Is it just me...

The best fiction, regardless of genre, is almost always an exploration of morality and how people handle it. That exploration is part of the development of the character of the characters. That is something that DW does extremely well. He remembers that people are not black and white and portrays them in all their shades grey and blue and green.

rdt wrote:Hi again, Peter
Again you make good points and present ideas to ponder.

rfc deals not just with morality, but immorality, as well. Sometimes the bad guys are so bad that one wonders how they managed to live past childhood.

Another point is honor. Some of the bad guys are really quite honorable. They are loyal and patriotic, they are imbued with a fine sense of justice and you think you would like to meet them. And sometimes they are just trying to do something to get out of a hole they have dug for themselves. Just the wrong something.

David Weber does use religion to make certain points, but he doesn't really have to. Morality and good and evil all exist aside from religion and don't even need to be defined in religious terms.

There is one "good guy" person in the Honorverse whose actions often seem bewildering to me. I am referring to Terekhov, who we know to be ruthless and also a good person. War is, of course, mostly immoral. But it requires a soldier to be ruthless in treating with the enemy. I can understand an Abagail Hearns meeting the Test much more easily than I can understand Terekhov being perfectly willing to blow up a space station full of non-combatants. And I do not really know why I can't understand it--I am just grateful that it is not a choice I will ever need to make.

Hi rdt, PeterZ, et all,

I'm late into this interesting discussion. Ah well.

Terekhov reminds me of the Hayyoth -sp -googled it, should be 2y, now can be found on google - Kerubim - can also spell cherubim - , aka, the Shemset Hor. The first means something like 'God's holy beasts', IIRC. The second is Ancient Egyptian and means The Companions of Horus. This is a compliment, coming from me. Equating the hayyoth cherubim with the Shemset Hor is a personal opinion. you can google both and decide for yourself. There is a lot of conflicting opinion about the shemset hor or shemsu hor, which is fun.

I have never understood 'cherubs' portrayed as flying fat babies, nor angels portrayed as cute cheerleaders with wings. Cherub - Kerub. Eyes of fire, all that. Scary persons of ambiguous gender, three faces, which has always sounded like someone trying to discribe an alien facial structure that, depending on the angle, looks something like a man or an eagle or a lion. The Storm Troops of Heaven, so to speak. In one of his books, perhaps in the Perelandra trilogy, C. S. Lewis said something like,'What if you met absolute goodness and it is also terrible?'

Thus the need for angelic messengers to start conversations with 'Fear not, oh man' and such like.

Terekhov would get along fine with the Hayyoth Kerubim. He's their soul brother in the flesh. So are Zilwiki and Cachet. Those are Hayyoth Kerubim type guys. Abigail is a female one, ruthless as a Valkyrie... or a Kerub, complete with flaming sword. speaking of Valkyries... there are some more of these Otherworlds troops. Helen Zilwiki is another on that road.

For an interesting novel, sort of vaguely about the Hayoth Kerubim, see Katherine Kurtz, St. Patrick's Gargoyle.

Pagan lore is replete with edgy good guys who can be scary and awesome but do serve the Light. Always. Gwynn ap Nudd in Welsh lore, comes to mind, sometimes called 'the Goblin King', but also... perhaps, like the Kerubim, he guards and keeps them in, a Keeper of the Gates, like Uriel. Odin. Herne. Even Janus. There are many more. Sometimes I wonder if they all belong to the same organization, policing the Otherworlds or whatever. In my tradition, The Noble Hunt.

Kartekeya, son of Shiva.

Terekhov is one of my personal favorites, but then I like the edgy good guys. Do note 'good guys'.

edited to clarify some spellings and add a comment or two.

You might be interested to know that the concept of Angels (messengers) seems to be extremely old; the ancient Greek word for messenger (from which Angel is derived) is in fact derived from an even older word in Mycenaean Linear B script: a-ke-ro

The idea of heavenly messengers seems to have reached the Jewish faith through their interactions with the Egyptians, so this is a very old idea in human thought and religion

Thucydides wrote:You might be interested to know that the concept of Angels (messengers) seems to be extremely old; the ancient Greek word for messenger (from which Angel is derived) is in fact derived from an even older word in Mycenaean Linear B script: a-ke-ro

The idea of heavenly messengers seems to have reached the Jewish faith through their interactions with the Egyptians, so this is a very old idea in human thought and religion

Hi Thuciydides,

Indeed it is, both old and seemingly universal. Call them devas, yeis, angelos, whatever.

And they were not always benign or at all (or ever) fluffy. I read a term in a novel recently, 'fierce compassion' I think it suits people like Terekhov or Abigail Hearns, the Zilwikis, Victor Cachet... Hearnes... Herne... interesting.eh? Herne... from the Anglo-Saxon Herr, lord. Herrin, lady. In some traditions Britain's Guardian, before George came along with his dragon. And perhaps still As Gwynn ap Nudd is Guardian of Wales. Both honorable, neither remotely fluffy.

Kartekeya, the devic son of Shiva, and somewhat 'god' of war and other things in Vedanta -Hinduism - is somewhat analogous to the archangel Michael, with the same job of leading the Heavenly Host.

There is a misconception among some, due to the use of 'god' to reference both God and old religions'... persons of power and authority. They are not to be confused with the uncreated Creator, old faiths were clear on that. More an assortment of a combination of archetypes and forces and persons who lived extraordinary lives.. sort of like a saint, without necessarily much sanctity involved, and mysterious beings created not born, aka angels, cherubim, seraphim etc. By those terms various persons somewhat equating Honor with a goddess of war is quite accurate to the spirit of such things. Shall we say, an avatar of Minerva?

Anyway, whatever 'angels' or 'devas' are they have an ancient lineage and are noted for both their ferocity and their compassion. Again, thus why I put Terekhov in their camp and fellowship. He is an embodiment of fierce compassion... which can be ruthless in pursuit of its objectives. Ask Sodom and Gomorrah about the cute harmlessness of angels. Ahem.

Note, in my previous post I did not list Honor among the human kerubim sorts. She does too much hand-wringing over the ruthless aspect of war to be a Kerub.

See Cicero, The Nature of the Gods, for an interesting take from an ancient perspective. It is a speculative conversation among a group of friends on just what the title asserts.

They had them in Babylon and Sumer also and in East Asia, though I am not up on the details there.

Off on another tangent with them there is Keith Thompson's interesting book; Angels and Aliens, or Jacques Vallee's Passport to Magonia or his Wonders in the Sky.