Ashni Addin

The Essenaɤ Ejadran or Vulture Icon displayed over the entryway is the distinguishing feature of a Ashniist Beyt or temple house.

Ashni Addin (Tamashek: ⴰⵛⵉ ⴰⴷⴷⵉⵏ, "Blood Doctrine") is the predominant Scipian branch of White Path. Ashniism is the principal religious doctrine of the Tenerians of Charnea, who represent the largest Scipian contingent of the White Path, and has also been adopted by numerous peoples who currently or formerly lived under Charnean rule. It is among the youngest major world religions with over 20 million adherents, making Ashni Addin one of the largest branches of the White Path. The creed and dogma of the Ashni Addin incorporates elements of the pre-Sakbeic beleifs of the Tenerian people into the framework of the Sakbeic pantheon, cosmology and clerical structure as introduced to the peoples of Charnea by the Desert Oracle. This mysterious religious figure, considered by the Ashni Addin to be an immortal prophet of Itzamna, is first referenced in the historical record as a street preacher in the city of Azut in mid-eastern Charnea in 1661 where first Charnean conversions to the White Path are believed to have occured. Under the direction of the Desert Oracle, the religious doctrine that would become the modern Ashni Addin spread west to the Charnean capital Agnannet where it would be adopted as the state religion by the Tamenokalt Kahina Ultmenir in 1719. The Ashniist pupils of the Desert Oracle established religious schools and societies focusing on different patron gods including the thirteen creator gods of Sakbe. Among these were the priesthoods of Itzamna the sun lord and Ishel the lady of the moon, which merged together in 1794 to form the Temple of the Sun and Moon which would quickly become the largest and most powerful clerical organization of the Ashni Addin.

Name

The Ashni Addin, translated as the "blood doctrine" or "faith of blood", gained its name from the common term for the White Path in the Mutulese Ozeros. In the regions of Malaio and Ochran under Mutulese influence, the Mutulese faith of Sakbe was given the name Kik' K'uhunak or the faith of blood to distinguish it from the indigenous Azdarist sects of the Sahb and Iifae which were termed the faith of oil (Bil K'uhunak) and the faith of water (Ja K'uhunak) respectively in reference to the important ritual liquids used in each religion. In other parts of the Global Circuit including the Mutul itself, this terminology fell into disuse with the term Sakbe or "shining white path" becoming the common way to refer to the native Mutulese religion. However, in the distant lands of Charnea which were outside the direct influence of the Mutul, these changes never caught on and the Tenerian translation of the archaic term of Blood Faith remained as the accepted term for those beliefs and organizations associated with the religion. In Charnea, Ashni Addin is still the accepted term for all of Sakbeism, with adherents of non-Charnean branches of the religion being termed Puritans or Shaddijnen. The rest of the world commonly uses Ashni Addin or Ashniism to refer specifically to Charnean Sakbe.

Beliefs

Cosmology

The cosmology and worldview of the Ashni Addin is based on a concept known as the Wheel, an evolution of the Sakbeist concept of cyclic reincarnation also known as the Sacred Cycle. Much like the extremely cyclical nature of mainstream Sakbeic cosmology, the Wheel is applied to many aspects and processes of the temporal and spiritual worlds including the span of a human life, the cycle of life and death, the rise and fall of nations and the lifespan of the known universe. Each of these processes and lengths of time is believed to pass through the three phases of the Wheel in similar ways despite doing so at radically different timescales. The three phases of the tripartite cycle, generally corresponding to life, death and rebirth respectively, each have many aspects and attributes which are not always fulfilled in every instance of the Wheel. Different processes, for example the lives of two different individuals, are associated and rationalized using the mechanism of the Wheel in different and specific ways depending on the particular conditions.

• The Mundane is the first phase of the Wheel, the phase of Life. It is invoked in Ashniist texts using the phrase "It is Born", and typically corresponds to the processes of basic formation. In the common context of a human life, the Mundane corresponds to the formative years of childhood and adolescence while in the cycle of reincarnation the Mundane describes the period of life in the mortal world. The Mundane phase is the period in which the thing, be it a human life or an iteration of the universe, revolving through the processes of the Wheel is not only created in a literal and material sense but goes about gathering various characteristics and undergoing rapid growth.
• The Moribund is the second, harsher phase of formation in the Wheel. It is invoked as "It is Formed", and its considered the lowest point of the Wheel. In broader Sakbeist cosmology the Moribund is strongly associated with the Sakbeist underworld or hell, Xibalba, a realm in which the souls of the dead are subjected to difficult, cruel and sadistic trials and challenges by the Lords of the Underworld which they must overcome in order to find their way into a paradise after death. However, in the context of the Wheel the invocation of Xibalba's trials is often not literal and instead refers more generally to a period of difficulty or hardship which must be overcome. As the Moribund phase sets in, the trials must be overcome at great cost and in so doing much of the growth of the Mundane phase will be challenged and destroyed while the remaining traits are galvanized by the process. It is also possible for the Wheel to "break" under the pressure of the Moribund phase, describing the outcome in which the tribulation overcomes everything that was established during the Mundane phase and the thing, be it a person or a soul, is literally or metaphorically lost to Xibalba and effectively destroyed.
• The Idyllic, the final phase and apex of the Wheel, is generally correlated to the Ashniist heaven known as the Field of Reeds. It is described through the phrase "It is Free" and is connected to both post-Xibalba paradisiacal afterlife as well as the event of reincarnation, rebirth and new life which returns the Wheel to the Mundane. The Idyllic is the domain of gods and ancestors, and is also the phase associated with the apogee of a person's life, the period of seasoned seniority and authority in Charnean culture. Upon reaching the Idyllic phase, the fat has been trimmed and flaws weathered away by experiences and trials of the Moribund, reducing a thing down to its pure essence which is then set to reign free for a time before undergoing rebirth and the repetition of the cycle.

Deities

The introduction of the cosmology, practices and deities of Sakbe at the hands of the Desert Oracle was readily embraced by the Tenerian nomads of the central Scipian deserts. However, the exchange of religious ideas was not one sided. The Ashni Addin retains numerous divine figures of non-Sakbeic origin which are worshipped openly and on equal footing with those gods which were imported by the Desert Oracle and his disciples. This was possible due to the flexible polytheistic framework of both the Sakbeic religion as well as spiritual practices of the Tenerians, which had always been shaped and molded by the practices of the many groups they encountered over the centuries. In particular, many of the gods of the ancient Deshrians as well as a handful of Periclean origin were adopted by the pre-Ashniist Tenerian tribes and were later integrated into the pantheon of the Ashni Addin when these same tribes adopted the ways of the Desert Oracle as their own. Sakbeic gods were also modified in their character and in their representation to suit the worldview and sensibilities of the desert nomads who had been molded by a landscape in stark contrast to the humid and densely forested homeland of the Mutulese Sakbeists.

One of the most important deities of the Ashniist pantheon is Ishel, the lunar goddess known as the "Nocturnal Physician". She is portrayed as a bald-headed woman with vulture's wings, or else as a masked doctor, in Ashniist depictions. In Sakbeic tradition, she is associated with medicine, midwives, birth and regeneration. She is also understood to be a being which consumes putrefaction and in doing so purifies the world. This nature of Ishel is thought to have come from the old medical practice of using maggots to clean wounds, leaving them to eat necrotic tissue while leaving the living flesh untouched. In Charnea, however, this led to a close association with vultures which the Tenerians believe to be benevolent spirits due to their consumption of corpses which prevents the spread of disease and contamination of water sources. The cult of vulture spirits is the most primoradial aspect of Tenerian religion, thought to predate all of the artifacts of foreign religious influence that have accumulated over the millennia. By effectively absorbing the practices of vulture worship, the cult of Ishel was able to spread quickly across the majority of the Tenerian nomads, propelling Ishel to the status of the most popular of the Ashniist deities.

Ishel displaced the storm god Ch'ak who is the most important deity of the Charnean Puritans as well as the Mutulese Sakbeists. His reduced status within the temples of the Ashni Addin is explained by the lack of clouds, let alone rain, across much of the territory in which Ashniism is present. Although some Ashniist communities rely on rivers, the majority of the Tenerians which make up the core of the Ashniist adherents are entirely independent from rainfall and surface water, relying instead on oases and especially wells tapping into underground aquifers. Nevertheless, the traditional form of Ch'ak retains a role in Ashniism as the bringer of the desert blooms, rare and religiously significant events which follow the brief winter showers which trigger the millions of dormant seeds in the desert to dramatically spring to life for a short time. Ch'ak is also sometimes associated with the goddess Kaharna, a deified historical ruler of the pre-Tenerian Amaziɣ associated with water and oases. In some Ashniist communities, Ch'ak is considered the son of Kaharna, in others they are two forms of the same entity, and in yet other communities they are worshipped as entirely distinct deities. In general, the blurred line between Ch'ak and Kaharna in the eyes of the Charnean Ashniists has aided to maintain the relevance of the Mutulese storm god among the desert dwellers.