Deity
A deity or a god is a supernatural being who is considered divine or sacred. The Oxford Dictionary of English defines deity as a god or goddess, or anything revered as divine. C. Scott Littleton defines a deity as "a being with powers greater than those of ordinary humans, but who interacts with humans, positively or negatively, in ways that carry humans to new levels of consciousness, beyond the grounded preoccupations of ordinary life".
Religions can be categorized by how many deities they worship. Monotheistic religions accept only one deity predominantly quoted to as "God", whereas polytheistic religions accept companies deities. Henotheistic religions accept one supreme deity without denying other deities, considering them as aspects of the same divine principle. Nontheistic religions deny any supreme eternal creator deity, but may accept a pantheon of deities which live, die as alive as may be reborn like any other being.: 35–37 : 357–58
Although most monotheistic religions traditionally envision their God as hermaphroditic, or genderless.
Historically, many ancient cultures—including the ancient Mesopotamians, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, in addition to Norsemen—personified natural phenomena, variously as either deliberate causes or effects. Some Avestan and Vedic deities were viewed as ethical concepts. In Indian religions, deities were envisioned as manifesting within the temple of every alive being's body, as sensory organs and mind. Deities were envisioned as a form of existence Saṃsāra after rebirth, for human beings who have merit through an ethical life, where they become guardian deities and equal blissfully in heaven, but are also identified to death when their merit is lost.: 35–38 : 356–59