At the beginning of the Nomad Captains' Council on Rendezvous:
"'In the name of Cosmos, rendezvous,' [the president] said formally. Joachim didn't pay much attention to the ritual that followed."
-CHAPTER II, pp. 7-8.
But we would like to see the ritual.
As part of the ritual of landing on an E-planet:
"'In the name of Cosmos, sanctuary,' said the boat's captain, Kogama Iwao, formally."
-CHAPTER XV, p. 131.
How many things are said in the name of Cosmos and what else happens in the rituals?
In the cabin of a Nomad captain:
"...against another wall was the customary family altar."
-CHAPTER VIII, p. 58.
What is on the altar and what rituals are performed in front of it? Some of this would have to be invented for visual adaptations.
Religions affect each other. Catholic priests keep consecrated Communion wafers in a tabernacle on the altar. In a Buddhist monastery, I heard someone ask, "What's in that box on the altar?" The answer was "The Scripture of Great Wisdom." A Jewish layman showing some students, including myself, around a synagogue said that, when the Rabbi has read from the Torah scroll, he holds it up above his head for the congregation to see. He commented: "Shades of the elevation of the Host!" I read that maybe Taoists constructed their Trinity in response to the Buddhist Tripitaka. Japanese homes can have both a god altar and a Buddha altar.
So a lot of us are familiar with altars but what is on them? Are there images of "Cosmos"? No subordinate deities are mentioned. James Blish's Okies refer to "gods of all stars" but only abstractly.
When I told a Polish man that there is a mosque on our street, he asked not about abstract beliefs but only about a concrete image: "Do they have crucifix?" When a pupil drew a picture of Solomon's Temple and placed a cross above the door, I pointed out that the cross would not have been there. Instead of realizing, smiling and saying, "Of course not!," he asked, very puzzled, "Why not?" People take for granted what they are used to seeing - and cultural differences can be immense. So what is on the Nomads' altars?
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
And I think we would like to read more about the burial service read aloud from that Navy manual by Lt. Rocheforte and Commander Flandry in THE PEOPLE OF THE WIND and THE REBEL WORLDS.
However naively expressed, that Pole's comment touched on the most crucial difference between Christianity and Islam.
Ad astra! Sean
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