Peter Metcalfe
>This is very bleak. What ever happened to the concept of
>extirpation or purification of the bad deed? And Yelm got tossed
>into the Deepest Pits and yet he got out.
The Dara Happan culture does not support such a concept. Repentence is only possible in the slightest degree. When a man foully blunders, his soul is forfeit, and that's all there is to it. Lodril never rose back to the ranks of the sky. The Dara Happan heroes are all men who _never_ failed, despite terrible trials and temptations -- from Yelmalio (or your favorite name for this god) to Yelm to Lightfore to Dayzatar.
Yelm was tossed into the Deepest Pits, but he was guiltless. More to the point, he was able to leave the pits _only_ by remaining pure and stainless to his ideals. If he had weakened, shown fear, compromised with the dark and the chaos, then he would never have returned. But his selfless dedication to what he knew was right, despite all odds, forced his destroyers to seek forgiveness after which he led them to life once more.
Argrath or Orlanth -- heroes who fell and learned from their misdeeds, are alien to Dara Happan psychology, as is any kind of comprehension of dualism. They don't grok the idea that Gbaji and Nysalor could be two parts of the same being (a common concept outside Peloria). There are traces of dualism left in their culture (viz. Gorgorma and Dendara), but mainly they view the world as a hierarchy, not a spectrum.
Sandy P.
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