Re: 99% Orthodox

From: Alex Ferguson <abf_at_yeats.ucc.ie>
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 21:28:25 +0100 (BST)


Ever-Orthodox Nick Brooke beats off Heretics with a stick:
> The speculations that have recently beset the Digest have been weirdly
> played-down interpretations of Theyalo-Jrusteli-Praxian ("conventional")
> Chaos Theory (e.g. Chaos is natural; the Devil is just another god; Orlanth
> is as chaotic as Wakboth; the Real World has Nature in it too so Chaos must
> be Natural; if Chaos isn't natural then Chaos doesn't exist; the Compromise
> was an explicit agreement to include Chaos in Glorantha; I forget what
> else), and not (AFAIK) attempts to define either Pelorian or Kralori
> beliefs.

Whilst 'beset' is perhaps a tad harsh, I share your disagreement with all of the above; most of them indeed do indeed seem to be speaking from some Revisionist Monomythic viewpoint, which is a dodgy premise -- the original (and still the best!) Monomyth is most certainly not perfect, but it's about As Good As It Gets. If one wants to take a variant look at Chaos, then I agree it's likely more profitable to do it from within the viewpoint of a particular culture, whether one of those explicitly included in the MM, or one of those mentioned in hand-waving footnotes...

> I would suggest that clarifying what the orthodox Pelorian/Kralori beliefs
> about Chaos, Cosmos and Compromise actually *are* would be more worthwhile
> than launching into heretical speculations which deliberately warp the
> well-known and well-documented Theyalan, Praxian and indeed Monomythic
> beliefs about Chaos.

I've been trying to do the reverse, I feel! That is, to clarify the 'other' takes as best as I'm able, while _defending_ the validity of the Theyalan, Praxian and indeed to an extent the Monomythic beliefs about Chaos. But Monomythic isn't really Universal, I have to say, and that's the point I've been trying to put to those trying to apply Monomythic constructs to places they were never truly successfully applied, Gloranthawise. (If you'll pardon the Haigesque neologism.)

I agree that Nils and I haven't presented any sort of grand mythic vista about the Eastern take(s) on Capital-C Chaos -- since basically there isn't one. In the East, there wasn't even a Darkness, much less a Chaos Age. Must have been a Little Local Difficulty you Honourable Barbarian Scum had. So sorry! Thus you can see that it doesn't loom nearly so large in the eastern consciousness as it does for people who were getting frozen, eaten, and snuffed out of existence at the time. Hence, they look at you funny if you at two nasty horrible slimy evil critters, and tell them that _one_ of them is much worse, as it's Chaos.

Contrariwise, the Orlanthi have had a whole series of Bad Experiences with 'transcendent' religion. (Don't get them started, in fact. Their bad luck with transcendental religions is comparable to Vormain's bad luck with... well, everyone else, really.) This is part of the reason that they're likely to either simply outright equate anything explictly 'extra-cosmic' with Chaos, or at the very least consider it to be _strongly_ under suspicion of being such. And if it's not Chaos, with our luck it'll be Dragonic. Not really a whole lot better...

Cheers,
Alex.


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