History Main / DivineRanks

* In the ''HisDarkMaterials'' trilogy, The Authority is merely the oldest of the angels.

* The {{Dragonlance}} universe has the pantheon, a few mortals that are powerful enough to possibly ascend to godhood, like Raistlin, and the High God, described as as far above the gods as the gods are above mortals.

* The ''YoungWizards'' series has the Powers That Be, who could be classified either as a group of non-omnipotent gods or as archangels, and the One, who ''is'' omnipotent but has even less involvement with mortal life than the Powers. They form the basis for all religions (on Earth and otherwise), but don't exactly correspond to any of them.

** ''TillWeHaveFaces'' goes one step further and uses Cupid as a Expy of God.

Compare PhysicalGod, DivineDelegation, PowersThatBe, and AnthropomorphicPersonification. See also OurGodsAreGreater, OurTitansAreDifferent, OurAngelsAreDifferent, CelestialParagonsAndArchangels, DemonLordsAndArchdevils, and TheOldGods.

* The MarvelUniverse sets up {{Thor}} as a superhero, though oddly he seems outclassed by beings who don't present themselves as gods.

* JapaneseMythology is even worse. The Japanese language uses the word ''kami'' to refer to gods, spirits, ancestors and forces of nature. Shinto priests have apparently complained about westerners translating the word as 'god', as this gives people not familiar with their religion a distinctly wrong idea.

** Marvel did put in the One Above All, who surpasses all the other (rather numerous) infinite beings in the Multiverse, who might either be a ShoutOut to the Judeo-Christian {{God}} or...JackKirby.

* In GreekMythology, the Twelve Olympians (and sometimes the Titans) are what most people think of when they hear about gods, but lesser creatures like nymphs are sometimes referred to as gods as well. Also, heroes tend to be divine-human offspring, and can sometimes send a god running in a fight.

* CelticMythology has gods, elves and faeries all over the place, and it's hard to tell where one stops and another starts. Also, the offspring of gods and mortals are generally above mortals but not quite at god level, though they still have no particular qualms about telling the gods where to shove it, and then shoving it there.

* The CelestialBureaucracy in ChineseMythology works this way. The highest of them is the [[KingOfTheGods Celestial Emperor]], followed by major gods and many celestial functionaries, followed by other gods and powerful ancestral spirits. However, some sufficiently powerful beings are both divine and are outside this system.

* L.C. Suggs possesses an entire ranking of Supreme Beings within the Suggsverse. It starts with Omnipotent Gods, and then it goes higher from there.

* [[HinduMythology Indian mythology]] also works this way. At the highest is the "Source" of the world who is beyond everything, followed by three deities of Creation-Preservation-Destruction, followed by other gods, slightly below them are the Asura (enemies of the gods), and then various beings worthy of veneration.

* Creator/CSLewis was both a devout Christian and a fan of pagan mythology. Therefore, in his ''{{Narnia}}'' books and lesser-known ''SpaceTrilogy'', he toyed with the {{Retcon}}-ish idea of beings that blended characteristics of Christian angels and pagan gods. Capital-G God, of course, was still the One True God.

* In the ''LeftBehind'' series, [[{{Satan}} Lucifer]] claims that God is merely the oldest of the angels. It is implied (to put it mildly) that Lucifer is mistaken about this, and God is everything Christian theology has ever claimed he is.

* NeilGaiman's [[ComicBook/TheSandman Endless]] are explicitly said to be above the gods. Individual aspects of them can be destroyed or imprisoned, but when this happens a new one will appear to take the previous one's place. Death is shown to be formally responsible for all death everywhere, but lets other people handle the details, especially when it comes to the afterlife: Hades gets the Greeks, Lucifer (to his annoyance) gets the [[SelfInflictedHell guilty and masochistic]], and so on.

** This is without even getting into the "Pantheon of Cosmic Gods", as they've been called on numerous occasions, which includes beings such as the Living Tribunal (who is said to be a servant of the aforementioned One-Above-All); the trinity of Eternity, Death, and Galactus; Master Order and Lord Chaos (and their servant, the InBetweener); Mistress Love and Sire Hate; the Phoenix Force; Mephisto; The Vishanti, Cyttorak, and many of the various other entities that Dr.Strange often calls upon while casting his spells, and even Thanos while he possessed the Infinity Gauntlet. The Marvel Universe has a LOT of "Cosmic Gods."

* In the Literature/{{Discworld}} you have a) Azrael and seven other Great Old Ones, b) a handful of anthropomorphic personifications like the [[strike:Four]] Five Horsemen of the Apocralypse and Time, c) the traditional Gods who live in Dunmanifestin and like smiting people with thunderbolts (like Om, Blind Io, Offler and the rest), d) Devils, small gods, elves & sundry creatures, and e) the Things from the Dungeon Dimensions, which are more like Lovecraftian {{Eldritch Abomination}}s.

**** Oddly, while the prophets are worshiped as gods they claim to not even be aware of the more typical races on first contact. On the other hand, they are outside time and may have gotten the idea there.

* [[HinduMythology Indian mythology]] also works this way. At the highest is the "Source" of the world who is beyond everything, followed by three deity of Creation-Preservation-Destruction, followed by other gods, slightly below them are the Asura (enemies of the gods), and then various beings worthy of veneration.

* ''DungeonsAndDragons'' is the TropeNamer here: The most recent edition of the rules gave gods a numerical god-stat which would range from 0 (quasi-gods such as the offspring of full ones) to 20 (the greatest beings who have the slightest chance of interacting with mortals). Though it's a throw-away bit of fluff text, there is mention of beings of divine rank 21 and up, who serve as the gods' gods. There are also arch-fiends, whose status is ambiguous: Officially they aren't even divine rank 0, but they have clerics and some resources suggest the DM could go ahead and officially make them gods. Apparently the fourth edition will do this with the head devil, but not the others.
** In a nod to the appropriately universe shaking power levels of the {{Eldritch Abomination}}s of the CthulhuMythos, the most powerful God in the D&D multiverse - arrived at by reverse engineering his (or, more appropriately, it's) stats as presented in the TabletopGame/D20System version of TabletopGame/CallOfCthulhu, is Azathoth, the ONLY God with a an OFFICIAL Divine Rank of 21.

* ''Videogame/WorldOfWarcraft'' has the Old Gods and their servants, as well at the Titans, their Titan Watchers, the various Stone Watchers below them, and their dragonflights, each of which is headed by a Dragon Aspect. There are also a huge variety of lesser gods and demigods--though it should be noted that the evils they have faced have been a fallen Titan and a fallen Dragon Aspect, with ranks of their own, and gods are ''not'' immortal in this multiverse. In fact, many nature gods fell during the first invasion of the Burning Legion. As well, mortals of sufficient power may be able to face such beings on their own, such as Azshara or the Guardians of Tirisfal.
* VideoGame/{{Touhou}}. As it's basically Shintoism meets {{Moe}} (the main character is a ShrineMaiden), it's full of ''kami'' (which may or may not be translated as "gods"). The least of them are barely sentient, inhabiting every objects-- these are the fuzzy balls that follow you in episode ''10''. Above them are gods of concepts, such as Harvest (the Aki Sisters) and Misfortune [[GothicLolita (Hina)]]. Higher than them are powerful individual gods, such as Kanako and [[GodEmperor Suwako]]. And waaaaay above everyone else is the Dragon of Gensokyo.

** The very highest rank is limited to Ananke, the embodiment of [[YouCantFightFate]].

* In GreekMythology, the Twelve Olympians are what most people think of when they hear about gods, but lesser creatures like nymphs are sometimes referred to as gods as well. Also, heroes tend to be divine-human offspring, and can sometimes send a god running in a fight.
** Meanwhile, there were the Primordial Gods, most of them [[AnthropomorphicPersonification embodying something]]. The Fates, Thanatos, Hypnos, and Erebus (to name a few) operated outside the Olympians' control. Special mention goes to Nyx ([[TheSacredDarkness Night]]) who ([[MultipleChoicePast maybe]]) aided in creation and whose wrath even ''Zeus'' didn't dare provoke. Oddly, for their power, none of them took a terribly active role.

* [[ComicBook/NewGods Darkseid]], he is a [[GodOfEvil god]].

* L.C Suggs possesses an entire ranking of Supreme Beings within the Suggsverse. It starts with Omnipotent Gods, and then it goes higher from there.

* Creator/JRRTolkien's Middle-Earth world has a largely non-interfering creator deity (Eru Ilúvatar), the fifteen Valar and an unknown amount of less-powerful Maiar, who are technically angels (Tolkien being [[AuthorAppeal a good Catholic]]) but for the purposes of the story are functionally polytheistic gods and demigods. The Vala Morgoth introduced evil and started corrupting the world, with a following of Maiar (among them Sauron). Eru does, however, claim that everything done is [[GambitRoulette all part of the plan]].

* Representative members of the TrekVerse hierarchy can be given as:

* Creator/JRRTolkien's Middle-Earth world has a largely non-interfering creator deity (Eru Ilúvatar), the fifteen Valar and an unknown amount of less-powerful Maiar, who can both be compared to lesser gods or angels. The Vala Morgoth introduced evil and started corrupting the world, with a following of Maiar (among them Sauron). Eru does, however, claim that everything done is [[GambitRoulette all part of the plan]].
** To be more specific, the idea is that in the beginning, there was Eru, who created the Ainur (the divine beings) and showed them his plan for creation, represented as a song. The Ainur were inspired by the song, even if they couldn't understand all of it (and not all of it was shown to them at once), and were invited by Eru to take part in it. Later, when they were introduced to the part of the song which showed the concept of sentient life, one of the Valar, Aulë the smith, wanted to have beings to teach his crafts to so much that he created dwarves. Eru confronted him over this, and when Aulë showed regret and humility, as well as fondness for his creations, Eru took pity on him and gave the dwarves true, sentient life (though he told Aulë that they were not to inhabit the world before the Elves). Whether the dwarves were part of Eru's original plan for creation is left ambiguous (it could have been a SecretTestOfCharacter for Aulë).

* Each ''{{Pokemon}}'' game up to ''Videogame/PokemonDiamondAndPearl'' has introduced higher and higher legendary Mons which control various aspects of nature and reality. This led to Arceus, who ''has created the whole goddamn Pokemon world''... so they scaled back down in the next generation.
* ''WorldOfWarcraft'' has the Old Gods and their servants, as well at the Titans, their Titan Watchers, the various Stone Watchers below them, and their dragonflights, each of which is headed by a Dragon Aspect. There are also a huge variety of lesser gods and demigods--though it should be noted that the evils they have faced have been a fallen Titan and a fallen Dragon Aspect, with ranks of their own, and gods are ''not'' immortal in this multiverse. In fact, many nature gods fell during the first invasion of the Burning Legion. As well, mortals of sufficient power may be able to face such beings on their own, such as Azshara or the Guardians of Tirisfal.

* The authors of the WhateleyUniverse knidly put some of the details of this [[AllThereInTheManual in a section on their web forums]]. It's needed, since there are Great Old Ones, Outer Gods, demons and devils, God and Satan (or so it
seems, anyway), mythological creatures, mutants wielding major magical powers, and so on.

seems, anyway), mythological creatures, mutants wielding major magical powers,


and so on.

*** To be more specific, the idea is that in the beginning, there was Eru, who created the Ainur (the divine beings) and showed them his plan for creation, represented as a song. The Ainur were inspired by the song, even if they couldn't understand all of it (and not all of it was shown to them at once), and were invited by Eru to take part in it. Later, when they were introduced to the part of the song which showed the concept of sentient life, one of the Valar, Aulë the smith, wanted to have beings to teach his crafts to so much that he created dwarves. Eru confronted him over this, and when Aulë showed regret and humility, as well as fondness for his creations, Eru took pity on him and gave the dwarves true, sentient life (though he told Aulë that they were not to inhabit the world before the Elves). Whether the dwarves were part of Eru's original plan for creation is left ambiguous (it could have been a SecretTestOfCharacter for Aulë).

* The authors of the WhateleyUniverse knidly put some of the details of this [[AllThereInTheManual in a section on their web forums]]. It's needed, since there are Great Old Ones, Outer Gods, demons and devils, God and Satan (or so it seems, anyway), mythological creatures, mutants wielding major magical powers, and so on.