Category talk:Fictional deities

Real gods.

If one person states that a listed "fictional" god is in fact real, is that grounds for reclassification? - Jeandré, 2004-08-30t20:56z

The way I see it: No. These gods were created for the purpose of fiction, and so even if some whacky guy starts believing in them, their original function as entities of fiction (not of religious worship) does remain such.

But even if we didn't care about their origins, only about the level of belief in them (which I'm sure many wikipedians will argue in favour) -- a single person simply *stating* a god of this list to be real, would also have to convince us that he actually believes what he/she said and not just trying to be funny or obnoxious. And perhaps even then they'd probably have to show that there's a significant number of other people that currently or in the past seriously believed in this entity (and weren't trying to be funny either -- e.g the Invisible Pink Unicorn).

Aris Katsaris 22:22, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

With Matthew, Mark, Luke and John all unavailable for comment, who's to say that the Gospels aren't just jokes people didn't get? Boffy b 22:06, 2005 Feb 10 (UTC)

I have an example of a deity invented for a work of fiction, and later worshipped earnestly: Sun Wukong from Journey to the West. - Kfroog 08:03, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

I would like to ask that, if you refuse to remove any of the additions herein, you add to the list. Include Yahweh, Jesus Christ, Krishna, and other such dieties. You can't say, as a completely unbiased source, one god is real and another is not. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.52.15.170 (talk) 05:08, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Name change?

I was just thinking about the name again because it's been kind of bugging me. Perhaps a better place would be [[category:Deities in fiction]]? Arguably every single deity in history could be listed here by the definition of fictional, whereas by saying "in fiction" you're more strictly implying characters from works intended as fictional, if that makes sense. Works of mythology/religion weren't intended as fiction, so it effectively removes the discrepancy. Sound good to people? Sarge Baldy 16:53, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)

That would be even more confusing, as "real" deities have been written about in fiction. Basically, deities listed here are those that everyone agrees are fictional, while others are believed in and may in fact be real. ··gracefool |☺ 03:28, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)

If everyone doesn't agree that one listed here is fictional, is that grounds for reclassification? - Jeandré, 2004-09-02t20:42z

I've already answered you above on this. Do you have a specific entity you are concerned about or is this completely theoretical on your part? Aris Katsaris 21:50, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Numbers: I wanted to know if Gracefool thought that one believer would be grounds, but he later clarified: a significant number. One or a small number of people, may find it BPOV that what they see as a revealed story of their diety(ies), is classified as fiction by people who think them "whacky". Of course many people would see it as BPOV if we just merged this list with Category:Deities, and some people could already be offended that we have a list of deities. If a large(?) group claim what was previously regarded by everyone to be a deity written as part of non supernaturally inspired fiction, was infact revealed (possibly unbeknownst to the author (at the time)); should we then reclassify it? Is it simply down to a NPOV concensus by those interested in this classification, on a case by case situation?

Truly believe: I'm also thinking about something less clear cut/jokey than for Invisible Pink Unicorns; where it may not be possible to distinguish between true-belief and faking. -- Jeandré, 2004-09-23t21:55z

Once again I'm asking: Do you have a *specific* example of such a deity or is this just some theoretical what-if game for you? Because I can't think of any such example. And in the talk page I'm allowed to call as many people "whacky" as I feel like as long as my POV doesn't influence the article or category themselves. Aris Katsaris 00:31, 4 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Generally, I was thinking that it would be good if we could figure out definitions and requirements to determine if something is a fictional deity or not. As for a specific example, see Rwv37's comment that categorizing IPU as fictional is a POV statement. IPU is not a particular problem, but future classifications might be. -- Jeandré, 2004-09-06t22:10z

Hypothetical discussion are only useful only that far. If there's ever a case of actual dispute we may go on discussing this. So far the definition the category provides is good enough. Aris Katsaris 23:16, 6 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Yes, if the number of people truly believing in the deity is significant (50+?). ··gracefool |☺ 05:35, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Would Jim Jones's followers be enough to classify him as a deity? What other requirements, if any, could be used? Would current believers be grounds for splitting list of deities and list of mythological beings? -- Jeandré, 2004-09-23t21:55z

Was Jim Jones believed to be a deity or simply an apostle or prophet or messiah? Either way I gather he's not a fictional person, so that's a question that doesn't concern this category. And I don't see any good in dividing modern day popular religions from ancient ones, especially given the fact of neopagan revivals of old belief-systems. Aris Katsaris 00:31, 4 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Christian Messiah [1] [2] [3] = deity, no? -- Jeandré, 2004-09-06t22:10z

Most Christians believe that their Messiah was indeed God made flesh, but the word "messiah" (meaning something like "saviour" I believe) doesn't necessarily imply a deity at all times. Jews for example don't expect the messiah to be a God but rather a person. Aris Katsaris 23:16, 6 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Yeah, I should've said "who have believed" rather than "believing". ··gracefool |☺ 02:55, 4 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Support move to "Category:Deities in fiction". Every deity is fictional, but not every deity has appeared in fiction, and if a hypothetical real deity did appear in fiction in a significant way, that deity would merit inclusion in the category. For example, if the god Odin was real, but a fictionalized version of him like Odin (comics) was created in a fictional world, the fictionalized version would be categorized here (and should be even though he's not real, but the current category name fails to draw a clear distinction between fictional gods that don't appear in "fiction" and fictional gods that do). Yahweh, Shiva and the gods of Discworld are all equally likely from an unbiased scientific standpoint to be fictional (i.e. "An imaginative creation or a pretense that does not represent actuality but has been invented." [4]), but only the Discworld gods are explicitly deities that primarily appear in fiction (rather than mythology or pseudohistory). -Silence 09:09, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

Changed my mind based on Category:Fictional elves being a subcategory of Category:Elves. Keeping things consistent is more important than going to huge lengths to be clear. -Silence 09:11, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

Following your rule, adding Portrayals of God in popular media to this category. ~ Robin Lionheart (talk) 09:13, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Source info?

Just a suggestion, might it not be worth the effort to add the fictional source of each deity on this page? Maybe re-organize it into a chart which gives: | Deity | Source | Notes | or something like that. Or just put the name of the source in parentheses after the deities' names on the list. Some of them already are, since the name of the page they go to could refer to something else otherwise, but maybe all of them should be changed to conform to that standard? Otherwise you'd have to click on every one and read its associated article to figure out where it came from. Just think this list would be more useful if it included this info on it somehow. -- Lurlock 18:03, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Such information would be better at List of fictional deities, see WP:CLS#Advantages_of_lists. -- Jeandré, 2006-05-07t08:41z

Question

Aren't all deities fictional? Then this category is a redundancy. Madhava 1947 (talk) 10:24, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

I was just thinking exactly the same thing! This is a nonsense category.

Well, it seems that the consensus is to keep it, regardless of whether it's a nonsense category or not. -- JediLofty ^{User | Talk} 10:08, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Not everyone who uses Wikipedia is an atheist. --75.135.82.7 (talk) 20:25, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Deity characters

Referring to "fictional deities" as "deity characters" is how I clarify the difference on disambiguation pages. It is a nontrivial distinction.

Characters like Cthulhu, Lolth, or Sauron have never been called upon to justify killing real people in the real world, and have probably never been the subject of serious, sustained worship by any real-world group, i.e. such belief is non-notable. (Although the characters may easily meet criteria for fiction notability.)

Deities that have actual worshipers, in the most notable cases, have been called upon to justify wars and takings by real people upon other real people in the real world. This is underpinning of a great amount of documented human history, and it is irrelevant to the issue of inclusion in this category whether any (or which) of these deities was merely invented by somebody at some point.

Interesting cases are Xenu (a featured article) and the Jedi census phenomenon. Xenu is traceable to the writings of a science fiction author with an intent to found a religion, while the real-world Jedi are fans that may have found a spiritual fulfillment in Star Wars, while director George Lucas may have intended nothing of the kind. Whatever their connections to fiction, these have become real world religious phenomena, with notable impact on society. Fictional deities, or deity characters are never the subject of genuine worship. —Yamara ✉ 07:55, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Just as real-world Pastafarians may have found spiritual fulfillment in the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Whatever its connections to parody, Pastafarianism has produced real world religious phenomena such as Pastafarian holiday pageants and ordained Pastafarian ministers performing Pastafarian weddings. Causing changes in public policy on several occasions also seems like a notable impact on society to me. ~ Robin Lionheart (talk) 23:05, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Should this category be added to the broader category Fictional characters who use magic?

Unless there are fictional deities that lack powers, methinks we may wish for this category to be listed as a subcategory of the other.  Thoughts?  allixpeeke (talk) 05:57, 28 March 2019 (UTC)