Destiny & Free Will, Week I [Monday, Period 2]

[atreideslioness]

Ghanima was already in the classroom as the students assembled, leaning against her desk as they filed past her. Holding a steaming mug of spiced coffee in her hands, she subjected each person to an apparently disinterested inspection from her glowing blue-on-blue eyes.

Not even another Truthsayer would have been able to tell what she was thinking.

The moment the bell rang, her eyes snapped from the door to the children seated around the room. "Good afternoon," she said in a clear voice that carried effortlessly. "This is Destiny and Free Will. If you are in the wrong class, please consider this your opportunity to leave. Although if you are here and believe in fate, then you are where you are supposed to be, no matter what it says on your schedule."

"I am Lady Ghanima Atreides of Arrakis. You may address me as Miss Atreides, Lady Ghanima, Miss Ghanima, or some variation thereof. For those of you whom I have had in class before," she smiled suddenly, looking far less severe. "Welcome back."

"This class is designed to look at the differing opinions on predestination and freewill from a variety of religious, temporal, and philosophical schools of thought," she continued. "Regardless of any personal experiences you may have had on this topic, I expect everyone to maintain a respectful and open mind towards the subject matter and your classmates. Mocking destiny is a dangerous pastime, and not one I will permit during class hours. What you do on your own time, however, is your business."

"There is no syllabus, because to have one would tell you when a class is fated to fall. Or perhaps it is free choice which allows me to not have one." Ghanima's smile was decidedly impish. "For now, I'd like us to discuss as a group if you believe in destiny, free will, or neither, and why."

[ocd up!]

Comments

Re: Class Conversation!

[ancientbschamp.livejournal.com]

"I know that the Fates exist," Gabrielle began matter-of-factly, the way she might say I know there are little blue deer in the preserve who love to keep me company when I'm working out a story out loud. "Not just as concepts -- as actual, physical embodiments of what they do."

She hadn't met them personally yet, but Xena had, and besides, she'd met several gods and the Furies (plus banshees in Britannia but the less said about that the better, and la la la, not bringing up how she'd accidentally released the Titans because that episode sucked), so it logically followed that Lachesis, Clotho, and Atropos were as real as the others.

"But that's the thing, isn't it? I don't believe the Fates -- or the gods -- are as in control of our destinies as they'd like us to think. I've seen people try to thwart the gods, and succeed at it -- whether or not they were right to try." Helping to free Prometheus had been one thing; what had happened to the prophesied child of Dahak who was supposed to bring Dahak's kingdom to earth had been another thing entirely. There wasn't a simple right-or-wrong answer. "From what I've seen, their motivations aren't always pure."

Pandora and her descendants had been fooled for generations about the contents of that box, after all.

"They're not . . ." She was echoing what Xena had told her once, though she'd come to believe it herself, after everything she'd seen the past several years. "Necessarily in charge because they should be; they're in charge because people choose to let them be. And I don't believe we should just let them control our lives. We can take our destinies into our own hands, and make them what we want them to be . . . and I think we should."

She paused, then smiled slightly. "So I do believe in free will."

Could've just given the short answer, Gabrielle, but noooooooooo.

Re: Class Conversation!

[thinkbetterofme.livejournal.com]

"Yes, how do you know that belief is not one they wanted us to have?" Faramir asked. "One is as likely to prove destiny as one is to prove coincidence."

Re: Class Conversation!

[ancientbschamp.livejournal.com]

"That's a good question, isn't it?" Gabrielle asked. "I met a man once who was the kindest, most trusting, most devout follower of his god that you could ever meet. There was just one problem. He loved his younger son a lot more than he loved the older one, and the older son was jealous . . . jealous enough to manipulate their father into believing their god wanted Anteus to sacrifice his younger son to prove his faith. It wasn't hard, either. Mael didn't have to do anything fancy. Just some drugged nutbread, a big metal plate to make sounds like thunder, and a speaking-trumpet up on a hillside. The strange part is, once we found out what Mael was up to and tried to stop him, something spoke up and stopped Anteus from sacrificing Ikus just in time. It wasn't Mael, because he was busy fighting Xena at the time, and I was up on the hillside trying to get to the speaking-trumpet, and it definitely wasn't me."

She shrugged. "I don't think there's a simple answer."

Re: Class Conversation!

[angelo_wings]

"How do you know that those people -- the ones that thwarted the gods -- weren't doing what they were supposed to, according to destiny?" Rinoa asked.

Because that was one of the points that usually confused her.