Well, we, of course, also believe in God,
but our difference from all other religions
is this -- we know God is so far away that
we can have no contact with Him -- and He,
on his part, has no knowledge or interest of
any sort concerning human affairs. It is
useless to pray to Him or worship Him. He
cares nothing about us.
He has given the entire control of this
world for ten thousand hears to the bright
spirit, Melek Taos, and Him, therefore, we
worship. Moslems and Christians are wrongly
taught that he whom we call Melek Taos is
the spirit of evil. We know that this is
not true. He is the spirit of power and
ruler of this world. At the end of the ten
thousand years of his reigh -- of which we
are now in the third thousand -- he will
reenter paradise as the chief of the Seven
Bright Spirits, and all his true worshippers
will enter paradise with him.
This is from _Adventures in Arabia_, by John Seabright. The words were spoken by Nadir-Lugh, a priest of the Yezidee people, who worship Shaitan by the name "Melek Taos", Peacock Angel.
What in the world does this have to do with anything? Well, it's interesting, but it also brought to mind some differences between Gloranthan "Monotheists" and Earth monotheists.
Earth's Zoroastrians, Jews, Christians, and Moslems agree (mostly) on certain things that don't occur to Western Genertelans. For instance, Malkioni don't have an Adversary, a spirit opposed to the Creator and actively tempting and destroying mortals.
Malkioni don't seem to have an eschatology, a tale of the end of the world, which is central to Christianity and Zoroastrianism and present in other Earth monotheistic religions.
Malkioni don't (that I can tell) have "angels", powerful supernatural beings who serve God.
In fact, Malkionism is the most unEarthly religion I can find in
Glorantha. It really doesn't have a cognate -- it's certainly
different from any real monotheistic religion.
- --
Assistant Sysop, GEnie's First and Fourth Science Fiction RoundTables
The SFRT page has moved AGAIN, to http://www.sfrt.com/sfrt1
End of Glorantha Digest V2 #319
WWW material at http://hops.wharton.upenn.edu/~loren/rolegame.html
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