Aruerism

Aruerism, also known as Egic paganism, is the religion practiced by the Egic peoples before they converted to Werranism. Aruerism is still practiced in parts of Kautenland in the west banks of the Torad, but elsewhere it is largely extinct.

## Arüer

Aruerists follow the teachings of Arüer (“the Wise" in proto-Egic). Before him the entire world was desolate and horrible. Arüer would meditate every day, until he eventually realized Büür, essentially a great truth, though a fairly abstract concept that Arüer never properly explained, because it is not explainable. Once he achieved Büür he turned into a very big tree, believed to be more than five kilometers tall, but would shrink every time someone displeased Arüer. From Arüer came all vegetation and the Earth was no longer desolate, but green. As a tree, Arüer could control all life on earth, and would use this to cause miracles that would be interpreted by wise men. known as the Elders. Aruerists believe that Arüer has his presence in all trees. There are still Elders today interpreting Arüer’s miracles. Arüerism started declining after St. Lorau cut down Arüer’s tree.

## Büür

The main purpose of Aruerism is to achieve Büür. It is believed that upon death, if one has not achieved Büür, he will be reborn in the next life in a world that is worse than the previous one. An immoral man cannot achieve Büür, minor things can be forgiven as long as they are not habitual, but things like murder. If you are unable to achieve Büür, you are considered unclean. Not all trees were made for worship, most were for comfort. Though they are hard to distinguish, so people usually consult Elders beore cutting down trees. One tradition is to carve faces into worship trees. This servers two purposes: putting your face on a tree means you identify with Arüer, and it marks a tree as a worship tree so that no one will cut it down for lumber. The most important part of achieving Büür is to not give into desires. You may not eat unhealthy, marry, be rudeor own nice things if you want to achieve Büür. No one but Arüer in this world is beleived to have achieved Büür.

## The gods

Aruerists believe that there is an undefined, and possible infinite amount of gods. They think that the gods are unknowable aside from what Arüer had revealed, and that the gods all act thropugh Arüer. Aruerists believe that directly referencing a god is taboo, though they will not refer to a god of a certain thing, they believe that there is a god of almost everything. They believe that Arüer's power to cause miracles comes through a blessing from the gods. Supposedly the Elders are blessed by the gods in interpreting Arüer's miracles in which certain aspects of the gods have revealed themselves before. Arüer taught that there is a god of everything. he has said that "There is a god of birch, oak, trees, plants, nature, life, forests and leaves, and that these gods are all equally important and do not contradict each other, for the nature of the gods is unlike the nature of men.".

## The realms

In Aruerism it is believed that the world consists of many realms. The first one is the Helovartz (highhouse), it is the realm that the gods live in.