The Royal Institute of History, Culture, Religion & Philosophy
Barzakh university
oN THE metaphysics of sovereignty
Of all humanity's pursuits in the way of wealth, fame, fortune and power, none has forsaken innocent life more than that which we call sovereignty: the divinely inspired power to rule.
For many of us, life is not lived at the whims of fanciful autonomy, but at the behest of esteemed rulers, those who bring with them that which abates uncertainty and grants ease to our restless, weary hearts. It is when our revered Autarch speaks that His commanding tone reverberates as a timeless echo through history, expertly weaving centuries of unspoken wisdom into a single moment of pure, unadulterated clarity. In His presence, we are provided the counsel of both a wise sage and a caring father; one who has seen, experienced and somehow survived that which no mortal should bear witness to. It is He, esteemed ever is our Autarch, who has beheld the very nature of all that is True, and it is He that comes to share this benevolent message with the penitent among us.
In exchange for this, our beloved Autarch asks — demands — that we submit to His benevolent will and discretion; that we offer up words of supplication and reverence, lest we are led astray by whim, desire, and the hollow comforts of platitude. We are glad to offer up our wealth and our servitude, for the alternative — staring deep into the surreptitious void that is our world — is much too frightening. There is, as is expected, something terribly comforting about submitting one's will to the urges of a descendant of divinely inspired royalty.
Yet, I ask you to consider this carefully: is this not the domain of the Divine? How is it that we have come to revere mere mortals as though they are gods, capable of embodying Divine Will? How is it that we, transient mortals, have become the conduits of that which is meant to be holy?
Perhaps it is because the Wise Lord, in His timeless, transient, and eternal wisdom, has anointed those of royal blood as His avatars. Under the guise of divine inspiration, they impress upon our world abstract borders — crude lines on maps that define and legitimise their rule over vast swathes of land. From these borders arise armies — soldiers, smiths, farmers, fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, and, in exceedingly dire circumstances, children — who swear oaths to protect these dominions with their very lives. In times of struggle and strife, submission to the Autarch is that which protects the domain from assailants; in times of conquest, we are told that our efforts are merely fulfilling the divine edict — that is, expanding His rule — that the Lord has willed.
I say, to those of us who have surveyed the nature of the Divine made manifest, the mind struggles to ascribe temporality, transience and corporeal impermanence to that which transcends time, space and all that it contains. Put simply, the Lord is eternal, everywhere and nowhere, and yet His 'avatars' are as transient and bound to the rules of the physical realm as we are. When asked to defy the limits of their mortal constraints, we witness no miracles of divine origin, but are instead labelled as dissidents and unbelievers. When we query wisdom with logic, we are warned that reason alone cannot yield absolute truth — only the illusion of agency amidst the vast planes of uncertainty. We are told that our expressions of shaky faith are whispers of the Accursed One; and that we know very little compared to all there is to know, and so we would do best to abandon lines of ignorant inquiry, lest we concede our thrones of gold and streams of honey in the life beyond the veil. To be clear, we must relinquish that which we hold dearest, our lives and our loved ones, else our fates and destinies are forfeit.
To what end, I ask. Until what end? Will we spill innocent life in the service of brutal conquest for the rest of time?
Perhaps the answer to this quandary, then, is not to submit to the idea that some cryptic wisdom only known by the Royals justifies their rule. I, in my ardent, scholarly scepticism, believe the truth to be much simpler. Those who are truly penitent among us recite: "dahishn az ī ow ēwān ast", Sovereignty belongs to He alone, each and every supplication. Let me be clear: our rulers are inspired — not by divine, cosmological edicts that have taken a predilection for a specific bloodline, but rather by the thirst for dominion over abstract nations that are conceived in hubris, ego, and the all too human lust for power and dominion. And yet, the cruelest irony is this: the vast majority of us were never seeking dominion — only peace to enjoy what little time we have left.