Teshnos

From: Peter Metcalfe <metcalph_at_quicksilver.net.nz>
Date: Sat, 11 Jun 2005 16:24:50 +1200


Alexander Dotor:

>I believe that the Teshnans are very wordly in their believes,
>especially if they have to master the First Teaching.

Teshnans that have yet to master the First Teaching are spiritually unfit to handle wealth and so are kept poor. This impels them to study the Teachings of Chal better.

>What, if it is becoming possible (or is it already) to bribe a
>priest that he's making false statements about your Life
>Flame ... incorrectly putting you in another caste. Maybe the
>Zitr are the only exceptions to this change and they find no
>more people in the Third caste that are worthy to belong to
>them. Maybe this is this is, how the time of No-Zitr arrives ...

While there is always some potential for corruption in any scheme, changing castes is dependant on an examination of a life-flame, which is a real thing and not something that the Priest could just make up.

The first problem is the act of bribery. What would you bribe a priest with? As one who has yet to master any teaching, you don't have anything the Priest could be interested in as he is so much more wealthier than you. Likewise if you are seeking admission into the Nobility, then the Nobles must determine your worth and the same problem applies - the Nobles are so wealthy that they can't be bribed.

Now it's possible that good Teshnans are kept back from promotion while questionable Teshnans are promoted. But the way to get promoted is to suck up to your examiners rather than outright bribery.

> > The reason for making Teshnan religion a common magic
> >pantheon is that Teshnos is what the God Learners would
> >have called a mystical religion. How exactly the magic
> >works at its more advanced stages is not yet known.

>Will this higher mysteries be revealed in the near future?

It depends on what you mean by near future. Personally I'm waiting for ILH-2 as a guideline to what the Teshnans might be able to do.

>There
>was Mysticism in the HeroWars book. Do you mean that we've
>to add Mysticism to the Teshnan religion, or that the Common
>Magic Pantheon is only the first stage of a pure Mysticism
>religion?

There's no such thing as a pure Mysticism religion. What I mean is that the Teshnans can use the common magic religion to obtain a mystical insight.

For example, one of the gods in the Teshnan Keyword is Vai Madar Sa, who teaches a feat, a spell and a charm. These are analogous to the Hero Wars martial artists who learned physical, mental and spiritual disciplines (which could be used to defend against theistic, spiritual and sorcerous magics). Presumably if a VMS cultist were to raise his cult magics to 1w2 then he would obtain some secret knowledge.

Now the picture is more complicated as Vai Madar Sa is actually a Vithelan Diety rather than a Teshnan one and the Teshnan cults would work differently.

>Are the fire realms for Somash worshippers only, or do you think the
>Otherworlds of all gods are within the Fire Realms?

All the Five Gods are Fire Gods and so the Fire Realms encompass their otherworlds and not just the Somash otherworld.

>Maybe it became his way, when the path to Enlightement was reduced
>to a single path - the path of Chal. Chals was - as far as I remeber - also
>a Somashi, and the Somashi rule Teshnos in fact. They interpret the
>thoughts of Vessel of Light and distribute the orders thorughout the land.
>All other temples must listen to what they say.

Chal is not a Somashi, but the founder of a religion which includes Somash. The Somashi do not rule Teshnos - they are one of the Five Priesthoods of Teshnos. While their temples do much of the governance of Teshnos, their duty is to support the other temples of Teshnos rather than tell them what to do.

The Vessel of Light's thoughts are interpreted by a Council of Five, that is composed of each of the Five Gods' greatest priests. Hence Garusharp only has one voice among five in the Council (not that in matters much because decisions are reached by consensus).

Yes, HeroQuest voices does present the Somashi as being dominant but that is only because the article is written from a Somashi viewpoint in the same way that the Seshnegi article is written from a Knightly Point of View. If the speaker happened to be a devotee of Solf then his description of Teshnan society would look much different as would a Seshnegi article written from a Wizardly Point of View.

--Peter Metcalfe


End of Glorantha Digest, Vol 11, Issue 192


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