Andrew E. Larsen
On Nov 26, 2012, at 9:49 PM, John Biles <john_at_hZRGQlqJS1tWKzh-h8nDIDSV-kwRRy19fjHLZD2GNIYHaP8m7djgwZNHYkHh0uz62jC3B_7c8DY.yahoo.invalid> wrote:
> On Mon, Nov 26, 2012 at 4:27 PM, michaelL <michaelalewis25_at_66zqD8sJMe5m1aydDC_zwi3HyHBPsjtZrIPoVHjtjHs0eqoz3jnpkZJw_S6PRMJSvlnJor5c14BzqAYYlE53a0z6Voo.yahoo.invalid> wrote:
> > 1) That's a nice way of viewing things. Thanks
> >
> > 2) Could you give me some examples of emulation of a god? I don't totally understand this. How do you act like the god of plowing? By going outside and plowing?
> >
>
> Warning, all examples are pulled out of my imagination, but:
>
> Farmer Jolin has a maple tree in the northwest corner of his field
> which he just plows around, even though he *could* clear it. Why?
> Because his god Barntar has a tree in *his* field in the northwest
> corner.
>
> This is because when Barntar faced an unusually wet spring, the local
> stream overflowed its banks and ran down into the northwest corner of
> his field. He tried digging a drainage ditch but that overflowed too
> because the water just *kept coming*.
>
> So he went to his mother, Ernalda and asked her advice and she went to
> a 'friend' and came back with a seed and planted it; it grew into a
> mighty, thirsty maple tree; as fast as the river flooded his field,
> the oak tree drank it up and turned it into syrup; so long as Barntar
> tended the tree and left it undisturbed, it provided him with tasty
> syrup and kept his field dry.
>
> So as his god does, so does Farmer Jolin, keeping his field dry and
> getting tasty syrup.
>
> Once a year, he gathers friends and initiates of Barntar and Ernalda
> and the 'friend' who re-enact the myth.
>
> (He is blissfully oblivious that the women's side of this involves
> Ernalda getting help from her old lover Flamal. And it's probably
> better that way if he doesn't know what *that* involves. His wife
> doesn't know what the men do during the Minlister festival and she
> really doesn't *want* to know.)
>
> When he plows a field, he follows the pattern laid down by Barntar
> when he first yoked his uncle Urox to a plow and plowed the field.
>
> When he sows the field, he plants equal amounts of barley, rye, and
> oats, as Barntar did, because Barntar didn't want to offend his kin,
> the three sisters who are goddesses of grain, by making one of them
> seem more important.
>
> And so on.
>
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