(This post contains spoilers for various novels and the background in general - you have been warned!)
In the Imperium of Man, the Emperor is worshipped as nothing less than a god, and no other form of worship (or even atheism) is permitted. But we know from the 'Horus Heresy' novels and background this was not always the case and - more significantly - during his lifetime the Emperor advanced an atheistic policy called the Imperial Truth which specifically denied his divinity (along with denying the existence of gods and supernaturalism in general).
However, when trying to persuade Horus to betray the Imperium during the vision in the Serpent Lodge on Davin (detailed in "False Gods"), the Word Bearer Chaplain Erebus claimed the Emperor has actually encouraged worship by his actions during the Great Crusade (and earlier). Erebus goes on to say the Emperor is planning to abandon the Astartes, retire to Terra and ascend to godhood (whatever that might actually mean - a separate problem I will tackle in a later post!)
This is what I am talking about when I ask if Erebus was right; the simple claim the Emperor encouraged worship and / or people to think of him as a god (for the purposes of this essay, I am defining the two as each other - we don't have a consistent definition for worship, godhood, divinity etc. in 40K, but I think we "know it when we see it"). I am not addressing the question of whether or not the Emperor is a god (that is the follow-up post "Was Lorgar right?") It is obvious Erebus was not telling Horus the full truth in the Serpent Lodge vision (but it is not obvious if that is because Erebus was deliberately lying or if Erebus himself was deceived by the powers of Chaos). I am not concerned with that - I am simply asking if, objectively, the statement the Emperor encouraged worship is an accurate one, regardless of whether or not Erebus thought he was lying when he made it.
I submit that, despite his promotion of the Imperial Truth and all the times he decries worship and supernaturalism, the Emperor did encourage others to see him as a god. I am aware this may be an unpopular opinion (the general opinion among the fandom is that the Emperor was the perfect atheist and that belief in his divinity represented a complete break with his intentions and actions). My thesis is that the Emperor presented himself in a manner which he knew (or could reasonably suppose) would lead to people thinking he was a god.
Astute readers will notice I have made an assertion some may not agree with; namely, that taking actions one would reasonably suppose would lead to a conclusion is the same as taking actions which deliberately lead to that conclusion.
I would call this the "what did you think would happen?" argument. If a man, for example, sends a dozen red roses to a woman on Valentine's Day, he should not be surprised if she thinks he has a romantic interest in her. It would be even more reasonable to presume romantic interest if he wrote poems extoling her beauty, sent her other gifts, and invited her on dates. It would be unreasonable for the man to claim he did not intend the woman to think he had romantic interest; he is acting like a man romantically interested in her.
It would be even more unreasonable for him to claim he did not intend to convey romantic interest if the woman wanted it; a man sending roses to a woman who has a crush on him must reasonably expect her to think he is interested in her.
Of course, this scenario presumes the man is aware of what his gestures mean; if he comes from a culture where the giving of red roses has nothing to do with romance and poems are written for trivial reasons etc. and he is ignorant of their meaning to the woman then it is reasonable to assume he intends no romantic affection. It doesn't matter what the woman thinks - if the man making the gesture has no idea they are common romantic gestures, he does not intend to convey romance. But, of course, if a man from a foreign culture knows what the gestures mean in the woman's culture (even though they don't mean it in his) and still choses to make those gestures, it is reasonable to think he has romantic interest.
Naturally, all of this assumes the man is not only culturally aware but that he is also intelligent. Just as an ignorant man might innocently make a gesture which conveys a meaning he did not intend, so might an unintelligent man.
But, if a man is aware of the symbolism of his actions and is intelligent enough to realize how they will be taken, one can assume he intends that conclusion to be drawn. If he publicly professes the exact opposite ("I have no interest in her, sir!") and throws up his hands in innocence and amazement people could conclude such a thing, yet acts in a manner which suggests the exact opposite and is clearly intelligent and educated enough to know it, we would not presume innocence or accident. We would presume reverse psychology.
Our example has used romance, but it can easily be applied to the Emperor. First, let's look at his actions.
First and foremost, it must be admitted the Emperor's actions, behavior, and appearance (it is strongly implied - particularly in "The Last Church" and "Master of Mankind" - the Emperor can control how he appears to others) lead people to believe he is a god and worship him. Lorgar wrote the Lectitio Divinatus and others followed the cult for a reason. Whatever he intended, people thought he was a god and should be worshipped.
The question is; did he do something which caused that, or did people just assume he was a god because he was ageless, charismatic and powerful?
He (at the very least) permitted and (probably) encouraged people to use the phrase "beloved by all" after his name. This appears from the first in the "Horus Heresy" novels, and is used not only by adherents of the Lectitio Divinatus cult, but also followers of the Imperial Truth. This sort of phrase is only found in religious contexts, especially with the official, required status it seems to have. At the start of the "Horus Heresy" novels, the Emperor has only left the Crusade recently but the phrase does not seem something new or novel. The Emperor must have been aware of its use. The fact he permitted the phrase is perhaps not indicative of him wanting to be thought of as divine, but the fact he did not suppress it certainly suggests it. He demands atheism but permits (and probably requires) an honorific for himself. Doth the gentleman protest too much?
In the short story "The Last Church" the Emperor preaches absolute atheism and offers a rational explanation for everything the priest uses as evidence of the divine, including a vision of a golden figure many decades before. This vision is the foundation of the priest's entire faith, and came after a battle against the Emperor's Thunder Warriors. At the climax of the story, the Emperor reveals himself in glory to the priest - and the priest recognizes the light and the golden figure of the Emperor as the same one he saw. It is strongly implied the Emperor was the source of the vision and, even if he were not, he chooses to reveal himself in a manner which exactly matches the priest's vision. The Emperor said it was emotion and stress which make the priest hallucinate, but now either it was him who gave the vision or he chooses to perfectly replicate it. Causing a vision or perfectly mimicking it are actions one would expect to inspire devotion.
We learn in "The First Heretic" the Emperor, after learning Lorgar was worshipping him and erecting glorious temples to him, censures the Word Bearers. He does this by destroying their holy city but also forces the entire Legion to kneel before him with his psychic power. Let that sink in; the being you consider to be a god forces you to kneel before him. Kneeling is a traditional posture of reverence to the divine - people kneel when praying or at religious services. It is a symbolic act of submission, and the Emperor forces it on the Word Bearers against their will - revealing he not only desires their submission, but will remove their free will to get it. A tyrant might demand someone bend the knee on pain of death - but a god would simply force the action.
In "Master of Mankind", the Emperor is consistently referred to using the capitalized pronoun "He". This is a traditional way of referring to God in Christian cultures (and deities in general elsewhere). Because the novel is written by and for traditionally Christian cultures (the Anglosphere) it is reasonable to assume this is intended to convey a belief in his divinity. With the exception of the "flashback" scene where the Emperor shows himself as a boy to Ra via psychic vision, this is consistent. It appears in dialog and narrative, even dialog and narrative from people who officially deny the divinity of the Emperor (so it cannot be said these people are adherents of the Imperial Cult in defiance of the Imperial Truth). Much of the novel has these characters speaking with the Emperor inside psychic visions, communication which the Emperor specifically identifies as not taking place with auditory language. The Emperor and Ra are not "speaking" to each other - Ra is being made aware of the Emperor's thoughts and the Emperor is, obviously, aware of Ra's. The distinction between 'he' and 'He" isn't obvious to our ears, but it would be to Emperor's psychic power. At no point does the Emperor say "stop thinking of me as 'He', you faith-filled loony". He lets Ra (and others, presumably) use a pronoun which has been used for the divine - something in complete defiance of his Imperial Truth.
In "Mechanicum" it is revealed the Emperor repairs a fallen Knight with but a touch - something which the Mechanicum take as a sign of his divinity. It is hard to argue this is an innocent action - if the Emperor wished to establish his technological credentials he could have done so by repairing the machine (or giving instructions on how to do so). Instead, he performs what the Mechanicum regard as a miracle. It is reasonable to assume he would have known how this action would be understood - he must have had intelligence on Mars and the cult that ruled it. It can certainly be argued the Emperor saw no other way to gain the Mechanicum's allegiance - that military defeat would be too costly or even impossible, and that using their religion gave the surest chance of success. But that actually makes the case even better; the Emperor deliberately encouraged worship to secure their loyalty. To explain why a thing is does not argue that a thing is not - in fact, it is quite the opposite.
The Emperor called his mission to unite the stars "The Great Crusade" - while clearly this (English) title is a translation of whatever it was called in High Gothic, the word chosen is one with (at the very least) religious overtones. When secular governments announce initiatives to combat social ills, they do not often use religious language (it is the "war on drugs" or the "war on poverty" not the "crusade against drugs" or "the crusade against poverty"). Even religious organizations today rarely use the word "crusade" for their initiatives; only the most strident, hard-line groups do that. The Emperor had already undertaken the Unification Wars (not Crusade) and it would have been easy to give a similar name to the galactic version of what he'd already done on Terra. The Emperor was casting his secular philosophy and government in a religious mode from the moment the armies left Terra.
In older background materials (such as the Realm of Chaos books) it is (at the very least) strongly implied the Emperor founded (or at least was the inspiration for) various cults and religions on Old Earth. The official lore seems to have backed off from that now (it has not been recently mentioned to the best of my knowledge) but it was certainly there before. A man who founds religions is not a man who has always promoted atheism - which means Erebus' claim is right.
(A tangential point which must be mentioned - the Imperial Truth is no such thing, and the Emperor knew it. He was well-aware of the nature of the Warp, he'd trafficked with the Chaos gods on Molech to obtain Warp powers. He knew the "supernatural" existed and he actively lied about it (in "Horus Rising", Horus - the Warmaster, his favored son! - appears completely ignorant of the nature of the Warp when soothing his concerned legionnaire about his experience in the Whisperheads, and Eldrad is aghast Fulgrim does not know about Chaos in "Fulgrim"). This does not, of course, speak directly to the Emperor promoting his own divinity and he may have had many reasons for obfuscating, but it reveals a track-record of lying about the supernatural.)
The vast majority of these datapoints rely on the "what did you think would happen?" argument - namely, that the Emperor might not have explicitly intended to encourage worship, but that his actions would be reasonably assumed (by an intelligent, culturally-aware individual) to lead to that conclusion. The question isn't if the Emperor was a god, or if the Emperor thought he was a god - the question is; did the Emperor take actions likely to make believe that?
And, if he did, why didn't he stop if he so wanted to promote atheism?
There are (if we allow the "what did you think would happen?" argument - an argument which, in its basic form, is allowed in current law) only three possible reasons why he did not stop.
1) He was unintelligent
2) He was culturally-unaware
3) He wanted people to think he was a god
While there is a strong cottage-industry in the fandom (and even in canon - Roboute Guilliman calls him a "terrible father") of pointing out the Emperor was deeply-flawed when it came to human interaction, he was clearly not stupid (he is described as brilliant and his various creations and projects reveal that) and he was not culturally-unaware. The Unification Wars and Great Crusade (which he led) were, in the main, military campaigns but they contained diplomatic elements (such as the unification of Old Albia) which demonstrated cultural-awareness. He is certainly guilty of sometimes failing to predict how people might react in situations which seem obvious in hindsight - the classic examples are the various traitor Primarchs who fell to Chaos / betrayed him because of mistreatment, lack of compassion etc. However, the lore is carefully written so there are no absolute good guys or bad guys - meaning that while it is possible to find a Primarch's betrayal reasonable, it is also possible to find a Primarch's betrayal unreasonable, and even ridiculous or histrionic. In short; the Emperor was not perfect but neither was he a complete dolt when it came to human interaction.
He would also have been aware of the human need to worship something larger than oneself; a lot of the lore seems to suggest the Emperor himself had a blind-spot when it came to this - that he (being so wise, powerful and perceptive) could not conceive of this human need - but the notion he was completely lacking in empathy (meaning to appreciate another might think differently) is hard to swallow. Empathy is a central component in getting people to do what you want - you have to predict how they might act, understand if not agree with their motivations, beliefs and desires. While (as mentioned above) the Emperor failed to empathize with half of his sons, he empathized with the other half just fine . . . as well as many, many millions (billions? trillions?) of humans. He knew humanity was receptive to his actions - just as the woman with a crush on a guy is receptive to any gesture of affection he might give her. A sensible person - knowing someone has a crush or a species is seeking the divine - proceeds with caution . . . unless he wants a particular conclusion to be drawn.
Taking that into consideration, I think it is reasonable to assume a man of the Emperor's intellect, cultural-awareness (even if we discard his origin story as being born in 7000BC or thereabouts, he was extant for centuries if not millennia during the Unification Wars and Great Crusade and so was not completely naïve), not to mention psychic power (which would allow him to read minds), would have known how his actions would be interpreted. He was neither unintelligent or culturally-unaware. The only possible conclusion (following Sherlock Holmes' maxim) is that - despite his promulgation of the Imperial Truth - he wanted people to think he was a god.
Seriously; I genuinely think this is the only reasonable conclusion. I can't see any argument against it unless we presume the Emperor was a complete dolt . . . something which, I think, we have to honestly say he wasn't.
Change my mind in the comments :)
=][= Danforth Laertes
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