Book Review: Small Gods by Terry Pratchett
Surprisingly Buddhist!
Obviously Small Gods, a work of comic fantasy written by a brilliant British atheist, is not an explicitly Buddhist book1. And yet as I read it, so many of its themes resonated with Vajrayana that it seemed worthwhile to write about. This is unavoidably going to be a spoiler-filled review, so if you haven’t read it and you like the genre you may not want to read further2. On the other hand, if you hate fun or you’ve already read Small Gods, read on!3
SPOILERS BELOW
First of all, let’s talk about the title — Small Gods. What a delightfully paradoxical name. It calls to mind the deity practices of Vajrayana. Specifically, the idea that when you generate the deity in your practice, you aren’t really connecting to something outside yourself but rather connecting to an aspect of yourself. The small god is inside you.
The way religion works in Discworld (the setting for Pratchett’s books) is that a god’s power is proportional to the strength of belief of its adherents. Gods need believers! There’s a great line in the book, “Things that exist don't need your belief. Only those that don't...” Indeed that paradoxical way of thinking about religious belief is exactly what I had previously written about regarding ritual practice. Our belief makes the divine real.
The eponymous Small God of the book, a tortoise named Om, is down to one remaining believer, Brutha (who becomes a prophet), despite having an entire nation organized around a religion supposedly devoted to Him. Unfortunately for Om, the religious structure surrounding him is stagnant and persecutory (it is ruled by an inquisitor who is the book’s villain) and no other followers have faith in him. This stagnation — when a tradition ossifies and loses its transformational capacity — has of course been the story of most religious traditions, and a good reason why the dharma has to be re-adapted for each time period. It’s also a reason why some gravitate toward non-institutional modes of practice, like the early Mahasiddhas of Mahamudra.
Brutha is notable for having the gift of perfect memory. The importance of memory for spiritual leadership is also very Buddhist. Mindfulness in Pali is “sati”, which literally means memory - Brutha’s talent is literally being mindful all the time! At the start of the book he is illiterate and yet at one point in the book he is able to memorize the contents of an entire library purely visually. He is always paying attention even if at first he seldom understands. Good lesson there too! It also illustrates that intelligence and spiritual attunement are not necessarily yoked together - that in fact intelligence can be a hindrance as much as an aid to connection with spirit.
The villain of the book, Vorbis, is the opposite of Brutha, governed by his own intellect with no faith whatsoever. He is someone who can’t hear the voice of god because he is only able to listen to his own voice (this is explicitly emphasized). In other words, he is someone for whom ego has become a substitute for god. When he eventually goes to the afterlife, which is a large desert the dead are meant to cross, his ego disappears and with no internal voice does not know where to go. You could say he remains disconnected from the Ground of Being.
Another element of interest is the relationship of the Gods to morality. The Gods are largely amoral, treating humans as expendable objects. It is only through incarnating as a lowly fragile tortoise and experiencing mortal danger and suffering is Om able to develop some compassion for humans and come to accept Brutha’s humanistic conception of morality. The (non)-duality of compassion and its emptiness (i.e. human constructedness of morality) can be seen in this way. The source of the good can be found within humans, not in the Gods.
Finally, at the climax when the Gods come together (after a bit of cajoling) to issue a universal credo to their followers to stop an impending war, they say two things:
This is not a game.
Here and now you are alive
That “this is not a game” serves more of a reminder to the Gods themselves (who are found literally to be gambling with lives) than for the humans. The second statement is more directly addressed to the humans - it is meant to affirm the sanctity of life. It can also be read as a wonderful pointer to the awake awareness that’s always right here. There is a vitality, a loving aliveness right here in this moment. Always right here.
At this final non-battle, Urn, a man who had earlier made a machine of war, sees that the machine can also be pointed at people he cares about to do them harm. At the end he learns to apply technology for peaceful purposes instead. This can be read from a tantric perspective — that the energy of shadow, of the samskaras, can be liberated and repurposed for the benefit of beings. In the end a philosopher takes the reigns of power (how Platonic). Those who are predisposed to power are not the ones who should yield it. And yet, the exercise of power is a necessity for a well ordered polity. This is another example of the yoking of wisdom to a shadow trait in order to do good in the world. Both of these plots points are thus very tantric (and something I’ve also previously written about).
In summary, Small Gods is an moving (and hilarious) parable of the spiritual path, made sharper and more poignant by the non-believer who wrote it4.
Trying something new with this review. If you like it, maybe I’ll do more of these!
I’ve only read 10 or so Pratchett books (there are a lot more) but this one is by far my favorite.
Honestly, spoilers don’t matter that much. You will still greatly enjoy the book even if you read the review. I tried to exclude mention of most of the fun plot twists :)
We can learn a lot from people who don’t share our path.