>
>
> Mike Dawson wrote:
>
> > All of these are dodges around my question.
>
> The only idea so far which isn't a dodge is time poisoning. As Bruce Mason
> put
> it,
>
There is a simpler explanation. All mortal beings die. That's part of what
they do. This can be because they have failed the Law, or they are descended
from someone who fell prey to Death or agreed to die or whatever. But, all
mortal things die.
This is generally a good thing, since immortality is a rejection of change, and, without change, you get stagnation (look at the Brithini and Mostali -- they like what they are, but they are not doing much of anything new) -- and, while a few cultures might welcome this sort of thing, most would be horrified by it.
So, the only way to cheat death forever is to stop being human. Anyone else just "buys off" death for a while. I don't see old age as "time poisoning" so much as getting closer to death, either in a literal sense (the spirit of death is actually closer) or because death builds up in you until whatever God or Spirit or Psycopomp or whatever comes for you. If you can actually cut that out of yourself, you become something other than a person -- a Hero or a God or something that exists in the Other World of symbols and allegory, not in the daily life of people.
That's my thought.
Peter Larsen
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