God Time, Sacred Time, and Profane Time

From: Gregory C. Walsh <gwalsh_at_src.umd.edu>
Date: Sun, 20 Nov 1994 13:03:27 -0500

Hello. I am revamping some aspects of my non-gloranthan world, and I ran accross an old book on historical theory which does a good job of explaining/providing a framework for Gloranthan world views. Speaking as a non-Gloranthan. The authors is Eliade, the book "Cosmos and History".

The posits (from 1959) posits that archaic man was fundimentally anti-historical. That there were two existances, a God Time and the more profane time in which we live. God time happened in the past, before "time". Events in God Time provide archtypes which people attempt to mimic in profane time. (Chpt 1: Archtypes and Repetition.) An event, rock, person, is only as real as it is close to being one of the archtypes. Devine cerimonies do more than re-enact God-Time (e.g., hero quests, sacred time) they transport the participants to that event, and in essence, the world is rebooted. There is no irreversible "history" in the sense we are comfortable with.

The reading is a little thick of course. Chpt 2 talks about "sacred time" in other cultures -- those few chunks of days at the end of the year where creation rituals are re-enacted. It is called "The Regeneration of Time".

Enjoy,
Greg Walsh

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