I do kind of want to shed light on a fictional universe that has had a major impact on what I believe. Warning: kind of long, as there's a lot to cover.
Take Dungeons and Dragons. Not the new one, mind, but old school: specifically, Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, 2nd Edition Revised. That game had a very interesting setting that nobody really played except in a well-known CRPG. That setting was Planescape. (The CRPG was
Planescape: Torment, one of the single most well-beloved games
ever... and I've never played past the first hour
.)
The theology of Planescape is simply
fascinating. Anyone who's played
Torment probably already knows a lot of this, but to summarize it somewhat briefly, all material universes (which include all other D&D campaign settings, our own real world, and presumably all other worlds, fictional or otherwise) exist in something called the Prime Material Plane. There's two other main Planes of existence: the Inner (or Elemental) Planes, and the Outer (or Divine/Spiritual/Alignment) Planes. These are connected by "pathway" Planes: Astral and Ethereal, with a hypothetical (i.e., non-canonical but setting-rules consistent) third one whose name I can't remember. (It's hypothesized to exist because of something in the setting rules called the
Rule of Three:
see two things, ask for the third, because all things come in Threes).
The Inner Planes are the "stuff" from which the Prime Material Planes are made of, consisting of the familiar Earth, Fire, Water, and Air, along with two others: Positive and Negative. But we're not here to talk about that, we're here to talk about the Outer Planes.
In D&D, the Outer Planes are described as being a large disc (sometimes called "The Wheel)... except that its exact size and shape can vary wildly based on the whims of the people who live there, and that of people on the other Planes. I have something for me right there: the Otherworld (i.e., the World of Gods, Elves, the Dead, etc.) is not constant like our own, except in the sense that it's in constant
flux, based on our conceptions of it. The Outer Planes are also divided up based on the Alignments from D&D.
Starting a new paragraph to catch people up on that simple-and-complex topic, Alignments are an aspect of D&D that's generally hated but can have its uses. It involves picking a character's general moral and ethical stance. There are 9 Alignments on a 3x3 grid: Lawful-Chaos and Good-Evil, with Neutral being used for the middle. (So,
Lawful Good, Neutral Good, Chaotic Good, Lawful Neutral, True Neutral, Chaotic Neutral, Lawful Evil, Neutral Evil, The Joker.) These are hardly set-rules, but are themselves capable of huge variation and mutual leaning. So a character can be Neutral Good but does have an ever-so-slight tendency to lawful actions, or a Lawful Evil character having a staunch rule against killing babies.
So, back to the Outer Planes. They're divided into four general "categories" based on a loose "geography": the Upper Planes are Good, the Lower Planes are Evil, the Left Planes are Law, and the Right Planes are Chaos. The Gods are beings that basically "rule" the various areas that make up each Plane.
In the center of The Wheel that is the Outer Planes is called the Outlands, Plane of True Neutrality. In the center of the Outlands is an infinitely tall spire. At the top of the infinite spire (yes,
at the top of the INFINITE spire) is Sigil, the city that is the central "hub" of the Outer Planes, and might be the Center of the Whole Multiverse (or not, depending on your thinking). It's the City of Doors. Anyone in Sigil can go anywhere in the entire Mutliverse from the countless Doors in this city (whether deliberately or by accident). Naturally, all Gods, Good and Evil, Lawful and Chaotic, want to control this city. Control this city, and you control the whole Multiverse. But they can't get in. Gods and their armies have tried many, many times to get into Sigil, but no matter what they do, they can't get in.
Because the Lady of Pain won't let them in.
And that's the single, most important rule in the entire Mutliverse: the
one "thou shalt not" that even the Gods have to follow, and best summarized by internet content creator The Spoony One: "Thou shalt not **** with the Lady of Pain". (Some of you might remember that that was my signature for a while).
Now, I don't take this cosmology to heart, but then again, neither do I take the cosmology presented in Edda Lore to heart, either. As a gamer, and a huge fan of fantasy settings, there's a lot I can take from this and apply it to my own practices. I do tend to think of things in terms of the Rule of Three, and as a pluralist-polytheist, I believe very much in the existence of all Gods and pantheons. I also believe that they don't often get along, even within the same pantheon. The cosmology of Planescape is just one more way to help contextualize the Otherworld to build stories around.
So that's one example of how a fictional creation can still be inspiring to us.
