Bell Digest v940518p2

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From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: the Aeolian Church
Message-ID: <9405171638.AA05635@pebble.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 17 May 94 16:38:16 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4044


Me and Joerg, unusually enough:

> >> This low magic he learns from both the pantheistic offers of the Aeolian 
> >> church

> > (After all, sorcery is sometimes taught in cults, even theistic cults.)

> > This is a very confusing way to describe sorcery, which isn't even theistic
> > in origin.

> Not in the God Learner sense of "theistic".

The religion of the Invisible God isn't theistic by anyone's use of the
term as I've heard it applied to Glorantha.  After all, the IG isn't
manifest, initiatable to, reachable by worship, etc.

> Yet wizardry is tied firmly to the religion of the Invisible God.

Wizardry is sorcery with a funny hat, to anyone else but the Westerners.
There is no objective way. or even one most people agree on, to tell the
difference between a sorceror and a wizard.  "Wizardry" is really only
well-defined to mean "sorcery [in the RQ sense] which we approve of".
Even "follows the commandments of the IG" is something which is open to
interpretation, manipulation, and downright fraud, and isn't much like
the (enforcible) requirements to belong to theistic cults.

> From my understanding, the spells granted from a deity to associates 
> always covers one imortant aspect of the deity.

Not necessarily: more specifically, it's the use of the most "use" to
that associate.  The "most important" spell is likely to be one taught
at (ordinary shrines).

> Call it heroquesting for an ability, if this sounds more RuneQuesty to you.

No, it doesn't.  At the moment, it could be argued "heroquest" is a polite
term for "no-one knows how this works".  Anyway, making things sound
"RuneQuesty" isn't something I'd advocate at all costs.

> (Sartar is sorcery-user friendly: look at Apple Lane. The TEB smith 
> family lives without fear of pogromes.)

What makes you think anyone knows they are sorcerors?  I presume most
people thing they worship "the gopd of the Third Eye Blue cult".  I think
most Sartarites would be very unhappy with Aeolians they happen to bump into,
chucking around sorcery willy-nill, and saying wildly heretical things
about _their_ god in the same breath as stuff about this ficticious
deity the Westerners worship.  Note the same could be said for Invisible
Orlanth worship...

> > Well, I can't imagine _any_ Heortlander of "humble origins" doing so, I'm
> > not clear whether you'd have only Hendriki doing so. [speak of e.g. St. 
> Chalana Arroy]

> If that's what the clergy has told them to say in the sermon, they will. 
> Just as the Irish were quick to say St. Brigid instead of Goddess Brigid.

I don't know about "quick", but at any rate, the result was a form of
worship quite different from, and entirely incompatible with, the worship
of the original pagan "pantheon".  If this has happened in Heortland,
I suspect you'd find the remaining "conversative" Orlanthi, and their
similarly-inclined neighbours, much less happy about the whole process
than you seem to envisage.

> > While some pagan deities have been co-opted as Saints, this is really a
> > way of permitting their worship to continue, but implicitly denying their
> > Godhead.

> I view it rather as defining various degrees of Godhead.

This is simply wrong, from the point of view of "modern" Christainity: ask
your friendly neighbourhood Roman Catholic if he thinks St. Christopher is
a god, in any sense.  Can we at least agree you're not using the "usual"
sense of the word "saint"?  As far as I can see, the Western Churches
also use the term in its "usual" sense.

> >> The Aeolians have a simple definition of Saint: an entity worshipped 
> >> by the church and its members.

> > Okay, but to a theist, especially one who knows how the church in the
> > west uses the term, this is likely to sound like "Not-a-real-god,-honest
> > -guv Barntar".

> RuneQuest has a simple definition of a deity: an entity worshipped by 
> cults and their members.

How the RQ rules defines deity isn't very relevant to how a particular
socity does.  And isn't the definition of "saint" we disagree on?  If
you're referring to the mortal saint/divine saint thing, recall it was
you who made the original distinction...

Alex.

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From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: Afterlives, initiation, stuff.
Message-ID: <9405171812.AA05720@pebble.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 17 May 94 18:12:18 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4045


Lewis:
> Alex: Why not write up your GLC scenario as a Free Form and run it at 
>       Convulsion?!?

This made me giggle and snort.  But, hey--



because I'll be in the HtWW1 freeform, right?

> Matt Thale: Lorkarnos = MAstakos?
> 	Answer 1; as a God Learner I would agree that this is probably one 
> 	god being worshipped by two different societies.  Perhaps Lorkarnos 
> 	is to Mastalos as Yelmalio is to Elmal.  

I don't think they _are_ the same from a GL pov: different magic, different
runic associations, one serves trade function, other is "purely" motion.

> 	Question; Do dwarfs have to sacrifice 1 POW to become initiates of 
> 	the *Cult* of Mostal?  After all Mostal is DEAD and offers NO 
> 	benefits or even an afterlife!  What is the Cult of Mostal anyway? 

> 	1) I believe that Mostali are automatically tied to their creator 
> 	Mostal (thus NEVER needed the crude and primative mechanism of 
> 	using 1 POW to tie their spiritual organ to Mostal).  

Whatta horrible and unnecessary metaphor that is: why posit a spiritual
organ when we know Gloranthan have a perfectly spiritual spirit?

Anyway, who ever said death was a hindrance to accepting POW sacrifice?

> We known and have had recently had reaffirmed by Sandy that an Extra point of 
> POW is NOT REQUIRED in order to join a subcult.  

> A GL viewpoint would describe Barntar and Voriof etc. as subcults of Orlanth 
> which have just got a bit bigger than normal and evolved an independent 
> existence.

Well, the trouble is, when this happens the GL subcult "mechanic" is
going to break down, rather.

> Hence in areas where they are still worshipped as part of the pantheon

As part of the Orlanth cult, more to the point...

> there might be no need of separate POW sacrifice.  This argument 
> could be extended to Orlanth Lore Master, Orlanth Herald, Orlanth Trickster, 
> Orlanth Death Wielder, Orlanth Charioteer (aka Lhankor Mhy, Issaries, Eurmal, 
> Humakt (arround the upland marsh) and Mastakos).  

Indeed, but this isn't much different from associate worship.  Indeed, it
may be the form much "associate" worship actually takes...

Jonas:
> The idea of splitting the cult into priests and initiates seems less
> repulsive after Joerg informed me of the the RQ4 suggestion that initiates
> should regain their divine spells once a year.

Is this the variant where you may roll to regain use of a spell cast
_during_ the HHD ceremony, or something different?

Joerg:
> >> He is an initiate of the church, first of all.

> > Is this in the sense of theistic initiation, or more like wizardly
> > apprenticeship?

> This is more like theistic initiation. (I regard apprentice wizards as 
> rough equivalent of acolytes or apprentice shamans.)

I meant, is he being initiated _to_ something in particular, but that
question doesn't translate well across the boundaries of our different
views on theistic initiation.

> > I think this person's link to Issaries, or at least "the usual" Issaries,
> > is fairly slight, so I wouldn't use the above description.  As a general
> > principle while discussing cult structures, I'm inclined to ignore claims
> > of an afterlife: better filed under "cult propaganda".

> Thoughts of the afterlife were more important in people's lives 
> than you seem to be willing to accept.

Ahem, I never said it wasn't important to the _cultist_.  I'm saying that
I think the _truth_ of what a cult claims about the afterlife it offers is
a matter beyond discussion of cult structure, GLish "proof", 'n'stuff.
Whether it's beyond HQ is a thorny issue.

After all, if it were a matter of GLish cult comparisons, it would be
hard to see how you could "get to" the same afterlife by Aeolian and
Sartarite Orlanthi worship.

> I see the Orlanthi culture as similar to the Viking culture in this 
> question. Your family and clan is made up not only by the living, but 
> also by your ancestors. If joining another creed would separate you 
> from their assistance in this life as well as the next, the decision 
> to do so would be a desparate one. Such as joining Humakt. Whenever 
> possible, a person would retain his family ties.

This seems to be somewhat in contradistinction to your implication of
them converting en masse to crypto-Malkionism, which after all, has a
totally different, not to say incompatible, view on the afterlife.

Alex.

---------------------

From: joe@sartar.toppoint.de (Joerg Baumgartner)
Subject: Heortland and its neighbours
Message-ID: 
Date: 17 May 94 19:07:03 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4046

Sandy Petersen in X-RQ-ID: 4033

>> Is Gustbran lame? 

> 	Hmm. Hadn't thought about it, really. I guess I'd prefer he  
> wasn't, because it makes him too much like Vulcan.

If the smiths of Gustbran are travelling masters visiting the 
lesser smithies of the steads (as David Dunham suggested a while 
ago), being lame would be against their role. I doubt that Orlanthi 
would practice the crippling of master crafters, this seems more 
the province of civilized cultures.

On the other hand there is the fact that a lot of smiths walked with 
a stoop or limp after abusing their leg muscles over long time.

While I'm at the subject of metals: What treatment would Gloranthan 
"bronze" require to be crafted? Would you need a vented furnace to 
get the material into a ductile state that it could be hammered, or 
would cold hammering suffice, like for Earth's bronze? Can it be 
melted and cast directly into tools and armour pieces, or does it 
require quenching and tempering to work out? How does a Gloranthan 
smithy look like?

> If only Mastakos had a more Orlanthi-sounding name. For  
> some reason his name sounds Pelorian to me. I suspect that's part of  
> the reason I confuse the two. 

An Orlanthi name wouldn't be right to my ears - Mastakos is a 
member of the Sea Tribe of deities who allied himself to Orlanth 
at some time. This explains his (and Heler's) blue skin as well.

> Joerg says, in  reference to the Heortlings:
>> "right in the middle of theist territory" is a funny definition for  
>> people having Ancestor worshipping trolls to the north, quite  
>> shamanistic Beast Riders to the East, a mix of Atheists to the  
>> south, and a bay full of mermen to the west.

> 	I don't want to get mixed up in this discussion too deeply,  
> but the "Ancestor-worshiping" trolls have gods and a cult structure,  
> and most of them that deal with the PCs belong to the fairly  
> conventional Argan Argar structure;

Agreed, although there is a good deal of Black Arkat worshippers 
there as well, to give another remain of Western culture (however 
rudimentary), and their temple is set right in Heortland.

Does this temple stand in Kitori tribal lands (i.e. the Troll Woods) 
or in one of the larger cities in the Volsaxi valley?

> the shamanistic beast riders to  
> the east rarely interact with the Heortlings;

Except where the Marcher Barons hold them back, and where plenty 
of young "knights" serve for a time to prove themselves, now 
cattle-raiding has been reduced to ceremonial entertainment among 
the civilized Hendriki - even _if_ the western influence was recent, 
I doubt such a structure would encourage this barbarian pastime.

> the merman have regular gods (Triolina, etc.), 

They do. They don't interact much, though.

> and don't forget that just above the trolls  
> and to the west of the trolls are the highly theistic cultures of  
> Esrolia and Sartar respectively. I can't explain away the atheists so  
> easily, tho. 

Esrolia also holds some of the most cosmopolitan cities of Glorantha, 
which are the prime centres of interaction.

> Nick firmly states: 

>> I find the idea that all Malkioni saints are recognised and
>> worshipped by all of the sects ludicrous, and will not countenance  
>> it. 

> 	I don't agree. Here's why. Unlike Earthly saints, Malkioni  
> saints give actual magic powers to their devotees.

Dangerous territory, I know, but most Earthly Saints are credited 
with miracles, which are nothing else but magic. The devout 
worshippers which make pilgrimages to for instance Lourdes do so to 
benefit from the divine magical powers available there.

I am sufficiently scientist and sceptic not to believe in such 
"reliable" miracles myself, but then my creed has no Saint worship. 
Yet in these peoples' mythical reality the magic is there. The 
Saints _are_ worshipped for the magical powers they convey. They 
were more so in medieval times, before the age of scepticism.

> Clearly, there are  
> no "false" saints, especially since any saint must gain his powers  
> from the Invisible God. 

Why can't there be demonic miracles, aka witchcraft? What is the 
Malkioni attitude to magic not from the Invisible God? Or does 
even a theist priest's or a shaman's power ultimately derive from 
the Invisible God, according to Malkioni doctrine? In this case 
there are no false gods, only gods pretending to be Saints.

> 	In the same way that St. Francis was accepted and beloved of  
> the medieval Catholic church, despite the fact that his doctrines,  
> teachings, and practices were alien and aberrant, even subversive, to  
> their stern doctrines, Saint Rokar can be worshiped by the Hrestoli.  
> All they need do is claim that the Rokari have "perverted" the  
> original saint's teachings. 

> 	In addition, I believe that mainstream Malkioni have the  
> belief that any good Malkioni, of whatever sect, can attain Solace.  
> Naturally, it's easiest in _insert_name_here_ sect.

Even if you belong to a sect committed to the primal sin of Tapping?

> If you're a  
> Hrestoli, a Rokari is not doomed of necessity, any more than if  
> you're a good Russian Orthodox all Roman Catholics are doomed. Folk  
> of all faiths recognize the "saintliness" of individuals like St.  
> Francis, Gandhi, and Mother Theresa.

In Gloranthan words, Chalana Arroy is a recognized saintly individual 
in Malkioni society?

> While nits can be picked, I stand by the statement in GoG:
> 	"We Malkioni belong to many different castes and sects, but  
> all of us recognize the divinity of a saint, no matter what sect he  
> attained his sainthood through."

Again I ask: Is divinity necessarily something positive?

> Alex responds:
>>This has always bothered me.  Does this mean there is no  
>>pure-broadleaf forests in all of Glorantha?

>	You mean besides in the tropics? I dunno. Are there any  
> pure-broadleaf forests in Europe?

Hard to say, really, since there are hardly any lowland forests left 
untouched. I do think that the old English forests were deciduous 
broadleaf (oak, ash, beech, and hazel) to an extent that no green 
elves could have been supported by the amount of conifers.

> Everywhere I've traveled in North  
> American I've seen some evergreens mixed in with the deciduous. For  
> that matter, the reverse is also often true. In the high Sierras the  
> fifth most common tree is a black oak. Of course, the first four most  
> common are all conifers, but there's still enough black oaks that  
> anywhere you look, you can see one. 

I'd also expect that e.g. Winterwood would have large amounts of 
birch aldryami, from my experience in northern Norway. These might 
produce only runners, though, since they tend to be dwarvish. But 
then so do the pines, while firs are next to non-existant. Only 
rowan (yet another broadleaf) is native there as well...

-- 
--  Joerg Baumgartner   joe@sartar.toppoint.de

---------------------

From: joe@sartar.toppoint.de (Joerg Baumgartner)
Subject: Stygians
Message-ID: 
Date: 17 May 94 20:09:55 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4047

Martin Crim in X-RQ-ID: 4036

> Gary Newton (isaac@twics.com) asks about compatibility of magic
> across the good old GL divisions.  Greg Stafford has explained
> this as being like a development of an internal organ in a
> particular way, which is incompatible with development in any
> other way.

I don't have this statement expressis verbis, but I always 
interpreted it that way that a person develops its spiritual 
organ the way its chosen creed prescribes. If this is e.g. the 
East Isles combination of Divine Magic and Sorcery (or whatever 
magic the East will turn out to possess as common magic), then 
this is the way this person will develop its magic, and its 
spiritual organ.

> The spare-driving ways of Stygians are, indeed, a bother.  The
> Henotheists have three different levels of involvement in the
> visible gods, from mere toleration to actual dual worship.  (It's
> actually more complicated than that, but we're just talking about
> magic here.)  Each tradition has its strengths and weaknesses,
> but none is so much more powerful than the rest that it dominates

I doubt that even full access to all magic systems would make 
a person over-powered. The main limitations for RQ magic practitioners 
are their MP and their personal POW. If the magical ecology limits the 
availability of POW spirits and other POW sources, those available will 
be coveted by all power-seekers, and be distributed through a hack-order 
not unlike broo-society unless the culture offers an outlet for such 
means, such as temple storages.

> (or so we deduce from the fact that Ralians haven't conquered
> anybody near them, except for the Trader Princes who only faced
> disorganized clansmen).  

The Ralians did conquer everybody around them in the late 1st 
and early 2nd Age. They don't any more because the God Learners 
destroyed their source of unity. For the same reasons the Orlanthi 
don't rule Peloria right now, although a certain denizen of Pavis 
might change that.

>      In game terms, one way to do it is to limit the spell lists
> of magicians so that they are roughly equal.  The advantages of
> flexibility will be balanced by the disadvantage of having to
> learn all those sorcery skills.  I don't think people should have
> both spirit magic and high sorcery, but they can mix the low
> spells with spirit magic.  Remember that this is an RQ-level
> explanation--don't extrapolate to what the society does.

You go further than me. In my Aeolian campaign I allow either 
low sorcery or spirit magic to be chosen. I might be convinced 
that spirit magic could be learned later, but I'd hesitate to give 
the same chance of success as for people not using sorcery.

I might be convinced that people using spirit magic exclusively 
should get an automatic success as in RQ2, theists get a success 
at POW*6 for their own cult's magic, and reduced chance for foreign 
spirit spells (associate spirit spells could remain at POW*4).

> Nick in X-RQ-ID: 4011 finds the GoG statement of all-saints-to-
> all-cults ludicrous, and will not countenance it.  Not that it
> matters, but let me suggest something which startles a lot of
> people when they first hear it.  
>      In Islam, Jesus and John the Baptist, along with the Hebrew
> prophets, are recognized prophets.  I have a Muslim friend who
> believes in the virgin birth of Jesus.  I admit I don't know of
> any muslims who honor St. Paul or any of the other apostles, but
> the GoG story is not as far-fetched as all that.  Nick already
> knows this, thus his cladistic tree method of determining who
> your saints are.  

I like your example, because it exactly reflects my picture of 
acceptace of Saints. The different sects will share the most 
important religious founders (in our example Abraham, Moses, the 
propheets of the Old Testament, John the Baptist and Christ), but 
will diverge in the acceptance of other saintly personalities. St. Paul 
was no direct disciple of Jesus, so his role as one of the apostles was 
hotly contested by the Jerusalem commune. To my knowledge, none of 
the apostles or the Christian Saints are acknowledged by the Muslims.

So the Malkioni Saints Malkion, Hrestol, and Xemela would go 
uncontested. I doubt anyone in Safelster will know and care 
about Dormal. Stygians would have somehow hard feelings towards 
Gerlant Flamesword, even though he proved to be right in the 
rejection of Arkat when Arkat became a troll. Arkat's divine nature 
goes undoubted, but is it a good thing or a bad thing? Paslac's 
futile resistance against the Return to Rightness crusaders won't 
have earned him friends in Seshnela, but maybe respect. Valkaro's 
saintliness wouldn't be questioned, but: Who knows about this guy, 
and how?

>      I admit I had trouble at first imagining Rokari, say,
> acknowledging a Boristi saint.  How would they learn of him? 
> Obviously only from Boristi... unless the saint makes himself
> known to all believers!  In this scenario, his own divinity makes
> him known across sectarian lines.  Or not.  I really don't feel
> strongly one way or the other.

Worse than Boristi Saints would be (pre-Lunar) Carmanian Saints or 
Stygian Saints drawn from the native populace's deities. While 
acknowledged as divine individuals by the locals, the best 
non-henotheist sects can say about them is that they are False Gods. 
Is Arkat a False God as well?
-- 
--  Joerg Baumgartner   joe@sartar.toppoint.de