Trickster Gods

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Native American and African tales put a lot of emphasis on the trickster. Raven , Coyote, and Anansi are all prominent and "high up" in their respective pantheons. With European/Pagan traditions you mostly hear about Loki, but Prometheus and Hermes fit a lot of qualities we find in Tricksters. You could also add in Puck and the Fae in general from Celtic lore. I don't know enough about Chinese and Japanese mythologies to accurately pick out trickster gods, but I would be very surprised if there are none.

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I was born in Paraguay and loved the mythology of the Guarani people.
In the creation myth the first humans (their Adam and Eve) had three children the youngest son Japeusá is known as a trickster, liar and theif. There is also the Pombero, ugly imp men who bring misfortune. Then there is Jasy Jastere, one of the seven children of Tau the lord of night. Jasy Jastere would spirit away children who didn't sleep during the siesta and take them on adventures or eat them depending on how he felt. He had a magic staff that would make him invisible and if you could steal it he would lose all his power. Once in possession of the staff you can ask of him a boon, typically where to find treasure.

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The religion that is interesting to me is Hinduism because there ISN'T a close parallel to the Trickster that I can think of. Some candidates would be Hanuman, Narada Muni, Vishnu, or specifically the avatars Mohini and Krishna.

Hanuman is a monkey, which seems to be a natural choice for a Trickster, and there is the tale of trying to eat the sun. There are other stories that generally involve being over-excited and foolish of custom which fits a monkey but not so much a trickster.

Narada Muni is a sage that can travel between material and spiritual worlds and is friendly with the divine and demonic races. His "advice" can often be the catalyst to large mythic events. For example: when Krishna is born, his evil uncle gets a mystic warning that his sister's 8th child will kill him. He decides to leave the other kids alone, focusing on the 8th. Narada comes to Kamsa and using some word manipulation convinces Kamsa that clemency is dangerous and that he should kill ALL the children.

Vishnu - and thus the avatars - is a strange case. There are LOTS of stories of avatars using wit or "legalese" to get around oaths and benedictions. That's certainly a Trickster trait. And yet Vishnu is also widely regarded as the topmost in the pantheon, and that doesn't mesh with the Trickster vibe. Tricksters subvert the law, they don't maintain it.

>>18997516
Sadly the Guarani only shared their tales orally and many of the old tales are lost after spanish missionaries created parallels between their beliefs and Christianity. Hence why Tau is considered a Satan allegory instead of a lord of night.

>>18997516
Awesome stuff. Any links or stories to share about that youngest son? And interesting you bring up Chrisianity. That's another tradition that doesn't really have a Trickster. I think the extreme dichotomy in their views based on the God/Devil dynamic simply doesn't allow for a category of "mischief."

Though from the wiki, one scholar Evan Brown noted similarities between Tricksters and Jacob from the Bible:
>The tricks Jacob plays on his twin brother Esau, his father Isaac and his father-in-law Laban are immoral by conventional standards, designed to cheat other people and gain material and social advantages he is not entitled to. Nevertheless, the Biblical narrative clearly takes Jacob's side and the reader is invited to laugh and admire Jacob's ingenuity–as is the case with the tricksters of other cultures.

>>18997529
This saddens me because the children of Tau are badass. They are fearful creatures, cunning and powerful over their domains. To the average tribesmen you would think they would be considered demons but their "official" title is protecter. They are elemental forces of nature, concepts that have become physical. It's a shame.

more like gave you the light or the sun, hand to hand with pronoia skywalker

>>18997532
There really isn't much left other than a few cliff notes. The main tale is that he commit suicide by drowning himself in water, the reason why isn't mentioned. It's said that he turned into a crab as a curse and that is why all crabs walk "backwards".

Is power a large trait for Tricksters? What I mean is, to me, a Trickster is generally "weak." Direct confrontation with a threat isn't usually an option for a Trickster. This marks a large distinction from something like a Chaos God like Eris or Kek. It's also different from the Cosmic Joker conception. Those beings are manifesting reality and using that ability to create the "joke." A trickster generally works within reality, finding loopholes rather than rewriting.

>>18997499
Pssst, Loki wasn't a God in nordic times, hell he wasn't considered a God until kinda 100 years ago.
Now ask yourself this. Why?

>>18998164
Was he created as more of an archetype to symbolize something?

>>18997573
That's the thing, the trickster mocks, subverts, deceives, and undermines those whom have power. That is the trick or the joke, the trickster takes the status quo and turns it on its head.

>>18998164
maybe because he's a little piece of shit who isn't worthy of that shitty title

also the jews, /x/tology 101

>>18997481
I got Becky the sun. Becky lemme smash

>>18997481
Ictinike?

on another note, coyote really likes to mess with my life. I mean I get I have to take life with a pinch of salt and laugh at bad luck. But there's only so much a person can shrug off.

>>18998881
Hes universally hated for killing and torturing for amusement, sex changing and birthing monsters, killing Baldur the veritable Light in the sky, sex-changing to prevent his release from Hel and mocking all creation. Yet at the same time he was notorious for granting Gungnir to Odin, Mjolnir to Thor and many other mythical weapons and legendary feats. It's a love-hate relationship, but think of him as a betrayer who always destroys the status quo even if it is in a positive manner, just for the
sake of revolution regardless of whom gets destroyed.

Odin was two-faced as well.

>>19000105
>sex-changing to prevent his release from Hel and mocking all creation.

Was Loki a Freemason?

>>19000105
I salute you, anon who knows what actually happened about Loki.