"YOU ARE BUT GNATS BEFORE MY DIVINE MAJESTY!" "Great, so why do you even talk to us? I don't bother talking to gnats."

Why do so many divine beings go out on their way to seek validation from the obviously inferior mortals? Why is my fear and love, my praises and beggings, so important to them? Why do they even notice me? What did I do?



Lovecraft had the right idea: anything so far above mankind would not care about them at all. We'd just be ants, trodden under their feet not because they care enough to do so, but because they don't even notice us. But I feel that there's a lot to do with the opposite approach as well: for a god to descend among the mortals for a while - a lifetime for us, a short while of idle distraction for them - as a peasant rather than a king, freely mingle with us, one of us. They couldn't care less of what we think of them, because they know for a fact that they've nothing to prove to us. Why not have a while of good time instead? Why not see what these little mortals are coming up with now? What else is there to do in the universe, anyway?



Don't get me wrong - I've got plenty of divinities, like too many for me to count, that fit into the weird middleground where they feel themselves above mortals, yet not above enough to not flaunt it. They can play innumerable roles in a story, and drive all sorts of plots all on their own, in a far more varied manner than either exteme. But from an outsider viewpoint... they come across as pretty insecure.

That, or it's a strategy game they're playing. You know how addictive some of those can get. Even a god might not be able to resist.