Faith of the Holy Mother

The nine pointed sun of the Holy Mother.

The Faith of the Holy Mother is the dominant religion in Thanalor, and is practiced all throughout the known world. It is widely regarded as the most popular faith in Karothoz, with likely the most followers out of any of the major religions. The Faith was officially founded in 710 A.G.W., when Daloth the Prophet officially appointed Lilathon the Vestal as the first Holy Keeper of the Divine Scrolls.

The Faith is divided into two branches, the Priesthood and the Justice, both of which work in conjunction to elect a Holy Keeper that rules over the Faith and is responsible for re-inscribing the Divine Scrolls.

## **History**

The Prophet Daloth spent 15 years living among the elves of Leavenwood, during which he is said to have first heard the Holy Mother's voice, who instructed him to pen the Chronicle of Light. The Chronicle outlined the core tenants of the Faith, and documented Daloth's various adventures throughout Karothoz, each of which held a particular lesson or moral to be learned. He came to Thanalor with these teachings and began to spread word of the Holy Mother throughout Agathor.

However, it was not Daloth's doctrine that garnered the majority of his followers--it was instead his capacity to wield a previously unseen holy magic that had the capacity to heal the sick or smite the vicious. Daloth was also able to teach these abilities to a select few who possessed some natural talent, and because of this his number of followers quickly grew beyond his imagining. His influence stretched so far that his Chronicle of Light caused great turmoil in the royal palace of Nyralor, culminating in Dilaron's murder of Rothlora and the beginning of the Great Severance.

But such politics were beyond Daloth's concerns--he instead sought to establish an organization that would outlast his own existence and spread the word of the Mother far beyond any of his mortal means. He went to one of his most loyal followers: Lilathon, a peasant girl from a small southern village, and appointed her Holy Keeper of the Divine Scrolls. She was to, upon Daloth's death, receive his Divine Scrolls and rewrite whatever parts of them she saw fit to keep upon new parchment, and afterwards destroy the original scrolls. The reasoning behind the establishment of this tradition remains unclear, but it has continued hundreds of years after Daloth's demise.

When Daloth was assassinated in 727 A.G.W., Lilathon re-inscribed the Divine Scrolls, and set about organizing the Faith into a more structured system. She noticed that Daloth's most loyal followers could be grouped into one of two types: those who focused on healing and offering spiritual guidance, and those who sought out evil in the world and extinguished it through might. As such, she established the two branches of the Faith, the Justice and the Priesthood. The Justice would be comprised of paladins--the Knights of the Faith--who wielded the Mother's light to root out foul things throughout the land, while the Priesthood would heal the sick and feed the poor. The Justice would be led by nine Justiciars, and the Priesthood by nine Augurs, who would be responsible for leading the Faith's paladins and priests respectively. Lilathon also decreed that upon her death, and the death of any Holy Keeper after her, the Augurs and Justiciars of the Faith would gather in the House of the Prophet to elect a new Keeper from their own ranks, only inaugurated if the candidate reached a 2/3rds majority. Lilathon also worked with her most trusted followers to create the Nine Trials, a test used to determine who was to be accepted into the Priesthood or the Justice. The trials would be the same for any candidate, whether they desired to be a priest or paladin, and they would be granted the choice to join either the Priesthood or the Justice upon their completion of the test.

Lilathon's death in 775 A.G.W. proved to be the ultimate test of her reforms: the nine Augurs and Justiciars of the Faith all gathered in Nyralor, and through much deliberation, elected Justiciar Vanothir as the second Holy Keeper of the Divine Scrolls. Vanothir, who granted Lilathon the epithet "Lilathon the Vestal," immediately re-inscribed the scrolls as his predecessor had done, all the while warding off pressure from several Augurs and Justiciars to retain the original scrolls despite Daloth's wishes. Vanothir, however, believed the greatest way to honor the Prophet and the Mother herself was to uphold his wishes, and by doing so the tradition of re-inscription was canonized.