The "can't you detect heresy with divination" question gets battered around the Digest every so often. In my opinion, it is a strange "how many angels can dance upon the head of a pin" question that results from people misusing game rules mechanics in order to solve abstract philosophical questions.
First Observation: Divination is not a cell-phone chat with the divine. The spell itself is an unfortunate legacy of the generic RQ magic system. In many myths, RW and Gloranthan, folk contact the gods and get some sort of a response - from the cyptic messages of the Delphic oracle to rune-casting Norse wizards. Divination, as a game mechanic, covers this entire range of divine communication. In Glorantha, priests, holy folk, devotees and the like can sacrifice to their gods and get some sort of relevant response.
The response may be a voice in a dream, a burning bush, smoke that moves in a certain direction, a number with certain associations, whatever. Each culture, and in many cases, each god has different divination rituals and different expected responses. "This sacrificial chicken has a distended liver, which, as we all know, means that we must prepare for war." Or something like that.
Can the Heortling godi learn whether Orlanth Dragonfriend is a heresy by making a sacrificial offering of burnt cow fat and hide to Orlanth the Thunderer? Probably not, unless Orlanth Dragonfriend is something completely incompatible with Orlanth the Thunderer. Remember, most Gloranthan gods are worshipped as archetypes, aspects or masks. Nobody worships Orlanth In-All-of-His-Many-Aspects. They worship Orlanth the Thunderer, the King, the Warrior, the Farmer, the Lightbringer, the Ram, the Bear, the Boar, or whatever. Maybe if you asked Orlanth Dragonkiller if Orlanth Dragonfriend was a heresy you'd get an answer.
Let me give a couple of Gloranthan examples. The Dara Happans once went through a period of theological scholasticism where priests would determine that Yelm is not something - frex, Yelm is not a tree, Yelm is not a woman, Yelm is not a bird, Yelm is not a man, etc. etc. Eventually, if I recall, Yelm was purified of nearly all of its syncretic accumulations and became something that almost nobody could contact - more of a mystical concept than a god.
More or less the same thing was done in reverse with Tarumath (the High Orlanth of Lokamayadon). Orlanth Greybeard and Orlanth the Wind - yeah, Tarumath incorporates them both. Orlanth the King of all Storm Gods and Orlanth the Changer - you got it right, Tarumath incorporates them as well. Again, more of a mystical concept than a god. However, was Tarumath the Orlanth the Thunderer, protector of the Heortlings? No, he wasn't - that was proven to be so at the Battle of Day and Night . And guess what, that Orlanth is the Lightbringer. Harmast proved that when he reenacted the Lightbringers' Quest in spite of Lokamayadon's opposition. Which I guess means that Tarumath must be a heresy. Or does it?
Jeff
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