Discussing the subjects of Western Religion makes me realize how hard it is to practise such an intellectual religion. Think about it : if you're theist, your God is IN you, it springs out of you when you want it (and sometimes when you don't), it powers your moves, your decisions, your instincts. Animists also have it easy : they engage in discussion, negociation, even love with spirits they can see and who can and do answer these attentions.
But if you're a malkioni... all you have is FAITH. In RW, Religious Faith is "a firm trust in things that one hopes, a demonstration of things one cannot see" (Hebrews 11-1). I do think that contemporary, western intellectuals like us don't have any idea what FAITH is. When I read what we say about faith, it strikes me as blind men discussing colors. We cannot imagine what it means to live by, to feel FAITH. We are afraid of people who experience it, we flee them as they feel so odd, "weird" to us.
Back to Glorantha : in malkioni lands, Faith comes from KNOWLEDGE. Knowledge repeated to you by your readers, week after week. Knowledge that comes from looking at the pictures on churches' stained glass windows, at the statues of Saints. Knowledge that God made the Universe Perfect and that devolution made it what it is today. Knowledge that you will live Perfection again after you die. But also knowledge that comes from watching the World, the cycle of Seasons, the laugther of children, the beauty of Nature. It's all you have as a malkioni : your Faith.
Imagine what a conscripted dronar in the seshnegi army feels when he sees pagan farmers near Hrelar Amali use gods-given strength to draw one hundred furrows in one day. Imagine how he reacts when he sees the first ears of wheat blooming in a few minutes under the Earth Priestess' rich green light. He thinks about what the Reader says week after week about the necessity of hard labor, about unknowable solace. When the local pagan peasants call out to him, if his sargeant is busy elsewhere and there is no Reader around, how long do you think he will hesitate before joining the pagan festival ? It's all a matter of his Faith...
Of course, not Knowing Faith doesn't stop us from building a wonderful fantasy world with plenty of interesting stories to play and read, of course. But I suspect that, paradoxically, we will never emulate malkioni life as well as we do the pagans'. Because we do not know Faith.
Merry post-Christmas to all of you ! Walk with Joy.
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