Divine Authority¶
"Shield us from corruption! Guard us from sin! Grant us sustenance!" — the prayers of the Divine's three aspects (S112)
Contested
This page is named in the open question The Divine: god or goddess, and the Empress. The two newest documents disagree on the sex of the Divine and on whether the Divine's clergy awaits an Empress.
The Divine Authority is the clergy of the Divine, the god whose star rose over Terrun after the fall of the Sancturi Empire and whose worship rules the kingdoms of the north. It is "fanatically Orthodox", it demands sacrifice, and in the core realms "even kings … bow before the clergy" (S112). Its name among its own people in Proturas is the Divine Alliance; its enemies call its followers "religious fanatics" (S112).
Also called: the Church of the Divine (S015).
Doctrine¶
"Fanatically Orthodox -- all other Gods are forsworn enemies and their followers are heretics and infidels. Significant effort is made to stamp out any reminder of old gods (temples razed, artifacts seized and destroyed, etc)" (S112). The Divine's "motivation is control and power. He wants to fully reassemble the City of the Gods at any cost" (S112).
"The Divine must be pleased constantly with offerings and sacrifices. If he is displeased his protection will be withheld." "The Divine prefers that infidels, heretics and criminals are sacrificed, but if none are available a random (usually an infidel slave) is chosen. Kings and Nobles have been sacrificed when they have been convicted of Heresy." The priests "abuse this to take the best for themselves and kidnap and enslave whomever they want" (S112).
The Divine is worshipped in three aspects, each with a prayer: "The Lifewarder : often depicted as a woman holding a shield. Prayer: Shield us from corruption!"; "The Redeemer : often depicted as robed, bearded man with outstretched arms. Prayer: Guard us from sin!"; "The Earthgiver : often depicted as an old man with a farmer's hat and hoe. Prayer: Grant us sustenance!" (S112). The Divine's Ascendants "live among the mortals. Each is a dragon of various colors" (S112), and the clergy's power flows from the Divine through "Incarnates (similar to ascendants)" to "Priests, Paladins, Clergy", the first-ranked source of magic in the age (S112).
Since the Redemption, "Monsters and Aberrations are more common … Commoners are encouraged by the Divine Authority to blame Warlocks/Witches, Infidels and their own unworthiness (roughly in that order)" (S112). Divine priests call the Redemption itself "Perdition" (S112). Rune magic "is forbidden by the Divine", Fel magic "is strictly forbidden in domains of the Divine", and the Riftborn are "Outlawed and hunted by agents of the Divine" (S112). The Uk'Zarai, "known as Angels", are "the winged harbingers of the Divine" and most live in the "sacred city" (S024).
In Lorsythe and the Divine Nations¶
The Divine Nations are "Nations of Humans, Wood Elves, Hill Dwarves, Halflings and Oesterkull" (S112). The kingdom of Lorsythe "is part of the Divine Alliance, a group of nations devoted to the worship of the Divine and the eradication of evil in all its forms (most notably the Riven and Sancturi Gods, Magic-Users, Dragons, Demons, Fae and Rift-folk)"; there "blasphemy is a cardinal sin punishable by death" (S004). The Alliance's coins carry the faith: silver "temples" with a temple on one face and the symbol of the Divine on the other, and gold "wings" bearing an angel (S004). The Baegor Monastery in the Rift, "a monastery of the Divine Order of Lorsythe", outlived the kingdom that built it (S066). The forces of the Divine Alliance "are constantly searching for the location of Proturus", the hidden city that shelters "the fallen (fallen angels of the Divine), riftborn, fae creatures, magic-users, witches, etc." (S002, S009).
In Proturas¶
When the southern lands were overrun, the Divine Alliance was absorbed into Proturas, where it sits on the council and rules the Stairs and South Bank. "They are a fanatical religious group which worships the Divine and her pantheon. While not wealthy, they make up for this deficiency with zeal." Its leader is the Prophetess; its units are "Angels, Runecasters, Runeblades, Divine Zealots, Priests of the Divine, Alliance Irregulars"; its symbol "White uprising cupped hands around a white star on a red background" (S078). Its soldiers "live on subsistence wages due to their divine duty. (In truth much of it due to Fel-touched influence)" (S078). The Templars of the Divine, "militant order separate from the old northern kingdoms", sat with the Alliance on the earlier Conclave of the Grotto (S026). The Alliance and the Kalari Children of the Light "despise one another" (S078). The faction's politics are told under the Divine Alliance.
The Unholy Flight¶
The Alliance's founding legend is the Unholy Flight. "In the last days of the Sancturi Empire, when the empress had been slain and the great city of Sanctorum overrun", two High Precepts of the Houses of Sidcarnon and Barahd and the Principate of the Sages "organized an exodus, taking the Sanctoric Cartus / Elysium's Gate (their sacred text) with them to keep it safe. After brutal fighting, some of it against their the other Sancturi who saw them as deserters who should ascend to Elysium with the Empress, they made their way north with a caravan of refugees and founded the kingdoms of the Divine Alliance", Lorsythe and two unnamed others. "For their sins (of blasphemy and desertion), both High Precepts were executed and their corpses (skeletons) remain on display in the Divine Temple. Most followers of the Divine attribute their difficult circumstances as divine punishment for this original sin. The Principate revealed that the Divine had left the earth and that the Empress would only return after the races were worthy of her again and the earth had been purified of abominations. From that day, they have been ruled by a Prophet/Prophetess who communicates the will of the Divine" (S078). The sacred text is Elysium's Gate; the Flight itself is told under the Divine Period, which the timeline opens with the Ascendance of the Divine in 906 of the Sancturi calendar (S016).
Earlier accounts¶
The post-Sancturi lore of early 2023 writes of the Divine as "He", with a male Redeemer and Earthgiver among his aspects, and names the Divine Star Sharuvas, the god who "displaced Arcantus and killed Arya" (S112). The Proturan factions of later 2023 write of "the Divine and her pantheon" and of an Empress who will return (S078). The question is open.
Gap
No source names the Prophetess, describes the Divine Temple beyond the two skeletons, or sets out the clergy's ranks, feasts or rites of sacrifice. The two kingdoms founded with Lorsythe are left as "??".