From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk
Date: Tue 31 May 1994 - 22:54:27 EEST
Sandy:
> I feel that any Malkioni who attempt to include CA as a saint
> are considered heretics.
Isn't everyone?
> I'm not sure that saint-style worship would
> even work for her, though I'm sure they could organize some sort of
> hybrid Invisible God service and get her Rune magic (just as a shaman
> could contact her and get magic without really becoming an initiate
> or priest). In any case, I think her magic would come as Rune spells.
This is an odd argument, given that CA is a cult which explicitly allows sorcery. I see no reason why any or all of the following cannot exist: a Stygian-style IG/CA cult, with (some) CA rune magic; a Petersenesque Saint-style worship of CA, or a subcult thereof; a cult of St. CA, granting specialist healing magics. One might then start to wonder if these were all the "same" CA, or even the "real" one. And?
> There have been some puzzling references to saints in the Daily.
> "Saint cults" "Saint Rune Lords", etc. To clarify matters, here is
> how the RQ rules are currently intended to support Saints. Anyone who
> insists on a different system for their campaign has my blessing.
[Oodles of rules for sacking POW to Saints in a quasi-RM-like way]
I like this system, and it (or an earlier, but substantially similar) version is what I was referring to as "magic granted by manifest saints as non- wizardly magic". (To paraphrase myself.) Please, Sandy, jump on my head if this characterisation strikes you as fishy. That is, I think this form of saint worship is used by some Malkioni, but is rejected by others. I think the considerable majority of Hrestoli worship saints in this way, but that many Rokari do not, regarding it as Stygianism by other means. These sects mostly recognise these saints, but worship them differently. As ;-) justification, note that Sandy posted it, and is an obvious Hrestol simp.
> ARKAT'S BLESSING (8 POW): When invoked, the skin and clothing of all
> illuminated beings within 100 meters of the supplicant turn
> translucent white. This effect lasts until the next sunrise, and
> includes the supplicant himself, if he is illuminated.
This is a weird one. Doesn't it break the pseudo-rule that illumination is not magically detectable? Partly fixable by making it castable _only_ by illuminants.
> [Xemela:] The
> supplicant takes hundreds of points of damage, dying instantly in a
> tatter of bloody shreds, but all her "patients" are cured and ready
> to return to battle.
Gro-ooooooooss.
> Loren Miller states:
> >Every worship service is a heroquest. (I think I was the first on
> >this forum to state this flat out, but Greg said exactly the same
> >thing at the RQ-Con Heroquesting seminar.)
Oh yeah? Quote me an RQ-ID, and I'll undercut it. ;-) (Greg's been saying this for at least four years, which must be some kind of record for him.)
> Every worship service IS a heroquest, but this tends to unify
> the cult, not divide it. Most heroquesting does not change the nature
> of reality, but rather confirms it. Only creative heroquesting as was
> done by Arkat and the God Learners alters Things As They Are.
I semi-agree. But HQs, and hence worship, can be _inadvertently_ extropolative. "Oops. I'm sure that mistress race troll wasn't there last time." Never attribute to ingenuity that which can be satisfactorily explained by putting one's size eights in the wrong place.
> re: Malkioni Afterlife
> OPTION ONE: humans are always committing sins because we are evil by
> nature.
I wonder why the Malkioni would beleive this. I can thing of two broad classes of reason: a) humans were created by someone other than The Creator, and are hence flawed (not a standard M. belief, but an amusing-sounding heresy); and b) humans were created as good, but fell to Original Sin of some kind (or were otherwise warped by some bad guy). Obvious candidates are Sex, caste transgressions, Tapping, or being got at by chaos.
> But for
> most trivial sins, the service takes care of everything. If we die
> with too much sin still on our conscience, we don't receive Solace.
This probably fits in with a belief in some form of purgatory, since almost everyone will have at least some deposits in the Sin Bank, particularly if they died without receiving Final Absolution/the Last Rites/The Prayer of Solace/Extreme Unction/whatever.
I wonder if many Malkioni believe in Hell? (A hell for bad Malkioni, specifically, I'm sure they have rather firm views of what happens to those Theist Dupes.) The Brithini simply believe in Oblivion, so their views may colour the thinking of the others.
> Penances
> include: pilgrimages, crusades (if one's ongoing), public humiliation
> or confession, fines, mortification of the flesh, etc.
Saying two dozen "Praise Malkion, Bringer of Truth"s; becoming an exploding Xemela devotee. Whatever's wrong with just _starting_ a crusade?
> OPTION TWO: humans are bi-natured. Part of us wants to sin, part of
> us wants to do good.
Or that we're inherently good, but are corrupted by the world of the flesh, with its Manifest Evils, and so on. Otherwise, reasons for being partly bad as above, I suppose.
> Penances can help us because they count as automatic Good
> deeds. On the other hand, they're unpleasant, and we can get just as
> many brownie points by simply doing the right thing in our everyday
> life.
This has the interesting consequence that one can benefit from doing a "penance", without having actually done anything wrong. (If a penance is a good deed, and doesn't merely cancel out a bad one.) Thus some excessively guilt-ridden sects (rogue Rokari, or extremist Hrestoli) may do this at every possible opportunity, just in case they some thing bad later, or just to get as good as possible in any event.
> I suggest that one of these two ways of getting to heaven be chosen
> by the Rokari and one by the Hrestoli. Any suggestions on which is
> which? I rather like Option One for the Rokari, as it seems to be
> more "practical" and guilt-ridden, while Option Two is
> internally-driven -- you kind of choose for yourself what is right
> and wrong in a Zen-like way. So Option Two sounds more Hrestoli to
> me.
I agree mostly. But I'm sure many Hrestoli also consider that they'd be "saved by grace", or a similar concept, stressing some form of belief more than the above. I bet lots of variously bizarre and credulity- stretching combinations and are thought up by individual sects.
Another reason to approve of a Rokari preoccuppation with Bad Deeds is because it mirrors the Brithini idea of avoiding doing bad things, since they precipitate eventual death. Some Rokari may actually believe this is literally true for them, too.
Malkioni don't (apparently) appear to believe in Final Judgement of any (wholesale) kind, so presumably you go to Solace (or not) as soon as you die (or via purgatory, perhaps). This raises the question of whether Saints are the exception to this (if one believes in manifest saints), or if one can be In Solace and In the World simultaneously. The Chaos- obsessed sects are presumably the ones most likely to believe in an apocalypse of some kind, and (possibly) hence a Final Judgement.
An entertaining Stygianist variant occurs to me: most people go to their "theistic" afterlife when they die, as a kind of purgatory. After a while there, they may be allowed to go to Solace. This might be true where there is dualist worship of the "good" IG and a "bad" manifest deity, or where the theist afterlife isn't so much a Purgatory as a not-quite-so- nice preamble to Solace, rather than being actively unpleasant.
Alex.
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