Polytheism

Polytheism is the belief that there are many gods. It is related to Paganism.

In polytheistic religions, including most forms of Paganism and neo-paganism there are several gods and goddesses. Some polytheistic religions also believe that there is some quasi-conscious essence, or ground of being, but they do not necessarily call this concept God.

Indian pantheism/polytheism
Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism all developed in roughly the same region in India, and share a number of traits that distinguish them from Western conceptions of God. All three religions share the concept that all of the phenomenal world is essentially an illusion that stems from the perception of self, or self-consciousness. To conceive of the self as a being with individual existence constitutes a dramatic alienation from the world soul (brahman, atman, jiva, nirvana), or unitary consciousness of the universe, a state of being where all is one, and self fades away. As the self fades away, so does this illusory universe in which we live.

While superficially polytheistic (there are potentially innumerable gods and goddesses in these religions), the gods and goddesses are, themselves, variously alienated from the ultimate reality, a reality that has nothing much to do at all with the world we perceive around us. While gods and goddesses may or may not be thought to exist (as much as the self does or does not exist), there is some question as to whether the term God is an apt description of the ultimate reality, or world soul that sits behind the illusion of self and the universe that is perceived by the self. For this reason, these religions are sometimes considered rather atheistic, especially by scholars in the Abrahamic tradition.

Since the world soul is the only true reality, and the phenomenal universe is an illusion, the relationship between the world soul and the universe is very different than that in Western forms of monotheism, where the universe is very real, even if dwelling in a "fallen" state. The concept of creator and creation is very different here, so the notions of transcendence and immanence are, as well. The world soul is immanent, in that all beings are a part of it, even if they dwell in a state self-delusion; it is transcendent, as well, since it exists quite independently of the collective illusions of the manifold selves.