> > I said in a specific area,
> > Elmal is weaker than Yelm in the command of Fire
> > and the Orlanthi acknowledge this by knowing Yelm
> > to be the King of the Fire tribe (they don't
> > worship Yelm because he's evil).
>Yeah, I totally buy this. However, that's not the
>statement I was objecting to. I was objecting to the
>more generaly statement that Gloranthans are willing
>to admit when their own gods are inferior to another
>culture's god because the other culture's is a Great
>God in the sense of holding the rune.
The statement you were objecting to does so happen to be the statement that I made above. I was simply pointing out how the perception of the relationship between a Lesser Fire God and the Great God of Fire would be understood in a land that did not know Yelm.
>Orlanth and Entekos is a more interesting example. I have a
>hard time envisioning a Dara Happan acknowledging that thier
>Good Air Entekos is inferior to the unruly storm Orlanth of
>those smelly hill barbarians.
You are switching between meanings of inferior. A statement about inferiority in strength (which is basically the Entekosiad's myth of Dendara and Daak) is not the same thing as moral inferiority (which Dendara most certainly is not, and the main reason why the Dara Happans favour her above Orlanth).
If Orlanth wasn't the source of storms, then he wouldn't be giving the Dara Happans so much grief nor they expending so much energy in trying to conquer him.
>So, presumably Dara Happans would not acknowledge that
>Ernalda is Great.
No. If they look at Ernalda's worship, they see the Great Earth Goddess, Oria, being worshipped under a different name. Even if Oria does turn out to be not a Great Goddess, then they would still recognize Ernalda as being the worship of the Great Earth Goddess.
>In any case, if any Gloranthan can recognize a great god,
>how do they claim that Oria is Great Earth when we already
>know that Ernalda is?
Because Ernalda and Oria are both names for the Great Earth Goddess perhaps?
>Is your note about the different rune a suggestion that Oria
>is not-quite-Earth, but something sufficiently different that
>she can be Great, too?
No. It's a recognition that my equation of her as being the Dara Happan Ernalda might be wrong.
> > If it is a god, then
> > it is by definition, a theistic entity and thus not
> > their Sun spirit Halamalao.
>I think Greg's recent comments on the mixed nature of
>things elfish _may_ mean that Halamalao is not solely
>comprised of spirit.
I don't think so. In his "the World is made of Everything", he says "Enchanted Aldryami forests combine divine and animist powers, [...]" which implies that the elves worship entities that are either animistic or theistic, not that they worship entities of mixed natures. Euphonies was merely chosen for the connection with music and not meant to imply that the big spirits are made of lots and lots of little ones.
>Their afterlife is centered around the Great Tree herself.
>They will not experience any sort of otherworld that implies
>that their sun is less than someone else's.
Well since the Elves do link the Earth realm where a Goddess of Earth greater than their own Earth Goddess resides, I don't think this tenable (TR p140).
> > Through observation. I sacrifice to the Storm, I
> > end up in the Storm Realm. I sacrifice to the
> > Earth, I end up in Daleel, the Earth Realm. The God
> > at the centre of that Realm is the Great God.
>If I sacrifice to Elmal,
Elmal is just a name, we are talking about the Gods behind the names. The analogous example would be for the Orlanthi to sacrifice to Fire.
>surely I end up in Elmal's place in the Storm Realm,
>where he's the biggest sun/fire/light god around.
A much bigger one lies across Daga's Desert.
>[Orlanth being surrounded by other gods] indicates to me that
>he is great (little-g, meaning a cultural leader), not Great
>(big-g, rune-holder).
So it's merely the fact that the Orlanthi worship Orlanth as a Leader God that causes other gods to cluster around his stead? I doubt it. I think it far more probable that the Orlanthi worship him because he is the Great God. And how many cultural leaders are there, that aren't Great Gods?
>Would an Orlanthi visiting
>Orlanth's hall see Orlanth shift from Orlanth
>Allfather to Orlanth Thunderous (or whatever)?
They see an unshifty Orlanth. Exactly what Orlanth looks like depends on who they are, the purpose of their visit and also what Age they are in.
>If so, is it reasonable that Glorantha's accept this as a
>sign that the god has a higher order existence that
>makes him Great?
The fact that a god's worshippers are of several types (i.e. Orlanth has Adventurous, Allfather and Thunderous) means that the God is Great.
>What I meant, but did not say, is that Gloranthans
>cannot comparatively rate their own gods compared to
>gods that do not appear in their own myths. They do
>not have a scale to go by.
But the gods of other nearby cultures do appear in the myths of Gloranthans. In Orlanthi myth, Yelm appears as the Evil Emperor while Shargash appears as Jagrekriand. In Yelmic myth, Orlanth (Oralanatus), Humakt (Urnbudud), Ernalda (Remelada) and Elmal (Elmalus) make appearances. So both should at least be able to make cross-cultural comparisons about each other.
I don't see any reason why a theistic culture would not have any mention of gods of nearby cultures in their own mythology. Making cross-cultural comparisons will lead to a reaffirmation of the status quo.
>Does multiple aspects correspond 1 to 1 with holding a rune?
It seems to be. The known exceptions, Chalana and Humakt, are known to have worshippers in Dara Happa and Carmania respectively.
> > How else do you think the gloranthans could come
> > up with the concept of Great Gods?
>I think the God Learners were the exception and that
>this is a God Learner concept.
It isn't. I've quoted a Lhankor Mhy entry in the Runequest Companion indicating their understanding of the concept (which quotes several enemy gods and not all of their own gods).
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