(On the Nature of the Gods and of the Cosmos translated into English)
Like everything that exists in the world, this subject must have a history. It is precisely this history that I intend to outline in the opening of this argument: where this curiosity began and what the process of thought behind it was. For the task of the historian is to uncover the past in order to understand the present and anticipate the future, and for anything to be considered science, it must possess a methodology of research.
Where did it begin?
My question concerning the nature of the Gods and of the Cosmos did not arise from an abstract or purely speculative interest, but from a concrete discussion held during a seminar on Byzantine history, focused on models of governance in Late Antiquity. The discussion revolved around the opposition between the tetrarchic model and the monarchical one, and the professor’s observation that the tetrarchy is, in essence, the product of a polytheistic model of thought, whereas monarchy reflects a monotheistic one, it opened an intellectual fissure that compelled me to move beyond the initial topic. We both promptly agreed on the limitations of each model. The tetrarchy is fragile, as it involves cooperation among several centers of will which, by their very nature, tend to pull in different directions. Monarchy, by contrast, resolves the problem of coherence, but does so at the cost of rigidity, imposing authority, and the constant risk of usurpation. Byzantine history provides sufficient examples in this regard, such as the usurper Phocas, who deposed Emperor Maurice following the revolt of 602. Yet these observations did not interest me as political judgments, but rather as symptoms of fundamentally different ways of understanding the order of the world.
At that moment, the discussion utterly transcended the historical framework and reached a deeper level. From the professor’s perspective, monotheism would ,,easily prevail’’ over polytheism, because the world is ordered, coherent, and unified, and this order would reflect the will of a single God. Christians, according to this argument, did nothing more than observe nature and recognize its fundamental unity.
This assertion forced me to pause. Not because I deny the order of nature, but because I found problematic the identification of order with the uniqueness of its cause. As a polytheist, but also as a student of history, I cannot ignore the fact that the people of the ancient world, deeply religious and largely polytheistic, posed the very same fundamental questions about the Universe. Moreover, they did so in a manner that cannot be reduced to poetic mythology, but which opened the path toward philosophical and scientific thought. In my own words, they were pioneers of scientific methods such as the observation of nature and experimentation. The Presocratic philosophers were not satisfied with the mythic explanations of Homer and Hesiod. They asked what the world is made of, what its originating principle is, and how the transition from disorder to order can be explained. Thales sought the archē in water; Anaximander spoke of the apeiron, the indefinite infinite; Anaximenes of air; Pythagoras about number, proportion, and geometry. These answers are not naive, but represent serious attempts to grasp the deep structure of reality.
Equally important is the question of how order arises from chaos. Anaxagoras introduces Nous, the ordering intellect that sets the world in motion; the Pythagoreans see order as the result of mathematical harmonies. In all these cases, order is not denied, but neither is it reduced to the arbitrary will of a single entity. Rather, it emerges from the interaction of multiple principles, forces, or structures.
Viewed from this perspective, modern science does not refute this outlook, but rather complicates it. The Universe is composed of stars, planets, galaxies, nebulae, visible and invisible matter, each governed by specific laws. Order exists, but it is stratified, differentiated, and dynamic. There is not a single explanatory level, but a plurality of coexisting levels.
At this point, the question becomes inevitable: does nature have a purpose? Aristotle answered was affirmative, speaking of telos, of the tendency of each thing to actualize its own nature, just as an acorn tends to become an oak. This vision introduces an internal finality, not one imposed from the outside, and allows for the conception of an ordered Cosmos without requiring a single, centralized, and absolute control.
From here arises the problem that truly interests me. If the Universe is ordered yet plural, coherent yet stratified, intelligible yet not simple, then polytheism does not appear as an inferior form of thought, but as a symbolic model more closely aligned with the complexity of reality. The Gods are not rivals to order, but expressions of it, each corresponding to a level, a function, or a dimension of the Cosmos.
Thus, my question concerning the nature of the Gods and of the Cosmos is not a theological polemic, but an attempt to understand whether plurality, both at the cosmic level and at the symbolic level, is not more faithful to the way the world itself functions.
Monotheism, polytheism, and the problem of cosmic order
(a comparative approach)
To avoid a sterile polemic centered on the question of ,,who is right’’, it is necessary to present the monotheistic argument concerning the unity of the Cosmos in terms of its own internal logic. Only in this way can its explanatory limits and possibilities be analyzed in relation to modern scientific knowledge, without falling into ideological confrontation.
In monotheistic thought, the Cosmos is conceived as a coherent, ordered, and stable unity because it originates in a single, transcendent, and omnipotent will. This Divine will is placed at the beginning of all things and confers order, meaning, and finality upon the Universe. The regularity of natural phenomena is interpreted as the direct expression of this will, and the intelligibility of the world becomes a theological argument for the uniqueness of its ultimate cause.
Within this framework, Cosmological explanation operates inside an epistemology of faith, in which truth is guaranteed by orthodoxy understood as correct adherence to a set of dogmas regarded as immutable. The strength of this model lies in its elegance and internal coherence. Its difficulties, however, arise not at the level of theoretical consistency, but at that of epistemological flexibility.
Once fixed by revelation, the monotheistic Cosmological explanation becomes difficult to adjust without calling into question the very structure of faith itself. In this sense, the relationship between monotheism and modern science remains a tense one, since scientific knowledge operates through continuous revision, hypothesis, and falsification, with explanatory models constantly subject to correction.
By contrast, polytheism is often perceived, especially in modern discourse, as fragmentary, unstable, or archaic. This perception rests largely on a reductive mythological reading that confuses the symbolic expression of myth with its philosophical and Cosmological level. A closer analysis of ancient thought shows that polytheism is not devoid of coherence, but operates according to a different epistemological principle.
Polytheistic religious systems are structured primarily around orthopraxy, that is, correct practice, rather than intellectual adherence to a fixed set of dogmatic statements. The emphasis lies on maintaining a functional and ritual relationship with the order of the world, not on formulating a definitive Cosmological doctrine. This structure allows for greater conceptual elasticity, in which new observations of nature do not undermine the religious framework, but can be gradually integrated.
In this context, tradition is not conceived as a static corpus of immutable truths, but as a practice transmitted and adjusted over time: a set of customs, representations, and interpretations that have endured precisely because of their capacity to adapt to different historical and cultural contexts. This dynamic makes polytheism compatible with a worldview in which reality is complex, stratified, and subject to change.
In relation to this structure, modern science, whose aim is to understand nature through observation, experimentation, and modeling, does not enter into a structural conflict with polytheism. On the contrary, the deepening of knowledge about nature can contribute to a more nuanced understanding of how Divine principles are conceived symbolically. The Gods do not appear as alternative explanations to natural laws, but as expressions of the orders, functions, and forces that structure the Cosmos.
Thus, the relationship between science, nature, and the Divine is not one of exclusion, but of mutual clarification. Through a deeper understanding of nature, the symbolic architecture of the Divine also becomes clearer, without the need to reduce reality either to a single principle or to a meaningless chaos. As ancient philosophers understood, by observing nature we may better understand the Divine and the mechanisms of the Cosmos itself.
Returning to the argument, what are the fundamental questions?
From Antiquity onward, the Presocratic philosophers formulated the fundamental questions of Cosmology: what is the originating substance of the world, archē? How does order arise from chaos? Does nature have a purpose, telos? And is there a plurality of worlds? Their answers, though diverse, converge on one essential point: reality is not reducible to a single, simple, personal principle, but is the result of the manifestation of a primordial essence in multiple forms.
The water of Thales, the apeiron of Anaximander, the air of Anaximenes, Pythagorean number, or the ordering intellect of Anaxagoras are not personal gods in the religious sense, but neither are they mere abstractions. They represent attempts to understand the plurality of the world’s order from within it, not by appeal to an absolute external cause.
This perspective is further developed by Aristotle, who introduces the idea of telos. Things do not exist by chance, but tend to fulfill their own nature. The acorn becomes an oak not because an external will constrains it, but because this becoming is inscribed in its structure. Order is thus immanent, not imposed from outside. This vision opens the way to a Cosmology in which the Divine is not separate from nature, but manifests through it.
In monotheism, by contrast, the order of the world is the result of a single, transcendent will that creates ex nihilo and governs the Universe through laws reflecting a unified Divine reason. Epistemologically, this model introduces a fundamental rupture. The human being, finite and immersed in nature, cannot directly know the intentions of an infinite mind situated beyond the world. Access to truth is mediated by revelation, sacred text, and interpretative authority. Science is accepted insofar as it does not contradict this revealed framework, and the tension between observation and dogma remains structural.
The answer I arrived at
Polytheism does not presuppose such a rupture. If the Gods are understood as ontological powers co-originating with the Universe, immanent and active in specific domains of reality, then knowledge of nature becomes simultaneously knowledge of the Divine. There is no single absolute Cosmic mind, but a plurality of centers of limited intelligence whose interactions produce both order and conflict.
This vision is surprisingly compatible with modern Cosmology, which describes the Universe as the result of interactions among four fundamental forces: gravity, electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. Though distinct, these forces cooperate to produce the observable unity of the Cosmos. Unity is not primordial, but emergent.
Just as a walnut appears to be one on the outside, yet once its shell is removed reveals an internal structure composed of several interdependent parts united around a common center, so too the unity of the Universe may be understood as the result of collaboration among distinct principles.
In this sense, the monotheistic idea of a perfect, immutable, and unified order appears as an excessive simplification. Contemporary physics reveals a probabilistic Universe marked by broken symmetries, imbalances, and irreversible processes. Order exists, but it is local, fragile, and context-dependent. Polytheism explains this reality without resorting to mystery or forced moral justifications. Order is the result of a temporary balance among powers, and chaos is not annihilated, but constantly held in check.
In the language of classical Cosmologies, this plurality was expressed through the four elements, understood as modes of manifestation of reality. In the language of modern physics, it is expressed through the four fundamental interactions. Although they belong to different explanatory frameworks, both point to the same underlying intuition: the order of the Cosmos is maintained through the relationship and balance among distinct principles. From this interaction emerges a level of coherence that makes structure, life, and intelligibility possible.
This difference becomes decisive at the moral level. In monotheism, the existence of evil raises the problem of Divine responsibility. If a single omnipotent will creates and governs everything, then suffering, disease, and natural catastrophe can only be attributed to this will, either directly or by permission. Classical theodicies like: evil as a lack of good, as a result of free will, or as a pedagogical test fails to provide a morally satisfactory justification for extreme and impersonal suffering.
Polytheism avoids this problem not by denying evil, but by explaining it structurally. The world is not governed by a single perfectly good will, but by a plurality of powers with different interests and domains. Evil arises when the balance among them is disrupted, when one force becomes excessively dominant, or when conflict is left unmediated. Order is not guaranteed, and harmony is never definitive. Ethically, this view is more honest with the human experience, which is inevitably tragic and unpredictable.
In conclusion, polytheistic Cosmology, understood not as literal mythology but as a metaphysics of immanent plurality, offers a more faithful explanation of the real structure of the Universe than classical monotheism. It recognizes a common origin of all things “archē” but refuses to reduce its manifestation to a single transcendent will. The order of the world is not imposed, but emergent; the Divine is not external to nature, but present in its dynamics; knowledge does not depend on exclusive revelation, but on the investigation of reality; and evil is not a theological scandal, but an inevitable consequence of a plural world.
Thus, polytheism appears not as a relic of the past, but as a paradigm capable of integrating ancient philosophy, modern science, and human experience into a coherent vision of the Cosmos.
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