Nick Griffiths Haynes: The concept of deity within druidry is extremely complex and intensely personal. One definition is simply that a deity is a power of nature with the power to kill. Another could be a spirit so large that we are never out of its presence. This leaves us with examples like the wind, the rain, and the sun. Then there are the named gods, those ancestral deities, whose pantheons have evolved with the scattered tribes of humanity, springing up out of oral traditions across the globe. Tales told by the fire side of heroes and magicians, the god who made the desert, the great smith who works unceasingly inside the volcano, the woman who rides her white horses across the wild seas …
Susan Warren: Deity is a power and spirit of nature able to destroy and create, for example chaos, darkness, earth, procreation, fear, and lust. Free of the human constructs of good and evil, it is neither benevolent nor wicked. Deity simply is. The gods care no more for humans than they do for anything else. The intent of deity is only the expression of its power and this is where interest in humans arises. Where empathy exists, so does the potential for relationship where we can become expressions of that power.
Red Griffiths-Haynes: For me, the expression of deity and the god’s as they are perceived within modern druidry are many and varied. Central to my understanding of druidry is my relationship with my gods, they are my greatest teachers, inspiring service and devotion to my craft. Simply, I understand the gods to be powers of nature such as mud and rain, fire or love. They are the powers that touch our lives and affect the survival of humanity, provoking us into relationship with them and into awe at their inevitability and unstoppableness. They do not have personality and they do not care – the rain does not care for us – they simply are. Throughout time, humans have told stories of the gods, written mythologies and given them names – Cerridwen, Rhiannon, Isis and Cernunnos, personifying those powers of nature and enabling understanding and relationship. These are the ancient and ancestral gods, caught within the consciousness of humanity, fed and strengthened by generations, teaching us the nature of deity and relationship with those forces of nature around us, showing us how we might survive. Some of their names we have forgotten, their tales falling away as our relationship with nature changes others walk with us still, continuing to touch our lives, telling the story of our humanity
Watching Falcon: My definition of deity seems to expand the more I think about it. For me it is a “force” that is greater that we can comprehend. It is creation and life itself. It shows itself in different forms and at different times. It can be seen as the powers of nature or in the guise of different gods and goddesses. I believe that deity communicates to us in a way that we can best understand it…..for some it is spirits of nature; animal guides; angels; or various gods or goddesses; etc. For me I relate to animal guides and a particular pantheon…If an angel came to me speaking a language other than English there would be a big communication problem.
Red Raven: A sentient life force that exists in a different plane of existence that can choose to interact or not with humanity.
Bish: In my reality, the (infinite all that is) universe and all universes, i.e. the multiverse (I like the term ‘verse), is made up of fragmented deity. That which IS.
In a Singular time, deity desired to see its own self (when you are everything, there is nowhere else to hang a mirror!) and, in order to do so, fragmented itself into an infinity of deity. It therefore follows that everything, everyone, all that is in this universe and all others, is deity. In the same way that white light may be split by a prism into all the colours of the perceivable spectrum (along with some we cannot normally perceive), deity may be viewed from many perspectives. From some perspectives these ‘colours’ might resemble the various pantheons of the polytheists. From other perspectives only one or two of the ‘colours’ are seen, or perhaps so many one runs out of names. This means that I must not only treat everything I interact with as a facet of deity, but I must accept that I too am in a tangible fashion godlike. Not in my gods image but a part of my god. It means that when I perceive spirit within people, animals, trees, rocks, streams and winds I am perceiving deity. It means I find communion with deity wherever I am – all I have to do it turn off the noise of the mundane world and ‘tune in’ to the song we all hear all the time and therefore for the most part ignore.
AntonyB:
First Cause, One and the Many
Many faces in which One Being
Beyond all the forms we can see
One Form, centre of all Meaning
Spirits of the land and sky and sea
Within wind, rain, water and fire
Elemental forces, in all that we see
Gods of hearth and home, our desire
God reflected in every single face
Definitions of deity to here refashion
The stranger is a brother to embrace
An image in love, care, compassion
Deity defined: words fail to say how
Except: this is thou, neither is this thou
Phil Ryder:I can share my personal understanding of deity but I am unable to define that which changes with every step. Like a walk through an unknown forest my definition would be based on the path walked, having no way of knowing the wonders to be perceived just around the next corner. The path has led me to feel that nature is a manifestation of deity, not necessarily deity, but the essence of deity. It goes beyond being a force or an energy, these being just physical manifestations of that essence, it is the sacred power of existence that flows from the cauldron of potential, in my Druidry understood as the Awen. Though the Awen we gain conscious connection with deity, we are enthused and inspired by that connection, we are driven to creativity by it. If the essence of deity is expressed within nature then through nature we can also connect with the divine. Seeking understanding of the interactions within the physical we come to a point of glimpsing how that interconnectedness shapes the world in which we live and more importantly how we can change it. And so to return to deity, is it a god or gods or could it be best described as a divine principle? I can’t currently say. It is enough to simply say that deity is the focus of my religious practice.