Talk:Lord of Light

Untitled

"is a renegade crewman who has turned down god-hood"

I think this sentence is incorrect. In my book we are never told if Sam is a god...

• Actually, I believe we are told that Sam had not taken up godhood, despite it being offered to him. The only time he accepts is in the section where he is the aging Siddhartha, and his acceptance there is false.

Shouldn't we mention that parts of the book was originally published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction? --Kristjan Wager 08:50, 30 May 2005 (UTC)

From what I remember, much of the summary is incorrect or at least gives the wrong impression of the plot. I wouldn't mind rereading the book again anyway. ^_^ --Starwed 06:55, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

Sam, Buddhism and Deity

Sam introduces Buddhism as a culture jamming tool and with this new religion, murder and outright rebellion strives to cripple the power of the "gods".

In many ways, the story of Lord of Light mirrors that of the novel Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse.

And of the real story of Gautama himself, upon whose life Siddharta is modelled; or that of another boddhissatva prince. Buddha's was a revolt against Brahmin orthodoxy and his ethic involves no God, does not address the question of God; it addresses the question of self and sansara and mu/wu (all that is nothingness, sorta). The egalitarian teachings of Sam in the book are in the same relative position; the revolution took hold in India for many years, including the great empire of Asoka and spread to other countries, even taming the wild and violent pre-Buddhist Tibetan civilization. But within a number of centuries Buddhism in India was assimilated and propagandized back into Buddhism, and assmilitave Hindu multiplicity prevailed and reverence for divinity and ritual restored. The reason Buddhists make offerings is that, human though he remains, Buddha's spirit is eternal, as well as aware; but he is still just a transcended being, not a god (although some sects might as well call him one).

And is Sam a god, as the comment above asks? Not if his character is buddhistic; boddhisattvas remain human, which is their whole meaning - that transcendence is possible within the mortal body, even though all the world is an illusion. In Hinduism it is an illusion too, and so is all concept of the eternal; the Eternal can not be known. In Buddhism, it can be entered - or rather, forgotten altogether, once one has reached samadhi, since all concept of mind has been lost in mindfulness....

Sorry for the ramble; I really gotta start a blog - but it's Wikifying as a habit that's got me writing a lot, 'tis true. Lotsa interesting subjects, and things I hadn't seen or thought about for a while.Skookum1 10:52, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

None of this applies, however, as Sam is not buddhistic. He merely pretends to be, because he believes it to be a way to break down the power of the gods. It might apply to Rild, who may have actually been buddhistic, but it no one ever claimed that Rild was a god.

mkehrt 23:00, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

And yet despite Ratri's early comments and Sam's consistent denial, I would hesitate to say that he is not buddhistic. The book consistently obscures that fact: while Sam does not seem to have reached internal enlightenment, and certainly does himself believe he has, he posses a quality of enlightenment clearly abnormal. Murugan and Taraka both, in somewhat supernatural ways, elevate him to the status of Lord of Light, and Taraka describes his words as binding and unbinding others. Further, it are his words that bring Rild through to his enlightenment. Denying Sam's status as a boddhisattva would seem an unreasonable step. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.246.116.3 (talk) 21:54, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Blasphemy?

User talk:203.99.195.1 put the following into the article text. I'm not quite sure how to address it. It seems worthy of discussing here, it is not appropriate in the article as it stood. John (Jwy) 14:30, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

IS IT NOT BLASPHEMY TO WRITE ABOUT HINDU GODS LIKE THIS? WILL CHRISTIANS TOLERATE IT IF I WRITE A NOVEL AND KEEP JESUS AND MARY AS THE MAIN VILLAINS? WILL MUSLIMS TOLERATE IT IF I PORTRAY ALLAH AS A CRIMINAL? WHY SHOULD HINDUS BE INSULTED LIKE THIS? IT SHOWS A SICK MIND. THIS IS UTTER NONSENSE. ALL THE NAMES MENTIONED HERE ARE REVERED HINDU GODS. THE CREEPS WHO WROTE THIS NOVEL WILL DEFINITELY ROT IN THE HELL OF THEIR OWN RELIGION

Stupid and utterly pointless commentary, if only for the fact that this novel is not about gods, but about humans IMPERSONATING gods. He should at least have read the article. --TheOtherStephan 11:18, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Completely pointless. Not nly are the characters humans assuming the mantles of gods, it wouldn't matter if it was about the Hindu gods themselves. Wikipedia (theoretically) follows NPOV, and so the article only relates to the fact that the book exists. The merits and flaws of its contents are not what is being adressed here. The fact that this book may offend some people (fairly or unfairly) is not a reason to change the article on it.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 74.67.252.128 (talk) 00:39, 10 February 2007 (UTC).

It does raise the interesting question of how the novel in question was received in India, however.

[User Calibanu] 13.34, 16 August 2007

Indeed, in the Sudanese teddy bear blasphemy case a kindergarten teacher was in serious legal trouble for allowing her 5-year-olds to name a teddy bear "muhammad", despite the fact that "muhammad" is in fact the most common male name in the world. 10,000 protesters took to the streets demanding her execution! Wouldn't it be better if we could all stop trying to look for ways to take offense at trivial things such as teddy bears and works of fiction, and simply try to get along?? 173.79.1.186 (talk) 07:07, 15 October 2016 (UTC)

I wonder what the complainant would think of Michael Moorcock's novel Behold the Man, for example. —Tamfang (talk) 21:31, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Rakasha or Demons?

On the page, the Rakasha are consistently referred to as demons - in fact the word Rakasha appears only once, in the description of Taraka, and it's not entirely apparent that the term Rakasha refers to the race of beings of which Taraka is most powerful. I know demon is the more familiar term to English readers, and they do possess traits similar to demons (with the exception of being supernatural, as the book puts it), but I think Rakasha would be more accurate. --Jamoche (talk) 02:13, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Rakasha is what they call themselves. But the Gods call them demons. So both names are correct, just a matter of perspective. If you are American, think of George Washington. King George of England called him a terrorist, while Washington called himself a freedom fighter. 217.238.61.198 (talk) 14:22, 26 April 2016 (UTC)

LOL. King George never called him a 'terrorist'. He called him a rebel.

The article now consistently uses the spelling Rakshasa, which is more accurate in our world but does not appear in the novel (iirc). —Tamfang (talk) 21:32, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

It would be good to use the book name, and also mention that the other is more accurate. --GwydionM (talk) 07:24, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:LordofLight(Zelazny).jpg

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BetacommandBot (talk) 17:06, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Structure

The Structure section is entirely original research, and I have tagged it accordingly. It may look obvious to whoever wrote it, but this isn't the place to publish an analysis carried out by you. If you can't cite someone else who has made these observations, then cut it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.91.171.36 (talk) 02:41, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

While the above comment is correct, it fails to note that some of the structure section is also flatly wrong -- the first six chapters of Lord of Light do not form a cycle at all. As noted in the summary below it, chapters 2-6 are the history leading up to the first chapter, but Sam's resurrection in the first chapter does not reset the rest of the world to the state it occupies at the beginning of chapter 2: Yama is a God in the past, and exiled in the present; the original Brahma (Madeline) is dead in the present and replaced by Shiva (to point out only two of the many significant changes that prevent the story from being cyclical). I have removed this paragraph. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.97.64.155 (talk) 01:34, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

Indian comment

Nice imaginative work, its nice to know that there is a work like this (almost in the lines of lord of the rings) involving India and hindu charecters, bravo!!!.

sorry to inform you that it really has no minute connection to hinduism or its philosophy and imaginatively tries to draw a magically "logical" history of religious evolution in India (offcourse not even closer to reallity). also i do not want to talk about gods and deamons but some part of story lines can definitly applied to normal human beings and period of society in India, which tried to keep the knowledge themselves and not to spread it out, may be thus cutting of all the knowledge what we had known. And now trying to go back and only to say hey we knew that !! (ya sure..:) ) .

would have been nice to have seen the ARGO work completed. (for sure banned in India ;) ).

Shrikanthv (talk) 07:06, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

LoL does not purport to portray real Hinduism in India, but rather its adaptation to the purposes of the "Gods" on a fictional colony planet.... —Tamfang (talk) 00:53, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

Reception?

So, despite Zelazny being "curious as to how such a book would be received", judging by this article, there was no reception whatsoever? Also, it sorely lacks an analysis of influences. I'm sure there has been treatment of these subject in scholarly literature. --62.65.236.47 (talk) 10:55, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

The "Characters" section and linking to articles of the gods they were inspired by.

The "Characters" section hyperlinks each character to the article of the god/deity they were inspired by. I think it's important for the article to note that while the characters are based on the Hindu deities, they're not actually the same ones, and this edit of mine reflects that.

Aathish S (talk) 05:56, 29 June 2021 (UTC)