Inima
| Inima | |
| [[Image:|thumb|center|200px|{{{1}}}]] | |
| Name(s) | [ Inima] |
| Image | {{{Image}}} |
| Region | Thanatos |
| God of | Fertility, Death, Renewal |
| Allies | |
| Enemies | |
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There is only one religion worshiped by the people of Thanatos. They are tolerant of the fact that other people do not follow their teachings, but they don't really approve of such backwardness on their island. While worshiping another religion won't get a person burned at the stake, it will get them viewed as ignorant and perhaps even barbaric.
Thanati worship a female deity called Inima. She is primarily a goddess of rebirth and fertility and is portrayed as a shapely woman with a round, fertile belly.
Contents
Common Worship Practices
These practices are offered both as inspiration and as a guide to what will likely be accustomed to their neighbors doing. Not all Thanati practice the same way, nor do all Thanati have equivalent interest in theology and spirituality, and this level of variation should be familiar to any Thanati characters.
Iniman worship stresses balance, harmony, and the unity of all things; they also believe that what will be, will be, that Inima has a plan and there is nothing anyone can do to change that. All things are connected and just a small piece of the bigger picture. Because of this, they also believe that what one does in this life affects them in the next. If they live a good life and honor themselves and their people, they will have an even better life when they are reborn in the next. If they do badly in this life, their next life will be poorer. That is part of why honor is so important to them; karmic cause and effect extends beyond corporeal death.
The assumption of reincarnation means there is no real death for Thanati. The body is only a fleshy husk, made up of various elements. Any alchemist could break it down to its base components. What they care about the is the soul, the part that makes up the personality of the person. After all, how is it different to talk to a body with a soul than a soul without a body? To Thanati, there is no difference.
That is not to say the body is unimportant. The body is the temple of the soul and, like a temple, it needs to be cared for so as not to disrespect Inima. However, like a temple, it fades with time.
Individual Worship
Thanati worship of Inima is highly individualized, ranging from dedicated ascetics to characters who just need localized profanity.
Individuals may worship where they please, when they please, and their methods of worship consist of a lot of meditation and reflection. They also do a lot of physical meditation in the form of slow, stretching movements that work with the body. It's about reaffirming life and reconnecting with the universe, enjoying one's own sweat and pulse and the life Inima gave.
A big part of Thanati philosophy is in letting go; monks often practice this in a ritualized fashion by making elaborate, detailed sand paintings that they destroy upon completion. They believe in minimalism and do not like clutter. Their spirituality teaches that beauty is in the simplicity of things, that a single flower arranged perfectly is far more beautiful than opulence and gold.
Community Worship
While the temples scattered throughout the isles provide services, they are not compulsory. One may attend if they like, as services are more learning experiences than lectures. There are always monks available there that can answer any questions a person might have and many people enjoy having philosophical discussions with them.
Within the Temple, knowledge is held in high regard. Even the lowest monks spend years in school. Those that aren't sent out to the various villages spend their lives in the schools or temples, writing books and compiling what they have learned. The larger temples possess massive libraries, rivaling or surpassing those of the larger kingdoms. While many of the books are available for people to see, they are fond of their secrets and have large collections that no one outside the upper ranks of the temple are allowed to see.
Night of the Dead
The Night of the Dead is a celebration honoring all those who have died, occurring towards the end of fall. It is believed that on this day, the veil between the afterlife and the mortal world is especially thin, allowing souls and spirits to visit.
It is a cheerful celebration that doesn't start until after sundown. A major feast is prepared (with many of passed relatives' favorite foods) and it is offered to the souls of the dead. Once it has been deemed that the dead have absorbed the food's essence, there is feasting and then partying. It is not a somber celebration at all and not really a holiday about death. It is rather a celebration about enjoying life.
Children born on this holiday are considered to be very lucky.
Marriage
Marriage celebrations are huge, bright, colorful, and elaborate, with huge feasts. Colorful flowers are used in excess for decoration and perfuming, and the marrying couple usually wears garlands and other floral ornaments. An entire village will participate in the celebration and the families of those being wed will often spend far more money on it than they have. Red and gold are considered to be lucky colors, symbolizing life and cleansing fire, and so the marrying couple usually dresses in those colors.
No one wears white for weddings; that is considered to be an unlucky color, as it is both blank and a reminiscent of bones. Wearing white to a wedding is considered hostile and rude, and white flowers are also never used.
Long before the wedding date is chosen, the couple always gets their fortune read to determine the best day to wed. The future bride may also be with child by the time the wedding date is set--but this is not considered taboo; it is considered very lucky to marry when pregnant. The morning of the marriage ceremony, the couple bathes in salt water from the ocean to cleanse and purify their body, though if they live further inland they may just bathe in a tub of freshwater that they've added salt to--a more expensive alternative, but it is their wedding day!
The actual wedding ceremony is short, fast, and personal; usually only the couple and a monk are present for that, though Thanati believe that their goddess, Inima, serves as their primary witness. Incense is burned, a monk blesses them and passes cleansing fire around them to ward off demons and malevolent spirits, and the couple drinks from a shared cup of rice wine. After that, they are considered married, their names are recorded in a book by the monks, and the feast and party commences.
On the wedding night, the groom's family decorates the marriage bed with flowers, for luck and fertility.
Thanati cannot marry non-Thanati, nor can they marry people who do not follow Inima.
Funerals
Funerals are not sad occasions. While Thanati grieve for loved ones like anyone, the purpose of a funeral is to celebrate a person's life. According to their faith, death is not the end.
Thanati have a choice of what happens to their body when they die, and most discuss this with family sometime in their life. Since they won't be needing their body anymore, some Thanati choose to have their bodies donated to the Temple, who can use them for research. Others prefer a more traditional end.
Traditionally, the bodies of the deceased are cleaned, dressed, decorated with fragrant flowers, and ritualistically burned on a pyre (along with some precious belongings the deceased may have loved in life) while friends and family hold a vigil--often saying prayers and burning incense. Fire is believed to be cleansing and to drive away malevolent spirits, the burning pyre keeping them away from the site so the soul can have safe passage.
Later, the ashes are put into an urn, and the bones and fragments that didn't burn are gathered and put inside as well. Afterwards, a feast is held in remembrance of the deceased's life. Traditionally, the urn is placed at the head of the table in honor of the individual.
Folklore
While Thanati worship only one goddess, they believe in a slew of spirits and demons and there are many local legends and folkloric traditions that tell of them. Many of them have names and even identities, some represented in statues and paintings as otherworldly beings with animal features, multiple faces, and multiple arms. Others are known as shape-shifters, like trickster foxes that take the shape of beautiful men and women. While spirits will never be worshiped, they may be honored and respected, though demons are always malevolent and fire is used to ward them away.
Magic
Divination is common, and integrated into the daily lives of Thanati people. What Inima reveals to questioners is obviously her decision alone, but using divination to ask is considered an entirely mundane thing to do.
Thanati with an aptitude for one of the favored magical disciplines can continue their education under the sponsorship of the Temple, though upon graduation they're required to join the caste to give back.
Magic that alters the natural order and balance of the world (such as elemental magic) is taboo to Thanati and considered to be dangerous. Those that possess that kind of magic are encouraged to never use it, and to do so is to dishonor themselves. Necromancy--the summoning and raising of the dead--is taboo. After all, it directly interferes with the natural cycle of death and rebirth, which is Inima's domain alone. This doesn't mean it doesn't happen, nor does it mean that there aren't devoted to the practice.
Secular Influence
The island is ruled by the Temple and its associated caste. The religion is very much built into their everyday lives in little ways. For example, Thanati enjoy arranging what they have very precisely in order to achieve balance and allow energy to flow uninhibited. While people may have different levels of faith, everyone at least goes through the motions.
Being sold to the Temple at a young age is one of the only opportunities for upward mobility available to lower caste individuals. Their origins affect how they are treated within their new caste, but a rare few do rise high enough in the ranks to keep the practice alive.
External links
- [1] Basic Thanatos Writeup
