What Greg said about the mixed world from Lemens, Chris on 2001-03-15 (Glorantha Digest Vol 08)

From: Lemens, Chris <CLemens_at_exchange.webmd.net>
Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2001 12:11:33 -0500

There is an interesting article on the Issaries website called "The World is Made of Everything" at http://www.glorantha.com/new/everything.html. Near its end, there was a statement that surprised and intrigued me: "Enchanted Aldryami forests combine divine and animist powers . . . " I wondered what this meant, so asked Greg about it at length. He gave information that is much broader than Aldryami. He asked me to summarize and post here. He is somewhat Delphic, though, so my presentation here of his ideas are probably full of errors that need to be burned out through the crucible of the digest.

What he said:

First off, there are (at least) three types of trees in an Aldryami Forest: just plain trees, trees with their own spirits, and trees with their own gods. However, the elf religion allows elves to participate in spirit practice with both animist and divine trees without the misapplied worship penalty.

For humans, this would not normally be possible. However, things are different for the Elder Races. The Uz and Aldryami otherworlds "are part of the Underworld." (His words.) The Underworld need not differentiate between things as being animist, divine, or sorcerous in nature. In particular, the Aldryami do not have the same type of differentiation between spirit being and divine beings that (say) the Orlanthi do. (My characterization: Dryad says to Heortling, "Spirit, shmirit; I'm an Oak! What Notes are in your Song?")

He also said some things about the nature of the central/inner/mundane world, which I do not quite understand. First, he said: "Nonetheless, everything in the central world is as if it was from the god, spirit or sorcerous world and/or underworld." I queried this closely to see if he was using "or" and "and" in their set theory meaning. I think he was not, because he replied: "Everything is made of various mixtures of those, and sometimes parts are not mixtures, hence sometimes spirit trees, sometimes a few divine trees, etc." He specifically rejected a reading of his words that a thing may only be (a) one of the four otherworlds or (b) both the underworld and one of the spirit, god, or sorcerous otherworlds.

Reporting ends, speculation begins:

So, I guess everything in the inner world is a mixture, except when its not. I think he might have meant that the _entirety_ of a thing must be a mixture, but _portions_ of things may be purely one or the other. Here, of course, the Forest (the entirety) is a mixture, but the tree (just a portion) may be purely spiritual. I have trouble applying that concept to, say, Orlanthi. Another possibility is that he meant Everything (note the capital E meaning the entire central world) is a mixture, but that portions of the central world may be pure, especially if you break them down to fine enough parts.

I wonder if part of what he meant is that the mundane material of the world (e.g. dirt, apart from the Earth daimon or spirit inhabiting it) is a combination of all otherworlds that cannot be separated into parts, so is kind of a common point to all. I think this would be different from the Underworld, where things may belong to a particular otherworld, but that classification is sort of irrelevant. Put another way, as between gods, saints, and spirits, the mundane world would be common ground; the Underworld is no man's land. (Now that I've said this, it will probably be true IMG unless blatantly contradicted, because I like the double meaning of "no man" also meaning no human.)

I would also note that the "etc." in Greg's reply hints that there are sorcerous trees and maybe even mystic trees. I can see a sorcerous tree understanding the Song of Aldrya as being awash in harmonically flowing energies. (Pick up some new age stuff from the local organic food store, replace "crystal" with "tree", and you're 75% there!)

I can't imagine what a mystic tree would be, so I doubt that one, unless it is Aldrya herself. It seems to me that any mystic elf would naturally refute the Song and become rootless/renegade. Aldrya could, of course, refute individuality (or the difference between dogs and spirits, or some thing else) on behalf of her people. Seems like a big stretch, but potential MGF. ("Traipsing through the underworld, you trolls come upon the biggest tree you've ever seen. She has her legs crossed and is humming to herself. It seems like she does not notice your existence. However, you notice that you are starting to fade away . . . ")

I wonder if Elves & Trolls suffer an Alien World penalty if they stray from the Underworld to the Godworld. If so, I wonder if there are areas in which neither Elves nor Orlanthi suffer Alien World penalties - a kind of border region of overlap.

Chris Lemens