Elder Scrolls: no Demons nor devils?.

[Abisha]

how come they not exist in this series. and no i don't consider daedra demonic.

[Half Phased]

Because they’re not in the elder scrolls.

[Sédrio]

Demons don't exist BECAUSE of the Daedra. They are quite active in the world of Elder Scrolls. Like, instead of blaming something monstrous and unexplainable to be because of "demons" or "the devil", they instead have a name they can attach to it. Not to mention daedras are an actual race that people can just physically see in front of them. So the concept of a demon has never made it in the Elder Scrolls, as far as I know.

The world is being invaded? Mehrunes Dagon's at it again!
I drank and cheated on my wife? It wasn't me, it was Sanguine, he made me!
Charlie bit me, and Molag Bal's to blame.

All of these things have a name attached to it. Whereas the real world, if we look at christianism, something dark and mysterious could only be "demonic". Someone committing a sin must've been tempted by the devil, etc...

You should look up the Aedras and Daedras, they are interesting.

[R4ndomG4mer]

Christians/Catholics have demons, Japanese mythology has oni and various other dark spirits.
Norse mythology has many dark/evil creatures, such as Draugr.
Whatever names are attached to them, most religions/mytholgies have some concept of evil creatures or spirits. In the case of The Elder Scrolls, they just happen to be called Daedra.

[siransan]

Answer a) there are no Angels either, that is just how this world works
Answer b) the spiders ate them all, have you seen those beasts?

[Skumboni]

Religions are made up things, just like those demons. They just did not get made up for this game.

[Valden21]

Demons and devils don't really exist in the setting because the setting's cosmology isn't really set up that way. More than anything else, the Daedra are pretty much the personification of specific concepts. Sheogorath will always be crazy, Sanguine will always be partying or looking for a party, etc.

[Fear2288]

Well that’s nice that you don’t count the Daedra as demons, but they’re the facsimile of them in the TES universe.

Real world religions and cultures don’t exist in The Elder Scrolls, thus the real world concept of a demon doesn’t exist there either.

Daedra are the TES version of demons. They’re supernatural, can be manifested into the world, usually have selfish intentions aimed at either achieving control/dominance or causing chaos, and most mortals perceive them as being evil.

The Daedric Princes are heavily inspired by real-world demons and commit many of the actions associated with tales of demons: possessing, corrupting, and manipulating mortals, carrying out or inspiring acts of hedonism, sadistic violence, and chaos, making insidious deals with mortals and offering wealth, power, knowledge, and success in exchange for worship or - more commonly - something that those who accept the deal come to regret, and so on.

[Von Faustien]

technecly arena had demons even if thats just early installment weirdness and they got retconed into being deadra in daggerfall when the lore got fluffed out.

its also worth mention that despite the supposed difference between adera and deadra the line gets pretty dam blury and 3 of the "deadric" princes are Aderic beings.

[Junipercat]

Originally posted by Abisha:

how come they not exist in this series. and no i don't consider daedra demonic.

That is as close as you get. Otherwise there are no demons because your religion doesn't exist in this universe. Same reason there are no angels.

This is not an alternate Earth. Don't be another Patheticjedilord.

[RequiemsRose]

You might not consider them to be demons but daedra are the closest facsimile in the game. If you end up going into the lore it's actually not that different as far as origin stories go, including the part where the daedra might actually be roughly the same thing as the aedra but one group decided to help creation and the other group didn't (aedra translates to "our ancestors", daedra translates to "not our ancestors", some similarities to angels vs fallen angels/demons if you want to view it through irl religious lens). Mind you that's a cliff notes explanation to the point of bordering on inaccurate but, there's an entire wiki dedicated to this info that I have no intention of copy-pasting or summarizing here, you can google it if interested though.

Edit: if you did want to explore it more but aren't sure where to start on the search I can at least link a few interesting pages regarding the "higher beings" in the elder scrolls universe and the general creation myth, though bear in mind the lore also includes that there are different cultural beliefs and interpretations...plus the joy of retcons in games is always fun:

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Padomay
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Anu
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Magna_Ge
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Magnus
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Lorkhan

[Valden21]

Originally posted by Von Faustien:

its also worth mention that despite the supposed difference between adera and deadra the line gets pretty dam blury and 3 of the "deadric" princes are Aderic beings.

You sure 'bout that? The distinction between Aedra and Daedra is pretty well-defined in the lore. According to UESP, the difference between the two is that the Aedra sacrificed a little bit of their divine essence to create Nirn and everything in it, and the Daedra didn't. AFAIK, there are no Daedra who started out as Aedra. Indeed, from what I can tell, the one Daedra who used to be something else is Meridia, as she used to be a Magna Ge.

[alexander_dougherty]

Originally posted by Von Faustien:

3 of the "deadric" princes are Aderic beings.

No, ONE of them is Aedric, Malacath.
One nearly became an Aedra but didn't join in, Meridia.
And I assume the third is Azura, but she isn't even close to being an Aedra, she is nice, but that isn't the same as taking part in the act of creation.

[alexander_dougherty]

Originally posted by Abisha:

how come they not exist in this series. and no i don't consider daedra demonic.

Daedra is all you are going to get, whether you consider them fiendish or not.

[FauxFurry]

The Elder Scrolls may have been inspired in equal parts by Dungeons & Dragons and Ultima but its creators wanted their derivative setting to have its own unique cosmology rather than recycle then re-purpose real-world mythological figures like D & D and its progeny would do. and it is better off for it.
Anyone who wants that kind of thing in the Elder Scrolls will have to use mods (of which there are a large amount, at least for Legendary Edition).

[Von Faustien]

theres a clear defintion for what makes a deadra but not all the deadra follow it

of the 18 princes we have

actual deadra
13 14 depending on how you count sheogorath and Jyggalag, H

Hermaeus Mora, Clavicus Vile, nameria, Sanguine, Vaermina, Azura, Boethia, Hircine, pyrite, Nocturnal, Shogorath/jyggalag, Molag Bal, Mephala


former mortals
1
Sheogorath (new version)

magna gi
(which id argue is aderic as some like magnus are worshiped as adera)
2
Meridia and Ithelia

actual adera
(albeit ♥♥♥♥♥♥ adera)
Malacath

magitech weapon or curse victim who pissed off alduin depending on the origin story you go with
1
Mehruns Dagon


the Aderic gods likewise are full of magna gi and former mortals and the Khajitte even lump in explicitly deadric being like Azura into there panthons alongside the adera with no distinction

the given lore definition is an alright rule of thumb but brakes down on a case by case basis