Baldur's Gate 3: Lathander, The God Of Dawn

the Thunder the morning Lord is one of the most popular deities in the Forgotten Realms but his story is not a very clear one he's much beloved of the common people and is in many ways the go-to good aligned deity of the Realms but as I've once explained the God's behaviors colored by their limited perspectives on the world as powerful as they are they cannot see outside the box they've been put into and the Thunder is no different in this respect with that said let us now explore the god the founder together as stated the Thunder is one of the most popular deities in the Realms and for good reason he is the god of dawn renewal birth spring as well as vitality and creativity and by extension hope the Thunder appears as a young and slim man burnished by the sun wielding a mace and radiating the light of Dom he represents the best of humanity and his strivings to improve the world and make it a better place and his dedication to good is unturned by considerations of either law or chaos he wishes the best for the world and those in it and he is willing at times to go to Great Lengths to make it happen even if he is sometimes blind to the results and the process of getting there something we will return to later despite his association with the Sun the Thunder is not in fact a god of the sun rather he is the god of Don he is the promise of a new beginning and the aspect of the Sun that banishes the darkness and gives way to light and with that the promise of New Life hence his governance over the domain of birth and it is for this reason that of all the deities and feroon save perhaps for kellenbor he is the most opposed the creation and existence of the undead in former editions of d d specialty of Priests of lathander wielded greater power against the undead and could turn them at a higher level than other priests as detailed in a previous video about the nature of the Gods gods are the embodiment of certain virtues vices and their areas of life and that very fact can make them blind to Nuance subtlety and sometimes just outright limits them in their ability to see anything from a perspective that lies outside of their domain in the Thunder's case the counterpart to his exuberance optimism and hopefulness is his tendency to fall prey to vanity excessive enthusiasm and even zealotry at times always believing in the good above all in his own goodness this has on more than one occasion that's a destructive acts that were more harmful than beneficial ignoring the consequences of his actions and being resistant to countervailing viewpoints and oftentimes the Thunder takes the view of his way or the highway in essence he is a reflection of a well-meaning youth which more often than not is not tempered by wisdom and since he is divine he lacks the ability to grow and change in this regard he simply hopes for the best and attacks problems head on not infrequently heathens of the consequences but that is the price of progress or so the thunderer might argue with you whilst most deities of the Realms have a clear history of their Origins such as mistra Shar and suluna the Thunder despite his importance in the pantheon is not one of them so there is no clear picture of the Thunder's Origins but one persistent theory has been that of lathander ultimately being an aspect of the sun god a monitor who rules directly over the Sun so much so that the Church of lathander later developed a heresy within his confines in an effort to unite the two deities more realistically however he is probably an interloper deity as many if feroon's gods are today whose arrival was never kept track of particularly well the first semi-concrete event we are aware of concerning lathander is an event called the dawn cataclysm the date of which is not precisely known indeed it might even be incorrect to refer to it as a historical event proper instead perhaps being a cosmological event but it did have earth-shatteringly important consequences for the Realms and above all for the structure of the ferunian pantheon even the details of what happened in this cosmological event are not particularly clear and historians cosmologists and chroniclers of the realms have not been successful in documenting the details of the Dawn cataclysm there is no record of mention prior to this and as we do not even know where to locate it on the timeline it is even more difficult to say but based on estimates it seems that lathander first became truly active as a deity after the fall of netheral what was the Don cataclysm the dawn cataclysm was an ill-fated attempt largely directed by lathander to reshape the fironian pantheon to his liking the details of this event are unfortunately as I've already stated not well known as there is no Canon answer as to what happened but the results were a restructuring of the furuni and Pantheon the most Salient consequence of this cataclysm was that the ancient deity of luck taike or 2K was split into time Mora and bashaba the goddess of good luck and Misfortune respectively and an ancient deity of pragmatism and reason was Helm's lover was also destroyed and there was a reshuffling of the hierarchy of the pantheon after this but we do know that lathander grew greatly in importance after these events and Rose to the prominence he enjoys today as little as we know about the dawn cataclysm it is a testament to the thanders you need to break some eggs in order to make an omelet philosophy with his seemingly good intentions resulting in less than desirable outcomes for most involved one of the greatest points of confusion is the nature of the relationship between the Thunder and a monitor with a monitor being the ancient nethery's deity of the Sun the LA and to some extent time a monitor however had a very different perspective from lathander being primarily dedicated to the the preservation and the prosecution of the law and therefore was thoroughly lawful neutral versus lathander's unbridled neutral goodness but there is a parallel in their dedication to their respective philosophies and it is for this reason among others such as the association with the Sun that some worshipers naturally connected the two deities one of the more unusual strains of thought and indeed heresies in the Church of the Thunder was the idea that the Thunder was in fact the god a monitor and that there was a singular solar deity that expressed himself in iterations similar to the down sun the Sun at High Noon and Dusk and that lathander represented the youthful aspect of the sun specifically the Dawn and that it was simply a matter of time until a monitor would return to reclaim the mantle of the Sun in all of its Glory this was sometimes referred to as the Risen Sun heresy and a somewhat different heresy that nonetheless overlapped was called the three-phase sun which theorized that the Thunder was in fact a tripartite deity encompassing the phases of the sun with a thunder representing Dawn a monitor of the high Sun of noon and jergel or Merkel representing the Dusk and an event that seemed to support this was the casting of an incredibly powerful spell called a monitor's Eternal Sun in the city of eversold that caused the rising of a miniature sun on the horizon within a 150 mile radius in the year 1374 Dr Summit later it seemed as if the prophecies had come to pass after the spell plague of 1385 Dr the heresy appeared to have come true as the Thunder seemingly disappeared and a monitor long thought dead or at the very least missing in action returned apparently now as an amalgam of both the Thunder and the sun god being lawful good this was to remain the case until the emergence of 5th edition d d because there is good reason to believe that even though much of this might have been econonical it nonetheless failed because fourth edition itself failed and fifth edition along with the events called the second sundering brought lathana back as an independent deity concurrent with the reshaping of a monitor back into his old strictly lawful self meaning now that both deities exist side by side as separate entities and we may never know if this was simply a consequence of the bad marketing decisions on the part of Wizards of the Coast at the time or just a normal attempt to retcon poor lore decisions regardless as it stands now both the Thunder and a monitor are their old selves and very much distinct in terms of his relationships with other deities the Thunder gets along well with a good many the Thunder and chantea the goddess of agriculture have been romantically involved for centuries and see each other as Kindred Spirits with many of the same goals and perspectives and lathander is allied with many of the good aligned deities or otherwise creative ones including gond tymora tier torum illmator soon suluna agma kalambore and Maliki and is naturally opposed to evil Gods such as Talos Bane and the historical gods of death such as Merkel although not an outright foe because of lathander's involvement in the dawn cataclysm Helm nurses a grudge against him for the loss of his lover the goddess merdain the Church of lathander is predictably modeled on the principles of the Thunder himself the church does not have a strict hierarchy because the Thunder is solely concerned with good works but there is a loose hierarchy of clerics and worshipers that operate on the principle of mutual respect for each other and their experience followers of the founder are encouraged to provide a to others and Foster Innovation to improve the lives of folk in the Realms the work closely for example with clerics of shantea the earth mother to promote agricultural works as well as Foster creative projects athletic events above all followers of the Thunder are driven to oppose the forces of evil and in a similar fashion to clerics and followers of kelimvore albeit for different reasons Undead being the antithesis of life and New Beginnings are diametrically opposed to the philosophy of the church and are therefore sought out and destroyed at every opportunity like many good align deities the Thunder sponsors paladins but as he is not lawful paladins of the Thunder are less rigid than many paladins nonetheless organizations such as the order of the aster are considered the military arm of the church and engage in much of the heavy lifting when it comes to taking the fight to evildoers promoting Church goals such as defense and the recovery of important good alliance artifacts the Thunder also sponsors a monastic order called the order of the sun Soul which originally worshiped a monitor during the days of netherill but switched over to the worship of lathander after the fall of nethero for all of his flaws the Thunder remains one of the most familiar and most beloved of good cities in the Realms worshiped and admired for his optimism hope and benevolence and will likely maintain this position for the foreseeable future as always thank you for tuning in please leave a like comment share and subscribe as it really helps out the channel much appreciated and I will check you out next time take care

Channel: Spell&Shield

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Length: 11min 7sec (667 seconds)

Published: Wed May 17 2023