Re: The Glorantha Digest V6 #260

From: Chris Bell <argrath_at_xsite.net>
Date: Sat, 10 Oct 1998 20:41:28 -0500


>

On the current army-based Flame War...

Tervor, Peter, stop it. From the moment any sort of flaming starts, both parties automically invalidate themselves. I'm here to read and write about Gloranthaa, not to see you two beat your chests about who said what and meant why. If I want this kind of abuse, I'll go to Usenet. Please, gentles, take it to e-mail!

> Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1998 17:11:56 -0400 (EDT)
> From: <bjm10_at_cornell.edu>
> Subject: Glorantha, now or then?
>
> How do you view Glorantha, as a now or as a then?
>
> I prefer to view it as a then, with all source material coming to us as
> fragments and interpretations of fragments from a place and time both
> long distant.
>
> Yeah, "Argrath" kicked Lunar butt, but "argrath" can also be a word meaning
> "liberator". So who's to say that one of my PCs isn't actually "Argrath"?
>

Yeah, that's a very good way to view it, like a set of lost histories from a magical, wonderful world. Now, *that's* Glorantha.

> Date: Sat, 10 Oct 1998 07:08:43
> From: Ian or Katts <ianw_at_orac.net.au>
> Subject: Re: Lunars and Orlanth
>
> >From: "D. Pearton" <pearton_at_u.washington.edu>
> >Subject: Lunars & Orlanth - all warm and cuddly?
> >
> >Actually the Red Goddess and Orlanth cannot co-exist. The lunars (both
> >religiously and politically) cannot accept the existence of the Orlanth
> >cult. They are fundamentally incompatible.
>
> Why cant Orlanth and the Red Goddess co-exist ?
>
> I can understand why the Sartarite Orlanthi, or even all Orlanthi, would
> believe this, but that doesnt make it true.
>
> Ian Whitchurch

Easy easy, simple simple. It all comes down to Chaos and the Void. In Lunar philosophy, Chaos is both evil and wondrous. the Universe has it's bright and dark side, and the Red Goddess is the personification of the balance between all those forces. She contains the mytsteries of both the Lawful Gods that can be understood (such as Yelm, Lodril, and so on), as well as the baleful mysteries of Chaos. The Red Goddess is the Keeper of the Balance, and in her healed Cosmos, all things, including those things from outside that want all to Not Be, will be healed of their disharmony and coexist in Joy.

Further, the Lunar Way, with it's legacy of Nysaloran Illumination, embraces the concept of mystical transcendece, where the individual transcends the gross material world and becomes *nothing*, and *everything*. This is the essence of the Illumination as described in GROY, "Being one of the many, when he was nameless and faceless." The first Illuminant was not Nysalor...it was Yelm! This is perhaps the foundation myth of the Dara Happan (and later, Lunar) view of the Cosmos and Chaos (which they did not recognize as such, as the Orlanthi know it.) Interesting that one of the most lawful cultures on Glorantha may perhaps be one of the most "Chaotic". I haven't read Fortunate Succession or Entekosiad yet, but it seems that the Lunar Way is simply a natural progression of Pelorian magical and mystical thought.

As opposed to the Orlanthi...the foundation of Theyalan Myth, regardless of Pantheon, is, imo, the "I Fought, We Won.", or more correctly, their response to it. Yelm's Illumination was his answer to the I fought, We Won...instead of defying Chaos, he compromised it and integrated it, to the extant of not even *knowing* what it was. This was perhaps Yelm's greatest victory, and greatest failure, resulting in a variety of mixed results for his people in Time.

Now, as opposed to the Orlanthi, and Orlanth. Orlanth's reponse to the "I Fought, We Won", was to change himself and strive to re-create the world, personally. As opposed to Yelm's identifying, unddrstanding on a deep soul level, giving up and giving in, Orlanth assumes the Draconic secret of taking responsibility and (re) creating the world through his actions. Up until the quest for Heler and the meeting with Aroka, the Blue Dragon, Orlanth simply watches out for himself and his kin, performing quests, deeds and battles to protect Ernalda and the stead of the Storm Tribe. However, the encounter with Aroka and learning Aroka's secrets spurs him to accept responsibility for his actions, and become entangled in the affairs of the greater world, feeling compassion for *everyone* and *everything*. At the moment of his accepting responsibility and becoming entanngled into the world, Orlanth transcends it, caring not for himself. This is also expressed in the quest for Daliath's Well of Wisdom, and the learning the secrets of the Sea Gods. I always felt that the Gods of Storm and Sea would have much mutual understanding, anyway. This commitment to the Lightbringer's Quest, the saving of the being who would rightfully see him destroyed, is in direct juxtaposition to the Dara Happan view of Justice as being intrinsic. In Orlanthi culture, Justice comes not from the Cosmos as an unnamed force, but from Life and within.

The "I Fought, We Won" that nearly all Theyalans experience as part of their initiatory vision lies in direct contradiction to the Lunar experience. In the I Fought, We Won, the individual must make, on his or her own, the choice to live and fight and not give up despite being doomed to lose (IE - Orlanth and the Lightbringers being defeated and losing parts of themselves in Hell.) By choosing not to lose individual identity and to reforge the world, as the Dragons did in their Utuma dance (even though the Great Cosmic Dragin *did* choose to lose identity, so that the world could live!), to become entangled in the world for the sake of others, and suffer for them, is the greatest expression of the I Fought, We Won and the Lightbringer's Quest in Orlanthi and Theyalan culture.

Every Orlanthi and perhaps Theyalan knows Chaos, not only through their personal experiences in the material world, but also through the vision of the I Fought, We Won, which gives spiritual understanding of the threat that the Hungry Void is. The anihilliation that Chaos offers is the Nysaloran Transcendence. Lunars see this as a good thing which leads to peace, Orlanthi see this as the road to the annihilation of the Cosmos, which almost happened in Myth. Orlanth and his allied deities *can not* abide Chaos, in any form, as from their personal experiences (mythically, at least, for your subjectivists) confirm the terror and despair that is Chaos. In the portion of the Lightbringers Quest where each Lightbringer faces defeat, they perhaps look Chaos squarely in the eye, become one with it (as Greg describes all Gods being Illuminated), and made their choice.

*This* long-winded tirade is why Orlanth and Rufelza can not co-exist, unless one fundamentally changes. Either Rufelza repudiates and scorns the Chaos that is part of her essential being (not likely, as she *is* Balance), or Orlanth betrays *everything* he suffered for on the Lightbringer's Quest, and acknowledges a Goddess who would bind him into a slavery where *I* has less importance than *Us*. Regardless of which view you take, subjective or objective, on these points the gods can not compromise.

Chris Bell
argrath_at_xsite.net


End of The Glorantha Digest V6 #261


Powered by hypermail