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Message: <blockquote data-quote="M.L. Martin" data-source="post: 9858462" data-attributes="member: 4086">The closest I think we ever get are in two sources. First is the explanation of the Law of Gilean in Dragonlance Adventures; while I don't have my copy to hand at the moment, it talks about a need for contrast and 'unity in diversity.'  Second is the material on souls' progession in Holy Orders of the Stars, which I do not and have never owned, but which I believe states that the 'gods' are embodiments/examples of fundamental principles that are all necessary for souls to progress to a higher state of being through the full experience--good and evil--of mortal life. (At the risk of bending ENWorld rules, you can see parallels to Hickman's own beliefs in this.)   If you go back to the very earliest, proto-DL material--Jeff Grubb's homebrewed pantheon--you'll find the three pantheons are Lawful/Good, Lawful/Evil, and a loose Neutral and Chaotic alliance. And there's been a tendency for the past thirty years to emphasize the gods as forces of order unified against Chaos. Despite the date on the webpage, that essay actually dates back to 1998. It doesn't address one of the deeper issues--how can Evil be both fundamental to the world and yet be Evil as we understand it. This tension shows up from the beginning--the Queen of Darkness is described in Dragons of Spring Dawning as one of the 'forgers of the world', and one of the three participants who will bring the world to completion at the Last Day, and yet in Test of the Twins, we get Astinus--essentially the mouthpiece for Gilean--saying outright "Evil cannot create; it can only destroy."  Evil as something that must be opposed and should not be, but yet something that has a role in the unfolding of the world or divine providence, is something that can be worked with, but Dragonlance often gets away from that and the idea that "'tis not in mortals to command success" to the idea that "Evil is just as fundamental to the world as Good, and Good unchecked would be just as destructive as Evil."   Looking at the two major inspirations/allegories for the Cataclysm--the Flood and the Downfall of Numenor--we never get a sense that Istar has reached the levels of wickedness comparable to antediluvian human civilation or Late Second Age, imperialist, human-sacrificing, Melkor-worshipping, Numenor. One of several reasons the Cataclysm doesn't work for me, along with the religious allegories wrapped up in Istar and the post-Cataclysm 'abandonment of the gods.' (Note that for those reasons, I've never read the Kingpriest Trilogy, so maybe I've missed a reimagining of Istaran civilization.)  I think Hickman's original concept--made explicit in his proposal notes that he placed online a few years back, and still hinted at in places like DL12 and Tales of the Lance--works better. The Cataclysm was simply the magical backlash from the Kingpriest's hubris-filled attempt to magically summon a god to Krynn to wipe out Evil.   That's from the earliest material--the people only see the wrath of the gods and not the call to repentance. But the gods pull all their faithful clerics from the world beforehand, and apparently never seek to reach out to the people after that. (Yes, I'm familiar with the 'parable of the gem' from Dragons of Autumn Twilight. Makes Krynn's gods sound like the idols criticized in Isaiah 44: "they see nothing, know nothing, and so they are put to shame.")   As mentioned, you'll find this whole 'balance' concept in a lot of fantasy from the 1980s--The Dark Crystal, early Masters of the Universe, I think Legend--so I'm not sure where the ultimate source is.</blockquote>

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