Line #30 GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff/MythologyAndReligion


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3	* OlderThanFeudalism: In Myth/ClassicalMythology, being a SmugSnake and [[JerkassGod savage warrior]], the god of war Ares is TheScrappy to the Greeks. He got much more respect as Mars by the Romans (who saw a little bit of their own character in him). It helped that the native Mars/Mavors was a patron of farmers (a sort of harvest protector) as well as warriors, which suited the Romans (whose self-conception was as smallhold farmer-citizen-soldiers) just fine. According to legend, Mars was the father of Romulus, Rome's founder and first king. In some of the Latin texts Mars seems almost irreconcilable with Homer's Ares.
4	** In an inverted manner, Odysseus/Ulysses was praised by the Greeks for his cunning and guile and was a national hero to many of the Hellenic states; the Romans disliked him for being sneaky and dishonest. They respected the Trojans for their steadfast defense more than the Greeks; that's why Vergil embraced Aeneas the Trojan prince as the ancestor of Romulus and Remus in the Aeneid.
5	** Prior to the spread of Christianity, Heracles was the most widely-depicted mythic figure in the world, ranging from Gibraltar to Japan. If you go to a Japanese Buddhist temple, look for a guy with a club standing next to the Buddha -- the Japanese call him ''Nioh'', but yeah, it's Heracles.
6	* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Buddhism Considering how Buddhism originated in India]], it's found more favor in the lands farther East than in its country of origin. This is mainly because the main Buddhist empire of the Mauryas collapsed after the death of Ashoka and small petty rulers reasserted themselves. Later Hindus tried to incorporate some Buddhist ideas and beliefs into Hinduism, with some success, but the schism remained because Buddhists don't adhere to the Vedas and are opposed to its caste system.
7	* Christianity: "{{Never Accepted in His Hometown}}" was applied quite literally -- no thanks to various events in world history. (Although Middle Eastern and Palestinian Christians do still exist, [[http://pewforum.org/Christian/Global-Christianity-exec.aspx they are minorities]]).
8	** On the other hand, this wasn't always the case: much of the Middle East save the Arabian Peninsula and Iran were primarily Christian until [[UsefulNotes/{{Islam}} another big religion]] came around. And even then, Arabia and Iran had a large number of Christians.
9	** Modern Nazareth is full of Christians... It’s pretty fun to walk around there during Christmas.
10	** Roman Catholicism is the primary religion in the Philippines; the biggest Christianity hotspot in South East Asia—or indeed, practically ''all of Asia''—ever since it was colonized by the Spanish Empire. How big? The last two [[UsefulNotes/ThePope Papal Visits]][[labelnote:*]]St. John Paul II in 1995, Pope Francis in 2015[[/labelnote]] drew about ''five to six million'' people in just one instance. And that is not even counting the throngs of people lining up to see the Pope during his stay in the country. Almost no other country in the continent can claim such a thorough acceptance of a religion imposed by the West, thanks to the obsessive zeal of the Spanish friars in converting and colonizing the whole archipelago (and the fact that, with the Spanish regime founded on a union of Church and State, the friars were often ''de facto'' governors unto themselves in many corners of the colony, especially where civilian administration was sparse). The Philippines is also believed to have the third largest Catholic population in the world, after Brazil and Mexico.
11	*** Another Asian country, Timor-Leste is also heavily Catholic. With around 97% of the population identifying as Catholic, it is one of the most densely Catholic countries in the world, second only to Vatican City itself. Although this is attributed to Portuguese colonists, this is also a somewhat recent trend; only 20% of East Timorese were Catholic during the 1970's.
12	** Similarly, almost 30% of people in South Korea are Christians, though they tend to be Protestant rather than Catholic. Once upon a time, North Korea was also so heavily Protestant that it was dubbed the "[[https://providencemag.com/2016/07/jerusalem-east-american-christians-pyongyang/ Jerusalem of the East]]." Hell, Kim Jong-un's great-grandmother was a Presbyterian deaconess at one point.
13	** Eastern Orthodoxy was originally centered in [[strike: Constantinople]] Istanbul (you can guess it from the name of the denomination's main patriarch, who is called the Patriarch of Constantinople), resonating from there to include Greece, Romania, and a large part of the Slavic world. Though the patriarchate is still based there, the population of Istanbul is nowadays overwhelmingly Muslim.
14	** The Anglican Church started in England, as its name suggests, and is still largely centered there. The thing is, the average Briton is at best nominally connected to the denomination, while the vast majority of its practitioners live in former colonies, particularly in Africa. This is actually causing a cultural identity crisis: the leadership is Western and increasingly liberal, but the "third world" branches are very traditionalist and, when issues come up to a vote, have a clear advantage.
15	** This trope is very much played straight with the fact that Jesus was a Jew in the Kingdom of Judea preaching to other Jews about Jewish issues. Then was claimed to be the Jewish Messiah and deified -- by everybody else. Played with in that according to Christian beliefs, Jesus actually wanted everyone else to love him. He was just focusing on preaching to the Jews first before he can finish his mission on Earth.
16	* UsefulNotes/{{Islam}} is by no means unpopular in its hometown (how else would the Middle East be able to be stereotyped as all Muslim?) but statistically speaking, it gets way more believers outside of its hometown, by virtue of population difference.
17	** The Middle East (in its traditional definition[[note]]Bahrain, Cyprus, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, the UAE, and Yemen[[/note]]), in spite of having many of its countries Muslim-majority, actually accounts for just about 20% of the total world population of Muslims, with most of the percentage being taken up by South Asia (including the relatively-speaking Hindu-majority India), which accounts for almost a half. And the most-populous Muslim-majority country in the world? Not in the Middle East, not in South Asia, but in Southeast Asia (Indonesia).
18	** Shia Islam arose as part of an early dispute of the Muslim community in Arabia. Although the sect has a strong following in a few Arab countries like Iraq, most of its adherents today live in Iran (largely thanks to a rather aggressive evangelization campaign in the 16th century) and South Asia.
19	* The largest community of Bahá'í Faith is located in India, which represents almost a half of the faith's roughly 5 million believers. The seat of the religion's governing body is also located in Israel. The faith actually arose in 19th century Iran, where it is persecuted and the target of conspiracy theories.
20	* Spiritism is largely forgotten in Europe since early 20th century, but retains a huge number of followers in Latin America, especially Brazil.
21	** It's also a recognized denomination in Canada, with an "official Church" organized in the Province of Alberta. Which is HilariousInHindsight, considering former Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King's obsession with spirits and mediums.
22	* [[Myth/ClassicalMythology Hellenic reconstructionism]] is way more common in the U.S.A. and Australia than in Greece. The influence of the Greek Orthodox Church (and the lack of complete religious freedom) is responsible for that.
23	** Similarly, [[Myth/EgyptianMythology Kemetic (Egyptian) reconstructionism]], while uncommon in the West, is almost unheard of in Egypt.
24	* Ancient Egyptian gods, primarily Isis, became very popular in Roman times before Christianity, to the point where there was a temple to Isis in England.
25	** For an ancient Egyptian deity that's gained massive popularity in the modern age, there's Medjed, a really obscure character even in the ancient texts -- only two mentions of him have ever been found, both in one papyrus. When this papyrus was exhibited on 2012 in Japan, however, a lot of Japanese people were drawn to Medjed's unusual appearance (basically a BedsheetGhost with human feet) and its supposed ability to breathe fire and shoot beams out of his eyes. Medjed has since become a meme and pop culture icon in the country, appearing and being referenced in various media such as ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'', ''VideoGame/Persona5'', and ''Anime/OhSuddenlyEgyptianGod''.
26	* Mithras, a sun god from Persia, was also very popular in the Roman Empire, especially among the soldiers.
27	* Most Zoroastrians today are not found in Iran, but in India, Africa and United States.
28	* According to official LDS/Mormon sources there are more members of Mormonism outside the US. This is especially true in South Pacific countries such as Tonga or Samoa where they claim 30-40% of the national population.
29	** If you think Mormons, you will think Utah and maybe a few neighboring states like Idaho. Yet for the entirety of the lifetime of founder Joseph Smith, it was mostly an East Coast and Upstate New York phenomenon. The first Mormons did not reach what is now Utah until after the death of Joseph Smith (who was born in Vermont and died in Illinois)
30	* Catholic Patron saints also can fall into this rule. The classic example is [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_George Saint George]], patron saint of... [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patronages_of_Saint_George well, almost everywhere.]]
31	* In parts of central Europe - most notably inner-Alpine Austria, but to a lesser degree parts of Germany and Belgium - towns often parade giant statues of the Biblical hero [[Literature/SamsonAndDelilah Samson]]. They're called [[https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samsonfigur Samsonfiguren]] (or 'Samsone'), and are paraded around after the Catholic feast of Corpus Christi as a representation of victory.
32	* [[OurVampiresAreDifferent Vampires]] originated in Slavic folklore. The vampire legends were imported to England in the Nineteenth Century, and have been prominent in English language fiction ever since.
33	* The carbuncle, described as a small mammal with a gem on its forehead, is a mythical creature/cryptid that was sighted in South America that's so obscure in the west that it didn't even have an article on Website/TheOtherWiki in English [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbuncle_(legendary_creature) until 2020]]. In Japan however, it's so popular that it's become somewhat of a [[StockMonsters stock monster]] in [[EasternRPG JRPGs]] and {{Mons}} series.
34	* Maman Brigitte, a loa in Voodoo, was originally St. Bridget, brought to the Caribbean by Irish Catholics fleeing oppression under Cromwell. St. Bridget, in turn, is thought to be connected to the Celtic fertility goddess Brig.
35	* TheFlatwoodsMonster is a cryptid that only has two reported sightings in its home of West Virginia, with little popularity in the remainder of the United States. In contrast, the cryptid is very popular in Japan, appearing in video games and anime regularly, though it is treated more as an alien over a cryptid there.
36	* Judging by the amount of anime and manga that uses terms and concepts from Myth/NorseMythology (namely the Titans in ''Manga/AttackOnTitan'' are far closer to norse Jotuns than they are to their greek namesake, the world-tree Yggdrasil shows up in a lot of anime and even [[Literature/TheMasterOfRagnarokAndBlesserOfEinherjar stuff with no correlation to the actual myth]] uses Norse names), the old Nordic tales are rather popular in Japan. In fact, there is a very small, but at the same time, very vocal, Japanese Norse Pagan group.
37	** Similarly, while Christianity as a religion isn't all that popular in Japan, Christian ''theology'' is surprisingly well-liked in Japan, which explains why many anime and JRPG franchises from TheNineties, such as ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'', ''Franchise/ShinMegamiTensei'', and ''VideoGame/{{Xenogears}}'', use lots of Biblical and Gnostic motifs or outright include religious figures like God and Lucifer.

Context GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff / MythologyAndReligion