Zaffa the Idiot

The Honest Liar, the Empirical Poet, the Great Splitter of Hairs

"Every particle of this universe contains the whole of the universe."

—The Curated Reflections of Zaffa the Idiot

Zaffa the Idiot is a Material demigod of philology, cosmology, true falsehoods, imaginary realities and possible impossibilities. In mortal life, he was a First Age philosopher, theoretical physicist, wandering poet and argumentative pedant whose true identity has been the subject of libraries of debate.

Though Zaffa wrote and spoke a great deal about many subjects, he is arguably most famous for his arguments about the infiniteness of reality in all directions: large and small, out and in, straight or cyclical. He argued vehemently that Waking Materia was not some isolated universe within a largely empty multiverse, but simply "a forest adjacent to plains and rivers and mountains," implying that there is no true separation between these dimensional ecosystems and furthermore that non-material realms are just as much "alive", in their own way, as the planes.

Although Zaffa has not been confirmably heard from since Antiquity, he is not thought to be a deceased or otherwise lost god like Solonn, Gavvan Grimbold or Olcadan of Dhund. Gods in this position are sometimes called "Silent" Gods: they dispense divine quintessence to clerics and mortal swords, but mortals do not hear from them, which is another way of saying they do not have oracles.

Zaffa the Idiot's alignment is Chaotic Neutral.

Appearance & Heraldry

See also: Zaffa the Idiot Image Gallery (External)

Worship

"No one, not a single one of us, experiences True Reality as a whole. Instead we tunnel through it as narrowly and efficiently as possible, and and the end of the day we are satisfied with these tunnel-worlds because what we truly value is forward movement, not True Experience."

—The Curated Reflections of Zaffa the Idiot

The Honest Liar has some lingering worshippers among scholars and artists, mainly in Khayyam, Jura and Nurin, though they are now curiosities in the Third Age, when they were once celebrities in the First.

The Conciliat Panharmonica

The writings of Zaffa bear an astounding similarity to the operations of the Order of the Clock Tower, an arm of Jura's governing Conciliat Panharmonica. The Clock Tower's maxim, "As above, so below", is a direct encapsulation of The Idiot's ideas about the endlessness and sameness of the universe at all scales. They're similarly guided by more-or-less Zaffic notions of causality: the ability for a gust of wind to eventually cascade into a tidal wave or a single assassination to end in multiplanar war.

Domains

Zaffa's primary Domain is Knowledge. His secondary domains are Truth, Creation, Luck, Cities and Kung Fu.

Favoured Weapon

Zaffa's favoured weapons are the nine-ringed temple sword and unarmed/Kung Fu. His Relic sword is known as Hairsplitter. He is a Divine Grandmaster of Voidmind style kung fu, alongside the great proto-Maraian hero Hanaviri-no-Kishiki. It is not known what other connections, if any, these two deities have.

Identity

Zaffa's true identity was hotly debated in the Late First Age. Many hold he was an avatar of an existing god; perhaps Jabberwock's idea of entertainment, or perhaps the avatar of a rival Lichlord to God-Emperor Ina'ut (Zaffa, who was ostensibly Alanthian, had a habit of antagonizing Ina'ut's holy ishka'ari halberdiers and tsuna'am wizards). Others posit he was Lichlord Nef in the flesh, as Zaffa's appearance about coincided with the disappearance of Nef from New Rozsan politics.

Relationship with the Tiam-Anzu

Zaffa was occasionally called Zafathasura Dragonsbane due to his vicious distrust of the God-Queen and Emissary of the Tiam-Anzu, Tallari-Anaviri-Irallat, despite their counsel being near-universally regarded as useful. This title was likely half-mocking, as he was not known to have fought (let alone slain) any of the intelligent, feathered dragons; they were just a common target of his invective poetry. Oddly though, he seems to have been a respecter if not outright worshipper of a different Draconic God, the Duskscape Regent of insanity and theoretics Jabberwock. Indeed, his divine quintessence as a demigod bears a similar flavour to the Laughing Master's.

Ironically, despite Zaffa's anti-draconic politics, followers of The Idiot and Tallari were the two primary schools that expounded on the Layer Model of multidimensional cosmology, as well as describing the "great nothing" of what he calls "Pandæmonium", which surrounds the Known Universe.

Zaffa the Idiot

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Godhood
Ascendant, Material
Alignment
CN
Domains
Truth, Knowledge, Creation, Luck, Cities and Kung Fu
Favoured Weapon
Ringed Temple Sword
Relic Weapon
Hairsplitter

Banner Art Credit: Joao Bragato

Profile: Zaffa dressed as an Alanthian noble. Alanthan'aravaut was a very colour-coded society: the higher the number of patterns and colours, the higher one's social rank.
Illus. Yoshitaka Amano