Palespyder’s Web

I have now accepted that this is most likely not my path. I am unable to travel enough to ever even get Fyrded, let alone make it to Knighthood one day. I will be contented with learning to make armour, spending time with my wife, and working on my house.

Reality slapping you in the face is a sobering experience. I will strove to become Knightly, but my dream of one day being a Knight in the SCA, is just that.

Found this on the Armour Archive:

Æiric Ørvender

In Arms:

- To fight at your utmost in every battle, to give your all to every opponent.
- To Offer no insult to someone who may be inferior in prowess by ‘toning down’ a fight, unless it is a ‘teaching fight’
- To teach and train ALL who seek skill in arms, to do so in a respectful and optimistic manner but never fail to speak the ‘hard truth’ where/when it is needed.
- To be honorable in every fight, to never ‘loose it’, to keen honor stainless even at the cost of losing a battle to an ‘overly armored’ opponent.
- To always strive to the next level in martial prowess, especially with the knowledge that the will always be a higher level to obtain.

In Court:

- To be a steadfast supporter of the Kingdom, Crown, and it’s People. One must not always like the person who wears the Crown but one must always respect the Position the Crown represents… and always do Honor to the Kingdom, it’s People and it’s Land.
- To strive in areas other than the singularly martial, to excel in all endeavors before the People and The Crown to bring Honor through actions to the Kingdom.
- To Serve

In Camp:

- To strive to a better representation of Persona, through research, application and action.
- To inspire by example, to create for others an goal in which to reach for, and to assist others in achieving that goal.

I have been reading this book, Living the Martial Way, good read so far. I am currently on the chapter on Honor and was shocked to read the honor consists of three principles, Obligation, Justice, and Courage. While reading on these things, the author speaks about the three levels of what I call honor enlightenment. He uses the story that a man is killed after leaving a large sum of money with a friend for safe keeping. The friend knows no one but he and his dead friend knew of the arrangement. His honor comes down to three choices in decending order of enlightenment.

• He can return the money to the man’s family without ever thinking of keeping it himself as this is the right and just thing to do.
• He can think about keeping the money, but return it after shame and guilt set in.
• He can keep the money and never tell anyone what happened.

The most honorable of men would choose the  first because it is his Obligation to do so and his Giri is fulfilled to his friend. He would never consider keeping someone elses money for his own selfish game because that in turn hurts the man’s family and causes injustice. It takes courage to do these things and thus his honor is intact because he has fulfilled the three tenants of Honor.

There are men, I have known many in my time, who are unscrupulous and look for oppurtunities like this to profit off of the misery of others. I do not feel I have ever, nor will I ever be that man. Now, that being said, I am neither saint nor demon, I am a middle of the road man who would think out both sides of the coin before returning the money, does this make me dishonorable or less then honorable to the other man? I don’t think so, I think it makes me unenlightened and enlightenment is something to work toward until the end of your days.