POLYTHEISM, in sophiology, or the science of human conceptions, term employed to designate the doctrines peculiar to the ontologies of most mythological philosophy of a plurality of gods, as well as the primitive theories of knowledge out of which such doc trines proceeded. Polytheism, thus character istic of an ontological doctrine, designates in particular all theologies which are part and parcel of an exceedingly primitive world-con ception. The most obvious task in sophiology in this connection is to restate the definition of a concept, an idea; and then briefly to lay open the common character inherent in the idea of a god, the idea of a polytheon and the idea of God. And it is equally obvious that to find such common characteristics, modern prepos sessions must be set on one side: we must boldly enquire: What is the minimum defini tion of God? Before proceeding to these definitions let us review the situation under polytheism as a whole. For the purposes of study, sophiolo gists conceive of three very general phases in the development of human thinking. Dis tinguishing these according to the methodol ogy peculiar to each of these phases, they have characterized human philosophies as mytho logical, metaphysical and critical. As every philosophy implies at least an embryo-ontology, so have we characterized the doctrine of many gods, or of a polytheon, as the theological portion of mythological ontology. For, in truth, mythology is not religion; it is primitive philosophy or science. It is religious in so far as it is theological science. And, of course, as theological it is philosophy or science of a sort that owes its origin to the existence of religious experience in the heart of man. The simplest savage who wonders at the unseen but mighty wind that streams from unknown realms of power has already felt that which abides unchangeably amid the flux of the phenomenal world; has already felt that which inspires religious feeling and its volitional con sequents, cults and philosophically formulated theologies, such as polytheism. For religion is essential humanity. The wild beast to es cape the storm shrinks growling into the cavern called its den. But on the same occasion the most abject human savage, awe-stricken, turns, falls and prays. The lowest man perceives a hand behind the lightning. He hears a voice abroad upon the storm, and for both these things the highest brute has neither eye nor ear. Nor is even an atheist without religious experience, unless he is inhuman. For there
can be little doubt that there are at present those who are atheists only in this sense, that they merely deny every particular theism on the ground that it is an inadequate expression of the whole mystery of being. Now that can be no profound thinker who is without any sympathy for such a position. Again: to deny our need of religion is one thing; to deny its existence altogether in the human heart is quite another. Schleiermucher stood upon a rock when he asserted the self-authentication of the religious consciousness. For the varia tions among theologies, polytheistic, herotheistic or monotheistic (which are philosophies), can no more affect the experiences which con stitute and succeed the spiritual new birth of anyone, than the variations among biologists can affect one's assurance that he is alive. Yet as some there be who have an atrophied intellectual consciousness, and are idiotic; so some, too, it may be granted there may be who have an atrophied spiritual sense and are inhuman. But if any possess a religious mythological philos ophy, or theology, we may be quite certain that they likewise share the religious experiences. In this way even polytheism expresses the religious life of man.
Religion then, in a polytheist even, is not the intellectual formulation, in the shape of dogma, or doctrine, of mankind's conscious re lation to God, a relation which all feel. Such formulation on the contrary is the work of philosophers. Principles thought to be dis covered of man's relationship to the ultimate grounds of being are gathered and made into a group, a ((science° ; and the cultivation of this science, or mythic system becomes, in primitive culture periods, the duty of a special class. This class is that of the priest, shamans, rab-mags, biksbus, magicians or wabeno-men. All are primitive philosophers. Thus we come to the idea of religion in the widest sense, as the perception of the supernal world together with the effects of that perception on the com plex nature of man; while theology, in a way commensurate with this idea of religion, is understood as that perception and its conse quences reduced to system however crude. Ex amples of such theologies are still extant; some systems are now building. The earliest systems are the mythical systems of polytheism which originated under influences of the experience of our most remote ancestors.