Ali the Helering

The past remains in the past. We look to the future.🙂

Races meant something quite different in the '30s and '40s from what it means today. Culture is not the same as gene pool. To call the Numenoreans a race by the time of the War of the Ring is a bit of a stretch. A handful of nobility in North and South, and the unfortunately named Black Numenoreans. Bree is divided into racial districts, with limited mixing. Being a rarity doesn't make something implicitly an approval of racial interaction, either.

Sometimes in the ancient and early medieval RW a priesthood could be inherited, without personal devotion. You simply went through the motions of ritual at the required times.

Rootless Aldryami can be interesting to have in a group, but only in the hands of an experienced and capable player. If not, they're a complete disaster.

I think I do, but I still think that when it comes to understanding how to pattern religion it is best to use the RW as a model. Now, I appreciate that I say this as a follower of a religion, but as someone who studies the social anthropology of religion I would say it even if I didn't.

I know we have had massive differences in the past Darius, but this is brilliant!

Never forget that Greg's work didn't appear out of thin air. He was a serious student of mythology and anthropology.

I would always approach this from a RW point of view. Siddharta Gautama propounded the eternal and unchangeable truths. Except for those revealed by Mahayana. The god of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is eternal and unchangeable. Except for the different understandings of the various followers of Jesus of Nazareth, Mohammed, Baha'u'llah, the people of Samaria, the Druze, Reform and Liberal Judaism, you name it.... even Free Presbyterians. Of course the deity is eternal and unchangeable, and always has been as WE worship them. Others are simply wrong.

Particularly since JRR couldn't decide on Orcish origins anyway

I have to most profoundly disagree. In Galadriel's case, elves are divided by tradition and attitude, not race. Her daughter married a half-elf whose choice of kindred made him an elf, not a human. Faramir and Eowyn are both human, the one representing the decayed imperial power (Gondor/Romano-Britain) the other the vibrant addition of noble barbarian blood (Rohan/Anglo-Saxon) and is not inter-racial. Elrond is an example of many folk within the British Empire of mixed race who looked down upon those of their non-white ancestry. Yes, Sam is indeed described as brown-skinned, as would almost all outdoor workers when Tolkien was writing. The Fallowhides, the fairest skinned hobbits (according to Concerning Hobbits) form the nobility, as in Tolkien's England the fairest skinned folk formed the nobility. Melian and Elu Thingol were indeed an inter-racial marriage, if the Maia can be counted a race in the sense we are using. As a Roman Catholic Tolkien might well have been thinking of other forms of 'mystical marriage/bridal theology' which influenced a variety of writers such as Henry Suso, Catherine of Siena, Teresa of Ávila, Gregory the Great and Bernard of Clairvaux. Bree contains humans who are corrupt, evil, forgetful, and brutish. The friendship of Gimli and Legolas emerges from shared peril, and via many racial slurs.

For another time travel take on it, try Gary Kilworth's "Let's go to Golgotha", which is googleable.

No luck I'm afraid. I just remember reading it and emitting a loud "Oooo"! It appears that the idea of it being all-male has somewhat fallen out of favour anyway, since it is known from the writings of Porphyry that there was a female initiatory grade called the 'hyena'. It has been argued that this is derogatory, but the female hyena is a creature to be both admired and feared for her hunting capabilities. Likewise, her anatomy leads to an interesting conversation regarding gender and sexual identity.

Damned if I can remember - it was back before Covid, I think it was in Britain, but I am not certain. I shall go looking....

A recent discovery of a dedicatory plaque from a woman has proven that female membership of the cult was not unknown.

To vote is to express your hope for the future. As Bill said, folk suffered so that we (in the US or not) could vote, so honour their memory tomorrow.

It was a flexible aspect of deity in the Eastern Med at the time of Christ, apply it to the deity of your choice. There are statues with sheep or cattle slung over their shoulders. Jesus saying "I am the Good Shepherd" was one of his claims to godhood which we often miss.

Or an ever changing canon....

Don't get mad, get organised! Join the IWW for heaven's sake...

I am always puzzled as to why people don't expect a capitalist system to have capitalist outcomes.

It wasn't a bad opinion poll, but rather total incompetence with respect to the budget. The figures didn't balance, the tax rates for the rich were being cut in the midst of a financial crisis hurting many on the lower rates of pay and threatening to devastate those on welfare, it triggered the fall in the pound to the worst exchange rate ever, the Stock Exchange was slipping, and government bonds were losing value. Besides that, everything was fine.

Yeah, but Trump needs protection. Desperately. Truss doesn't even need salad dressing, unlike a lettuce.

After less than two months in office, Truss will receive the ex-Prime Minister's 'allowance' of £115,000 a year for life. I'm afraid I don't know the dollar equivalent, I haven't checked the exchange rate in the last hour....

Yeah, despite the fact that some Tories thought her a Little Gem, eventually they saw reason, told her she couldn't Romaine in post and sent her off on a Rocket.😁

Mind you, I'm not an axolotl😁

So sorry, hadn't logged your icon