Ancestry?

[Lokabrenna]

This topic has probably been done to death, but I've been doing a little reading and I wanted to get some other opinions.

I'm currently in the middle of reading Northern Tradition for the Solitary Practitioner: A Book of Prayer, Devotional Practice, and the Nine Worlds of Spirit by Galina Krasskova and Raven Kaldera, and they spend a bit of time talking about whether or not one should worship the gods that one's ancestors worshiped.

I was just wondering what everyone else thought of this idea? How important is one's ancestry, especially when one feels drawn to a tradition that isn't "in the blood" so to speak?

So, just as an example, my adoptive parents are of Irish descent, but my birth parents are Romanian, and I feel no connection to either the Irish or Thracian pantheons.

Does anyone have anything to add? I hope I'm making sense, my thoughts tend to meander.

[Sollie]

I do get what you're saying. I think that there's a happy medium that can be reached between where you came from and where you're drawn from.

I have double italian blood (maybe not a lot, but enough) and am really drawn to that culture, so I try to study it. However, I have other type of ancestry I just don't connect with. So while I'll study it just to learn about my past, I won't really do anything with it.

If that makes sense?

[Torey]

I think it's personal choice. Some deities and entities will not work with people outside of a specific culture, so this can be limiting - however, insofar as blood is concerned - there is hardly anyone anywhere in the world is 'wholly' of any 'pure' blood from any one culture or race. I am so mixed up ethnically until I have stopped trying to connect with any of the gods of my ancestors - instead I just focus on what I feel most comfortable with personally. I do not feel obligated to worship as my ancestors worshiped nor even have an interest in their gods out of some kind of genetic duty.

[Vigdisdotter]

I was just wondering what everyone else thought of this idea? How important is one's ancestry, especially when one feels drawn to a tradition that isn't "in the blood" so to speak?
It's a good question, no matter how many times it's been hashed out. My answer is a bit complicated, so please bear with me.

I'm a big believer in Genetic Memory. That is, the idea that mannerism, beliefs and a host of other things are encoded in our DNA. You can see it in adopted children and adults. They can have the best adoptive parents in the world and still feel a disconnect, like an outsider looking in. This isn't a criticism on the parents by any means, but rather is an expression on that genetic memory searching for that which it's part of...in this case the biological parents.

Little things like being able to look at your mom and realizing that you've inhereted certian traits from her and others from your father, that you are like your uncle or grandmother can go a long way to understanding one's self. But with out those connections, the question of self often go unanswered and there is a feeling of something missing.

The same happens with faith, I think. Understand that I'm not saying people are bound to the faith of their family history. Rather, I'm saying that you have to come to know what it is and make peace with how it's affected yourself, before you can move on from it; same a child needs to know where they come from before they can individualize.

So yes, I think the faith of one's ancestry is important. but not the sum total of one's options.

[AncientFlame]

I think it all comes down to choice. If you're familiar with your ancestry, and feel comfortable and/or drawn to worship those deities, then do so. Honestly, I feel it's better to connect with those deities that you feel drawn to, regardless of bloodlines.

[Nachtigall]

I think it's different in America, where most of the people don't feel very connected to their ancestry anyway. For me, it's not only a genetic connection, it's also the land, the culture I was raised in, the language I speak, etc. So, I find it easier to relate to Slavic Gods. But still, my personal belief is that similar gods from different pantheons are often one deity, that just has different names and aspects.

[Skylar]

I think it all comes down to choice. If you're familiar with your ancestry, and feel comfortable and/or drawn to worship those deities, then do so. Honestly, I feel it's better to connect with those deities that you feel drawn to, regardless of bloodlines.

I fully agree. Many break away from their ancestors religion/beliefs because it is not what they are comfortable with. To each their own.

[Meadhbh]

I agree with the whatever works for you. If you feel like your ancestry helps you connect with a certain group of gods go for it. If you feel like you feel more connected to some one elses the lack of dna shouldn't stop you either.

[Tiberias]

I don't see ancestry as all that important. If we were all worshipping the deities that our ancestors spent the longest time praying to, most of us would probably be Christian anyway (with some Muslims, Jews, some West African animists, and Buddhists thrown in the mix).

One barrier I've also come up against is location. While I've made a point of studying my ancestral folklore (Asturian and Basque myths, fairytales, and pre-Christian scraps), the overwhelming majority of it is tied up in specific interactions with geography. The Basque "gods", especially, just can't be properly worshipped, in my opinion, unless you're living in the Basque Country.

[Siwan]

I personally think ancestory has a big part to play, at least in my beliefs, since i'm centered on acestorial worship (Cymry recon and Shinto.) I'm only allowing myself to delve into Shinto since I will be living in Japan as a cultural anthropologist (hopefully) in the future, otherwise i'd fully put myself within Cymry recon since i'm 100% celtic and I'm too patriotic for my own good.

I also agree that ancestorial gods cannot be worships to their fullest extent unless you're actually in the country they originate, but that's more my belief again (I see gods a rooted to a country or culture, instead of being able to move between them.) It doesn't mean you can't worship from a different country (america for greek for example.) I just think it's harder.

However, if the deities calling you are nothing to do with your family or culture but you still wish to worship them by all means do so.

[sleepycat]

Another point, if I may.
Some deities simply will not be interested in you, no matter what you do.
They are, overall, a strange bunch, and their agenda is not often understandable to us.

[Toki Wartooth]

It can be important. I think that depends much more on you than it does on anything/one else. If you feel drawn to things that your ancestors may have done or believed in, go for that. If you don't feel that connection, then don't bother to force yourself into that sort of box; go after what you do feel a connection toward.

I don't feel too connected to my ancestry...and even when I do feel any kind of connection, I feel much more connected to my Dad's side than my mom's. I've tried connecting with both, and it just always seems to work out with the one side and not the other. I can live with that, though. *Shrugs*

[kaosxmage]

Ancestry seems a little overblown as important to spirituality. I have a lot of ancestors that practiced many faiths. The majority for the last couple thousand years were probably Christian in one of the many denominations. Those before them who honored various Pagan Gods, probably honored spirits tied to specific locations. Others might have praised more popular and universal Gods; however, even in the historic worship of Gods, the practices and "dogma" never remained the same. If you follow the trail of Gods through time, you will find the faith honoring them to be very fluid. So, if you're choosing your ancestors to be the most important element to your faith, how do choose which ones are important? You have to disregard others to choose the few.

--Kaos

[Benvarry]

Ancestry seems a little overblown as important to spirituality. I have a lot of ancestors that practiced many faiths. The majority for the last couple thousand years were probably Christian in one of the many denominations. Those before them who honored various Pagan Gods, probably honored spirits tied to specific locations. Others might have praised more popular and universal Gods; however, even in the historic worship of Gods, the practices and "dogma" never remained the same. If you follow the trail of Gods through time, you will find the faith honoring them to be very fluid. So, if you're choosing your ancestors to be the most important element to your faith, how do choose which ones are important? You have to disregard others to choose the few.

--Kaos

Agree with all of this. I also tend to give weight to the fact that humans all come from the same place, if you go back far enough in time, and it's not like they all just suddenly divided themselves into neat little cultural groups that kept the same isolated religions for all time. There's been a lot of evolution and interference along the way. Also, who knows? You could have ancestry in more parts of the world than you think - obviously, one's blood lineage can never be certain. ;)