If you compare it with NiangMaoism, as I keep suggesting, aren't the differences fairly stark? (In order to back-translate Darudism into NiangMaoism, take all of its 'mystic entities' and replace with "Discard such foolish notions: cling not to that which is not eternal", throughout...)
> I guess that has been answered - the Five Dragon Warriors and others
> certainly show that its not all unmanifest dragon souls (awfully hard to
> distinguish from unmanifest enlightened mystic souls with the names
> changed)
Is Metsylan Enlightenment 'unmanifest' in the Greggly Sense? Frankly, I keep losing track. It's not as 'unworldly' as NiangMaoism, if that's anything to go by.
> Consider me sent to the back of the class!
> There are only a couple of problems - there is no 'Dragon Pantheon'
> article
I really had best write one, then. Consider yourself deppitized to help, my faithful Ozzie friend...
Simon Hibbs:
> Orthodox non-draconic mysticism seems to me to be all about transcending
> reality and ascending to a state of enlightenment. It seems to me that
> this is a very personal and individualistic philosophy. Yes, advanced
> orthodox mystics might choose to extend their time in the world to help
> others, but they are helping these others purely out of altruism. They
> don't need to do it and it's not essential to their personal
> transcendence.
With the usual caveats, I'd suggest this probably _is_ a characteristic of 'manifest' rather than 'orthodox' mysticism. Can't very well entirely refute the world if you're hanging around dispensing sage advice and what-not. Though this seems to me to be a difference in degree, not of kind.
> The Kralorelans believe
> that when they die they wait in the otherworld for their Emperor to
> exit the physical world and then they all transcend together.
They don't actually transcend at this point, just to quibble. But it's a (final?) step on the way to such, yes.
> Perhaps the defining characteristic of Draconic mysticism is the
> integration of individuals into a transcended draconic whole.
No, I don't think so. As I said earlier, the Summer Land Heaven bit is just _one_ route to draconic transcendence. I think there's an aspect of truth to what Simon's suggesting, though. There's a strong element of collective endeavour and consciously reconstructed cosomological hierarchy going on here, though it's more of a means, rather than a particular end.
Cheers,
Alex.
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