Gephqua
From Gephqua
Name: Gephqua
Home World:Gephquan
Language: Gephquanese
"The Gephqua" or "The Gephquanese People"
Physiology and Development: The Gephqua are bipedal, humanoidal people descended from a frog-like ancestor. Endothermic, smooth blue-green skin, large eyes. Omnivorous. While generally shorter than the average human, and physically weaker, Gephqua are much more agile and generally more energetic than humans, with a slightly higher metabolism, thus Gephqua on average must consume more food and water than the average human..
Gephqua females most often only bear one young from one eggs, but occasionally identical twins (from the same egg) or fraternal twins (two fertilized eggs) are born. After copulation the female gestates the egg for about three months, after which she lays the egg which she keeps it incubated. Special clothing and a specially made artificial pouch has allowed Gephqua females (and males) to move about with the egg safely nestled against the mother’s (or father’s) belly; though often while in the home the mother will sleep with the egg, incubating it, usually in a special nesting-room; while traditionally the role of incubator has fallen to the mother, it has been common for the eldest daughter to help in the incubation process; more recently fathers and older sons have been encouraged to take part in the incubation process as part of the growing sense of sexual equality in Gephqua society. In modern times specially constructed incubating units are available to help monitor and babysit the egg at home, more expensive units are linked to a cell network which call a portable communication device (like a cell phone) indicating to the parent that the egg is hatching should they be away from home at thetime of hatching. It takes approximately five months between egg-laying and hatching, for a total gestation of approximately eight months.
A newborn Gephqu is known as a hatchling, the hatchling is born fully formed, but is half-blind and completely dependant upon its parents to survive. Like mammals Gephqua females produce a nutrient rich substance similar to milk to feed their young. At about a year old the hatchling is weened off its mother’s milk and begins eating solid foods, but meat is usually avoided until the hatchling matures to about 2 ½ to 3 years of age, as its body’s digestive system is usually not ready to handle the more complex structure of most meats.
At around three years of age the hatchling has begun to take its first steps, also by law if the hatchling has not been given a name by its third birthday it must have is name registered then, though most hatchlings are given their name well before then.
At around five years the hatchling is no longer in its infant stage but has reached childhood, the child should, by this time, be able to speak simple sentences, and early childhood education is encouraged to prepare the child for school.
By the age of eight or nine the child is enrolled, by law, into a primary school, which lasts approximately five years, at around the age of thirteen or fourteen the child is taken to a secondary schooling for another four years, the child is brought into its tertiary schooling at around the age of seventeen, which lasts for another five years. At the age of twenty-two the adolescent is not yet considered a legal adult (twenty-five is the legal age). A quaternary school is often encouraged, both three-year and five-year quaternary schools (similar to college or university) are available for tertiary school graduates. For high level technical vocations such as medicine, law, science or scholarship a quinternary school is available for quaternary school graduates (comparable to graduate schools), the time spent at a quinternary school can vary from as short as two years to as long as seven years, depending on the graduate course being pursued.
At around the age of fourteen the child is enters into the first state of pubescence, its sexual organs begin to develop, there are actually three stages of pubescence for Gephqua. The first stage is where the sexual organs begin to develop, this happens around the age of thirteen, the second stage, in males, involves a radical shift in hormone levels, at around the age of sixteen, during this time the male adolescent is unruly and prone to violence, and the third stage, at around the age of nineteen, sees the balancing out of homone levels and at around the age of twenty the adolescent is generally considered sexually mature--though in modern Gephqua society one is not legally an adult until the age of twenty-five.
At around the age of thirty Gephqua are usually expected to seriously look for a mate, however since Gephqua often have a life-expectancy of around 120 years, the pressure of finding a mate is more lax now than in the past.
While courtship and mating rituals differ depending upon cultural variations and religion (or lack thereof), the most common mating-age is between thirty and forty with an average mating-age being about thirty-six.
Long courtships are generally encouraged, and a usual betrothal period of about two years prior to the Ceremony of Union (marriage). Conservative members of society generally frown upon sexual contact prior to Union, but is more lax among the younger, more liberal, generations.
A Gephqua couple may spawn many children over the course of their life, however at the age of eighty the male undergoes a phase of life known as “kaqoda” translated roughly as “burning” where a chemical change in the body renders the male infertile, the phase is usually considered quite painful and can last for as little as a week to as long as a month. Modern medicine has helped give treatment for males undergoing kaqoda, to help ease the pain and some hormonal treatments even are able to suppress kaqoda for longer or enable the male to continue to enjoy a happy sex life after kaqoda (as quite often kaqoda leaves the male’s sexual organs inoperative. The female, at around the age of a hundred, enters into her own phase of infertility, however little happens to her physiologically other than she no longer produces eggs.
At about a hundred and ten years old Gephqua enter their senior years, no longer fertile. The average lifespan of the Gephqua is about a hundred and twenty years old, though it’s not uncommon, especially with modern medicine, to see a Gephqua live up to a hundred and fifty years. The oldest known Gephqua lived to be the age of 203, Gephqua rarely live longer than 130 years.
History: The Gephqu generally use the Ashkenzi (see below) calendar system, which begins with the beginning of creation YW (Year of the World) and BW (Before the World).
1.5 Million BW - About when the first modern Gephqu appeared.
4,000 BW - The earliest signs of aggriculture among the Gephqua.
2,000 BW - The earliest archeological finds for Gephqua civilization.
YW 1 - In Ashkenzaism, traditionally thought to be the beginning of creation.
YW 1000 - Gephqua enter the Bronze Age.
YW 3500 - Gephqua enter the Iron Age.
YW 5000 - Gephqua enter the Middle Ages.
YW 6500 - Gephqua enter the Early Modern Age.
YW 6700 - Gephqua enter the Modern Era.
YW 6800 - Birth of the United Gephquanese Empire
YW 6930 - The United Gephquanese Empire experiences reform, the emperor no longer absolute monarch.
YW 7001 - First successful space flight.
YW 7045 - First successful manned landing on an extraterrestrial solar body.
YW 7070 - First Contact with an alien race, Space Age officially begun.
YW 8000 - Gephqua enter the Neo-Modern Age.
YW 8500 - Gephqua enter the Galactic Age, exploring large portions of the known galaxy.
YW 8900 - The United Gephquanese Imperial Republic folded into the Galactic Union of Worlds. Gephquanese is the lingua franca of the Union.
Religion:
Ashkenzaism: The Ashkenzi were an ancient tribe, their name comes from their ancient mytho-historical ancestor Ashken, whom they sometimes style a prophet. The Patriarch Ashken was, like most of the people of his time, a worshipper of many gods, but while in his father's workshop (Ashkenzi tradition holds that Ashken's family ran a lucrative business building idols for the locals) every idol fashioned would break. After the seventh attempt to make an idol of the god Immunz failed (the idol broke) Ashken heard the voice of the True God (Zyoh HaLayim, lit. "The Living Being" or "The Being of Life" from "Zyoh" meaning "Life" and "Layim" the plural form of "Laya" meaning "To Be"). The voice said to Ashken "Laya Layim" (I am the Being of beings).
Ashken, in fear, asked the voice who He was, to which the voice repeated, “Laya Layim.” Upon further inquiry the voice said, “HaAph HaPhebq HaAtanah Zyoh Zyayim Bakira HaKolah.” (I am the First One, the Last One, the Lord, the Life of Life and the Ruler of the Eons.) Ashken was instructed by the Voice of God (HaS’mah Saddiq) to renounce his family business of idol-making and commit himself to the One True God.
As a result Ashken was rejected by his father and was exiled from his clan, Ashken traveled in despair and loneliness in the wilderness of over a year as to the loss of his family. Finally Ashken came to a mountain and decided to petition the voice he had heard, crying out to know why he should be abandoned by all whom he knew and loved to be cast out of his clan, to which the Voice of God again came to him, telling him that he would become the father of a new clan, and that eventually through his descendants the Divine Light would return to the people and would be signaled by a promised savior, the Masiq (HaMasyqh). The voice then drew Ashken to a nearby village, where he saw the most beautiful woman he had ever laid eyes upon, drawing water out from a well. The voice instructed Ashken to take her as his bride and first convert.
Ashken and his bride, (Marha, usually given the affectionate title of “HaKazha” lit. “The Mother” or “The Matriarch” similar to Ashken being called “HaMotza“ lit. “The Father“ or “The Patriarch“) sired five sons and five daughters. These ten children would become the patriarchs and matriarchs of the Ashkenzi tribes.
Over the course of his life Ashken was given a series of visions, which were written down originally by his own pen, but in his later years by his children who recorded what he spoke (at least according to Ashkenzi tradition) The Book of Ashken contains all of these, divided into seven tractates. The first tractate, often seen as the most central, is called “Tobas” and contains all the laws which God gave to Ashken and the Ashkenzi people.
Names of the Ashkeniz God: Zyoh HaLayim (The Living Being), Laya Layim (The Being of Beings), HaSaddiq (The [All] Powerful), HaAph (The One, The First, The First One, The Only One, etc)
The Ashkenzaism is not a unified religion, but has splintered into various sects over its long history.
The Purists, as they are sometimes called, are also sometimes considered the more conservative branch of Ashkenzaism, they prefer to conduct their worship services in the older dialect, they accept the Book of Ashken alone as their sacred scriptures, and do not believe in an afterlife, but rather believe that when the Masiq comes, the Divine Light will restore the dead to life only in the After-Age (that is, the time after the conclusion of history). The Purists are perhaps the largest, in terms of percentage, of the Ashkenzi sects.
The Jarians are another large movement within Ashkenzaism, the Jarians accept the Book of Ashken, but also embrace the Jarayim, roughly translated as “prophetic sages”, and the writings about and by the Jarayim is collected into a book, also usually called “Jarayim” or sometimes “Books of the Jarayim”, it is considered a companion volume to the Book of Ashken. The Jarians are more likely to use modern dialects in their worship than the Purists, and they also believe that the essence of a person is found with God prior to the After-Age. They depart from the Purists on several other issues as well. The other two major sects of Ashkenzaism are actually splinter groups from the Jarian sect.
The Yaddians are a messianic sect that split from the Jarians over the issue of whether or not Yaddi was the promised Masiq, the Yaddians believe him to have been the Masiq. The Yaddians believe Yaddi was more than a prophet, but in his role as the Masiq he is uniquely the manifestation of God. Yaddi was killed, however Yaddians believe he will rise from the dead on the last day and fulfill all the things which the Masiq was to fulfill and bring the Divine Light to all. Yaddians believe that in the meantime it is their purpose to spread the Divine Light (which they believe was given in part by Yaddi to those who follow him) to all they come into contact with. For this reason Yaddians are largely non-violent and reject weapons of war (some Neo-Yaddian sects accept violence as a sometimes necessary evil, but this is a minority position).
The Moqhtians
The Phalashim: The Phalashim are a caste of warrior monks who dedicate themselves to an unseen power which they call Roakh. Roakh is the spiritual fire that permiates all living things, and in their Temple they keep a blue flame perpetually burning as a symbol. The Phalashim are deeply intertwined in the ancient Urgatian Empire, where they served as the protectors of the emperor and the empire. This role has been transferred to the modern emperor, where they still fulfill their duty as keepers of the peace. The Phalashim are dedicated to chastity, celibacy, non-indulgence. Strictly disciplined they are taught to avoid fear, anger, hate, and avoid concepts such as revenge; and to live as simply and as unburdened as possible. Most Phalashim own only the clothes on their back (a simple cloak) and their darqir--traditional swords, or in the modern era, energy swords.
The Phalashim are organized and live in monastic communities, many in remote places, while others can be found in urban centers. The Temple of Roakh is the most sacred site for them, and is also where the Synod of the High Priests are located. Each community is led by two or three avim--elders. There exists a fairly strict hierarchy. Those who desire to become Phalashim must spend a year under the strictest discipline directly under one of the elders. If they pass the tests they are formally brought in as neophytes and are given their own darqir. As a neophyte one is then made the disciple of a teacher. Where they are personally trained. At the end of this training, if the elders of the community agree, the neophyte moves on to become a teacher himself. Teachers may only be graduated to an elder if the Synod of High Priests confirm it. Only elders may become a high priest, the highest level one can achieve as a Phalashim.
Initiate -> Neophyte -> Teacher -> Elder -> High Priest
Only seven high priests can exist at one time. There are several ways which one can cease being high priest.
1) Death. 2) Exile. 3) Retirement.
If a high priest is killed, he (obviously) can no longer fulfill his post. If a high priest violates the Code (the rules and regulations that bind Phalashim life together) the other members of the Synod can vote for him to be stripped of his cloak, darqir and cast away into exile. If a high priest is at a very old age he can choose to retire with dignity, a ceremony is held where the high priest officially renounces offers up his cloak and darqir and no longer holds rank. However, he is expected to continue to uphold the Code--even though several of his vows are nullified (such as celibacy), thus a retired Phalashim may marry, though few ever do.
The word “phalashim” itself means “separated ones” from the root word “phalaha” meaning “stranger” or “to be different” or “make separate”.
