Re: How much do gods know? from Alex Ferguson on 1999-11-22 (Glorantha Digest Vol 07)

From: Alex Ferguson <abf_at_cs.ucc.ie>
Date: Mon, 22 Nov 1999 16:15:27 GMT

Kevin Rose writes:
> This mechanic also allows organizations that have single leading people
> (Humakt, Sturm Bull, Yelorna) who are rune levels to pretty much run the
> show in any way that they want. They just have to respect the basic ideas
> of the god, modification to non-core activities are fine. To quote Greg:
> "If you are a Humakti you have to be willing to kill and you have to be
> willing to die. Everything else is cultural."

I have to disagree somewhat with the above: note he said everything else is 'cultural', not 'cultic'. You couldn't simply, by an act of will, change your friendly neighbourhood (?) Humakt temple to have such-and-such magic or practice, just because "Humakt" worship along such lines exists elsewhere (much less, because it seemed nifty at the time). Rather it's in significant part conditioned by a whole set of cultural and religious norms, set of knowledge, etc. You could perhaps in principle change it, by a Sufficiently Large HeroQuest (TM), but in general it would be no small matter.

Depending on how one wishes to think of this, you could say that a given mode of worship reaches a certain 'aspect' of the transcendent principle (Death), one which appears to its worshippers as having a whole assortment of requirements, attributes, personality quirks, etc. Or you risk a Digest flamewar, and say that those characteristics are unconsciously imposed by the cult on the god. Either way, it seems clear that they havemagic teeth.

Cheers,
Alex.