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Message: <blockquote data-quote="xenoflare" data-source="post: 1868901" data-attributes="member: 12431">a defence of the monkHi,  first off, sorry if i offend anyone with this post.  i've been reading this thread with mixed feelings, as i'm not from a Hellenistic/ "Classically"-influenced cultural background, and i'm far more familiar with monks and the whole "mystic ki" thingajigs than i am with clerics and crusading paladins of the imagined past. As a minor introduction - i'm ethnically Chinese, culturally Southeast Asian, and religiously Buddhist with Taoist overtones - in all these 3 nodes of identity, the monk is a central figure.  I was just having a talk with my Muslim friend/ DM/ fellow player - and having a laugh over the fact that monks are supposed to be this kung fu experts obsessed with seeking perfection and kicking ass. Even though his background doesn't really include monks as a common myth, my friend has some problems imagining the serene men in saffron robes in temples as doing those funky stuff. Me too - i also just came back from work at a buddhist library, where there's a Buddhist version of Sunday School, and Sri Lankan monks teach kids and teenagers meditation and ethics.  i don't exactly see those monks as doing kung fu - in fact, they were asking me questions about how to prepare for the SATs as they wanted to study philosophy in university here in Singapore haha.   but somehow, if we follow the "mythic ideal" discourse - monks jump over clouds, fly around with flurries of superquick strikes, can step between spaces etc.  but - wait up. i do some readings over in some sutras and buddhist tales - and it becomes easier to understand. Monks are different from laypeople in that they have sworn to follow the way of enlightenment to the exclusion of all else - through the path of practising their road to enlightenment, they attain different fruits of merit.  Buddhist, Hindu, Jain, and Taoist tales are replete with tales of saints, sages, ascetics, monks, sorcerors, and priests (and no - those terms are not synonymous - monks are not necessarily ascetics, etc) who have gained great esoteric powers through their spiritual insight. For example, since Deepavali just passed by a while ago - the rakshasa king Ravana sacrified one of his ten heads in ascetic dedication to Rudra-Shiva, destructive lord of the Trinity, and gained great magical power and immunity to the attacks of gods and demons. Lord Vishnu had to incarnate himself into the mortal avatar Rama to defeat him, in order to bypass that magical defence.. and in Taoism, Zhuang Zi speaks of how this man, Lie Zi, who is so enlightened and carefree that he can dance upon the wind, chariot upon the elements, and be content no matter how the wheel of fortune turns.  Central to this idea is that spiritual power can be attained through some way, some means - the Hindu would argue that power is attained through sacrifice and devotion to the Gods, the Taoist, in understanding "nature" (the Tao) and thus transcending power/powerlessness's paradox, the Buddhist, in training the faculties of the mind and reaching enlightenment etc.  But this power is not necessarily the - END - result. Not the objective, if you will.  Buddhist sutras caution of becoming attracted to psionic powers that may develop with meditation - for they may impede one's enlightenment, and provide glitzy funky power that corrupts one's progress. Taoists would scoff at power for power's sake, for that is illusionary order that would degenerate with time's passing.   Power is amoral, in that sense.  And this is what this long-winded message is about, i guess..  The DnD monk is an aberration because he is removed from his cultural roots, so as to speak, and placed within (mostly) contexts that he may never have gone before. His special abilities are very much steeped in those mythologies i've mentioned - "still mind" is a kind of meditation process, ki is very real to Chinese and Japanese, dimension dooring via Abundant Step is like charioting on the universe i guess.  In the imaginations of non-Asian (i hesitate to use the word Oriental, because of my own problems with colonialism and orientalism - being a product of colonial history myself) audiences, the monk, transplanted into your mythic realms, seems to face indifference, hostility, at times. i've seen lots of posts that talk about how the monk doesn't fit, how the monk doesn't suit DnD, about how it must be tweaked..  i agree, because most games are not designed with the hmm. how to say. teleological focus of the monk in mind? DnD, as an erudite earlier poster pointed out - is not based on historical "fact", but based on imaginings.  For most of you, i guess tales of Fa Hai (literally "The Ocean of Law"), the diabolical monk/ exorcist who hunted the hengeyokai Lady White Snake would be unfamiliar. References to Jing Lun Fa Wang, (literally "The Law-King of the Golden Wheel"), the Tibetan monk in Louis Cha's swordfighting wuxia epics would find little resonance. You have your Bunyan, Robin Hood, Atalanta and Meleager, and King Arthur..  (where is this post going? lol. sorry.)  But i think - the two trends are not necessarily exclusive. in my gaming environment, my friends and I draw from the Occidental, if you will forgive my use of the term, tradition to imbue our games with lots of energy and ideas from traditions far from my own. i think... perhaps most of you could draw some ideas from the home cultures of the monk, as "imagined"?  In this age of globalisation and rapidly closing borders - (heck, i'm writing this on a message board in real-time, from singapore, on campus) - let us embrace what we can offer to each other, with open minds?  that's what i think, at least, the "monks in my world", teaching the merits of the mind to the children in the library, would be happy with haha.avaunt!Yours Sincerely, shao</blockquote>

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