The Invisible God is the Hidden Mover, the Ultimate Reality which can be known. From the Invisible God came everything. And once the Invisible God viewed everything, we could have the One Mind. The One Mind lets us view everything as matter, and the process of viewing as energy. That is the process of creation.
After that we get additional actions that divide the world into shapes and principles. forms and spirit, and so on. Eventually we get down to humans and reason, which then becomes critical logic that allows us to divide the world again into matter and energy.
All that is nifty and lets us run around with Neo-platonism, Aristotelianism, Islamic science, and so much more. But from a game mechanic perspective, here’s what a worshiper of the Invisible God gets:
Nothing.
That’s right – being an initiate of the Invisible God gets you no spells. It isn’t even a prerequisite for learning sorcery.
So why do it? I mean unlike Orlanth, I can’t wield the power of the Invisible God. I don’t see him in religious ceremonies. He’s invisible after all. So again, why worship him.
Because the Invisible God is the Creator. The Invisible God is at the center of Malkion’s teachings. There is a structure to the world. We gain Solace from this.
And some go deeper and gain Joy by experiencing the One Mind. That gets us into Plotinus, Sufism, henosis with the One Mind, of Hegel, and of the Form of the Good. And Joy is of course good.
But the gods offer us power directly. They let us wield their power if we fulfill our part of the bargain – worship, sacrifice, and taboos (cult restrictions and requirements).
This is the dilemma that Malkioni are always faced with. Do we revere the Invisible God alone, and be content with Solace or Joy? To do that means empowering our magical specialists with task of dealing with the magical universe. Perhaps it includes empowering additional specialists to make sure that the weak are protected and that justice is enshrined, not only what is rational.
This approach is common in Loskalm and Seshnela. And Brithos as well, but with no Solace or Joy. We might use gods and spirits, but as archetypes or even tools.
Or do we pay our respect to the Invisible God, but develop a personal relationship with a specific god? This is like bhakti – we approach God through devotion to a personal god.
This approach is most common in Ralios and in Maniria. It is often called henotheism. Most commonly it involves devotion to a god like Orlanth, Humakt, Zorak Zoran, Subere, whatever, as our personal god, but acknowledges the Invisible God as well.
Is there henotheism in Loskalm, Seshnela and Brithos? It is considered a heresy by both the Rokari and Hrestoli.
Now remember that Malkionism is like Islam or Buddhism – there is no supreme spiritual authority. So like in Buddhism, Malkioni leaders have occasionally held “Councils” to gather as many spiritual leaders together as possible to decide on what is and what is not Malkionism.
In 660, King Bretnos of Seshnela convened a Council at Frowal, to purify Malkionism along the lines adopted in Jrustela. I am pretty sure that council proclaimed Arkati teachings to be the Stygian Heresy.
That later approach, of approaching the Invisible God through devotion to a personal god, is commonly associated with Arkat.
Malkionism often wrestles with its own definition, in a way that most other cults do not. At the end of the day, if I am able to wield Orlanth’s magic then I am an Orlanthi. Simple as that. But the Invisible God is invisible, which means we mortals need to define things.
So if we think about this in terms of game mechanics, the Invisible God provides nothing to its worshipers – at least directly. So we are stuck with sorcery or spirit magic for the most part.
Since sorcery requires lots of study, literacy, and lots of time, it requires specialisation. A pre-modern agricultural society is only going to be able to support a tiny number of sorcerers – let’s say 4% for the sake of discussion. Those sorcerers need to be specialists – they aren’t politicians, merchants, or soldiers, let alone workers. So you can see that the impetus for caste systems comes out of this. It isn’t required to have a specialist group of sorcerers, but it does make it easy to go down that path.
For the rest of folk, spirit magic is fine. It is easy to learn, easy to use. Sure it is not as powerful as sorcery or rune magic, but it is useful enough. Heal, Strength, Vigor, Coordination, etc. Of course this raises the question of where we get it – ancestor worship, hero cults, long established spirit cults, local friendly spirits, etc. These practices don’t require the devotion that Rune cults do, and so aren’t heresies.
On the margin, there are no doubt some Rune cults that masquerade as ancestor worship (Issaries), hero cults, etc. There is likely an ebb-and-flow to them. Sometimes they grow and become more common, sometimes the thinkers think about them and demand they are pared down.
- See also: articles tagged with Invisible god