Where do the gods live? Small polytheism versus universal polytheism

Should we con­trast the local, nar­row dimen­sion of com­mu­ni­ca­tion with the gods with the broad, glob­al, uni­ver­sal dimen­sion that can char­ac­terise them? Based on spe­cif­ic cas­es that point towards small poly­the­ism, we will exam­ine the pos­si­ble links with uni­ver­sal poly­the­ism. This rais­es the ques­tion of the very notion of uni­ver­sal poly­the­ism. Does it mean the spread of gods through­out the oik­oumene? Or rather deities whose func­tions take on a cos­mic dimen­sion? We will con­sid­er here the case of gods described as “celes­tial”, such as Yah­weh, Baal Shamim and Ashtart or Zeus Hyp­sis­tos, Ker­au­nios and Aphrodite Oura­nia. How do they car­ry out their celes­tial func­tions, and do they have a tru­ly cos­mic impact? We will also exam­ine the impli­ca­tions of being described as Baal or Kyrios “Lord” of a spe­cif­ic place or space. This will be an oppor­tu­ni­ty to reassess the “Here there any­where” typol­o­gy pro­posed by Jonathan Smith to unfold the rela­tion­ship between the gods and space.

Zweit­er Vor­trag von Corinne Bon­net im Rah­men der Mon­­day-Lec­­tures, die gemein­sam von Max-Weber-Kol­­leg, Sem­i­nar für Reli­gion­swis­senschaft sowie dem The­ol­o­gis­chen Forschungskol­leg t³ The­olo­gie — Tra­di­tion — Trans­for­ma­tion ver­anstal­tet wer­den.