Deicide
killing of a god or goddess
Deicide is the killing of a god. The concept may be used for any act of killing a god, including a life-death-rebirth deity who is killed and then resurrected.
Etymology
The term deicide was coined in the 17th century from medieval Latin *deicidium, from deus "god" and -cidium "cutting, killing."
Aztec mythology
The Aztec god of war, Tezcatlipoca, tricked his rival Quetzalcoatl into over-drinking and wantonry. Quetzalcoatl burned himself to death in shame.
Buddhism
The crimes listed in the Anantarika-karma include killing an Arhat and shedding the blood of a Buddha.
Devadatta, a monk, and Ajātasattu, king of Magadha, attempted to kill the Gautama Buddha.
Christianity
According to the New Testament accounts, the Judean authorities in Jerusalem under Roman rule, the Pharisees, charged Jesus with blasphemy, a capital crime under biblical law, and sought his execution. According to John 18:31, the Judean authorities claimed to lack the authority to have Jesus put to death, though it is doubtful what legal basis such a claim would have had; the Jesus Seminar historicity project notes for John 18:31: "it's illegal for us: The accuracy of this claim is doubtful." in their Scholars Version. Additionally, John 7:53–8:11 records them asking Jesus about stoning the adulteress and Acts 6:12 records them ordering the stoning of Saint Stephen.
They brought Jesus to Pontius Pilate, the Roman Prefect of Judea, who was hesitant and let the people decide if Jesus were to be executed.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Deicide” is killing of a god or goddess. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Deicide, killing and goddess, not as a finished interpretation.
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The phrase “killing of a god or goddess” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1855439. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Deicide” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.