From: Carlson, Pam (carlsonp@wdni.com)
Date: Fri 19 Jul 1996 - 23:20:00 EEST
[urban commoners] worship Yelm in the big ceremonies ,
>but they are _not_ initiates into the mysteries of "Yelm the Emperor"
PM> So most Medieval Christians worshipped only the Saints and not Jesus
Christ is the savior of the common man, not the Emperor of the Universe.
My Dara Happa is a parallel, with the highest class of people - closely
Sure, Yelm has lots of great abilities - fighting, healing, observation,
because he was the King and therefore only fit to be worshipped by
the Nobility?
(IMO, the closest Christ parallel in DH is Murharzarm.)
As I understand medieval Catholicism, most peasants prayed to Mary, who
was an intercessionary for Jesus, who was himself an intersessionary to
God. (Remember - these people weren't allowed to/able to read the bible
themselves - that was the clergy's perogative. Martin Luther blew the
lid off that, and there was lots of associated violence.) Sure,
everyone worshipped God, too, but wasn't it possible to pray to God only
through a priest? (Disclaimer: my Catholicism Lore is not high.)
tied to the priesthood - acting as the intersessionaries to the highest
deity. (Some of this comes from all the refereces to Yelm being "high"
and, presumeably, hard to reach. Not as tough as Dayzatar, but not as
easy as Lodril. Thus all the Yelmic geasa I propose. And, yes - in My
Glorantha, if a Yelm Priest wants to be *certain* his Sunspear works,
he'd better live right.)
fertility - but these are mostly available through the associate cults.
(My guess is that the best healers in traditional DH are initiated to
Erissa, Yelm's "daughter". Scribes initiate to Buserian, warriors to
Yelm's warrior sons, etc.) Additionally, Lodril is open to everyone.
What Yelm does *exclusively* is rule.
This still doesn't exclude Peter's model of many aspects of the Yelm
cult being open to the majority of urban Dara Happans. But I prefer to
cover these with subcults. It makes good use of those 100 gods and
goddesses in Yelm's Court!
____________________________
DC> If person A is initiated into the cult of Issaries, and person B
is
initiated into the cult of Orlanth according to the old rules, we now
know
that they are both initiates of the Orlanth pantheon. What does this
mean?
IMO, it means that
1) both know all the general stuff about all the common deities in the
panthon, and worship them all when appropriate/necessary.
2) if both are men, both are initiated into Orlanth, and know his
mysteries which relate to being a man in their society. Women and
foreigners do not know these.
3) an Orlanth Goodvoice knows one of the mysteries of Orlanth the
Speaker, and maybe a spell to go with it.
4) the Issaries initiate knows many of the deeper mysteries of Issaries.
He knows things about secrets about navigating in hell, guarding paths,
preventing theft, etc - that the Orlanthi doesn't. He also has access
to more powerful Issaries spells. Due to his knowledge, spells, and
special link to Issaries, he would be far more effective in a clan
Lightbringer ritual than the Orlanth Goodvoice.
5) The guy initiated into the cult of Orlanth OldRules probably has a
job in society, even if he's only a farmer. He may be an initiate to
Barntar, frex. Then he would know mysteries of cattle, crops, wife
pleasing (sorting his laundry properly, frex), that the Issaries
specialist probably doesn't know. Or he could be Orlanth the Warrior, or
a combination of several aspects.
( Specializing takes time in game-terms, though, so it's difficult to
Another part of actually being initiated to a *diety*, is that you learn
walk too many paths of even a single deity.)
special "pitfall" secrets. Frex, Yelmies learn that Kazkurtem is a full
aspect of Yelm the Emperor, as Lodrilli learn that they, too, can become
Monster Man, and Orlanthi learn that Ragnalar can be found within
themselves, and Ernaldans learn that the Great Mother might just as soon
kill folk as help them. These "secrets" are not widely publicised
outside the initiated! Priests and rune lords learn even more secrets,
which allow them to walk more obscure and dangerous paths than the
average initiate.
Just IMO.
Pam
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