Catherine Nemeth
asked
Lois McMaster Bujold:
In “Penric and the Bandit”, Pen compares the Bastard’s very flexible type of justice that would seek ways to save Roz from a life of crime and set him on a better path to the Father’s law-based justice that would instead presumably only punish him (losing a hand or hanging). Do all the Gods have their own version/style/sense of justice, and would you be able to venture what they might be?
Lois McMaster Bujold
This is similar to the question you just asked, but since Goodreads randomly sorts the Q&A, unless you select newest-first, I'd better repeat the relevant parts of the answer here.
To quote myself: "The gods are not so much judgmental as choosy. After all, they are talking these souls up into Themselves to become part of Themselves, as a person takes up food. (Open question how much souls are "digested" over time... But if one has less than 100 years in the world of matter, and thousands of years Beyond, it's inevitable that the latter experience must loom larger over enough time.)
Think of it as some gods really liking broccoli, but disliking green beans, so swapping those portions across the table with their sibling gods.
No god wants to consume actual poison, spoiled or toxic food. In which case one could also think of the Bastard's hell as the gods' sanitation department/water treatment facility. ... Note that this [sorting] is not a mechanical process; you will never get a hard-and-fast rule for the result in advance, since it will sensitively depend on, so to speak, the fine grain of the initial conditions; the hearts of men that only the gods can see into."
"Punishment" is something humans do, sometimes with good reason to protect their communities. They project this style of thinking onto their god/s; possibly that's where the Father of Winter has acquired His bias in a more literal fashion.
Which makes the evolution/differentiation of the gods a somewhat circular process, each self-selecting souls to become more Themselves over time.
Ta, L.
This is similar to the question you just asked, but since Goodreads randomly sorts the Q&A, unless you select newest-first, I'd better repeat the relevant parts of the answer here.
To quote myself: "The gods are not so much judgmental as choosy. After all, they are talking these souls up into Themselves to become part of Themselves, as a person takes up food. (Open question how much souls are "digested" over time... But if one has less than 100 years in the world of matter, and thousands of years Beyond, it's inevitable that the latter experience must loom larger over enough time.)
Think of it as some gods really liking broccoli, but disliking green beans, so swapping those portions across the table with their sibling gods.
No god wants to consume actual poison, spoiled or toxic food. In which case one could also think of the Bastard's hell as the gods' sanitation department/water treatment facility. ... Note that this [sorting] is not a mechanical process; you will never get a hard-and-fast rule for the result in advance, since it will sensitively depend on, so to speak, the fine grain of the initial conditions; the hearts of men that only the gods can see into."
"Punishment" is something humans do, sometimes with good reason to protect their communities. They project this style of thinking onto their god/s; possibly that's where the Father of Winter has acquired His bias in a more literal fashion.
Which makes the evolution/differentiation of the gods a somewhat circular process, each self-selecting souls to become more Themselves over time.
Ta, L.
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