THE EMPEROR OF MAN [3] The Imperial Lie - WARHAMMER 40,000 Lore / History

[Music] [Music] [Music] airplane isn't any energy instruction Citron's the coach thomas imitating Sheila morph [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] in the darkest period for mankind one man would come to the fore he would unite the Tattered Remnants of humanity and would rise to become the leader of all his wisdom and strength unrivaled his mere presence inspired loyalty any other names are all now lost to the mists of time he is now known only as the Emperor of man thousands of human worlds have been ruined by the warp storms amid the aftermath of the Great War versus the men of iron human survivors remaining on these planets of Anarchy lived in fear fierce scavengers Raiders blood-crazed cannibals and on many worlds the fear of nightmarish demonic incursion they feared as their primitive ancestors once had more than anything the night the darkness the darkness promised any horror bloodshed screaming death and extremes of violence across many planets though including terror not all lived in squalor some had forged noble houses or settlements who were able to support large defensive forces hulking warriors forged in global Wars as mankind fought as it had done many thousands of years before for territory resources and the safety of its own people on terror itself many had begun to see a new army marching an army of thundering giants clad in magnificent and powerful armor they had crushed and swept away any who stood against them for none could resist their power war ravaged the planet and most importantly old tyrants dictators and despots were exterminated and those citizens who remained would pledge to the singular service of this military campaigns architect the emperor would stand triumphant on his home the world of mankind's origin the death and conflict here would slowly come to a close for there was no one left to conquer and more importantly no one left to question the validity of this imposing golden figure of a man mariya all affair was a simple man now an old man a priest by virtue of personal experience not wholly indoctrination a man who had long ago seen this army of Giants marching against those who had once favored the knight for its shadowed their evil deeds but now they feared it as much as those they had hunted the end of these dark times should have been something for celebration to rejoice and be thankful for not for area his services had once been popular but no longer along with the victory of this powerful army came a wave of disbelief and ridicule for those who believed those who had faith where people once had fear and sought divine protection now they feared no more his congregation had dwindled and then all but ceased yet he remained Korea waited for his midnight service once popular now rarely attended small flames licking the walls as the rain steadily drummed against the roof and the wind last against the walls of the church he had voices outside worshipers finally no guests but unwelcome ones as the door swung open he would see darkened figures lit only by the occasional flashes of lightning outside he didn't feel fear but he did feel a troubling sense of unease these were not men of faith they were men of violence as Ariha tried his best to welcome them the hooded figure who stepped forth into the church sternly declined and closed the door to his companions outside areia introduced himself as Uriel Arthur the last priest of the Church of the lightning stone the strange man explained that his name was unimportant but that he could be referred to as revelation they would briefly discuss the artistry of the church and sit to share wine the strange figure wore clothes much like any other but his were immaculate he wore a robe of crimson red and a silver ring with a strange marking upon it a device even revelation had already explained to her that the reason he visited tonight was so as to be able to view this church of his the last church on terror and the history would soon consign these places of worship as relics of the past he questioned earlier as to why he still chose to remain why did he not want to join with so many others who had heard of this emperor and his crusade his crusade to extinguish all forms of religion spirituality in mysticism to erase the misplaced beliefs in the supernatural area was defiant his beliefs were his own and his faith was unmovable he cared not even if the forces of the emperor came here to tear down and destroy his church no war mongering despot could shift his strength of belief revelation called him obstinate hurry accorded faith mocking him revelation stated a willing belief in the unbelievable without proof Marija fired back what makes faith so powerful as it requires no proof belief is enough I see now why the emperor wants rid of it said revelation you call faith powerful I call it dangerous think of what people in the grip of faith have done in the past or the atrocities committed down the centuries by people of faith politics is slain its thousands but religion has slain its millions if it were not abundantly clear by this point the darkened figure who had entered the Church of the lightning stone was indeed the Emperor himself setting foot in the last Church on earth to challenge the last priests and test his beliefs the absurdity of his arguments clear for any to see given what was to come in the following millennia from the Emperor would come the Crusades that would crush any who opposed them in fact any who were found to have religious beliefs that could not be convinced otherwise or serve some useful purpose were simply slaughtered and this was before the time of the heresy where millions would die in the Wars of those without faith and those who were consumed by it revelation would apologize for his overtly confrontational tone worried accepted and instead would see more of his church revelation would listen to areia tell its history revelation the emperor would continue to challenge earlier when he revealed the church's most holy artifact the lightning stone itself why is it holy he would ask was it deposited by your god a man martyred here a young girl received some revelation maria would describe how an old man thousands of years before deaf and blind had taken shelter from a storm below the stone only for it to be struck by lightning and curing his ailments it was said to have had healing properties the townspeople would build the church around this holy stone the Emperor examining the stone stated without showing any special interest or emotion haematite from a banded iron stone formation exposed by a landslip most likely that would explain the lightning strike I'm not being malicious I'm explaining to you how such a thing could have happened without any intervention of godly power the conversations here between the Emperor and area bear a strong similarity to conversations his Primax sons would have later in time where they would repeat his cold and indoctrinated beliefs that all could be explained with science Magnus the read prior to the turning of so many of the legions to cows spoke of the warp and its entities because their nonsense brother gods and demons and sprites and witches you should listen to yourselves we call it the ocean it is a product of galactic harmonics something to be explored some of its manifestations seem to be of a sentient kind at least in outline but that is not how things are the way our minds make it appear what they conjure to help us understand it must do our best to make sense of the vortices and so what do we cling to the old figures and archetypes once we used when we were scrubbing around in the dirt Magnus apparently perceived the wharf and its entities early on as nothing to be taken any more seriously than the material realm easily explained rationally because his views were dictated by the emperor views that placed many of the Emperor's finest in highly dangerous positions of corrupting manipulation yet we see these strongly held principles of the Emperor being pushed on Terraria the emperor at least through his words appears to fully reject the idea of spiritual beings by explaining away the lightning stone as mere natural events he goes on to explain to area though this is normal for humans that a man especially an already religious man might perceive that such elemental energy even if it did have healing properties would often be seen by your mortal human as something of a divine nature but that this was something humans do all the time that they project spirits or fears and dread onto that which they cannot see onto the darkness or the night to sounds and senses that we cannot be sure of that we fear the unknown as much as we place our faith and beliefs in it the tone in detail with how the emperor explains areas fixation on the Lightning stone being something of divine power somewhat mirrors that of Magnus the red Primark of the thousand suns years later and it's easy for us to see how the emperor had imbued these preconceived perceptions into his Primark sons and his legions if we take for example the traitor a starties of the word bearers even in the earliest days of the heresy they would in the presence of a demon who had shown them powerfully disturbing visions still display levels of disbelief and flippancy the emperor had so carefully taught them into not being so easily able to accept such things at face value to dismiss out of hand that they could possibly be the truth yet in time that ignorance would be their Achilles heel and would lead them to become open to accepting what is known to the creatures of the warp as the primordial truth a guitar didn't reach his weapon and steady laughed here I did the same creature this is the respect you show to a messenger of the gods what did you expect that the word bearers would kneel and accept everything you said as divine mandate we're done with kneeling Inga thou the resistance of the word bearers to the demon would of course be short-lived they'd already stepped way over the line by this point but it does demonstrate that as we know the transitions and confrontations for many in the traitor legions were not simply about instant corruption promises of power or being just casually rolled over by the entities that reside in the immaterial we well know that there was bitter fanatical fighting not just between the established legions during the heresy but also internally among brothers in their own legions the emperor spoke with earlier who is more and more aggravated by the poking and questioning of this revelation whoever he was if I'm adversarial it's because it infuriates me to see the blinkered willfulness of those who live their lives enslaved to such fantastic or notions as I contained in that book and others like it that damnable piece of Thunder in your hands that book is ninth centuries worth of agglomerated texts and assembled rewritten translated and twisted to fit the needs of hundreds of mostly anonymous and unknown authors what basis is that to take guidance for your life if a man claimed his dead grandfather was speaking to him he would be locked up in an asylum but if he would acclaim the voice of God was speaking to him his fellow clerics might well make him into a saint clearly those safety in numbers when it comes to hearing voices hariya spat back at this abrasive figure that invaded his sanctum this is my face you're talking about show some damned respect why should i said revelation why does your faith require special treatment it's not robust enough to stand some questioning why should you and your faith be singled out for special treatment I have seen God hysteria if you have had such experience you may believe it was real but do not expect me or anyone else to give it credence or her just because you believe a thing to be true does not make it so hariya maintained his account of having seen and felt God himself and would reference his youth but by now the Thunder armies of the Emperor had already subdued most of terror yet the young array decided he would attempt to find corners of the world not yet conquered by this so-called Emperor with his egor banners yet everywhere he traveled he found any towns and people that were already subdued giving praise for the Emperor albeit seemingly with a hollow sense of loyalty it would not be until years later when he would travel to the land of the Frank and there find a people who had murdered their appointed governor of the Emperor the townspeople wanted no part of this so-called Emperor's rule and a hastily organised civilian militia slaughtered the appointed soldiers in their barracks Mike Koenig rafi of the Emperor was torn down and the streets became full of happy songs dancing children and joyous people their newly found self determined freed hurry explained how the mood was optimistic positive and confident more towns heard the uprising and allied themselves with this stance against the tyrannical Emperor figure when all was said and done they would have anything like forty to fifty thousand men and women ready to fight and defend their position that they owed nothing to this Emperor and would not be made to bow down to his threats of violence hariya explained how this had been his dream of an adventure rebellion discovering these people willing to stand up to the giant soldiers of the emperor that he had previously seen march across the world and dominate humanity word was spreading that the army of thunder and lightning was marching upon them and so they would set out to meet it their jubilant spirits soared high as they left their homes and towns locals and children gifting them tokens and keepsakes filling them with pride in an ever renewed sense of purpose that ultimately would not last for long despite the fact that as they stood ready to face down the Emperor's warriors they outnumbered them ten to one their ranks revved up to a fever pitch of enthusiasm by many rousing speeches but as the first charge went forward in the Emperor's giants stood motionless a moment of concern crossed the minds and the faces of the rebels and only when they had crossed half the battlefield did the Emperor's solid wall of giant Warriors opened fire the result was instantaneous shock and horror they can like write that created carnage tearing limbs from torsos bodies exploding from the inside out in showers of blood and flesh mentally shattered individuals crawling around in screaming horror men and women split in half ruin corpses sobbing miserable parodies of human form crawling through the shredded remains of their fellow rebels some simply lay or sat confused and stunned in the devastation caused by the first bolts of fire whatever these Warriors of the Emperor were they were not men they were monsters Maria the cause falling over bodies split down the middle as if their whole sight of being simply ripped clean away others heavily wounded were crawling around begging for mercy men and women are like staggering in confusion and fear finally understanding what it is that they are dared to face perhaps wondering why on earth they thought that they could win against such warriors why had they put themselves in this position people began to hastily surrender knowing the prospect of winning the day was an impossibility the armored giant warriors ignored their cries and pleas marching into the blood-soaked battlefield hacking brutalizing the severely injured and stunned survivors alike they began to engage the remaining force that was attempting to disengage from the horror this was no longer anything that could be called a battle it was a slaughter by butchers before the carnage had ceased area fled as fast as he could leaving the screaming tormented wailing slowly fading in the background occasionally one of the Damned must have experienced some extraordinary act of suffering and their cries would carry high and far across the wind by the end of it the massed rebel force was slaughtered within the hour tens of thousands of men and women what was left of them lay strewn across the battlefield crushed ruined annihilated reared escaped and like crying and wounded in the darkness of the night seeing a golden face as he lay in his agony was speaking to him why do you deny me accept me you will know that I mean a truth in the only way this was his a parent personally experienced vision of God revelation the Emperor immediately dismisses this is just another instance of humans perceiving what they need to see because of their own mortality struggling fighting for life or seeing some kind of vision to explain away the worthlessness of their own life but area could not be swayed and he described how after his vision he fell into a sleep only to awaken miraculously healed the shrapnel embedded near to his neck and spine was gone and he decided as a result of this vision that he needed to travel home however upon reaching his hometown he found that his family had been all but slaughtered and destroyed his former life was gone and this is when he would turn to becoming a priest of the Church of the lightning stone they were explained how he'd wanted to serve God to spread the word of his church but the Emperor's forces all but prevented him from spreading his word anywhere instead spreading their own truth in reason and disregarding any belief of the supernatural area finally voiced his understanding that he knew why revelation was here to speak with him that he was here to offer her to join the new ways but he was still not convinced the Emperor would try different approach by describing historical accounts of atrocities committed in the name of religion or eras still not persuaded revelation explained that the tales were Universal and typify religious behavior there's been recurring since the beginning of human history the record of human experience shows that where religion is strong it causes cruel intense beliefs and produces intense hostility only one faith loses its force can a society hope to become humane they would argue back and forth earlier maintaining that much of a religions doctrines and texts are not meant to be taken literally the emperor exclaiming that this is surely the whole point that people will pick and choose and the subsequent confusion that will inevitably arise from such selective reading amounts to an entirely personal interpretation worse those that do take the texts absolutely literally would usually create misery and death believing the words in the text to be the absolute truth set in stone to be unquestioned and strictly executed the emperor would recount more ancient histories from human sacrifices to wartime horrors committed in the name of religion bloody wars where thousands would die hurry dismissed this as ancient ways long since forgotten to which the Emperor balked he pivoted to a more recent event describing death camps and eugenics committed by cardinal tang many thirty years previous to their current time area and had enough you fixate on the blood and the death revelation you forget all the good that can be achieved from faith if you think religion is a force for good area then you're not seeing the superstitious savagery that pervades the history of our world said revelation it's true that just before the descent of old night religion gradually lost its power over life but like the worst kind of poison it lingered and fostered division amongst the people of the world that endured without belief in God's divisions blur with passing ages new generations adapt to new times mingle in tamari and forget ancient wounds it is only belief in gods and divine entities that keeps them alien to one another and anything that divides people breeds in humanity religion is the canker in mankind's heart that serves such an ugly purpose enough snapped area I've heard enough yes people have done things terrible to one another in the name of their gods but they've done terrible things to one another without the recourse to their beliefs an acceptance of gods and an afterlife is a vital part of what makes us who we are if you take that away from humanity what do you suggest takes its place in my many years as a priest I have ministered to many dying people and the emotional benefits of religions power to console them and those left behind cannot be underestimated there is a flaw in your logic area said revelation religions power to console gives it absolutely no more credence or validity it might very well be a comfort to a dying man to believe that he'll go to some bountiful paradise of endless joy but even as he dies with a wonderful smile on his face it means nothing in the grand scheme of things as far as the truth of the matter is concerned maybe not silly area but when my time comes I will die with my God's name on my lips there are multiple aspects to read from the discussion between the Emperor and area for one it's fairly staggering that the emperor has the goal to recount the many accounts of religious atrocity as examples of why it's such a flawed and dangerous concept for Humanity and that for this and also other reasons it's why mankind is better off without it he makes these statements immediately after he is just certain listen to her account his own tale of facing down the Emperor's army of giant superhuman warriors versus a force of what can only be read as being a fairly large yet seemingly primarily civilian force of angry townspeople that the Emperor's Warriors proceeded to not any engage with maximum levels of aggression but then continue to engage one of the most inhuman slaughters brutalizing and committing Horrors best not even thought of and not against a defiant powerful warlord in his army of trained soldiers no they destroyed with no mercy a mob of crying stunned people who knew that they were defeated as the first shots were fired you can barely imagine a more inhuman situation why this level of violence and display of pure unfettered aggression was necessary has no explanation and as they knelt begging for mercy the Emperor allowed his giant warriors to let their bloodlust run rampant as these monsters often literally crushed under their heavy armored boots anything that moved until the ground was nothing more than a hell escaped a wasteland of horror you'd be forgiven for mistaking them for the worshippers of the blood God for on this day they surely imbued corn with a refreshing burst of power you can only see these events as shockingly hypocritical on behalf of the Emperor within almost the same breath he begins explaining how it is religion that is the terrible enemy of mankind because through its most extreme beliefs it can on occasion cause humans to commit terrible atrocities my ear doesn't counter the emperor with this astonishing level of hypocrisy is frustrating it also highlights to us that the emperor is operating from a position that is hardly objective or rational they are simply his talking points to achieve his own agenda that of removing the very idea of structured religion and spirit chu ality from the human consciousness as area had now essentially turned his back on Redemption in return to his prayers a golden light would rise from behind him he turned to face Redemption but was only able to exclaim you now do you fully understand the futility of what you do here said the golden giant yuria finally understood seeing the golden face they had seemed long ago in his memories as he was near to death after the horrific battle against the Emperor's warriors you are the Emperor the Emperor tells Aria it is time to go and they start to leave the Church of the lightning stone the Emperor begins to explain the artistry within the church is much like humanity that it is only meant to exist in the light not reside in the darkness that only went suffocating shadows of religion are gone will it be able to see again it's true brilliance [Music] hariya passed through his church as he moved to leave and join the emperor for whatever fate awaited him the Emperor all the while telling of how it was that he would create an Imperium that would make this church appear like a pauper's hovel in comparison hariya transition quickly from feelings of regret and that his life had been a misguided lie to a renewed sense of self belief and strengthen his faith even as confused as at at being Korea in this moment had a realization one the Emperor seemed unable to grasp but the Emperor had made many mistakes through his past and would make many more in the future the Emperor is not infallible flawless or as perfect as the vision he projects to his followers perhaps it's the nature of his origin and makes the Emperor seemingly unable to grasp the necessity for religion having a place in the human spirit area had allowed the warmth and love of his God to fill the emptiness within him when he needed it most this was what made faith powerful that it required no proof only belief its power was in that it needed no understanding at all he would follow the emperor out into the tempest that his church had kept shut out until now but as the emperor stepped outside the howling gale blew in extinguishing his candles as he stepped out into the thrashing rain in darkness lightning illuminated the hundreds of armored statues outside the church the Emperor's warriors they stepped forward and proceeded to put fire to the church and throwing grenades for good measure the Emperor watched it burn maria protested but it was in vain the Emperor knew exactly what he was doing and exactly what his plans for humanity were his Imperium had no place whatsoever for gods and spirituality Maria argued with the Emperor over his vision for the future declaring him a madman is the Emperor laid out his plans to conquer the galaxy the warriors standing in their presence were only their precursors he explained the Warriors he was forging would be the generals and lead the greatest crusade to every corner of the galaxy [Music] hariya protested didn't you just tell me of the bloody slaughters perpetuated by crusaders doesn't that make you know better than the holy men you were telling me about the difference is I know I am right replied the Emperor spoken like a true autocrat came earlier Emperor shook his head you misunderstand area I've seen the narrow survival path that is all that stands between humanity and extinction this is the way it must begin this was when era would finally see the truth of the Emperor and tell him that to deny humanity a thing would only make them crave it more so and if he were successful to be wary that his followers did not mistake him for a god lest they begin to worship Him who you could see through the gold and the blinding lights now this was not a God for he could see the burning ambition and the white-hot core of violence in the heart of the Emperor I wish I need the best for my people promise the Emperor I think you do but I will not be a part of it said her with that Maria would turn and walk back into the burning church he walked straight into the blaze as the flames closed around him outside the Warriors watched the church until it collapsed by morning and he smoldering ruins remained the Emperor turned away saying only come we have a galaxy to conquer the only sound to be heard was the chiming of an old and broken clock [Music] the small clock in this story ever mitad into the end as it has a specific relevance and really a tell-all of its own Maria had owned a small bronze clock described as having a crack glass face and clean delicate hands made of gold with inlaid mother-of-pearl its cogs never turned in its pendulums never swung he had stolen this in his youth where he traveled the earth looking for whatever kind of youthful adventure he could come across and he'd stolen this timepiece from a silver palace in the mountains of Europa he recalled how as he had fled this palace the craftsman who curated the many strange timepieces kept there called screaming after him that the clock was counting down to doomsday and would chime when the last days of mankind's existence were at hand hurry at the time he youthfully laughed off these eccentric craftsmen's bizarre calls would gift the clock later to his father but after hariya returned to their home to find his family essentially destroyed he retrieved the clock bringing it to the Church of the lightning stone there would make no sound since that day hariya had always dreaded hearing his chimes and he would never have to hear it chime again the chiming of the clock is the Emperor walks away from extinguishing the last Church on earth is meant to herald the deme of mankind but why what is its significance it's clearly symbolic as the last church is burned to the ground and the last priest on earth has engaged with the Emperor each gave one another the chance to side with each other's presented opinion instead they both choose to go their own separate ways the emperor with his plans for galactic secular domination the last priest on earth finally realizing that it is not the existence of a God in the physical sense that is the true power of faith but having belief is enough nothing would make him regret that this clock though appears again in the most unlikely of places many years later Magnus the Red Primark of the thousand suns would be overcome with a powerful vision a vision of things that could never be world's on fire battlegrounds of Astarte he saw slaughtering each other with blades and fists landscapes riddled with scars and corruption battlefields fought at a microscopic level where only bacteria and viruses remained as he looked through the putrid nightmarish landscapes he would find his eyes focus in on some he recognized more clearly the markings of the Luna wolves and Horus Luba cow he shouted but they could not hear him he would see fragmented and mixed divisions of friends and foes blade striking fatal blows a strange temple with pillars of fire and a black pool that appeared his darkest oil a powerful figure broke through the fractured pieces to coalesce it was Horus magnus inspected it more closely this thing it was not Horus what are you demanded Magnus you are not my brother not yet but soon answered the monster with a maddening grin my brother would never unleash this madness then you don't know him for it is happening right now the pawns of the primordial Annihilator are already in motion setting the traps of pride vanity and anger to ensnare the egos of the knights required to topple the king you rely said Magnus do I laughed Horus Horus lupica will betray you all you will set the Imperium ablaze in his quest for power nothing will survive all will become a nuclear caldron of chaos from the supermassive heart of the galaxy to the guttering stars in its halo where will this miraculous transformation take place last Magnus fighting to keep the growing horror from his voice on a little moon giggled the monster in the Davin system even if I believe you why tell me because it has already begun because I enjoy your torment and because it's too late to stop this said Horus we'll see about that promised Magnus Magnusson and his eye and the Horus monster was gone Herman and the terminated guards surrounded him their faces filled with dread my lord cried arimin what happened magnus shrugged off any help and climbed to his feet could already feel the sands of time moving across the face of the galaxy and he had a brief last flash of vision of a chiming bronze timepiece with a cracked glass face mother-of-pearl hands [Music] the vision of Magnus can be clearer the meddling form of Horus is very clearly zinc especially as it is appearing before Magnus the red the zinc the meddling God have changed twisting and manipulating Magnus could not have known the meaning of seeing the chiming ancient clock it's really just a mischievous he twisted playfulness of zinc of work and questions remain on who the craftsmen back on terror really was and how he foresaw the accuracy of the clock in its chiming the two instances are very much connected though the emperor himself had a choice why did he never warn anyone not even his price sons the pry marks are the dangers of the spirits the entities and gods that resided in the warp his turning away from the Church of the lightning stone on terror has its smoldering remains and all these symbolize were left to ruin was a definitive moment where the Emperor set Humanity on a path a path that rejected totally religion and spirituality and followed only the Emperor's Imperial truth the Emperor had a choice to bestow his knowledge of the cows gods and the warp to his sons but forbid them from ever attempting to make any kind of dealings with what inhabited the immaterial now he had chosen to do this you could argue that he would have armed them with the knowledge to know of the manipulating and pervasive nature of chaos and better enable them to avoid its temptations and his corrupting allure yet with that said has it not been shown time and time again that forbidding anyone in humanity to not open that box that's marked do not open is a recipe for disaster and I believe this was ready the position the Emperor found himself in if he had forbidden his pry marks from ever exploring and interacting with these beings or explaining to them the true nature of chaos and his plans for Humanity he ran the risk of them being unable to resist the forbidden fruit it's the oldest tale of humanity always needing that thing which you can never have making something off-limits and he makes it far more desirable it's human nature so instead the emperor opted for his only real alternative to say nothing and hope for the best yet this came with its own problems the emperor via the Imperial truth did his best to stave off any kind of dangers that might arise from chaos yet this was nowhere near enough not to mention the fact that as we're late to be discovered the Emperor not only chosen to selectively impart wisdom to his Primark sons but the he had carefully misled and actively deceived them under the crushing weight of so many miscalculations on the part of the emperor the growing apathy and diminishing sense of respect felt by horace could only lead to one thing the [Music] emperor's vision for humanity was one of progression forward-thinking rationalism returned to science and logic as well as a powerful sense that humanity were the ones who are best placed to take on the role as the most powerful race in the galaxy the elder had their chance and failed the remaining xenos were abhorrent savages as the Emperor began his guided crusade he decreed his imperial truth be brought to all the worlds of mankind essentially by any means necessary peaceful if possible by force otherwise the hypocrisy of the emperor given his self-righteous rantings against religion is blinding his primary criticisms against religion but it caused ignorance and horrific bloodshed when humans interpreted things wrongly or with an extreme perception of the teachings from their religion of choice yet on so many occasions the Emperor shows almost no regard whatsoever for human life far from being a benevolent leader who cares for its human species because remember after all the space green legions were meant to be a tool to bring about the rise of humanity not a permanent ever-present military force that would last for tens of thousands of years in one sense the Emperor's grand plans seem to have barely got off the ground before it all came crashing down despite his crusade in many ways being a success the whole vision and mission on behalf of the Emperor in the end was a catastrophic failure an empire in flames mass slaughter across so many worlds returned to the darkness of spirituality persecution and worst of all the emperor in the end left humanity in a position arguably little better off than when he had begun it's clear to all the Emperor is no ordinary man exactly what the Emperor is and just how much power and knowledge he had is always something of a gray area we know that the emperor is and was a perpetual and this has been established in one way or another since the very beginning of Warhammer 40000 and it's fairly obvious though when you think about the fact that he's existed since the earliest times no matter which origin story you subscribed to and I am far more open to the shaman sacrifice origin than I had been however I still do like the idea that the Emperor is somehow a creation of some final old one but full disclosure there was basically zero evidence for that it's simply a fun thought out loud of mine questionable as well if a single old one could create such a powerful being whilst on the run the Shemin sacrifice their works equally well if you get into the details of it really though the heart of the matter is that the emperor is an immensely powerful individual brand new information where we come to the unclear and hazy aspect is just how is he a perpetual compared to others say Vulcan primarch of the salamanders and this is where we risk going off into pretty heavy tangents that deals with the area of the Emperor's dealings with the chaos gods and his acquisition of knowledge to create the prime ox the long and short of it is that I do not believe the Emperor to be a perpetual in a sense of how it is often described the perpetual czar just kind of magical entities who somehow come back to life and are basically immortal if anything the descriptions often touted for perpetual czar extremely vague misleading with very little reference and this also ties into the very notion of the primordial truth the original explanation for the emperor following this shaman account was that the warp was a peaceful and calm realm a mirror of our material space that existed on another plane of existence it was a neutral and peaceful life stream of spiritual energy in the early days of mankind the warp and the creatures within it had not come to any positions of power remembering that the warp itself functions not through some sense of religious worship but simply by being filled with the natural psychic resonant forces at this time by more passive plants and animals the activities of others in the galaxy would undoubtedly have begun to fill the warp with more and more troubling energies but it was with the ever-growing souls of mankind and their obsessive guilt-ridden negative energies where the warp really began to fill on earth the primitive humans had developed a relationship with the war that they did not initially understand but every time we begin to realize how to use it those who understood this best were tribal shamans who could tap into the warp and use its energy to help heal and provide for their tribes you could also be reborn from the warp and carried forward into new human vessels and in many ways you can see how these shamans were indeed the first perpetual because they never truly died they would be reincarnated this is depending on how strict you want to be with your definitions however as mankind grow and the disturbances in the warp became more powerful more aggressive and this was before even the chaos gods the shamans began to discover that they were unable to be so easily renewed by reincarnation the warp was unstable it was becoming just more challenging and sometimes spirits will be lost fearing that his time had passed this would herald the end of their kind they decided after many years of discussion to unmask commit suicide and as they did so their kind would be gone forever from the earth yet they would be reborn as one individual the emperor of man he would not only bear the combined powers of the many thousands of psychically attuned shamans but also begin to remember their wealth of group knowledge he remembered that in his rebirth he was imbued with their collective strength so that he might live forever never again having to return to the warp which would in the date of the future prove to be far too hostile and too dangerous to allow him to be reincarnated where he ever to die this original understanding for me is one reason why the concept of killing the Emperor so he can be reborn is a fundamentally terrible idea but that should probably remain a separate discussion for us though the important information from this version of Earth's ancient history is the idea of the Emperor as a perpetual that this was gifted to him by the collective reincarnation of the shamans of Old Earth now remembering this we returned to the Emperor standing in the Church of the lightning stone from his own perspective as a perpetual he cannot fathom the importance or the need some humans have for faith nor does he subscribe to the concept of the primordial truth a truth that at this point is surely well knows the Emperor is not a God in the sense of a God being all-knowing and all-seeing is an astonishingly powerful individual to be sure but he makes a catalog of misjudgments he also proclaims to be working for the betterment of humanity as he describes to area outside the Church of the Lightning stone the Emperor looked down at him and said some things are best left forgotten that I hope you've foreseen the consequences of a world bereft of religion cetera I have replied the Emperor it is my dream an Imperium of man that exists without recourse to gods the United galaxy with terror at its heart a United galaxy said area averting his gaze from his blazing church as he finally grasped the scale of the Emperor's ambition indeed now that unity has been achieved on terror he's time to reclaim humanity's lost Empire among the stars with you at its head I presume said earlier of course nothing if such grand scale can be achieved without a singular vision at his heart least of all the reconquest of the galaxy you are a madman said Ariha hurryin knew he wanted nothing to do with anything this man had to offer no matter how noble and lofty his ambitions may be I hope in the name of all that is holy you're right Sudheer but I dread the future of forging for Humanity and as we heard before the Emperor replied I wish I need the best for my people I think you do but I'll be no part of it said aria there's a large pot of wisdom on behalf of early in his final conversation with the Emperor the Emperor also reveals himself to be a hypocrite and far from wishing the best for his people he singularly focused on executing his vision for Humanity by any means and any cost necessary even if that means the slaughter of innocents then so be it however it appears that areas words may have resonated with the Emperor somewhat because for as much as the Emperor had declared that his Imperium would operate from a secular position of science logic and reasoning there was a strong sense of practices that ran through the Imperium that had more than a flavor of spirituality to them the terrifyingly powerful presence of his warriors on many worlds were enough to make its inhabitants be awed into thinking they were being visited by some powerful spirits or holy figures of course the iterators would arrive to tell them about the Imperial truth and how they needed to follow a secular order but as much as this was true it still required a months of faith maybe not faith in the spiritual sense but faith in the Emperor and this is really where you get into the muddy territory of defining faith or defining gods and defining spirituality where are the lines drawn is unquestioning faith in your leader significantly different than unquestioning faith in your God the Emperor it seems knew that he could never fully extinguish the desire for humanity to be ordered by things that they did not understand that they had a need to place their faith in beings beyond their comprehension and through the belief of the Imperial truth preaching it as a priest conducts a sermon the Emperor managed to turn his truth into a faith and just as area had predicted it was not long before the Emperor's arguably mixed messaging on imposing a secular rule yet simultaneously himself appearing as a glowing light of golden godlike purity with a shimmering halo and unbelievable power it doesn't take a genius to realize that quite quickly some of the faithful are going to be more faithful than others and yet again the Emperor for all of his apparent foresight and power could not foresee his owner starties first some of them worshipping him and then slowly sliding into betrayal and finally outright rebellion the real Imperial truth is that the Emperor's worn religion was not singularly about moving humanity from the darkness into the light the Emperor surely knew that humanity would face as yet unseen horrors he had at the very least some awareness of these things from his encounters with the void dragon and he knew very much about the gods of chaos his suppression of religion seems in part on the same track as his ban on any AI development he knew that the consequences for allowing either could be potentially catastrophic and it's worth just highlighting something I see far too often incorrectly described the emperor didn't oppose religion because he thought that somehow this would diminish the powers of chaos why would it for starters chaos doesn't work like that the walk doesn't work like that the warp is a realm of resonating spiritual energy the mirrors real space the material the warp being the immaterial so praying to your gods is not going to have some direct huge effect and so neither would be removing that but the warp drives on and is fueled by is human emotions ambitions and desires this is why on chaos ships you don't have huge prayer chambers you might instead find humans or screaming lashed Astro paths to the foul interior walls of their ships carving demonic ruins into their flesh branding them cutting them and allowing their psychic energy and souls to be consumed their emotions pouring into the immaterial until their bodies are disintegrating riddled with black stinking cancers and foul liquids pouring from their orifices when it comes to interacting with the warp it's very much a case of actions speak louder than words and if that means fleeing the skin off of so many humans that are captured onto your ship until the deck is literally awash with blood and your entire room is strung up with skins lashed all around the place then that's exactly what you're going to do if you want to be able to communicate with your demon spirit in the war and that is by the way an actual example the Emperor sought to eradicate religion and spiritual superstition because he feared what he already knew that the forces of chaos lay waiting out among the stars this is why his arguments to earlier was so hollow he had little in the way of sincerity for his specious beliefs the Emperor knew from his own experience what awaited humanity and a society open to the concepts of religion and spiritual beings would be far more easily tempted the one who operated from a position of logic and reasoning cults and religious sects could empower the beings of the immaterial not through their worship but by their associated actions and a society open to worship could easily be manipulated into worshipping a cult or organized religion that was not openly worshiping one of the gods of cows it may not have even been aware that it was but this is how cows operates manipulation and half-truths the emperor had two choices before him the path of the light and the path of the dark no matter his agreements in principle with the gods of cows he had chosen the path of light for Humanity and he did not want to end up in his situation where his imperial truth could be so pissed I replaced by the primordial truth the terrors of the past had grown in the shadow of superstition and false belief if the human feature was to survive its rebirth it could not tolerate the delusions of the past the arguably greatest deception the emperor ever imposed on humanity was the Imperial truth the truth that was of course in fact a lie [Music] the Emperor knew this was all a lie he had known this since before the unification from before the age of strife before the fall of mankind during the Dark Age of Technology the lie being that the spirits gods entities call them whatever you will but do not deny their existence beyond our realm of perception it is simply enough after all to believe some would have it that the imperiled truth was never alive mock these fools shun them for they would entangle themselves and yourself in blinkered fallacious arguments and word splitting games and to you both were drowning in self consuming ignorance dragged down under the weight of their self-imposed obfuscation these architects of confusion to be dismissed and ignored the primordial truth was simple and clear the realm of humanity at one time would have called it hell or the underworld it was creations shadow it was the layer behind the Stars it was chaos and it was real to accept the primordial truth is to live in harmonic union with the powers of chaos it is to accept reality to embrace power over terror without the gods humanity will die piece by piece under the predation of aliens that lay claim to the galaxy those who remain will die as the elder died in agony unable to see the primordial truth before their very eyes this is fate it is written in the stars [Music] I fell it's worth reminding everyone at this point that the Emperor if we using people's preferred shaman analogy for his inception was originally produced out of our fear that the warp would become dramatically more hostile which it ultimately would that without the shamans intervention the human race would be consumed by the spiritual psychic creatures of the warp given the origins it's not surprising that the emperor would choose the path of light for Humanity as opposed to the path of darkness at the same time his image of him as a benevolent protector seems fundamentally misplaced the emperor is ruthless and more than willing to achieve his plans by whatever means an entirely fallible individual as well those worshipers over the emperor the most loyal and the most faithful would have you believe that everything that comes to pass is part of the Emperor's grand plan or the very least workable around his long term intentions it's difficult to see how that can be true if anything the Emperor's persistent declarations that he was just a man despite all of the evidence of his great powers seems significantly disingenuous yet one feature of him seemed certainly true when it comes to assertions that being his judgment the emperor displayed an arrogance that has perhaps always been present in him since his birth assuming that he could triumph permanently over the gods of the chaos realm the Emperor knew of the primordial truth from the very beginning he had already visited the gods of chaos millenia before his unification wars and had begun enforcing his declaration that all his followers obey the Imperial truth some would say that this was part of the Emperor's grand plan or that he had some miraculous plan of ascension for Humanity maybe that he planned in the fullness of time to either starve destroy or permanently protect humanity from the gods of the warp anything is possible and we currently have no near enough information to make that determination but anyone who would at this point but their unquestioning faith in the emperor should seriously take some time to re-examine the facts of the matter the Emperor operates from a position of just taking whatever action is necessary unfortunately sometimes that means getting your hands dirty the end justifying the means and so forth desperate times call for desperate measures but does the desperation of humanity warrant the casual slaughter of so many innocents humanity never asked for the emperor they were subjected to his campaigns of brutal violence subjugated any resistance to the Emperor's order was met with sickening violence during the Crusades the Emperor saw much success and many resolutions without a shot being fired but there were plenty more where this was not the case and if the Emperor's abhorrent war crimes on terror were anything to go by it was no small mr. I've often heard it said that the situation that occurred with the interacts was not one of the Emperor's making yet I asked myself wasn't it the interacts one of the few empires of humanity to survive the age of strife seemingly intact and in an advanced state of Technology its warriors wearing similar armor to a starties improving more than just a challenge from multiple legions they had working STC systems they should have been a bounty and a prize for not just the Emperor but for Humanity in another time the interest could have potentially been far superior saviors of humanity they already seemed to have an established rational order of logic and science and reasoning about their culture the Emperor's forces in the Crusades when you really look at it not so much perhaps if they had had some way to know what was coming their way they could have been more adequately prepared and mounted their own crusade even becoming more successful in the Emperor's forces it's unlikely but it's just worth remembering that the interrex were there and they were doing just fine they didn't ask for or want to be part of the Imperium or the Imperial truth Horace already turning away from the Emperor instigated the war with the interacts and it's not entirely without the influence of chaos that things ended up how they did but again Horace turning away from their light does not leave the Emperor blameless given what we know now it seems the Emperor's simply made a terrible miscalculation in not bestowing his prime marks with the truth of the events that had taken place up to the point of his crusade and you can perhaps understand the Emperor's desire to reduce an outlaw religion so as to not give the cows gods an easy win by laying open the likelihood of some forms of worship and the associated acts that would strengthen them in the war it's even understandable that the Emperor's simply wanted a path away from this kind of superstition and to try to get back to the way things were for human during the Golden Age the Emperor wants to return mankind to its place of power it's the zenith of understanding and rationalism in his efforts to achieve this it's entirely possible that he was just trying to get there too quickly and taking shortcuts to achieve what he could have done with a longer more steady conquest and there may have been in actuality no perfect solution to all of this the Emperor was doing the best he could under impossibly difficult circumstances was something I've often heard as well is if the Emperor survived through the Golden Age and had these genetic laboratories and so on why did he not keep an STC or two to boost humanity back to the Golden Age this is a very good question because from how STC's are portrayed it certainly would have been a quick fix for regaining the lost technology bringing humanity back from the edge of annihilation why the Emperor seemingly did not have any kind of complete STC stored away or in his possession is of course unknowable for us but we could make a few speculations as I discussed before my previous narrative about STC's despite them being portrayed as the Holy Grail perhaps in actuality STC's are just not all they're cracked up to be it seems beyond strange that if they were these holy grails of all human knowledge the emperor would not have thought to himself I'd better get myself one of these just in case now another possibility maybe they were rarer than descriptions would have us believe the war with the men of iron from what we've learned doesn't sound as if it just exploded overnight so if things were turning bad again you might imagine the emperor would see the writing was on the wall and secure an STC the other rationale could be though as I've said the emperor is far more capable of making mistakes and his ability to foresee the future is nowhere near as powerful as we're led to believe or perhaps he does get very clear visions but only a very specific events this is often used as a crutch to explain away the whole heresy and the Horus battle with the Emperor was all part of his master plan if you ought to assume he knew all he would have known Horus would betray him and allow events to play out as they did perhaps for some greater purpose we are yet to see we could assume that perhaps the chaos gods extended their powers to blind or to cover things from the Emperor we know that very powerful psychic manipulation is possible to hide the truth of things it's been used on many occasions by both loyalists and traitors hiding ships fleets entire moons some consider that the emperor is far more powerful than any can imagine that all of his actions are according to a grand plan that he's forged over millennia and that he will still lead humanity to the light out of the darkness that he will bring the re ascension of mankind how this would be achieved however remains entirely unclear some speculate that his plan was to lead all of mankind into the web way out of the grasp of chaos yet this is more than off the table after it was breached in the war in the web wave fought with it finally being sealed as the Emperor is permanently interred on the golden throne if all I have said has not convinced you then perhaps the Emperor himself will have to speak for me because when all is said and done the Emperor could see he had failed humanity even admitted it it's why he was forced to create the order of the grey knights and the Inquisition and the Emperor described the gray Knights thusly one unbreakable shield against the coming darkness one last blade forged in defiance of fate let them be my legacy to the galaxy I conquered and my final gift to the species I failed the words of the Emperor here always strike me as especially troubling it's not his admission of failure that bothers me it's the words forged in defiance of fate they suggested the Emperor seemingly knew that this was destined to pass that it was inevitable perhaps he could see all that was to come after all he could see what was coming it was unable to alter the path ultimately resigning himself to admitting failure he had tried to alter humanity's fate but failed which returns us once again to chaotic demons speaking the primordial truth the inescapable truth the Eldar failed when their tests came a humanity still had the choice to make the humanity needed to open itself to chaos as much as chaos needed the more powerfully resonating souls of humanity to fuel it to near material the emperor had already spoken about how dangerous he narrow the path of humanity was when he spoke with Oriya the Church of the lightning stone in their final words didn't you just tell me of the bloody slaughters perpetuated by Crusaders said earlier doesn't that make you know better than the holy men you were telling me about the difference is I know I am right said the Emperor spoken like a true autocrat the Emperor shook his head you misunderstand area seen the narrow survival path that is all that stands between humanity and extinction and this is the way it must begin it certainly seems that before his legions of Astarte had even been completed or his pry marks the Emperor knew that the path they were walking was an extremely narrow one which had a very limited chance of success his final acts much like his other decisions seemed to be that of a man making the best choices he could given the cards he was holding at the time trying his best to put right what once went wrong the primordial truth there is a troubling issue in one sense it's the simple admission that the chaos gods and their realm exist I personally feel it runs much deeper than that the impression I have had from their demons who have mentioned it is that it's much more than just an admission of existence it's about humanity being open to accepting what the elder could not the racquel it exists or survive without its help that like it or not the destiny of mankind in the immaterial are inexorably linked it's a symbiotic relationship that began at the dawn of man perhaps the Emperor could foresee the end times through his immense psychic power and what he saw he could not accept they set him inevitably on a path to save humanity from the darkness as he described it humanity was never meant for darkness owning the light can it achieve its full potential when the suffocating shadows of a religion that teaches us not to question he's gone from this world we will see its true brilliance in these words I think we can understand the Emperor's vision he did not want humanity to fall into the grasp of the chaos gods he had seen mankind at the highest point in its existence and he'd seen it fall but he knew that no other race in the galaxy deserved to rule more than man he was obsessed with making his vision a reality no matter what the cost this approach unfortunately imbued itself into humanity where the ruthless achieve your goals by any cost approach would become fundamental to the Imperium saw operation not forgetting of course the Emperor's perhaps unintended consequence of forbidding religion which would lead to ironically become one of its most powerful strengths the Emperor had feared that religious worship and faith would risk destroying humanity by making it susceptible to the beliefs and corruptions of the immaterial when in actuality the faith and unquestioning belief in the God emperor of man would become its most powerful weapon logger it seems had been right all along religious worship of the Emperor provided a far shura way to bind humanity together than rational thinking and science the Imperial truth would be eroded and people turned to faith this would ultimately lead to the Imperial cult replacing the Emperor's Imperial truth and the adapters Minister on the ecclesia key would become a powerful component of the Imperium ultimately though while the worship of the Emperor enabled humanity to wield a powerfully binding force that was an anathema to the forces seeking to corrupt humanity mankind's relapse into state religious worship would in time return it to a decaying ignorant and superstitious Society of ever more extreme positions where tyrannical leaders in the abandonment of scientific progress halted humanity's advancement dead was this the Emperor's vision after all not the darkness of chaos but the darkness of mankind's own inability to disconnect itself from superstition and faith such things had left area worshiping a rock in the Church of the lightning stone perhaps humanity during the Golden Age of mankind's greatest achievement was not their Zenith levels of Technology after all their greatest achievement was simply they had reached a time where they were able to step out of the darkness to abandon religion spirituality superstition mysticism and faith they allowed themselves to ascend into a world of pure rationalism science logic and order belief in the Imperial truth in the modern age of the Imperium was now a literal death sentence any heretics who opposed the worship of the emperor of man must be purged from society in the grim darkness of the far future there is only war [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music]

Channel: Luetin09

Views: 1,327,311

Keywords: Gaming, Discuss, Channel, Future, 40K, Warhammer 40K, Imperium, Humanity, Mankind, Doom, Fall, Space Marines, Heretic, Heresy, The Emperor of Man, Lore, History, Guide, Warhammer 40000, Warp, Immaterium, Rift, War, Slaughter, Horror, Nightmare, Tabletop, Inquisition, Primordial Truth, Chaos, Gods, Crusade, Unification, Last Church

Id: riyVcdAOOC4

Length: 65min 29sec (3929 seconds)

Published: Fri May 17 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/Snow75]

The Emperor of Man wanted a secular society, and when he “died”, people began revering him as a deity.

[u/AlColbert]

The 40k universe has a lot of great commentary on religion. Only problem is that in that universe gods are real.

[u/[deleted]]

40k lore is so awesome. I love it.

[u/Jalambi]

This really hit me the argument made, and it was fascinating to see the folly that can exist on both sides of the argument, even from a standpoint of science and evidence.

ITS AN HOUR LONG THOUGH.