First off, before this goes off the deep end, I agree with Pam and David (Cake) for the most part on the nature and role of "mystery" in religion, and do think that our attitudes and interpretations are in fact more or less converging; at least, for the most part. Having said that, several exceedingly minor comments.
Pam Carlson wrote:
>My point was that we shouldn't lose sight of the mystery involved in
>even the public, community based cults. All religions have mystery,
>truely comprehended only by their initiates. (That was my point with
>the Aboriginal example. I could have easily used the Christian
>mysteries of baptism, the sacrament, faith, salvation, etc.) Indeed,
>comprehending the mysteries is what makes one an initiate.
and David Cake added:
>I think Pams point (which certainly agrees with what I understand
>of aboriginal belief) is that in some places ALL religions are 'mystery
>cults', in the sense of having secrets unavailable to the uninitiated. Even
>religions that 98% of one sex is initiated into. So just because a religion
>has 'mysteries' doesn't mean that it has to be much like classical mystery
>cults.
Actually, David's last line was, in fact, the very point I was trying to make; I apologize if I wasn't clear on this, and perhaps part of the problem has to do with my original attempt at a distinction between "open" and "intitiated" cults. At least as far as I am aware, within the domain of what could be called comparative religion (apologies to digesters who hate this kind of crap), the terms "initiate" and "initiated" are actually pretty specific, and refer for the most part almost entirely to the nature and structure of personal and often mystical mystery cults in the Mediterranean and Near East, which were distinguished on being restricted to so-called initiates who had joined out of personal choice (and often for personal salvation) and which presumably had secrets which were only revealed to the initiated. The same specificity actually goes for the term "mysteries" within the Christian context; an initiatory aspect to the sacraments, in which they are referred to as "mysteries" is -- AFAIK -- _only_ a part of Eastern Orthodox tradition and doctrine, not Catholic (and certainly not Protestant) -- except, at least, for the Eastern-rite Catholic Church which I believe was outlawed and stamped out by the Soviets, and absorbed, with considerable protest, by Orthodox churches; don't know if it still exists as a separate entity anywhere. This is only gleaned from an amateur interest in the subject, so it's mostly IMO/AFAIK and correction is, of course, welcome.
At the risk of being accused of nit-picking, then, in a sense all Gloranthan cults are currently described in form, language and structure as though they were, in fact, mystery cults...and I suppose it could be argued that because all Gloranthan cults are currently described in that way that they _are_ all mystery cults in the RW sense; that's fine, for the most part, and has obviously worked well for many years. When I suggested that in thinking of pantheon initiation that a distinction might be possible between open and initiatory cults, it was precisely because I thought that part of the problem in describing the communal nature of pantheon "initiation" and finding a place for the many minor divinities that in the current rules seem to get lost in the shuffle (frex, the tie of temple size and available divine magic to quantified initiates) resulted from following too closely this model, and that the idea of having an open, less structured version of religious life, largely calendrical, might make it easier to organize and describe such things.
Okay, whoops; sorry, went into a bit of a rant mode there (I'm babysitting a 70 pound pit-bull right now, which can be kind of frustrating sometimes; not unlike actual babysitting, I suppose, but there's a lot more motive force in a dog aptly named 'Socket the Rocket'). Those are just a few thoughts.
Anyway, David Cake also noted:
> To take another view, though, I think in Glorantha there is an
>element of the mystery cult to every religion, in that there are parts of
>the ceremony that only initiates can properly experience (according to
>Gregs current thinking - the intro to the Entekosiad mentions this). So
>even if a cult is not a 'mystery cult' in the sense that its worshippers
>are forbidden to reveal its secrets to outsiders, they may be actually
>unable to truly reveal certain secrets.
Essentially, agreed; I suppose it could be argued that it is precisely the _experiential_ nature of the insight gained by "faith" that marks the difference between the committed worshipper and the simple observer, but I don't think this is a "secret" in the true sense of the word, and really doesn't have much to do with how a cult or religion is _organized_.
On other topics, Michael Raaterova described a (heavily Celtic) Orlanthi calendar (thanks for the info, btw, I had John's Far Point calendar saved as part of his Far Point Flora & Fauna stuff from off the wharton server and I'll reread it asap), and wrote amongst other things:
>I don't think midsummer and midwinter are communal
>festivals as the orlanthi are out warring or raiding during the summer, and
>stay indoors during winter.
Hmm, part of that IMO would depend on how long the raiding season actually is; war and raiding seasons in many RW cultures can actually be really short - -- frex, if the point of the raid is to gather booty (read: supplies), then raids might actually only occur in the brief period _after_ the harvest and before the coming of winter (esp. before the wintering of target herds). A "midsummer" festival strikes me as a pretty good time for widespread marriage festivities, modelled a bit after A Midsummer Night's Dream, perhaps -- bachelors and maidens frolicking in the woods under the auspices of Orlanth's bride and the occasional influence of mischievous spirits (PCs waking up the next day and saying "Hey wait a minute, who'd I marry?") while their anxious parents prepare feasts in the town square.
A midwinter festival, at least one that's yule-fire-based, would in fact probably be less communal, but the Yule Fire festivities described, IIRC, by Frazer in the _Golden Bough_ make an interesting model and had a communal element. IIRC, the individual hearth fires of the community were allowed to go out, and then were relit with torches brought from a central bon fire. This makes, IMO, an excellent festival to celebrate both Mahome and the dutiful actions of either Elmal as the loyal thane, perhaps as the guardian of the hearth?, or Yelmalio as the Winter Sun, who preserved light during the Darkness. The festival could take on somewhat serious implications in a place like Riskland, frex, if homesteaders way up the valley had to travel all the way to Hazard Fort and back in the middle of winter while their precious cargo, the blessed torch to relight their cold hearths, is being hunted as a trophy by chaos fiends out of Dorastor; practically becomes a HQ at that point.
I also agree with Michael that not all cults should have the same number of holy/festival days -- in fact, maybe there's a way of relating the availability of divine magic to the number and type of festivals that a community can perform? Might be just as reductive as the number of initiates method, though.
As this is getting a bit long winded (sorry), a few quick comments -- on Mhysticism, I for one would like to see more thought given to the idea of developing a spiritual, "inner" alchemical tradition to go along with a more fleshed-out version of Gloranthan alchemy (that's a real handful, though). I also agree with Tim Ellis that the sidebar fiction in Cults of Prax and Terror actually helped give some of the fullest fleshing-out of their respective areas of inquiry, and think that in addition to considering Varosh's narrative as part of a BUTTS package I think similar "travelogues" could do wonders for just about every area of Glorantha. Finally, I'd like to second Jose Ramos' suggestion that the structure of the Martial Arts skill, as a meta-skill capable of affecting other skills, makes sense to apply elsewhere (frex, craft:artificer as a way of producing really aesthetic objects using other craft skills), though admittedly that's more something for the rules digest. Oh, and I liked Mike Cule's "Aye and Bee" story alot, though I have to admit I found Androgeus' appearance at the end a _bit_ heavy handed :-) -- is it my imagination, or is the fiction around here getting better all the time?
Just some thoughts, sorry for the length of the post, and as always YGMV. Mark
End of Glorantha Digest V3 #65
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