This taste was not destroyed by Gotama's dicta as to the limits of profitable knowledge nor did new deities arouse hostility because they were not mentioned in the ancient scriptures.
A richer mythology surrounds them but in the fluidity of their outline, their mutability and their readiness to absorb or become all other deitiesthey follow the old lines.
One of the most interesting and impressive of Vedic deities is Varuṇa, often invoked with a more shadowy double called Mitra.
But some Vedic deities are drawn more distinctly, particularly Indra, who having more character has also lasted longer than most of his fellows, partly because he was taken over by Buddhism and enrolled in the retinue of the Buddha.
But it is clear that when the Buddha preached in Kosala and Magadha, the local deities had not attained any such position.
And even when Indian deities are most personal, as in the Vishnuite sects, it will be generally found that their relations to the world and the soul are not those of the Christian God.
Semitic polytheism is mainly due to the number of tribes and localities possessing separate deities, not to the number of deities worshipped by each place and tribe.
The creative deities are said to have produced the world by Tapas, just as they are said to have produced it by sacrifice and Hindu mythology abounds in stories of ascetics who became so mighty that the very gods were alarmed.
Most Hindus are apparently polytheists, that is to say they venerate the images of several deities or spirits, yet most are monotheists in the sense that they address their worship to one god.
The salient feature of this mixed creed was the theory that the Shinto deities were transmigrations of Buddhist divinities.
In this country, since the Age of Deities down to the present reign, the Imperial line has been unbroken through ninety generations.
This obligation was guaranteed by invoking the curse of all the guardian deities of the empire on the head of anyone violating the engagement.
If a man took oath to the deities of his innocence and was prepared to thrust his arm into boiling mud or water, or to lay a red-hot axe on the palm of his hand, he was held to have complied with all the requirements.
The Sun goddess, Amaterasu, and the goddess of Food (Ukemochi no Kami) are the two deities now worshipped at the great shrine of Ise.
On the day of the coronation the Nakatomi performs service to the deities of heaven and the Imibe makes offerings of three kinds of sacred articles.
These deities were now supplemented, not supplanted.
In the context of this revelation it is noticeable that belief in the malign influence of offended deities was gaining ground.
It was the sovereign who made offerings to the deities of heaven and earth at the great religious festivals.
If these injunctions be obeyed, the deities of heaven and earth and the ancestral Kami will protect the virtuous army in its assault upon the wicked traitors.
Now seeing that thy Majesty is thus Greater than householddeities like us, We render up to thy more powerful guard, This Tower.
Did a process of this sort ever occur in Greek religion, and were older animal gods ever collected into the temples of such deities as Apollo?
Race comes out in that, as it does in the endless sacrifices, soma drinking, magical austerities, and puerile follies of Vedic and Brahmanic gods, the deities of a people fallen early into its sacerdotage and priestly second childhood.
And celebrating the Darsa and Paurnamasya sacrifices, that one devoid of guile, used to pass his days by taking the food that remained after the deities and the guests had eaten.
There are also in the Lamite religion a great many fabulous deities represented by monstrous idols, which appear to be old reminiscences of a primitive creed anterior to Buddhism.
Religion: Caste deities The caste especially revere Mahadeo or Siva, who gave them the oil-mill.
From this it may perhaps be concluded that the images of the deities were decorated with garlands of roses in Europe, and the development of the rosary was the same as the Indian mala.
The shrines of these deities are generally built under a banyan tree and open to the east.
The names of archangels thus mixed up with Hindu deities may most probably have been obtained from the Muhammadans, as they include Azrael; but in Gujarat their religion appears to have been borrowed from Christianity.
In place of it they smear the stone with vermilion, which seems obviously a substitute for blood, since it is used to colour the stones representing the deities in exactly the same manner.
The caste worship the ordinary Hindu deities and especially Bhairon, the guardian of the gate of Mahadeo's temple.
Religion Their principal deitiesare Dulha Deo, the boy bridegroom, Nira his servant, and Kauria a form of Devi.
Neither the pipal nor banyan trees should be planted in the yard of a house, because the leavings of food might fall upon them, and this would be an insult to the deities who inhabit the sacred trees.
Religion The principal deities of the caste are Maroti or Hanuman, Mahadeo or Siva, Devi, Satwai and Khandoba.
In this month also all the village deities are worshipped by the Joshi or priest and the villagers.
In former times it may have been thought that the desecration of their sacred element was an insult to the deities of rivers and streams, which would bring down retribution on the offender.
Minor godlings "But in the concerns of this world, to obtain good crops and freedom from sickness, a host of minor deities have to be propitiated.
They may not make offerings to their deities nor touch any persons outside the family, nor wear head-cloths or shoes.
Jensen's theory that Haman and Vashti were Elamite deities in opposition to the Babylonian deities Mordecai (Marduk) and Esther (Ishtar).
Accordingly, in a discussion of the origin of Purim it is safer at present to lay no weight on the supposed religious antagonism between the deities of Babylon and Elam.
Along with Anaitis at Zela there were worshipped two deities named Omanos and Anadates; Strabo says that they were Persian divinities, and certainly their ritual as described by him was purely Persian.
In this way new songs and dances are constantly originating, the material for them being, of course, always taken from the tribal deities of the particular singer and poet.
The Egyptian deities Keb, Nut, and Thoth are called by Plutarch by the Greek names of Cronus, Rhea, and Hermes.
Sometimes the deities are represented in these processions by living men, who are believed to be possessed by the divine spirit.
Now we have seen that, in the opinion of some eminent modern scholars, the basis of the book of Esther is not history but a Babylonian myth, which celebrated the triumphs and sufferings of deities rather than of men.
Chief among these cosmic deities was the sun-god Re, whose supremacy seemed predestined under the cloudless sky of Egypt.
An extension of the principle that created the cosmic gods gave rise to a large number of minor deities and demons.
Nevertheless Egyptian cults, and particularly those of Serapis and Isis, found welcome acceptance on European soil; and the shrines of Egyptian deities were established in all the great cities of the Roman Empire.
Of the old deities Ammon represented by far the wealthiest and most powerful interests, and against this long favoured deity the Pharaoh hurled himself with fury.
There are but few of the greater deities who were not at some time or another identified with the solar god Re.
The land held in the name of different deitiesis estimated at about 15% of the whole of Egypt; various temples of Ammon owned two-thirds of this, Re of Heliopolis and Ptah of Memphis being the next in wealth.
At a very early date the anthropomorphizing tendency caused the animal deities to be represented with human bodies, though as a rule they retained their animal heads; so in the case of Seth as early as the IInd Dynasty.
In this way a large number of deities came to enjoy special reverence in restricted territories, e.
But the multitude of the deitiesand the variety of the myths that it strove to incorporate prevented the development of a uniform theological system, and the heterogeneous origin of the religion remained irretrievably stamped upon its face.
In contradistinction to the tribal gods, it rarely happened that the cosmic deities enjoyed a cult.
These meetings took place on the spot where the sacred shield had fallen from heaven, and here Numa dedicated a grove to the Camenae, like Egeria deities of springs.
Neither the influx of new deities nor the diligence of the priestly authors and commentators availed to break down the cast-iron traditions with which the compilers of the Pyramid texts were already familiar.
The greater number of the temples to the native deities in Upper Egypt and in Nubia (to 50 m.
Pairs of deities whose personalities are often blended or interchanged are Hathor and Nut, Sakhmi and Pakhe, Seth and Apophis.
And the deities accompanied by Agastya and celestial choristers and huge snakes and highly-gifted saints, approached the immense watery waste.
There the deities had practised asceticism in former days, and likewise virtuous rulers of men had performed sacrificial rites.
Thus addressed by him, the deities then spake to the saint, saying, 'This deed we ask thee to achieve, viz.
Thus these two foremost of the deities have sprung from thy body in order to do thy work!
The deities said, 'Thou wert formerly the refuge of the gods when they were oppressed by Nahusha.
Perhaps, we have not worshipped the deitiesthat cause calamities, or perhaps, we have not paid them the first homage.
And celebrating the Darsa and Paurnamasya sacrifices, that one devoid of guile, used to pass his days by taking the food that remained after the deities and the guests had eaten.
And the deitiesenquired of the great Indra, 'What is to be sucked by this boy?
Asshur-izir-pal mentions Asshur and Shamas as the tutelary deities under whose influence he carried on his various wars.
Sargon dedicated to him the north gate of his city, in conjunction with Vul, the god of the air, built a temple to him at Khorsabad in conjunction with Sin, and assigned him the third place among the tutelary deities of his new town.
Sargon names Vul in the fourth place among the tutelary deities of his city, and dedicates to him the north gate in conjunction with the Sun-god, Shamas.
Martu, Bel, Il or Ra, and the presiding deities of the city of Asshur, palaces for his own use, and castles for the protection of his territory.
Gula, the Sum-goddess, does not occupy a very high position among the deities of Assyria.
Asshur-bani-pal also paid him considerable respect, mentioning him and his wife Warmita, as the deities under whose auspices he undertook certain literary labors.
In the Black-Obelisk invocation, out of thirteen deities named, she is the twelfth.
Where are they but carried captive to Assyria, prisoners and slaves in the temples of those deities whose power they ventured to resist?
These worshippers of thedeities of old are dressed as follows.
This stupendous machine paused for a moment beneath the window of their Majesties, and the aquatic deities having made their obeisance, it passed on, and gave place to twenty-four other pages, habited and attended like the former ones.
Representations of deities of the Maya manuscripts; in Papers of the Peabody Museum, Vol.
These, like twin-born Deities delighting in each other's presence, have wrought marvels in the inward mind through the whole region of the Pyrenëan Peninsula.
The lots were cast, and it was found that none of the native deities bore him any ill will.
We see our own deities failing us, and unable to aid us in time of danger.
The Moon God was to the latest day the favored divinity of Ur of the Chaldees, and so of the local deities of other Sumerian cities.
It is of special interest as we find in these many familiar deities of Syria, Palestine, Egypt and other countries, who had their origin in ancient Chaldea.
The transformation of some of these gods under Semitic influences, and their gradual absorption of the attributes of the older deities is a curious study in Chaldean mythology.
At the time of this new arrangement of the Chaldean deities Erech was a prominent city of southern Mesopotamia.
The local deities of other important cities of southern Mesopotamia, more ancient and venerated, maintained their hold upon the affections of their worshippers to the last.
Neither of these supreme deities was represented by the early Iranians under material forms; but in process of time corruption set in, and Magism, or the worship of the elements of Nature, became general.
There was still another and inferior class of deities among the Assyrians and Babylonians who were objects of worship, and were supposed to have great influence on human affairs.
Some of the deities were of Etruscan, some of Sabine, and some of Latin origin; but most of them were imported from Greece or corresponded with those of the Greek mythology.
These deities are supposed to have represented spirit passing into matter and form,--a process of divine incarnation.
These deities were the planets under different names.
We seldom see a proud self-reliance even among the heroes of the Iliad, but great solicitude to secure aid from the deities they worshipped.
In the multiplex theism of certain Christian churches, three entirely distinct deities consistent with only one.
Subordinate deities of the polytheistic faith, such as devils and angels, are not dowered with the power of combination, and must urge individually their claims to adoration and propitiation.
He who created the Hindoos, who are preserved by Vishnu and destroyed by Siva--a rather neater division of labor than is found among the deities of some other nations.
The body of a primitive people's beliefs concerning its origin, early history, heroes, deities and so forth, as distinguished from the true accounts which it invents later.
For Cuzco was a sanctified spot, venerated not only as the abode of the Incas, but of all those deities who presided over the motley nations of the empire.
But the strong arm of Father Valverde and his countrymen soon tumbled the heathen deities from their pride of place, and established, in their stead, the sacred effigies of the Virgin and Child.
The Sun was to be worshipped above all; but the images of their gods were removed to Cuzco and established in one of the temples, to hold their rank among the inferior deities of the Peruvian Pantheon.
The above list will hopefully give you a few useful examples demonstrating the appropriate usage of "deities" in a variety of sentences. We hope that you will now be able to make sentences using this word.
