From: Joerg Baumgartner (joe@sartar.toppoint.de)
Date: Thu 26 May 1994 - 22:56:02 EEST
Cullen O'Neill X-RQ-ID: 4180
>>The Esrolian Ernaldan is not kin so she is a weirdo. She probably >>thinks that Ernalda is the king of gods and Orlanth is her wife. Now >>that's not on - is it? I mean, we have to respect her but we don't >>have to agree with (or even like) her. She would be better off going >>back to Esrolia where the men have no passion. This argument would be
> Yes This is probably the attitude, but you don't burn her at the stake,
> at worst you're rude... this is precisely what I meant by tolerate.
> But this doen't address the point I was making. ie: a lay member can be
> an accepted member of society.
What you call a lay member has a so deep share in the cult secrets and cult secrets of the pantheon in question that the only difference to what you call an initiate is the lack of a Rune Lord-like devotion. If any initiate was an avatar of his deity (only), I agree that most Gloranthans wouldn't be initiates, else they would be as inhuman as the Brithini.
Sam:
>> I tend to think of the Lay worshipper as someone who is along for the >> party. And I also think that this sort of unpious behaviour is seen >> by many cults as a good way to raise funds and so most would probably >> throw a party.
> Back to lay worshippers... I still think that a fairly large percentage
> of the population will be lay members. If you downgrade initiation, you
> get people suggesting that you need two levels of initiation, and that
> at the first level somebody can be an initiate of n cults (where n is an
> (arbitrarily large number). This is the same thing as a lay member (to
> me).
This is exactly the case. If any initiate was a Rune Lord only without 1d10 DI and without iron armour, you can stuff your religion .... cooling down ... Let me put it this way: I don't need to be the embodiment of the deity or deities I worship to be a participant in their more secret rituals. Nnot even priests need to act like their deities in every way, this is Rune Lords _only_, and maybe people aspiring to become Rune Lords.
If you played it otherwise, all Humakti would have to be totally celibate, lest they create new life. All Orlanthi would _have_ to go on adventures, and _have_ to marry an earth cultist, and _have_ to plow the earth, etc ad absurdum. No space for character development would be left, except for lay members, who don't even know what happens to them when they die.
No, an initiate needn't act like his deities all the time. Being initiated to more than one would mean sure madness (i.e. would be mandatory for Lunars <g>) deciding whether to act like Orlanth or Lhankor Mhy. LM never plowed, so my character mustn't? Orlanth did, so he must?
I don't advocate n to be an arbitrary large number. What I want is a reasonable attachment to the deities of one's social unit, be it hearth, clan or tribe. These deities include my ancestors (catch a religion not including them somehow), the local spiritual entities which receive worship, and the deities all of us worship. As a pure lay member with no link whatsoever to the divine my character is left with as much warm feeling in return for religious activities as the 20th century atheist paying lip service to some religion for what reason ever.
I don't want such characters as the standard character in Glorantha!
Nor do I believe that this is the deal teh Malkioni get.
>> But he is already part of that god's family. He is in Orlanth's Staed >> and so are all the other deities who are Orlanth's kin. Orlanth sits >> on the throne, Ernalda at his side and all his kin around him. They >> are drinking and laughing and having a good time..
> But where does someone who's an initiate of Urox, Ernalda, Orlanth,
> Barntar, Chalana Arroy and Aldrya fit into the Clan structure? Are the
> clans of gods less structured than the clans of men?
He doesn't any more if he has undergone a RQ3 initiation to each of these, costing him 60% of tie and income. He will cease to be a functioning member of the clan, and be expelled.
That's why Boris, Loren, I and probably a lot of lurkers see the need for a more pantheon-style of worship instead of the one cult - one deity stuff.
Cullen in X-RQ-ID: 4181
replying to Boris in X-RQ-ID: 4116
> The Lunar cults cannot be used to generalize for more 'normal' cults
> (generalizing is dangerous anyway, Devin's calling out the Inquisitors
> as we speak....). 'Normal' cults don't use sorcery
Sez who?
All the Eastern Isles, plus Kralorela and Vormain, plus the Lunars, plus the Arkati, plus the Carmanians, Jonatings... do. I don't want to start a head count. I am aware that the Eastern sorcery may be different from the Western, Malkioni sorcery. Yet there seem to be as many Stygians or Cryptostygians about on Glorantha as there are Orlanthi or Dara Happans or pure Malkioni. Are all the members of this large group abnormal?
Is Chalana Arroy, who after all allows her healers to use sorcery, not a normal cult? Is Kyger Litor, who allows her children to worship Black Arkat and to use his sorcery not a normal cult? Are the Wenelian Trader Princes not sufficiently Issaries that they pass as such in areas like Sartar and Prax?
Accuse me of rules bashing, but this particular "rule" makes little sense to me given what I read in GoG and Genertela Box.
> either are we going
> to use the Red Goddess write-up to change this. Lunars break rules for
> the #@)) of it anyway... surely their 'freedom' from the 'normal' form
> can't be used to alter the 'normal' form... of course 'normal' is only a
> 'useful GL construct' but lets not drop these altogether until Greg
> makes us.
He made us.
> Ok, this is a convincing argument. I give on the issue of
> this... but if a peson is effective as a worshipper when they're
> an initiate of a friendly diety, then why is there a need for
> pantheon initiation? Like you said from a guest initiate sees the
> ritual from a different perspective! That of his diety.
Because in your view of initiation, you wouldn't initiate the majority of the populace. Now you agree someone initiated is better than someone igcnorant, to which deity should he be initiated? Do we want only archetypes running around on the world? Even RuneQuest-Glorantha never was built like this, with characters like Griselda officially approved in Glorantha.
>> This begs the question, what is the iniatory >> status *relative to Ernalda* of all of the Orlanthi, Uroxi, etc. >> taking part in an Ernaldan High Holy Day service. They are not >> initiated to Ernalda, neither are they just lay members, as they >> participate much more fully. Yes, they are associates, but unless we >> call "associate" a third initiatory state, this is just handwaving. >> And if we *do* make associate another state of initiation, well then >> fine, I'll also call this a low initiate and I am satisfied. And if >> Alex (or anyone) asks me to what are they initiated that is associated >> with all the rest, well, I have shown above that one may initiate to >> many deities with a single initiation; one initiates to the "gods of >> my ancestors", i.e. the clan's gods. And if that is still >> unsatisfactory, they I suppose the clan wyter will do. It would be >> associated to all of the other deities worshipped by the clan, n'est >> pas?
> When one is initiated to a diety one becomes dedicated to that diety's
> viewpoint, and begins trying to become like that diety to the extent
> possible.
If it was this easy to become an avatar of one's deity, why the fuss about Rune Lords? Becoming the deity clearly is their province, not that of the initiate.
> In some way the Initiation must be at base a transformative
> experience (otherwise why the big change in afterlife/Divine magic?).
> This gets lost with pantheon initiation.
I don't see why. I hope to be able to submit the transcript of the initiation lecture of German RQ-Con soon, which nicely detailed what initiation is all about.
> The hero ceases trying to
> become like his/her god(dess) and becomes, well... kinda generic.
The hero still has the cultic prescriptions to act upon. He only acts as appropriate, but for the ordinary initiate appropriate behaviour is depending on the situation or work at hand.
> I think this is way to high a price to pay. I think that initiates of one
> god therefor serve to help the Ernalda service by being representatives
> of their gods at the holy day services (which might be put on by the
> whole community, but each initiate is participating as a representative
> of his god). Does this work for you?
No. The majority of initiates represent the benefiting party of the ritual, just like in Orlanth's stead. No need to represent these individually, really.
A few chosen initiates (if no higher ranks are present) become the avatar of their deity - for this ritual. Some become the avatar of a totally different deity - sometimes even an enemy deity - again just for this ritual. I doubt every clan has a full set of all deities in the myths, even the more popular ones. Other initiates have to jump in.
> Well... I suppose it does help in the way you speak. But couldn't you
> have just as rich experiences with everybody participating in all the
> rituals as lay members/guest initiates and when there is a lack of a
> _____(fill in blank) worshipper the community must seek out a priestess
> (or initiate any way) to fill in that role at the ritual to make the
> land fertile or whatever. I see alot of interaction between the cults
> without any need for multiple initiation.
I don't see how the basic initiation hampers inter-cult interaction. If you want a specialist, you still have to seek out a priest or Rune Lord.
LBQ:
> Well seriously... I couldn't figure out what it meant. I really
> mean it, no humour involved.
LightBringers Quest. Like God Learners one of the words that makes my
wrists ache.
--
-- Joerg Baumgartner joe@sartar.toppoint.de
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