>And I have to admit, the more I think about it, the more I think that
Death (transcendent,
>utter, important Death) is not a god. Certainly not limited to being
>a god. ...
Certainly the Malkioni don't believe Death is limited to being a god, and animists would have no problem with spirits of death, but presumably you're talking in a purely theist contex.
For theists gods and their powers are essentialy the same thing. A river god is not merely the god of the river, but literaly is the river itself. Gods aren't realy just people, but are merely represented as appearing as such for convenience, but can appear in many forms - as winds, as storms at sea, as showers of golden light, as statues, effigies, regalia, etc and certainly as weapons. I don't see why theists should ahve any problem believing that death is a god, and can manifest as a weapon.
>.....
>What all this has done though, is make me anxious to hear something
of the other
>death gods. I know very little of the myths about them. Truly Humakt
>as we know
>him is the closest to not only owning death, but Being Death. As has been
>mentioned, he is sometimes himself called the weapon that is death.
>(He is Orlanth's sword sometimes, and that is sometimes literally,
>one thinks.)
>So do any of the others have a role like that?
The other death gods come from different cultures. They will differ from Humakt due to the different way each culture interprets and deals with death. I think the theyalan Humakt is particularly potent because he embodies death is a relatively neutral way. Even Humakt's other association with truth is mainly seen as emphasizing the indepentence and impartiality of death.
A culture that saw death as being a partisan figure, perhaps seducing the living in order to further some world-destroying agenda, might be a potent god as such, but not as powerfull an embodiment of death per se because that is only one possible form death can take. Such a god is manifesting a particular form or interpretation of death, rather than death in all it's forms, which Humakt does to such an extent that the members of his cult stand apart from their own culture in a number of important ways.
Simon Hibbs
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