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Now within any universe you might find galactic clusters and delving deeper galaxies. And of course galaxies contain stars and around stars circle planets. But what is important is the beings who live on these planets or who have lived on them.
Before we go on let me make something very clear. I do not believe that our gods are aliens. I do not believe that there are intergalactic intelligences flying around and exercising mighty sciences upon us poor primitives. I do not believe that the afterlife takes place on some far planet and that if we stand on a tall building with a pyramid hat on our heads we will be beamed home.
I believe that the vast majority of the powers that are manifested throughout the history of Earth are tied to the Earth and that the Earth is integral to the beings of the gods. I believe that the most common source for Earthly gods can be found in the Earth, or rather, in millions upon millions of the tombs of our ancestors. Sound a bit morbid? Well it shouldn't. There are few if any cultures throughout the course of human history that have not revered their ancestors in some way. You need to look at it in terms of the above statements about the Word and how it is in all of us. Since all of those living beings who have existed on the Earth have had the latent potential to manifest deity it is unreasonable to think that some have not done so. I believe that this is the source of the many pantheons of gods and goddesses that have been worshipped throughout the ages. So when I look at the gods I see not mystical beings, but elder statesmen (of a sort) who are to be respected and learned from, but not worshipped. You might say that all that sets us apart from the gods is a realization.
This does not go so far as to explain certain other things, though, such as gods possessed of many arms or the head of a stag. Under one school of thought you would say that these visualizations are the result of primitive minds trying to explain characteristics through some medium that made sense. For instance, a stag headed god is understood to be close to nature and to animals in a more fundamental way than trying to explain the same concepts when there may be no common ground between the speakers, or when there is simply not the intelligence to understand more complex philosophies. This could explain why so many gods across the world have been pictures with animal heads. This is certainly the explanation favoured by anthropologists since archeologists have yet to dig up bones that say otherwise. So according to this reasoning you would look back in history and at some point somewhere you would find the primitive hunter who lived in close connection to the Earth and one day slipped over the line and became a power. As a god he may have then been interpreted as having the head of a stag by the people he encountered.
I don't know that I personally hold to this theory, though I admit it makes a great deal of sence. Another theory might tell us that when someone reaches that point where they begin to cross the veil there is a blending and a merging of energies where reality becomes fluid and the impossible becomes true. So as they become a god their being changes in ways that acentuate their personality and influence the forms they appear in.
A third belief might tell us a different story, one of magick and power and people who could change their forms. Through this lens you might look back thousands of years to perceive a fierce warrior woman who has harnessed great powers and can change her form to that of a raven. As she learns these skills and masters her will she grows closer and closer to that point where she one days ceases to be woman and is instead a goddess. I tend to like this idea and it is upon it that the next section grows.
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