Re: They _don't_ have a word for it!

taliesin the storyteller wrote:
> Same problem here - there are religions of course, and common words for
> "little-g" gods.
Japanese uses _kamisama_ for the Judeo-Christian God.  It's from _kami_,
"god" plus -sama "Lord/Lady", thus "Lord God", presumably a translation
of Western terms.  The Kassí did the same thing that Western languages
did when they became monotheistic, take the old common word for "god"
and make it into a name, "God".

> Many pay (more or less seriously) homage to a more or less personified
> "luck"; there's also a bit of ancestor-worship and awe of planets with
> naturally occuring life, the stars and star systems that support them,
> and astronomical objects and effects that are capable of snuffing out
> said systems, stars and planets, like black holes, supernovas, gaseous
> clouds and the like.
My confuture has a religion that worships a personification of the
Universe, known as Cosmos.  Cosmos created the Universe, and at the same
time, was created by the Universe, by all sentient life.  Theologians
debate over exactly what this means, how the creation can create the
creator.  :-)

Also, species as a whole are believed to possess racial souls.  Thus,
there is a Spirit of Humanity, for instance.  Individual salvation is
achieved thru the upward progress of the race.

> Exactly, though many believe in some form of reincarnation or other,
> this is seen as a good thing and not something to be freed from.
The Kassí believe in a form of reincarnation, but very different from
any concept I've come across in human cultures.  I wouldn't be surprised
if it does exist, however.  Everyone, they believe, has two souls.  At
death, these souls are released, and are later reincarnated, but not
together.  They pair up with a different soul.  Insanity is seen as the
result of a bad pairing of souls, the result of constant fighting
between the two souls.  Thus, while there is reincarnation, there is not
reincarnation in the sense of "I was so-and-so in my past life", but
rather, "One of my souls was one of so-and-so's souls in a past life"

> Does the Kash have any concept of heaven/Eden/paradise?
The Kassí believe that if you are sufficiently enlightened, you may
escape the cycle of reincarnations and join the Children of Goddess.
And if you're sufficiently corrupted, you will join the Rebels (roughly
equivalent to the Devil and his demons in Christianity).  But most
people are in between those two extremes.

--
Cenedl heb iaith, cenedl heb galon
A nation without a language is a nation without a heart - Welsh proverb
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