Balance of Power by Stableford Brian

Author:Stableford, Brian [Stableford, Brian]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction, Space Opera, sci-fi, space travel, arthur c. clarke
ISBN: 9781434449641
Publisher: Ingram Distribution
Published: 2012-01-31T13:00:00+00:00

There was one thing in his favor that I put down to sheer good fortune. It was true that he had arrived in Ak’lehr at an opportune moment in terms of historical development, but at any stage he would still have had a great deal to offer in terms of technological know-how. The thing that really allowed him to assume a position of such influence, and which allowed him to apply what he knew directly to the social world of the Ore’l, was the nature of Ak’lehrian theology. Had the church which found him and took him in been an anti-materialistic salvation religion with a rigid dogma and table of laws Verheyden would have stood no chance of gaining any influence over the history of the empire. He would almost certainly have been perceived as dangerous and destroyed. But the church which he found had become organized only recently. It had not yet rigidified around a body of dogma. It had cooperated in—and had been a major factor in encouraging—the beginning of civilization and the years of plenty which had come from progress in mastery of the environment.

The Ak’lehrians had one god, but were not precisely monotheistic. Other tribes and cultures had other gods, they knew, and they did not assume either that these gods were false or were their own worshipped under another name. They merely held that their god was the best god, and that this superiority would be proved by the benefits which he bestowed upon his people. These benefits were easy enough to see. As Ak’lehr extended its dominion by conquest the priests followed the armies, and pointed out to the defeated tribes how much more there was to be gained from worshipping the Ak’lehrian way. It was an offer that was hard to refuse, especially as the army encouraged conversion in a number of unsubtle ways. Ak’lehr had its fair share of the poor and the desperate, but there were always other peoples—real and imaginary—which could be cited by the priests as evidence that the Ak’lehrian poor were far better off than they might otherwise be. (And, in any case, it was the rich who really supported the church—and they were obviously reaping the rewards of god’s favor).

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