Clearcreek Rebuttal

[Random_White_Guy]

Clearcreek Rebuttal
Gausim al-Marain

"To you, good folk of the Well, who find themselves torn betwixt that which they hear, and that which they feel in their heart, I ask the same as I did in one of the Debates. Is your faith in the Wheel, or the mouth's of those who proselytize for it? Have you spent the time to truly know your God?"

Jordan Clearcreek, Nisah 27th, 7788

These words issued in challenge have been weighed most of the day, and as Honored Bearer of the Great Temple of Baz'eel I lend weight and measure to my words.

"To you, good folk of the Well, who find themselves torn betwixt what they hear, and that which they feel in their heart" opens with ad hominem assumption. For the number of those who are pious, devout, and adherent of The Wheel greatly eclipse the dissenters.

The woman Miranda Marlin, who so graciously helps herself to the Waters of Ephia's Well, raising bellows calling for a "Grand Muffin" to be replaced. This is not a sign of one who has spent months in our fair city with earnest intention. She is a Learned Wizard, she actively knows many magics and boasts often of the Fifth Circle upon the bellows. The word Mufti is not so difficult.

The Nadiri, Zol Nur, who speaks of having Studied penal code. She is not disdained by the community for her charity, but for the source. There is already law upon the Assembly, and she sit in violation of such. She has been given a week's time to seek to err her ways and instead has taken to a tantrum, as children are want.

The Nadiri, Lapa, who speaks of Senseless Violence against a single woman who preaches what she holds close to her heart not being a show of strength - It is not about a showing of strength. It is about the Pantheon that has encouraged our Gates to be so opened, that has encouraged our Culture, our Life. We would not walk into a person's home and ungraciously offend their offering of a coffee, or insult their family. And yet she chooses to do just this. In multiple accountings.

Even now as I have offered Sofia time to reflect on her ways, rather than what some sought of merely arresting her for her crimes, she chooses protest.

She does not seek to learn, to change, to find place in our community. She merely takes her book to our Statue and to sow more discontent.

There are more, so many more, but I tell you this plain fair reader: "Is your faith in the Wheel, or the mouth's of those who proselytize for it?"

This question a cutting one. And not in the way that Scholar Clearcreek believes it.

For  those who proselytize for it are chosen, by the Wheel. Their deeds, their actions, their causes are championed in divine sacrament and the rawest communion that may be offered between a Mortal and a God.

A lifetime dedicated to study, to understanding, and to prayer. So too though depending upon the divine duties of the Spoke - the sacred deeds demanded. Restrictions upon decorum, upon practice, oaths layered and emplaced and honored.

Men and women do not "Learn" to be Clergy by the practices of scavenging arcane scrolls. Men and women do not "Become" the Speakers of the Wheel because of study of odd stars.

By sacred Relic and Divine Will are the servitors of the Mother, The Protector, The Martyrs, The Wroth, The Wanderer, The Magi, and more given their powers.

And if they were fell, if they were false? They would have such powers revoked.

I do not admit they are not without flaws - but while many of you adhere to your hunt of Boardwork and Politic and Survival in this Great Ash, the Clergy of the Wheel aspire to enact the divine mandates of The Creator. There is a sacrifice of the self and a great cost that comes with such devotions.

And to question such - Not only having the thought, not only sharing the thoguht, but raising it across the realm by Bellow? By not only a Magistrate of Ephia's Well so reigned and governed by the Sultan, but in defense of a Sage Cultist of Il Modo?

These things fair reader give more than a degree of pause. They raise concern.

Not nearly though concern such as this - "Have you spent the time to truly know your God?"

Have you? Have you drank deep of the Waters of Ephia offered freely, have you walked the Roads protected by Warad, have you been graciously attended by the Martyrs who tend both gravesite and more to ensure the Dead may find their due and proper resting place?

In every facet of our Life, and in the barest skeleton of Ephia's Well, lays the Wheel.

It is the Guiding Star of Izdu that leads the Astronomers to wonder.

It is the Noble Warding of Warad that leads the likes of Lynneth, of Aurelio's service to the Mother, of Alain's tenants to the Martyr, that lead the Balladeers to the heights of heroism in the pursuit of a dream for a life a new with Cup.

It is the Janissary's pledge to the Wroth, his very Statue in their Garrisson, to see good works done and the wicked punished.

The Accord, The Sultan, the Leagues, the Populace.

For B'aara is the Creator. Merciful as she is Wise. But she defers to Izdu as she cannot be all thing. And her Wheel, touches all. From War to Peace, from Growth to cull. The Full breadth of existence. And in her Wheel, as it turns, the Waters of her divinity shared with those who may use it best among the Ecclesiastic Bureaucracy at that time. A Sultana deferring to her Court.

And in such a thing did Man learn to grow, and govern, in such manner.

That we have welcomed Asterabadian practice into Ephia though seems to have many believe such a thing also must apply to Divinity.

To this, and a great many others say the same in agreement:I know well my god.

I know my God, because I have been raised of it. And teach others the same.

And our City raised on such.

But Asterabadian Principle ends at the Secular Bureaucracy and the Assembly Chamber.

And to question such a thing is gravest insult.