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So, if you've taken any philosophy of religion classes, or theology from the mainstream Christian perspective, you'll be familiar with the definition of God as being:

1. All powerful ("omnipotent", can do anything)
2. All knowing ("omniscience", knows everything)
3. All good ("benevolent", looks out for mankind)
4. Perfect ("perfect")

This sort of perspective on God, however, is pretty local to Western theosophy. There are other conceptions of God, such as dualistic notions where two or more gods share these characteristics. Even in the Western tradition the monotheist God is not always a person, and rather than believing in a literal God some people believe in a metaphorical God.

This is where it gets interesting: In Warhammer 40,000 the Chaos Gods are the Warp, and can only be known through elaborate and crazy (read: inconsistent) metaphors. In effect, metaphors have a nasty habit of literally eating your soul in this fictional universe (a.k.a: "ficton" for short).

So I put the question to you, do you think the Chaos Gods are truly divine, and how do you parse "truly" and "divine"?

Hmm. As far as the Judeo-Muslim-Christian interpretation of God goes, no, I don't believe they are. They're not omnipotent, certainly not benevolent or perfect. There are arguments that certain of them, maybe Tzeentch are close to all knowing, but they fail on the other three counts, by THAT defintion.

However, from a different perspective, they have something (being fictional) that traditional religions do not, in that they are verfiably real things, insofar as the creators of the wh40k universe (the authors) have told us that they are. All religion in the real world relies on faith above proof. The big 4 which reside in the warp brook no arguments as to their existence, just the scope of their power.

So overall, no, I don;t think they fit the definition of divine that western/middle eastern religion applies to God, but the scale of their power in a fictional universe leads me to believe that it would be difficult to regard them as anything else. Other definitions rely simply on definining them along some theorised spectrum of power, with the God of the monotheistic religions at the far end (Omnipotent, creator of entire universes etc) and the humble bacteria or other very simple self replicating organism (Mortal).

No. Not really anyway...

Any being that has an entire dimension devoted to them, can make the sky bleed and make the dead get back up must be a god of some kind.

Nope. They are monstrously powerful and near invinvible but they aren't quite there...

Well, if you look at greek gods, they weren't all powerful. In a polytheist point of view, I would call them gods; but in monotheist point of view none of them are Gods.

But what can truly say what a God is:

If we could take say the City of Las Vagas (all of the land around and workings that make a city like Las Vagas run, i'e electrisaty, cars, trains, cammars, police, airoplains, helicopter, tanks, guns, gas grenades, missiels, semtex, massive ships, telly, phones, internet, concret, glass and steel,) back in time too, oh... say the time of the Neolithic man. Would it not to the eyes of the locals of that time seem to be a "City of the Gods" too them? I know I would think that the Gods have come too us.

God/dess/es are created by the human mind to explain some thing it can't even fathom to grasp. Therw out human per-history and moden-history, (well brozne age onward,) any thing that couldn't or wouldn't be explained would be passed of as "the Work of the God/dess/es".

...A volcano erupting, killing all that surounding it?..."A God did that.", or... "an earthquake rents a gashing scar across the land, buildings tumble to ruble, as far as the eye can see destuction and chaos have layed wast to a once green and fiurtile land, the very roots of the ilsland fell crashing into the sea?... "A God/dess/es did that too."...

Then man threw off the shackles of fearing God/dess/es to find that the world around them could be exlpained, slowly at first, then our brains started to work properly. We knew that the God/ess/es did not make the sun come up every mornning, nore that the god/dess/es made the rain fall. Granted its only in the last 3000 years that human kind has pooled all its colletive knowlage together. We have become like the God/dess/es of the pre-history and some of the moden-history too (lets face it we can fly, we create light, make paintings move, stave off death and we can bring the ressently dead to life).

The Warp is by its very exsitance (lets just say that it does for now ) is a realm where the laws that we know to be an almost absolute are now null and void (in both sences of the word). Any life there would be in the truest sence be "Alien" too us. They would have powers that would seen like the powers of the God/dess/es too us but to them using said powers would be a normal thing. Its our lack of knowlage of the life that calls the realm of Chaos home seem like Gods to us.

Truly Divine are to words that should not be used to discribe any God/dess/es as none of them have been good. Better words would be; they all scheme, kill or have killed, destoryed, demmaned, taken some thing or some one. They don't play by the rules and constantly cheet, they all dispise each other and dispise humans even more.

To combat the God/dess/es we could build a massive huge ghost trap like the ones in Ghostbusters, like the size of a star system. Point it at the Eye of Terror, trap'm all and send the bill to the Emperor...

...Failing all that...ermm....LoLwot!??

Another thing in favor of them being gods is that they can literaly break the laws of nature and physics and change reality, the definition of magic and/or divine powers. Advanced races technology may seem like magic, but there is a logical explanation, with the chaos gods, there is no such logical explanation or reasoning.

I guess it kind of depends who you ask, but I would say no. They are definitely powerful, but the Emperor is way more powerful. The fact that the Imoerium is still around is testament to this.

ZacktheChaosChild wrote:I guess it kind of depends who you ask, but I would say no. They are definitely powerful, but the Emperor is way more powerful. The fact that the Imoerium is still around is testament to this.

The emperor need extensive amplification tech and a sacrifice of 10000 psykers a day just to keep chaos away from Terra and make it light up a bit in the warp, I'm sorry but chaos is vastly more powerful.

Unless the Chaos Gods get a kick out of hurting humanity. I mean they're the Chaos Gods, capricious, uncaring, and not the cuddly human-oriented gods that carefully arrange the universe because they like humanity. There doesn't seem to be much point in theodicy where the Dark Powers are concerned: they're amoral.

That was something significant about H.P. Lovecraft's horror writing, that the ultimate powers in the universe were unthinking, uncaring, and simply hadn't gotten around to wiping out humanity. Of course Derleth pooped on that, but fortunately the original material is still around. Lovecraft writes about a Copernican universe, where the Earth orbits the sun, rather than humanity being the centre of the universe.

A common opinion about the Chaos Gods seems to be that they orbit around humanity, despite the umpteen races in the 'history' of the 40k ficton that have fallen to Chaos without being destroyed utterly. I think this is based on the notion that the Chaos Gods somehow feed on souls despite existing outside of time and space (feed, souls, and existing all considered here metaphorically...).

The only difference between an angel and a demon is dependant on who's side you're on.

Divinity is only applied to things people do not understand, and life forms made up of raw emotion definitely fit into "i don't understand it" category. Remember, at one point in time us humans called the sun and moon divine (some still do) and so using the /basic/ meaning of divine, not the current edition of the word as applied by western religions they are "divine" in the extent that no one will be able to understand them.

A host of other words come to mind when i think of the four warp entities, but "gods" aren't one of them

corpsesarefun wrote:
The emperor need extensive amplification tech and a sacrifice of 10000 psykers a day just to keep chaos away from Terra and make it light up a bit in the warp, I'm sorry but chaos is vastly more powerful.

I dont agree on this one, Correct me if im wrong but i remember, somewhere in the Deamons Codex, it says something along the lines of the Big E's warp presence is all that stands between Deamon just bursting outta fekking everywhere. This strikes me as something he would have been doing even before being interred in the Golden Throne

DA's Forever wrote:

corpsesarefun wrote:
The emperor need extensive amplification tech and a sacrifice of 10000 psykers a day just to keep chaos away from Terra and make it light up a bit in the warp, I'm sorry but chaos is vastly more powerful.

I dont agree on this one, Correct me if im wrong but i remember, somewhere in the Deamons Codex, it says something along the lines of the Big E's warp presence is all that stands between Deamon just bursting outta fekking everywhere. This strikes me as something he would have been doing even before being interred in the Golden Throne

True, and as a God Emperor the Emperor would have been alot more powerful than a broken Corpse who twiddles his thumbs all day long.

I'm under the notion that they are just very powerful beings. It's the followers that make them Gods and the actions of others trying to prevent worship of said Gods that confirm this.

The Chaos Gods need their followers to keep them in power, without them they would just be another entity in the warp that would eventually fade away after not being the flavour of the month anymore.

I'm not sure if the Chaos Gods always beat down on their followers, the Nurth and Laer seem to have had a somewhat normal way of life from what we have heard of them. I know in Fulgrim the Laer were only seen in battle but the descriptions of their cities and stuff seemed to sound rather normal.

Well, by definition you can only have one omnipotent being.

If anything arises that can match that being, it is no longer omnipotent.

In the case of the Chaos Gods, not only are there several, of varying strengths, but the Emperor himself is their equal (maybe even their better).

I don't think there's been anything shown to be one single actual God in WH40k universe, just many VERY powerful, transcendental beings.

Of course, in terms of the scale of WH40k, the Chaos gods are, for all intents and purposes, 'gods', as they are virtually unchallengeable by anything material. I well imagine that Khorne, if he chose to assume physical form, could well take a starlance or fusion bomb in the face and laugh, could well pick up a titan in one hand and throw it like a toy and so on.

Immense, unbelievable power on an epic scale. God-like, almost. But certainly not omnipotent.

Personally I would say the Chaos Gods are no more "Divine" then a 10 yeard old kid with a magnifying glass tormenting an anthill.

Sure the powers definately there, openly defying the chaos gods while in the warp is tantamount to suidice, their governance of their own realm is practically unchallenged. Benevolence is based in part at least on perspective, I mean their are some who beleive in a christian God and find him to be far from all kind and all loving (Read: Old Testament) All knowing, well again within their own realm I would probably say yes.

Perfect, again the sticking point is perspective, ask any cultist or adhereant of slannesh wether their god is perfect and you can pretty much garuntee the answer, I think they are perfect representations of their core existance, EG Khorne is the perfect god of war, not exactly the perfect god of flowers and free love.


I think the big problem with the Big 4 is that outside of the warp their power dimishes considerably to the point of demi godhood, they can still effect reality fairly strongly but not to the point that (Without help at least) they can make it rain blood on a planet far away from their domain. IN the warp however, yes they are Gods by the definition you presented, assuming that Perfection and Benevolence are based ont he perception of their followers.

The chaos gods are not gods by divinity, they are gods by the sense that they were birthed from the emotions of both humanity and the other races.
Khorne: created by the bloodlust and warcrazed
Tzeentch: created by the chaotic progress surge
Nurgle: created by the everlasting thought of death and plague (he is the oldest hence being grandaddy nurgle)
Slaanesh: god of decadence created by the eldars lustfull/slothfull practices. remember that the warp is the immaterium a realm essentially created by emotion and psychic presence.
oh and dont forget gork and mork: created by those crazy fun loving bastards the orks

therefore the gods in our realm are gods in the sense that they break the very fabrics of time, space, physics, what have you
but in their own realms they are mearly a much more powerfull being
really saying the emperor is more powerfull is not a fair comparison for this reason, the chaos gods being creatures of the warp cannot take any true form in our realm, whereas the emperor is a true physical being here

on the flipside in the warp the gods do have a bit more of a true manifestation but the emperor does not have his full capabilities.

I agree with the Chaos 'Gods' not being the technical term for them, but Im sure as hell not walking up to a horde of Bloodletters and trying to lecture them on the correct classification of their lord and master.

And to the Emperor> Chaos gods theory, I still hold the fact the Gods are too busy on their own eternal war with each other to care too much to take over the Material universe.

To them I think they view it as a snow globe, its nice and shiney and you do want it, but not enough to let your bastard of a brother stab you in the back when your distracted.

Mr Nobody wrote:Another thing in favor of them being gods is that they can literaly break the laws of nature and physics and change reality, the definition of magic and/or divine powers. Advanced races technology may seem like magic, but there is a logical explanation, with the chaos gods, there is no such logical explanation or reasoning.

Well there is, the existence of the Geller Field and the Astronomican prove it, but perhaps all the rules haven't been discovered yet.

The Chaos gods themselves obey certain obvious rules, such as the division into classes or types.

I am not saying if they are divine but they are certainly not supernatural.

Or if its switched around, The Immaterium IS divine, just not in the way we've assumed it is.

The very fact of belief itself has created the chaos gods (all of them, not just the big 4) and practices in there "sphere" of power empower them.

The very ideas of "gods" as people believed are actually only misrepresentations of chaos and the belief in angels, demons, gods, devils are all really just things from the warp that people have mistakenly believed for divine.

There is no gods, there is no angels just (grimdark) chaos!

They are nothing more than entities of the warp: They aren't even truly intelligent (by my reckoning) as they can't perceive reality beyond the confines of one emotion... be it rage, cunning, SECKS or morbidness.

I believe they need their followers in this realm to help them affect it (Noetic Science)
In my opinion there is no one omnipotent god in 40K but multiple gods who are perfect in one area of life or living but not at everything.

Nurglitch wrote:So, if you've taken any philosophy of religion classes, or theology from the mainstream Christian perspective, you'll be familiar with the definition of God as being:

1. All powerful ("omnipotent", can do anything)
2. All knowing ("omniscience", knows everything)
3. All good ("benevolent", looks out for mankind)
4. Perfect ("perfect")

Even the Christian God doesn't live up to that definition.
But lets not get into that.

Nurglitch wrote:So I put the question to you, do you think the Chaos Gods are truly divine, and how do you parse "truly" and "divine"?

Dictionary definitions
Divine = "being a deity"
Deity = "being a god"
god = "a supreme being according to some particular conception e.g god of mercy"

So yes the Chaos Gods are truly Divine.

Technically I think a strong enough Psyker (aka one that hasn't existed yet) could walk into the Void and blast them, though they'd probably end up re-forming eventually.

Harriticus wrote:Technically I think a strong enough Psyker (aka one that hasn't existed yet) could walk into the Void and blast them, though they'd probably end up re-forming eventually.

Many people think the Emperor is powerful enough... not now obviously he's on a big chair but when he was at his peak... or the whole Starchild thing.

Ahhhh the good Ol' Starchild theory

DA's Forever wrote:Ahhhh the good Ol' Starchild theory

Such a messed up theory... i could believe it was Tzeentch making it up, he would love it if he managed to trick the Inquisition into killing the Emperor.

Being Atheist, i would suppose that to be a "god" you must be ABLE to "live" on without being created by powerful psyker manifestations...
by my definition the chaos "gods" are not "gods" like Allah or YHWH, they seem to be manifestations of emotions, concepts and ideas.

my idea is that the W40k universe, has no "god". Humanity, Eldar and others simply willed the chaos gods amd others to be.

The old ones being seen as a creator race, perhaps they themselves simply came to like humanity thru natural selection and evolution, whilst orks and Eldar were genetically altered from certain species to combat the necrons who perhaps came to naturally like Humanity.