![\"Confetti](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/311\/2016\/04\/confetti_AndreasGraulund-300x200.jpg\")
<\/a>Confetti<\/em> by Andreas Graulund on Flickr<\/a> [CC-BY-2.0<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Metaphor and Analogy<\/h3>\n
Metaphors are sometimes useful. But there\u2019s a difference between a metaphor and an analogy.<\/p>\n
- \n
- A metaphor<\/strong> is applicable to a situation but can be interpreted in a number of different ways. A classic metaphor is \u201cMy love is like a red red rose\u201d (Robert Burns). If you try to turn this into an analogy, it doesn\u2019t work. Robert Burns is not saying that his love has thorns and a stem and the petals fall off. He is saying that his love evokes the same feelings as a red rose (beautiful, sensuous, smells nice). So those qualities of the rose are transferable to the experience of his love; the rest of the rose\u2019s attributes are ignored.<\/li>\n
- An analogy<\/strong> is an exact mapping of one thing to another thing. For example, the solar system is often used as an analogy for atoms (it\u2019s not exactly how atoms work, but it\u2019s a good way to teach kids about atoms). The electrons orbit around the nucleus. The planets orbit around the sun. There\u2019s a direct mapping of all the features of the two systems being compared.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/div>\nI see John Beckett\u2019s Bakery of the Gods<\/em> as a metaphor, not as an analogy.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nWhat\u2019s wrong with chocolate cake?<\/h3>\n
I am assuming that in John Beckett\u2019s Bakery of the Gods<\/a><\/em> metaphor, the people selling chocolate cake were Wiccans and Wiccanish Pagans. I like chocolate cake and<\/em> Wicca. I am not so keen on chocolate cake with not enough chocolate in it<\/a>, but each to their own. This metaphor, however, implies that you can\u2019t mix Wicca and polytheism (or maybe I am reading too much into it). That\u2019s the problem with vague metaphors, they can mean all sorts of things that may\u00a0not have been intended. I wouldn\u2019t mix chocolate cake with apples \u2013 but you most definitely can mix\u00a0polytheism and Wicca<\/a>.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Many flavours\u00a0are available<\/h3>\n
If my view of polytheism is different from yours, that\u2019s a good thing \u2013 it means that more flavours of polytheism are available; and that\u2019s helpful. Some people\u00a0like apple pie with cinnamon; others like it with shortcrust pastry, or puff pastry, or less sugary; others still don\u2019t even like apple pie;\u00a0some people\u00a0maintain that desserts are bad for you. There are many desserts available, and many flavours of polytheism (none of which are the One True Flavour).<\/p>\n
None of us know objectively what the nature of the gods is; we only perceive them with our limited, local, and finite perspective. It is interesting to discuss their nature and how we interact with them, so that we can learn from each other\u2019s perspectives. But we can\u2019t be certain what the nature of the gods is.<\/p>\n
We don\u2019t all like the same flavours<\/h3>\n
The only way to discover whether\u00a0one perspective is better than another is by observing its results in the world. If your perspective makes you feel closer to the gods, happy, fulfilled, and able to function effectively as a human being without harming others, then it is probably worth sharing. If your perspective makes you angry, bitter, jealous, and vengeful, then it probably isn\u2019t doing you or anyone else any good.<\/p>\n
And, here\u2019s the rub: apple pie with cinnamon makes me say \u201cYuk!\u201d but for someone else, it may be the only way to make\u00a0apple pie. That\u2019s just fine, as long as I don\u2019t make them eat my recipe, and they don\u2019t make me eat their recipe.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Apples and Apple Pie \u2013 the story so far<\/h3>\n
- \n
- John Beckett \u2013 The gods are like apples.<\/a>
\nThere are many different varieties of apple (Granny Smith, Bramley, Russet, etc) but they are all apples. They are also distinguishable from oranges.<\/li>\n- John Halstead \u2013 How do you like them apples? On gods and metaphors<\/a>
\nHowever, deciding where the tree ends and the apple begins \u2013 or whether it\u2019s still an apple when you\u2019ve eaten it \u2013 is difficult.<\/li>\n- Tom Swiss \u2013 The gods are like golden apples<\/a>
\nEris\u2019s golden apple was inscribed \u201cTo the fairest\u201d \u2013 and beauty is in the eye of the beholder. In other words, everyone\u2019s experience of the gods is unique.<\/li>\n- Pat Mosley \u2013 Up in the mountains, there\u2019s a tree that bears many apples<\/a>
\nEveryone has a different experience of trees and apples, but what matters is that there are many stories and many perspectives.<\/li>\n- John Beckett \u2013 The Bakery of the Gods<\/a>
\nIf a person who has eaten vanilla pudding all their life comes looking for apple pie, but is confronted with people selling chocolate cake, changing all the labels in the bakery, and claiming that all desserts are the same, they might get confused about what\u2019s apple pie and what isn\u2019t<\/li>\n- Yvonne Aburrow \u2013 Polytheism and Apple Pie<\/a>
\nBut then there are people claiming that they have the One True Recipe for apple pie, and everyone else is Doing It Wrong<\/li>\n- John Halstead \u2013 The gods are \u201clike warm apple pie\u201d: The hidden meanings behind our metaphors<\/a>
\nCareful with that metaphor, it\u2019s not neutral<\/li>\n<\/ul>\nVarious commenters have also pointed out that they are allergic to apple pie, or prefer rhubarb pie, or pear pie, or apple crumble.<\/p>\n
Did I omit your apple \/ apple-pie post? Let me know in the comments.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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Hail Eris!<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The way things have been going lately, anyone would think that Eris had lobbed an apple pie into the middle of the Patheos Pagan channel. There are so many apple and apple pie related posts, it's hard to keep track of them all.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/2016\/04\/hail-eris\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Hail Eris!\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The way things have been going lately, anyone would think that Eris had lobbed an apple pie into the middle of the Patheos Pagan channel. 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She has an MA in Contemporary Religions and Spiritualities from Bath Spa University, and lives and works in Oxford, UK. She has written four books on the mythology and folklore of trees, birds, and animals, and two anthologies of poetry. She is the editor of the Theologies of Immanence wiki, a collaborative project for creating grass-roots Pagan theology. Her most recent books are \"All Acts of Love and Pleasure: inclusive Wicca\" and \"Pagan Consent Culture: Building Communities of Empathy and Autonomy\" with Christine Hoff Kraemer.","sameAs":["http:\/\/yaburrow.googlepages.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/author\/yvonne\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1320"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3649"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3649\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/sermonsfromthemound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} - John Halstead \u2013 How do you like them apples? On gods and metaphors<\/a>
- An analogy<\/strong> is an exact mapping of one thing to another thing. For example, the solar system is often used as an analogy for atoms (it\u2019s not exactly how atoms work, but it\u2019s a good way to teach kids about atoms). The electrons orbit around the nucleus. The planets orbit around the sun. There\u2019s a direct mapping of all the features of the two systems being compared.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n