explain the structure of Aztec temples, which are step pyramids built in the form of mountains, and the ritual uses of the temple. At the top of the steps are the twin temples, one to Tlaloc the rain god and one to Huitzilopochtli. There are twin statues of serpents at the top of the stairs. At the bottom of the stairs is a carving of a dismembered Coyolxauhqui. Fourth, the story has astronomical significance, representing the sun as it rises over the sacred mountain in the morning, killing the moon and the four hundred stars. Fifth, this cosmic victory is represented as a battle and a sacrifice, which shows that the world is violent. The natural way as dictated by the gods and the cosmos is to make war and sacrifice. Sixth, Huitzilopochtli's annihilation of the enemy explains the proper rituals to perform after victory in war. The enemy must be brought to the temple and sacrificed at the top and all over--down the steps, around the base, in the temple doorway, everywhere. The righteous warrior is covered in blood at the end of the conflict, the blood of his enemies and also his own blood, for bleeding is another facet of Aztec religion.
There are other nuggets of truth hidden in the story, details of Aztec dress such as their love for beautiful feathers, the importance of mountains to Aztec life, the mother sweeping the temple at the beginning.
Even though we might doubt that things in this story occurred exactly as described, it's equally obvious that it vibrates on multiple levels with Truth about the Aztec world and soul. Truth, to a religious person, is not a petty adherence to strictly provable fact. Truth is more than that, much more. Truth reveals something about the world, something that cannot be revealed in another way. It is a unique statement, a definition. It is poetry, and to those who listen it is as inevitable and awe-inspiring as a hurricane. Truth sweeps aside everything in its path. Truth is power and beauty.
One of the last visions Hernan Cortes' Spanish forces had of the Templo Mayor, Coatepec, before they besieged and conquered the capital city of Tenochtitlan, was the Aztec priests' last-minute sacrifice of several captured Spanish soldiers. The captives were marched up the steps of Coatepec, made to hold feathers like swords in their hands and dance before the statue of Huitzilopochtli, then were quickly placed on a narrow altar and sacrificed. Those watching may have hoped for a miracle like the one that saved Isaac from Abraham's sacrificial knife in 22 Genesis, but no such thing appeared. The priests sawed open the chests of the Spanish sacrifices and snatched their still-beating hearts into the sunlight, then the priests decapitated the bodies and kicked them down the steps of the temple. Those waiting below dismembered the corpses, completing the ritual which re-enacted Huitzilopochtli's victory over the four hundred southerners. Massively outnumbered, the horrified Spanish fled before they could be taken. They returned in an unassailable force and took the city.
The Aztecs hoped their sacrifice would let Huitzilopochtli's prowess flow into them so they could fight off the Spanish. But their sacrifice was ineffective, too late, too little, or it fell on deaf ears. The god did not answer. The sacrifice was impotent and its memory aroused righteous rage in the Spanish, and soon Cortes' army took the Aztec empire's capital.
Hernan Cortes' Spanish would have agreed that the myth that told the story of Huitzilopochtli's birth was accurate. It told the truth about what would happen in Tenochtitlan. It shaped Aztec behavior and culture, specifically that of war and the capital of the empire. The story was sacred and powerful. To the Spanish it was a nightmare, a horrible dream which turned their own myths upside down and recalled the furnaces of Molech in Canaan which Moses warned against in the Bible. To the Aztecs the story was Sacred Truth.
It is even possible to understand the actions of the Aztecs, if not to empathize with them. You may recoil from the blood sacrifice of another human being, but if you believed what they believed would you have done any differently? If you can see why the Aztecs behaved as they did then you have begun to understand the power of myth to shape human lives, and the power of religion.
Mundane and Sacred Storytelling
Common folktales told for amusement are told at any time. They can be told during fieldwork, while washing or hunting, or on long trips. They are most commonly told at night, around the fire, and people often compete to tell stories in the most fancy and embroidered way possible. Everybody owns the common folktales, just as anybody who can remember a joke owns it and can repeat it.
Sacred stories, on the other hand, are only told at certain times. They may be kept to a single season such as winter, the season for religious instruction. They may only be told in small groups, by the men apart from women and children, or by women apart from men and children. Sacred stories are true and are thus told in a uniform manner. Consistency is important. They don't change from one telling to the next. Religious specialists keep the stories until they are ready to pass them on to a younger man or woman.
In a culture in which religious truths are passed down orally, in narrated stories, the elders and other religious specialists tell the stories. For example, the Celts had a specialist religious caste, the bards, to tell these stories, just as they had another religious caste, the druids, to perform rituals and sacrifices. It was forbidden to write sacred stories down, and that is how the Celtic priesthood retained its monopoly on the definition of what is sacred.
In a religion that is written down in everyday language anybody can read the sacred scripts. The stories themselves are not restricted to religious specialists. Interpretation of the stories, on the other hand, is a privilege reserved for religious specialists. Ordinary believers are prohibited from interpreting sacred writings. That task is confined to the priesthood.
The Mythopoet's Struggle
Websters' Dictionary defines a Mythopoet as a mythmaker, one who produces myths, one who encourages the creation of myths. Those who serve as GameMaster for various roleplaying games are, without question, Mythopoets.
Given our thesis that Myth is an understanding reached by a culture and expressed by an individual, you may wonder how you can think of anything that resonates with the same sort of power and truth as Myth?
Start by creating the world and universe. Put emptiness, creator, creation, judgment, and cataclysm together. Create a cosmic myth cycle. This will serve as the pattern for other myths and legends. Follow the cosmic cycle when you record other myths. Eventually you can use this cycle and other mythic variants of it to steer the action of your campaign. You will not have to force this, actions will copy the patterns of myth and legend on their own. Once you and the players know the patterns of myth and legend they will understand what works and what doesn't, and your campaign will naturally follow the path blazed by your invented myths and legends.
Every construction or fabrication has the cosmogony as paradigmatic model.
Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane
Once you create the world in myth, you have a foundation upon which to build the rest of myth for your religion. The origin of the people follows the same pattern. If the universe came from darkness, then darkness figures in the origin of the people. If the world was made from paper clips they had better have something to do with the tribe's origin. The creation of the world is also an important pattern for all the rituals in your invented religion. Whatever process created the world will be the same process that is used to initiate persons into the culture. For example, in the beginning of Genesis God separates the earth from the waters, thereby giving birth to the world. John's ritual of baptism, adopted by the Christian church, reflected this cosmic myth of a world newborn from the depths and made it personal.
Mythic Questing
We've already put forward the idea that somewhere, somewhen outside of the stream of sequential time, there is or was a place known as the Mythic Realm. Divine beings live there: the sacred gods. They live out their stories and their tales are reflected in our rituals and in our lives every year, every month, every day.
It's possible to set up your campaign so that the influence goes both ways. Not only does the Mythic Realm and the wheel of myth stamp its features into the sequential time of our lives, but our lives can affect the form of myth. For adventurous and brave individuals can explore the Mythic Realm.
What happens when a myth can be visited? What about changing it?
Ritual
Ritual is the most common way of interacting with myth. Through ritual participants perform the very same actions that the gods performed in the Mythic Realm. Through this repetition they strengthen the god's hold on them and on the world, and they also reinforce the god's actions in the mythic world. Rituals strengthen the god's mythic self through repetition. This is a kind of worship that sends primal flux to the gods. Divinities love it when mortals worship them this way, for this gives them primal flux and it also reinforces their identity, it strengthens them.
This faithful repetition of divine models has a two-fold result: (1) by imitating the gods, man remains in the sacred, hence in reality; (2) by the continuous reactualization of paradigmatic divine gestures, the world is sanctified. Men's religious behavior contributes to maintaining the sanctity of the world.
Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane
Sometimes worshippers diverge from the official rituals. They change a detail here, a movement there, and reinforce a course of action that the divinity did not originally pursue. If rituals can strengthen the god's mythic forms, then rituals are also capable of changing their forms. Divergent rituals have the effect of creating slightly different gods and myths. They open up the possibilities for the gods. This only has a minor effect in the short term, but after a while such ritual divergence can propagate among the myths that are sources for ritual. The myths themselves can change with time, to fit the altered mythic realm.
Bold Action in the Mythic Realm
If slight changes in ritual can bring about mythic changes over a long time, then boldly conceived and executed rituals may be able to make changes in the mythic realm much more quickly. This is what we call the Mythic Quest, a free exploration of the mythic realm with the intent to claim and exploit it much as explorers do with any new territory.
The myths of mortal religions are enacted in countless variations throughout the infinite mythic realm. Wanderers in these lands will encounter their gods in many stories, some familiar, some just slightly "off," and some totally unknown. Many of these unfamiliar stories will be secrets for one religious sect or another, and it is unlikely for those who don't know the stories to be able to safely interact with them.
Dangers of the Mythic Quest
Mortals who can find their way to the mythic realm through rituals skillfully performed, or other means of conveyance, can become part of myth. They can enter the immortal stories of myth, participate in the divine quests that created the world, find divine artifacts, and interact with divine beings. Unfortunately the natural laws in the mythic realm differ greatly from natural law in our world. One common difference is death, which operates differently or doesn't exist at all for many dwellers in the mythic realm. For instance, many divine beings don't die permanently when they are slaughtered and their flesh eaten. They can be restored to life easily by piling their bones together and covering the bones with their skin. This trick doesn't work with mortals, which is too bad for mortal visitors to the mythic realm who promise to feed certain gluttonous divinities. There are plenty of other differences between our world and the mythic realm. Read a few myths of any sort for more examples.
