We’ve reached the end, and will be building a very different sort of faith with our Small Gods.
Summary
Other gods come to tempt Brutha away from Om, and they meet St. Ungulant the anchorite, who is a devotee of all the small gods in the desert. In Ephebe, without Vorbis to led them, the Omnians are easily overpowered and the Tyrant is restored. In the desert, Vorbis picks up a rock, hits Brutha over the head, and sees a tortoise that is not Om; he kills it, then picks up Brutha and sets out toward Omnia. Brutha awakens to find out that he’s been back in Omnia for a week and that Vorbis has been named the Eighth Prophet, and asked to see him as soon as he’s awake. Vorbis tells the other officiants that Brutha will be named a Bishop, and asks to speak with him privately. Brutha realizes that Vorbis is afraid of him, but isn’t sure what to do with that knowledge. Vorbis shows him the Quisition’s latest tool: a great iron turtle for people to die upon, since they believe the world exists on that back of a turtle. Brutha isn’t sure what bishops are supposed to do, so he goes back to the garden and gets to work. Simony and Urn continue working on their weapons to invade the Citadel, which Vorbis learns about from a man who sells the group iron. Lu-Tze talks to Brutha about accepting his place in this story and learning to make his own wisdom.
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Battle of the Linguist Mages
Didactylos is angry at Urn for creating weapons (this one in the form of a giant turtle, too) insisting that’s not philosophy and can’t make anyone’s lives better. Brutha runs into Urn in the Citadel, and isn’t sure what they’re up to, but he thinks of leaving Omnia. Urn is led into the hydraulics chamber and opens the “solid brass” door with the “breath of god.” He figures out how the whole thing works, so they can open the door when Simony is ready to attack. The plan goes wrong; the hydraulics break and so does the turtle. Brutha returns and sees Vorbis decked out in the Prophet’s regalia. He slaps the man, and is grabbed by the guards; Vorbis orders that he is thrashed and then burned to death. Om has been trekking through the desert, trying to get to the Citadel, but he’s too small to make the journey, and is eventually plucked up by an eagle that intends to make him a meal. Brutha wakes up strapped to the Quisition’s turtle. Om bites the eagle and manages to project his thoughts into its mind and tell it what to do. Urn and Simony see Brutha strapped to the iron turtle, and Urn wants to save him, but Simony thinks they should let this happen; make Brutha a martyr for people to rally behind. Urn tells Simony the true evil of Vorbis is that he makes people like him, which is exactly what Simony is becoming.
Brutha tells Vorbis that what he’s doing is wrong, but Vorbis doesn’t seem to care. Then Brutha begins to hear a voice and knows Om is coming. He tells Vorbis he is going to die and Om gets the eagle to fling him directly between Vorbis’s eyes, killing him. Suddenly, everyone believes in Om, and he decries that Brutha is his Prophet. He burns away the old commandments and asks Brutha what his are, but he can’t think of any straight away. Urn and Simony and Dibbler all offer suggestions. Brutha takes none of them until someone mentions the idea of not killing anyone. Brutha decides that people should not kill each other, and also demands that Om hold with that commandment. Om is furious that Brutha demands anything of him, but he insists that this religion is a bargain. Om claims that Brutha is at his mercy, and Brutha agrees that is true. Om accuses Brutha of using weakness as a weapon, and he does not deny it. He says that Om should bargain with him now in weakness, because it’s better than bargaining with a person from a place of strength. Then he decides to go meet the Ephebians and stop a war from breaking out between their peoples. A dead Vorbis arrives in the desert he must cross before his judgement, but he has nothing to believe in and he feels himself to be alone. He begs Death not to leave him, but of course, Death cannot stay.
Brutha goes to talk to the landed armies of Ephebe and Tsort (primarily), and he tries to surrender to stop the fighting, but Simony and Urn show up with the army and their turtle. Brutha points out to Urn that his invention is now going to be used on his own people, which brings the philosopher up short. Brutha then punches Simony for refusing to listen; he goes to watch the battle with Didactylos. Om goes to the mountain where the major gods of the Disc dwell, and he finds the gods of Ephebe and Tsort—they don’t care about the war, but Om does because he’s spent too much time about people. So he starts a fight with those gods, which causes a storm at ground level, and suddenly the soldiers of every nation break rank to help each other as ships get beached. The gods appear and the war never begins. Later, Brutha tells Didactylos that he should be a bishop for Omnia, thinking that an Ephebian philosopher will be better at running things than priests or soldiers. He puts Simony in charge of the Quisition to dismantle it. And they all agree they have to find something for Urn to do, like irrigation or architecture. Brutha intends to copy out the Library in his head. Lu-Tze heads back to the History Monks, telling the abbot that he may have changed things a bit; Brutha didn’t die and there won’t be a century of warfare. Brutha does eventually die one-hundred years later, and Death brings him to the desert, where he sees the Vorbis has not moved… and these past one-hundred years might have been an eternity to him. Brutha decides to help him across the desert.
Commentary
Is this book taught in any schools? Theology courses? It should be?
Because the thing is, it doesn’t matter if you believe or not, the message is the same, and it comes from Brutha’s revelation:
“That’s why gods die. They never believe in people.”
This is driven home when Om realizes that he doesn’t know what to say to his followers—he needs Brutha to know what to say. And then again in the solution to the war, where everyone lays down arms because people need help.
Whatever you may believe in, it should be people. Not because they’re fundamentally good or fundamentally anything at all, but because people are what you’ve got. The gods aren’t doing anything… unless they’re like Om and they’ve spent too much time around people, enough to think like them. That’s the only reason this plays out the way it does. The best outcomes occur when people care about one another and believe in each other. Even (especially) when they appear to be at odds.
Look, not to be like ‘this book is extremely Jewish in its reasoning’ because I know I’m biased here, but… the one aspect of Jewish faith that I could always get behind is the fact that the afterlife isn’t really a factor. You’re not doing things to get rewarded; you’re doing them because you’re here now. Which happens to be what the gods say to all these people after the fight never comes to pass:
I. This is Not a Game.
II. Here and Now, You are Alive.
You’re not playing a game with prizes at the end, you’re alive. Seek because of that, think because of that. Act because of that.
This books manages to take so many deeply ingrained lessons in both faith and philosophy and distill them down to their simplest forms. Urn not recognizing that any weapon will eventually be adapted and used against the people you meant to protect in creating it; Simony’s inability to see any way out of a bad situation that doesn’t involve war; the acknowledgement that an assortment of religions shouldn’t threaten anyone’s faith (unless said religion is doing a pretty poor job of things); Brutha “weaponizing” weakness in his rebuilding of the faith because faith and philosophy—when done well—should concern themselves with caring for and empowering the weakest among us.
What also impresses me about this book is the fact that Pratchett gives Vorbis the fate he deserves… and then still finds a way to show him compassion at the very end. So as a reader, we can feel the satisfaction that there was some comeuppance to his horrible actions (the story tells us that he will have a lasting impact because people like this do, and it’s important to reckon with the cost they levy upon the world), but we can also conduct ourselves with compassion through Brutha’s actions. We’re being gently guided toward the better nature.
The only thing about this book that gets me a little irritated is the lack of female characters. Not for parity’s sake (the last book was almost entirely female characters anyhow), but for the subject matter. Women are commonly left out of discussions on religion and philosophy (and war, for that matter). That’s a bug, not a feature, and while I can see the argument in making all the characters male for critiquing their place in those systems, it feels like there’s a bit missing from the overall discourse this story is addressing. That said, it’s a minor quibble when set alongside what this particular tome achieves.
Asides and little thoughts:
- Okay, but Om grabs that eagle by the balls, only birds don’t have those so…
- Thinking about Lu-Tze’s accent on the page; it shows up when he talks to Brutha, but not when he talks to the abbot, and I’m super curious about whether this is a language difference (presumably he’s speaking a different one to the abbot) or a deliberate choice on his part. Pratchett at least doesn’t go for comedy with the accent, and writes it simply by removing certain words.
- I’ve always taken extreme issue with Sartre’s infamous “Hell is other people” quote, and Death telling Vorbis that he’s about to find out it’s the opposite is just… perfection. As a person who doesn’t handle loneliness well, this particular punishment is horrifying to me on a molecular level. Death is right.
Pratchettisms:
They went out into the desert but did not come back, preferring a hermit’s life of dirt and hardship and dirt and holy contemplation and dirt.
There was a chorus of nervous laughs, such as there always is from people who owe their jobs and possibly their lives to the whim of the person who has just cracked the not very amusing line.
Brutha tried to nod, and thought: I’m on everyone’s side. It’d be nice if, just for once, someone was on mine.
Bishops move diagonally. That’s why they often turn up where kings don’t expect them to be.
Probably the last man who knew how it worked had been tortured to death years before. Or as soon as it was installed. Killing the creator was a traditional method of patent-protection.
Give anyone a lever long enough and they can change the world. It’s unreliable levers that are the problem.
Don’t put your faith in gods. But you can believe in turtles.
And style? If the gods of the Discworld were people they would think that three plaster ducks is a bit avant-garde.
If he focused on the tiny glittering dome on top of the tiny Cori Celesti, he would undoubtedly see himself, looking down on an even smaller model… and soon, down to the point where the universe coiled up like the tail of an ammonite, a kind of creature that lived millions of years ago and never believed in any gods at all…
Next week we’re heading into Lords and Ladies! We’ll read up to:
“Er. Diamanda says you don’t understand, she says they won’t be trying to outstare one another…”
My first Pratchett book and I’ve been absolutely in love with him since then. His words have gotten me through some incredibly tough times and I’m so sad I’ll never get to meet him.
@0 one correction – eagles don’t have testicles (balls) but they do have testes (which haven’t descended) in their cloaca and I suspect Om’s grabbing it would hurt significantly.
@1:
Terry’s death was a blow to us all. But perhaps the Pharaohs were right in that they continued to live as long as their name was said.
Terry is, in that sense, alive and well in his books and you can get to know him there.
Thinking about Lu-Tze’s accent on the page; it shows up when he talks to Brutha, but not when he talks to the abbot, and I’m super curious about whether this is a language difference (presumably he’s speaking a different one to the abbot) or a deliberate choice on his part. Pratchett at least doesn’t go for comedy with the accent, and writes it simply by removing certain words.
I personally take it that Lu-Tze can speak Omnian perfectly well; his accent is part of his act to make himself overlooked.
Look, not to to be like ‘this book is extremely Jewish in its reasoning’ because I know I’m biased here, but… the one aspect of Jewish faith that I could always get behind is the fact that the afterlife isn’t really a factor. You’re not doing things to get rewarded; you’re doing them because you’re here now.
I’d quibble with that- Judaism does believe in an afterlife with reward and punishment- but it is true that that’s not what it’s focused on. The afterlife is God’s responsibility, and, as Pratchett would put it, it all probably works out in the end somehow; humans living in this world are supposed to focus on what they can do in the here and now.
Correction: Brutha doesn’t actually hit Vorbis, but he does come close.
Brutha’s mind gave up, and Brutha’s body took over. It brought his hand back and raised it, oblivious to the sudden rush forward of the guards.
He saw Vorbis turn his cheek, and smile.
Brutha stopped, and lowered his hand.
He said, “No, I won’t.”
I feel like the “turtle to the head” moment is a moment of understood genius, and an example of Pratchett’s often brilliant ending story writing.
Not only is it a well deserved and ironic end, and brings Om back to the beginning of the story, it also neatly cements why everyone suddenly believes in Om, and Brutha as his prophet. A prophet who gets smote from the sky via errant turtle while executing someone for turtle-related philosophies is one who, to his audience, has just received profound and hard to miss deific course correction. In universe, it comes off as a very memorable (and appropriately sarcastic) story, that likely got around very, very rapidly afterwards.
IIRC, one of the ancient Greek tragidians was killed by a falling turtle dropped by a seagull. Just another layer to the humor.
Scenes I loved.
Om bursting through the gates of Dunmanifestin and showing the gods what the Wrath of God can be.
Fasta Benj showing up by accident, discovering that fire makes fish taste better, learning about metal, and about war (“Remember when Pacha Moj hit his uncle with big rock? Like that, only more worse.”). Plus his god, the newt P’Tang-P’Tang, talking with Om.
The essence of religious ethics.
Om must abide by the same laws that his believers have to (for 100 years).
The most depressing thing.
Utopias, whether it’s Brutha’s Omnia, Arthur’s Camelot, Atlantis, Yahweh’s Eden, or any others, never last forever.
@@.-@: It depends on which part of the texts you look at. Originally the dead person would be sent to Sheol where, as Psalms 146:4 says – “His breath goes out, he returns to the earth; in that very day his thoughts perish.”
Later, possibly influenced by other religions or by developing messianic tendencies, rewards in the afterlife were created.
Great write up bar that Brutha expressly didn’t hit Vorbis. You should publish some of these on the original L-Space. There are some fantastic essays and write ups there far more in-depth than fandom.
https://www.lspace.org/main.html
@8 – Thanks for reminding me of that scene, when P’Tang P’tang told Om the number of his followers and asked if that was a lot. Om’s answer reminded me of the parable of the good shepherd, which underlines the pastoral ambience of Omnianism.
XVII. You Can’t Use Weakness As A Weapon.
“It’s the only one I’ve got.”
Dormammu, I’ve come to bargain.
He wasn’t sure why lots of people would want to hit Pacha Moj’s uncle with a big rock, but it definitely escalated the pace of technological progress
is still one of my favourite lines.
@5, @10: just so — it’s striking that the mob so believes in Vorbis that he can sentence someone who has done nothing at all. Brutha OTOH isn’t a saint, but he’s a decent human being (in all the ways Vorbis isn’t) right through to the end of the book. ISTM that a recurring theme in Pratchett is that it’s possible to behave sanely, and well, even in the midst of craziness.
It’s fitting that after pulling in great swathes of ancient cultures, Pratchett throws in handful on handful of mostly-recent references, e.g. “I don’t know what effect it’s going to have on the enemy, he thought, but it scares the hells out of me.”
One wonders how the sloppy, uninvolved gods who are most of the population of Cori Celesti survive, when being short of believers weakens a god. Maybe enough people scattered over the rest of the Disc having some trivial bit of belief (where nobody else in Omnia believes at all) is enough to sustain them?
@13: Brutha may not be a saint but I see him as a martyr in the afterlife. Having dragged Vorbis across the desert so that he could be tried by the church, which never happens, our last image of him is dragging the soul of Vorbis across the black sands of the afterlife toward the final judgment that Omnianism believes in. It is a sad image for a sad religion.
As far as Om and the other gods, after this book they all still seem to have a core of believers. Some are country based, like Klatch’s Offler, others are nature based, like Blind Io the thunder god. They have believers but the worship of them is sporadic, more of a Pascal’s Wager – i.e. couldn’t hurt, might help.
Women are commonly left out of discussions on religion and philosophy.
An odd thing to say. Women played a huge role in the spread of Christianity and centuries later of Protestantism during the Reformation, except for the ones who stubbornly defended Catholicism. Historically religion has been enormously important to women and something they get very involved with, hence the efforts to limit their influence.
A Mark Reads commenter joked that Om obviously bit “a rare species of Balled Eagle.”
Brutha’s (nearly-)dying thoughts echo Om’s from earlier in the book: “I’m on my back and getting hotter, and I’m going to die.”
I especially enjoy Fasta Benj. And the whole scene where he and the Ephebean and Tsortean soldiers are helping each other.
It would be nice if wars could be abruptly stopped by divine (or human) intervention in our world. Wish-fulfillment fantasy, Discworld style. I’ve gotten more bitter toward fictional happy endings at this scale (A Song of Ice and Fire has long been my escapist comfort reading), but tney are what they are.
Pratchettisms:
This was the trouble with last nights. They were always followed by this mornings.
“I think you should do things because they’re right, not because gods say so. They might say something different another time.”
Call-backs:
In Sourcery, Death says he dislikes chess because he can never remember how the horse-shaped pieces move. Here he plays chess with the Abbott of the History Monks, and says the same thing.
Earlier in this book, Om wanted Brutha to stove in Vorbis’s head. Turns out Om did the job himself.
Looking ahead:
We’ll never again visit Ephebe. We’ll also never again visit Omnia, though we’ll meet more Omnians. At least one of them will notably wear the type of turtle-shaped brooch that Cut-Me-Own-Hand-Off Dhblah got Om’s formal permission to create.
St. Elmo’s fire is sometimes called “St. Ungulant’s fire” in Discworld. We’re never told why a marine phenomenon is named after someone who lived far inland when we met him.
A cornucopia will, again, get consequentially hurled down from the sky. It’s apparently the same cornucopia both times, being a unique object with a hilariously weird backstory as told in Wintersmith: “According to Chaffinch, the god Blind Io created the Cornucopia from a horn of the magical goat Almeg to feed his two children by the goddess Bissonomy, who was later turned into a shower of oysters by the goddess Epidity, the god of things shaped like potatoes, after insulting Resonata, goddess of weasels, by throwing a mole at her shadow.”
ISTM that the quote about doing things because they’re right contains a callback to Good Omens; when ?Metatron? says “it is written” that there must be a final conflict, the pair ask ~”Are you sure something else isn’t written somewhere else?” “In larger type?” — and then jeer at it for claiming God doesn’t mess with His faithful.
@15: “Women are commonly left out of discussions on religion and philosophy.”
You are correct that women played an influential role in the christian church. But the moderator is spot on that they played almost no role in discussions on religion and philosophy.
It was men who made Mary a perpetual virgin to downplay the rest of the family of Jesus. Men made Mary Magdalene a prostitute to demean her and erase her closeness to Jesus. Men who wrote Phoebe, whom Paul names as a church leader and specifically as a deacon, along with other women who Paul names as church leaders, out of the church hierarchy.
@18, yes. Like I said there’s a definite attempt to limit women’s involvement, which somehow never quite works. For Example Mary Magdalene was one of the most popular saints of the middle ages precisely because she was depicted as a sinner who didn’t just reform but achieved high status in the eyes of the Lord. Mary is the first of Jesus’ followers to see him after he rises and she announces the fact to the apostles. And of course the Virgin Mary became practically a co-divinity.
I have a textual question, regarding the scene where Urn is tired in the forge.
Lu-Tze caught him [Urn] carefully and steered him to a seat on a heap of charcoal. Then he went and watched the forge for a while. The bar of steel was glowing in the mold. He poured a bucket of cold water over it, watched the great cloud of steam spread and disperse, and then put his broom over his shoulder and ran away hurriedly.
What is Lu-Tze doing here and why?
Ruining a control lever for the tank (war turtle) being built for use against Omnia; we see later that the lever breaks in ?Sergeant Simony’s? hand, stopping the tank (and therefore some useless carnage).
Got it, thanks.
@22: As a fan of the TV show Forged in Fire, once you forge steel you need to cool it down by quenching it in a liquid. If it’s too hot and you cool it too fast as Lu-Tse did, it becomes very brittle and cracks easily.
@16 And wanting to stay a Balled Eagle.
@13 You may recall the Soviet joke (I suppose from another theocracy) about the man who arrived at a concentration camp claiming to have been sentenced to five years for nothing at all:
“Liar! For Nothing At All the sentence is ten years!”
@7, yes, it was Aeschylus. According to Wikipedia:
@26 – I wonder sometimes if this wasn’t some sort of slander put about Aeschylus. Lammergeiers and vultures have very good eyesight and would be unlikely to mistake a bald head for a rock. But saying that someone’s bald head is is so like a rock that a keen-eyed bird would mistake it for one is the sort of insult that one encounters in the Classical literature.
@27. Possibly. It’s also possible that it was done to attract attention. The Wikipedia article on Valerius Maximus makes it sound like he writes clickbait: