The White God

Question: While recently doing some research, I happened upon something that surprised me. Apparently, some Mormons think Quetzalcoatl was Jesus, misinterpreted by the people of Central America. While I don't know how prevalent that thought is, I was wondering, has that ever come up in your sessions? How did you handle it, and if it hasn't, how would you handle it?

It's not just prevalent, it's a real and present tenet of Mormonism, actually. To quickly redact the idea down, the Book of Mormon claims that the Native Americans were made up of four tribes which were descended from Israelites who were either defectors or exiles who departed from the Old World and the worship of God to settle the American continents. In the third Book of Nephi within the Book of Mormon, Jesus resurrects after his crucifixion and announces that he will go forth to preach to his long-lost flocks there, and appears in the Americas as a prophet and teacher, blessing the children and calling the lost tribes to return to his worship. If you'd like to check it out straight from the horse's mouth, the official Mormon website is happy to explain.

The Book of Mormon doesn't directly claim that Jesus was interpreted as Quetzalcoatl, but it's the widely accepted view within the Church of Latter-Day Saints at this point. It's largely confusion stemming from over-simplification of Aztec ideas and religion; basically, because Quetzalcoatl is the White Tezcatlipoca, early European ethnographers interpreted this as him being Caucasian, despite the fact that the color white has very distinct associations in Mesoamerican symbolism and nothing at all to do with race before the introduction of Europeans into the mix. Add that to the confusion of early historians in the Americas who mistakenly believed Quetzalcoatl to be the "high god" of the pantheon, the popularity of the idea of a prophecy of Quetzalcoatl's return one day (which has its own set of problems we've talked about before), the perception of Quetzalcoatl as the only "good" god in the pantheon thanks to focusing on his preference for animal sacrifices, and the perennially popular weirdness of Caucasians believing that Jesus was Caucasian, and you've got a lot of confused Europeans drawing conclusions.

Now, scientific professionals in pretty much every field who are not Mormons have basically said that this entire premise is not only unprovable but thoroughly debunkable; archaeologists and geneticists point out that there's no evidence of these four tribes in the Americas and that the native Americans are largely descended from Asian ancestors, while linguists and anthropologists on both sides of the ocean point out the many inconsistencies in historical and cultural records for both the Levantine and Mesoamerican areas. But that's science talking to a religion, and devout Mormons are equally staunch in their beliefs, so the debate rages on.

As far as using it in our games, we haven't and probably won't. Since we're not interested in monotheistic religion being imported into Scion most of the time, that includes Mormonism, and we aren't particularly interested in bothering with the Book of Mormon. If you happened to be interested in it, though, we'd suggest doing something with Fatebonds and mortal perceptions, perhaps exploring how Mormon beliefs might affect Quetzalcoatl if he gets Fatebound too much or what Mormon religious practices might mean and symbolize to gods and Scions, particularly within the Aztlanti and other Mesoamerican pantheons.

In our games, Quetzalcoatl is probably aware of and mildly amused by the idea, but it probably doesn't go any further than that.