Recently I bought the Player-Companion Elves of Golarion, and the article about the Brightness struck me as rather odd. It says that every elf has the desire to find enlightment, and that they would live through many lifes if they didn´t find it. On the other hand the worship Calistria, because they identify themselves with her fickle nature, composed of Lust and Vengeance.
This seems a little contrary. Elves seek enlightment and harmony with nature, through various rebirths, but their main goddes preaches lust.
How does the whole philosophy work?
Also, if elves are in a cycle of rebirths, how do elven gods receive souls, which is often described as rather important for deities?
Right at the start of Elves of Golarion it points out that that elves are contradictory and inconsistent creatures. They are both smug and embarrassed about this.
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Also, Calistria is not their main goddess. Additionally its her freedom aspect that they most identify with.
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Recently I bought the Player-Companion Elves of Golarion, and the article about the Brightness struck me as rather odd. It says that every elf has the desire to find enlightment, and that they would live through many lifes if they didn´t find it. On the other hand the worship Calistria, because they identify themselves with her fickle nature, composed of Lust and Vengeance.
All more or less true, though Calistria isn't necessarily the most important God to Elves, just the one that other races worship most.
This seems a little contrary. Elves seek enlightment and harmony with nature, through various rebirths, but their main goddes preaches lust.
How does the whole philosophy work?
Why is that contradictory? Lust is one of the most natural drives living creatures experience, how is indulging in it inconsistent with either enlightenment or harmony with nature?
I mean, some philosophies would consider sex a distraction from enlightenment, but there are also ones which see sex as a means to achieve enlightenment, or at least a necessary part of the process.
Also, if elves are in a cycle of rebirths, how do elven gods receive souls, which is often described as rather important for deities?
It's not very important in Golarion. Deities' power is in no way based on worshipers or number of souls acquired. They get something out of worship, but direct power isn't it, and there's no indication they get anything other than divine servitors from souls...so the Elven gods probably don't have a whole lot of Angels (or whatever) serving them, but that's hardly the end of the world.
The main source of my confusion is that elves, who found the Brightness, are described as calm and self-composed. Why would Calistria have such an important role in elven culture, when the final stage of elven spiritual growth would result in a character opposite to her portfolio?
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The main source of my confusion is that elves, who found the Brightness, are described as calm and self-composed. Why would Calistria have such an important role in elven culture, when the final stage of elven spiritual growth would result in a character opposite to her portfolio?
Uh...Calistria is always calm and self-composed. She's a model of poise and grace, as befits her being the Goddess of Trickery. Lust isn't necessarily abandoning calm or composure...it sorta depends how you do it.
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I think the disconnect that I see is that if elves are supposed to be striving for some sort of internal balance, reaching some sort of enlightenment that will allow them to achieve natural transcendence once they die and be reincarnated into a natural creature. Then Calistria comes along, a goddess who tells her faithful to always redress those that wrong them. To compound upon this, she tells her faithful to take their time in making the punishment fit the crime - if a Calistrian didn't invent the phrase "revenge is a dish best served cold" on Golarion, then I'm pretty sure that the goddess did herself. So, how is that rectified? I'm pretty sure that planning out a revenge upon a person that wronged you over the course of a decade is counter to achieving nirvana with the natural world - animals live in the now, and don't scheme like that.
Personally, I have no problem with this - elves, like any other race, shouldn't be a one-hat race. Some elves are interested in achieving the transcendence the Brightness promises. Some are attracted to Calistria's aloof nature and long memory. Some are attracted to both, and fail to fully live up to either ideology. Some are attracted to neither, and give themselves to other pursuits. Almost all of them would be offended that these traits actually humanize them - and would be secretly ashamed because the accusation is right on the money.
As Deadmanwalking said, I don't see why enlightenment and calm should necessarily be viewed as incompatible with lust. Respecting the importance of lust as a drive (defining it as excessive makes the argument trivial, so let's not do that) doesn't mean that elves don't take the long view there too and balance it against the other parts of their lives.
Also, I think it depends on how closely one decides the Brightness is tied to nature and what kind of enlightenment it actually is. From what I recall, I would think the nature thing comes from the fact that elves' incarnations alternate with animal forms, just because that's how it works. Why? We'd probably have to ask Pharasma. At any rate, since people who can't tell their Brightness get a longer series of non-elf incarnations, whereas some people have the idea that half-elves are a speeding up of the usual process (with uncomplimentary implications for how elves see humans!), it does seem to be primarily due to the way elven reincarnation works. Especially if the half-elf thing is true, maybe living better gets elfier incarnations - maybe even skipping the animal stage altogether! We might compare the capstone of the "Brightness Seeker" prestige class, which I'll note pedantically is the "Seeker," not the "Has Found Brightness This Incarnation" class. ;)
As to what insight the Brightness gives, I think it's a glimpse into the nature of All That Is, or "Life, the Universe, and Everything:" far from complete, and pretty much compatible with the life of any individual elf. After all, the examples Elves of Golarion gives of the range of the horribly inadequate one-sentence summaries of experiencing the Brightness don't seem to mesh very well: "Peace is knowledge?" "All change is growth?" I figure the planes are a big enough place that the best any elf, even the most enlightened, can hope for is a partial (in all senses of the word) view of the big picture.
Dot.