(urth) Urth-Earth links

[Jerry Friedman]

>From: Marc Aramini <marcaramini at yahoo.com>

>
>I just don't see how Robert and Mary can be a missionary reality and Jesus couldn't exist.  It's like
> chewbacca living on endor.  It don't make sense.  So, yeah, for me, Christ is certainly present on ancient Urth.  


They can be missionaries for a religion that's like Christianity but not the same.  They distinctly don't mention Jesus.  The religion could use the (abridged) story of Moses's death the way the Chrasmological Writings use quotations from our writers.  And a female Christian missionary wouldn't let a man be naked in her presence when he has enough respect for her precepts to call her Preceptress.

The scene is extremely problematic and I can hardly see any way to draw definite conclusions about Urth's history from it.  For instance, according to "A Note on the Translation", names of animals that don't exist in our world indicate animals created by "biogenetic manipulation or the importation of extrasolar breeding stock" or when "an extinct species has been restored".  Do the mentions of the hesperorn and oreodont imply that those things were happening on Urth in the age of propeller planes?  And why would Wolfe use "hesperorn" for the name of a bird that "fluttered to her nest" when the genus Hesperornis was practically wingless and most likely slithered on the ground when it was on land?

Jerry Friedman