Me>>>By accessing the Higher levels of existance more readily, their
>>>sorcery is correspondingly more potent.
>Greg also read (or had Nick read) the Malkioni devolution scheme. By
>"Higher levels of existance" do you mean lifted to the level of Zzabur
>and Horal not as persons, but as principal forces? (Or at least a bit
>that way?)
I haven't heard the Malkioni devolution scheme (or maybe I have but I haven't heard the scheme as it was described at the Convulsion). But I think it would be fair to state that they have their minds operate in the higher level of existance. Great Wizards like Zzabur etc and Saints would have their bodies (and to some extent their surroundings and personal effects) also lifted up to this heightened state of existance (for additional ompf).
>Peter later clarified that the Higher levels are material in the
>materialist's worldview. To be expected - apparently the Malkioni know one
>state of transcendence, and that's Solace.
No. The Higher Levels of a Materialistic perspective are observable in the Material World. The Mystic's Higher Levels are not because he seeks them outside the Observable Cosmos. Solace* being a product of Materialistic Philosophy is not a transcendant state but within the Cosmos. The Malkioni do know of States of Existance outside the Cosmos but equate it with the number zero and thus 'prove' to their satisfaction that it cannot be reached by mortals.
*This is the conception of Solace as historically understood by most Malkioni. It does not preclude individual sects (such as the Perfecti or the Silence) from claiming that the meaning of Solace has been lied about and that the real Solace is, in effect, a transcendant state.
>People who attain [Solace] are dead, or
>Saints, or both. Wizards aren't necessarily saintly.
No.
Perhaps we should make a little schematic. The Malkioni view the world in terms of emanations from the Godhead at which the very lowest is the Mortal World, the second lowest is the spirit world. The highest materially observable emanation is the One Mind of the God Learners, the Good God of Estrekor and so forth. Above them is the Hidden Mover who is unknowable. Somewhere in between lies the Solace that Malkion discovered and above it lies Joy of the Heart that Hrestol discovered.
Now some Malkioni can be loose with words and describe the entire scheme above the material and spirit world as being Solace. Which makes a mess of how to describe Saintliness. Since to observe the existance of an emanation is to reach it, I do not think that is a good definition of Saintliness. Otherwise Sog City Uni would churn out saints by setting an exam question 'Prove the ultimate existance of the Invisible God'.
Hence I think that the status of Saintliness is arrived at by purifying the mind and body so as to attain a higher level of existance. Most Malkioni aim merely to purify the mind to some extent with the result that their mind survives the mortal death of the body and the dissolution of the spirit.
As an aside, the existance of the emanations is objectively verifiable but the properties happen to depend on the axioms taken. Thus Estrekor assuming that God is Immanent and not Seperate arrives as a different conception of the Supreme Being than the God Learners who assumed that it was Seperate from Existance.
The difference between the Brithini and the Malkioni IMO is that the Brithini do not recognize a mind/body duality but have an either/or philosophy. Either your entire self is in the sublime state of X or you are not. But after Malkion went away and died, many brithini reported seeing the sublime portions of him which had apparently survived death. This caused them to question their philosophy with the result they were empowered to fight to save the cosmos. They ended up being exiled but that's life...
End of The Glorantha Digest V6 #129
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