Light of Kassin

Divine Origins

The Kassinite faith can be traced back to a divine revelation that was delivered to a Vaali paladin known as Theophana Argyros, who lived in the mid 10th century. She is said to have sworn her oaths and been admitted to the Order of the Architects of Heaven in 954 AK; and that during her initiatory ordeal she experienced a profound and prolonged visionary state which left her comatose for twelve days. When she awoke, she claimed to have been uplifted in the eyes of the original and long-forgotten god of the universe, whom she called Kassin.
Struck by zealous fervour, she preached that Kassin was the only true deity, the creator of the universe who had been betrayed by his creations, and that the beings worshipped as gods were all masks of an entity that she called Goldentongue, also known as the Deceiver and the False One. She preached that Kassin demanded twelve tenets be followed, the Four Commands and Eight Bans, and that soon would come a time in which Kassin would be made whole once more and be victorious over the False One.
Theophana was a charismatic, but controversial figure, and whilst many flocked to her cause, just as many found her rhetoric abhorrent. Four years after commencing her preaching, she was assassinated by a cultist of the Queen of Shadows, and the movement that she had built gradually drifted apart. Were it not for what happened next, she would have likely been relegated to history as merely one of many cultic prophets who failed to gather any long-lasting following.
A handful of Theophana’s closest allies from the Order of the Architects of Heaven formed a schismatic group and split away from the order, calling themselves the Order of the Broken God. They reswore their oaths in the name of Kassin - and, it is claimed, were met with the spirit of Theophana who proclaimed herself the angel-egregore of Kassin.
The Order of the Broken God preserved the prophecy of Theophana over the following centuries, gathering a modicum of support in Vaalus and other parts of Kataris, and making an ill-fated attempt to bring the creed to Maddur. It was only with the dawn of the 13th Century and the coming of the Blight that this situation changed - when the desperate Vaali turned to the gods to appeal for help, they found the gods unwilling or unable to answer their prayers. In such an environment, the Kassinite faith quickly found a foothold, providing answers and a sense of certainty for those who lacked it. The faith spread fast, soon uniting under the banner of the Prefecture of the Light of Kassin - and within a handful of years, became one of the most powerful factions in the republic. Other factions, whether convinced by the Kassinites’ message, or merely seeking to ally themselves with the emerging power, soon joined them - and with a promise of reasserting law and order the Grand Prefecture of All Vaalus was able to reassert control over the republic before it crumbled completely into civil war.
Since then, the Light of Kassin has been the sole sanctioned religion in Vaalus. Over the years the Prefecture of the Light of Kassin has solidified its control over the republic, and has inexorably become more codified and entwined with the mechanisms of law and power.

Tenets of Faith

The tenets of the Kassinite faith can be summarised by the Four Commands, the Eight Bans, and the Eight Corollaries:
The Four Commands:

1. That the Light be kindled, first must Darkness be extinguished
2. That the Light be sheltered, first must Darkness be banished
3. That the Light be preserved, first must Darkness be warded against
4. That we become the Light, first must we face the Darkness

The Eight Bans:

1. Worship not the False One who profanes the Light
2. Consort not with Lying Spirits
3. Permit neither fury nor sentiment to usurp duty
4. Suffer not the desecration of the dead
5. Abhor the False Oracles
6. Bargain not with the Hierophants of Iniquity
7. Indulge not in the depravities of the Creatures of Darkness
8. Bow not to Oblivion; Despair not of Oblivion

The Eight Corollaries:

1. That Darkness be extinguished, so the will of the Creatures of Darkness must be broken.
2. That Darkness be banished and warded against, so the word of Light must be law.
3. That Darkness be faced, so must the faithful strive to strength and discipline.
4. As peace touched by Darkness is corrupted, so must peace not be shown to Darkness
5. As honour and compassion touched by Darkness are corrupted, so must neither honour nor compassion be shown to Darkness.
6. As falsehood is the spawn of Darkness, so is cowardice the child of falsehood.
7. Faith unmet by action is cowardice concealed.
8. Strength untested is weakness concealed.

The Commands and Bans are typically interpreted to imply:

• That for good to triumph, the forces of evil must be actively combatted, shunned, and guarded against.
• That all deities other than Kassin should not be worshipped.
• That the fey, elemental spirits, demonic entities and so-called “celestials” should be shunned.
• That the demands of faith supercede all other concerns.
• That necromancy should not be tolerated.
• That things associated with the forces of evil are corrupting and must be avoided
• That one must not give up hope of the victory of good over evil.

Worship

The Festival of the Revelation of Theophana

The Revelation of Saint Theophana Argyros is a Kassinite festival that occurs on the 2nd day of the 6th moon. Though the Light of Kassin has a number of other festivals and celebrations, this is the most important of all - for it celebrates the Revelation of the Light  as it occured in 954AK.
For all that it is without question the most important date in the Kassinite calendar, there was until recently no absolute agreement on the date that it occurred. Whilst the year and the general time of year that the revelation took place in are well-documented, the precise date is not; the story goes that Theophana, having taken her oath as a Paladin within the Order of the Architects of Heaven, underwent the required initiatory ordeal, and that this produced a profound and prolonged visionary state in which she fell comatose for twelve days before awakening, having had the truth of the world revealed to her by Kassin. There are no contemporaneous written records that give the days on which Theophana's initiation took place, and the earliest existing sources that do give a date are contradictory as to whether Theophana fell into unconsciousness under the full moon, or whether this was the day that she awakened and announced the Revelation of Kassin.
There has historically been some controversy over this particular issue; for many years the position of the Quaestors of Truth was one of compromise, asserting that the precise date is of far lesser relevance than the content of the Revelation itself, and that overly fixating on the circumstances of the messenger rather than her message is potentially idolatrous. It was only under the leadership of Archimandrite Theodosius in 1297 that the Quaestors elected to specifically approve of one position or another, and declared that the second day of the full moon was the day in which the initiation took place and Theophana fell into her sleep. This was, at least in part, a political decision, as the opposite view that her awakening occurred under the full moon had become something of a tenet of faith among the heretical Sarian Sect; though there are also good theological and historical arguments that the Quaestors' view was correct, one major one being the discovery of certain records relating to the initiation ceremonies of the Order of the Architects of Heaven which asserted that such ceremonies were to only to be performed under the full moon (though the Sarians assert that these documents are, in fact, a forgery).
In Vaalus itself, the festival is marked by torchlit processions in the hours just before dawn, culminating in a ceremony in which the celebrants cast their torches into a pyre as the sun rises, burning an effigy that represents the Deceiver. In smaller settlements these effigies are typically made of straw and sackcloth, though in the larger cities such as Achyras they may take the form of quite elaborate wooden carvings - often depicting a winged man, who may be bound in chains. This ceremony is said to represent the triumph of the Light of Kassin over the false gods, and the destruction of the false religions that came before. The day of the full moon is traditionally one of fasting and contemplation, to be broken with a feast when the full moon rises - respectively representing the sleep of Theophana whilst the revelation was delivered to her, and celebrating the promise of Kassin to bring the light of hope to the world even in the darkest of hours.
Those who are travelling beyond the borders of Vaalus rarely are able to mark the festival in the traditional fashion, but most will seek to acknowledge the Revelation in one form or another. The Quaestors advise that all the faithful - exempting young children, those in ill-health, and those who must undertake strenuous tasks - should awaken before dawn for prayer, and fast until the rising of the full moon; and that those who are exempt should at minimum offer prayers to Kassin upon waking and upon the rising of the moon.
A number of Kassinite holy orders conduct their initiations on the night of 6th full moon in imitation of Theophana, and it is said that those who take their vows on such a night are especially protected by the Watchful Light against the forces of darkness that they strive to oppose. Many who consider themselves servants of Kassin - whether paladins or not - will use this festival as an opportunity to reflect on any oaths that they have sworn or on their less formal commitments to the Light, and spend some time in prayer and meditation on this subject. Some of a particularly mystical bent have been known to partake of narcotic herbs in order to induce a visionary state in which they might experience contact with the Divine - and whilst the Quaestors do not specifically sanction such things, neither do they prohibit them.

Sects

One major sect, founded in 1231 by Isabella of Saria, was the Provisional Prefecture of the Watchers of the Horizon, better known as the Sarian Sect. Though it only existed for five years before being outlawed in Vaalus and its leaders declared heretics and sent to their deaths in the Desolation, the Sarian Sect was extremely influential in its time, and its disagreements with the Quaestors of Truth significantly shaped the course of the Kassinite church's further development. Several splinter groups of the Sarian Sect exist to this day outside of Vaalus, though they lack much of the influence that they had at the height of the sect's power.

Founding Date

1203

Type

Religious, Organised Religion

Alternative Names

Church of Kassin

Predecessor Organizations

• Order of the Architects of Heaven
• Order of the Broken God

Demonym

Kassinite

Leader

Calixta II

Leader Title

Archimandrite of the Light of Kassin

Subsidiary Organizations

• Sarian Sect

Permeated Organizations

• Holy Republic of Vaalus

Deities

• Kassin

Divines

• Goldentongue