Boash

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"Blind God" redirects here. For the Blind Lord, see Blind Lord.
The eunuch priests of the Blind God, as depicted by Jordi Gonzales Escamilla in The World of Ice and Fire

Boash, the Blind God is a deity that was once worshiped in the Valyrian Freehold and the one deity of the Valyrians who settled on Lorath.

Beliefs and customs

Followers of Boash ate no flesh, drank no wine, and walked barefoot, clad only on hair shirts and hides. Their priests were eunuchs who wore eyeless hoods in honor of the god, for only in darkness, they believed, would their third eye open, allowing them to see the "higher truths" of creation that lay concealed behind the illusions of the material world.

They also believed that all life is sacred and eternal, and in the equality of men and woman, lords and peasants, rich and poor, slave and master, and even that of man and beast. All equally worthy, all creatures of god.

Another essential part of their doctrine was the extreme abnegation of the self, for only by freeing themselves of vanity could men hope to become one with the godhood. Thus, the Boash'i put aside their own names and spoke of themselves as "a man" or "a woman", rather than say "I" or "me". Even after the extinction of the religion of the Blind God, this habit of speech would endure on Lorath, where the nobility regards it as terribly vulgar to speak of one's self directly.

History of the religion

Thirty hundred and twenty-two years before the Doom of Valyria, a sect of religious dissidents left the Freehold to establish a temple on the Lorathi main isle.

The ancient mazes of the mazemakers became the towns, temples, and tombs of the Boash'i. Men from other lands and faiths, including escaped slaves established on Lorath and were at first subservient to the followers of Boash and so the priests continued to rule. In time, however, the newcomers outnumbered the faithful and the while the worship fell away, the priests grew worldly and corrupt, forsaking their hair shirts, hoods, and piety and growing fat and rich off the taxes they extracted from those they ruled. Finally, the lower classes rose in rebellion. The acolytes of the Blind God were slaughtered, save for a few that fled to the great temple maze on Lorassyon, where they remained for the best part of a century, until they too died out.[1]

References and Notes