Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1998 02:50:27 -0500 (EST)
From: Casca
Subject: Habbalah (was re: IN> seneschal query)

On Tue, 15 Dec 1998, Anders Gabrielsson wrote:

But this doesn't explain why they believe it, only why the ones who don't aren't around for long, at least not if they can't hide it very well. I find this a bit of a mystery as well. I think it has to be part of their nature somehow, but I find it very hard to get inside their heads, so to speak. :-/

The Habbalah can be summed up thusly:

You die after living a good and virtuous life and you go to Heaven. While there, you run into Adolph Hitler. Wouldn't that piss you off? Wouldn't it be a travesty of truly cosmic proportions?

The Habbalah exist to make sure that doesn't happen. They are celestial Darwinists, weeding out the weak and unfit and ensuring that only the pure go to Heaven. They perform this function by selecting a mortal and random, and testing his virtue by attempting to manipulate his emotions until he is little more than a puppet. If he resists, then he is pure and worthy of Heaven, and he is left alone. If he succumbs to them, then he is obviously scum, and we all know scum belong in Hell. Scum in Hell deserve to be punished, and just because this guy isn't dead doesn't mean he's not deserving of punishment. In fact, since he succumbed to sin, he's OBVIOUSLY evil, and needs to be punished for the evil deeds he committed under the Habbalite's direction. So they turn the guy's life into a living Hell, destroying (or causing him to destroy) everything of value in his life. Serves the weak bastard right.

Sometimes, Habbalah get...enthusiastic. There are so many humans, with such finite lifespans, that your average Punisher really has to hustle if she's to make a difference on Earth. This often leads to interesting techniques of time-management, such as starting with children. Children are supposed to be innocent, right? And the innocent are supposed to go to Heaven, so it stands to reason that a child should be able to resist a Habbalite -better- than an adult. Any child who succumbs to emotional manipulation is obviously a bad seed, and it's better for the whole of humanity that such deviants are removed from society early, before they get a change to influence others or, God forbid, reproduce. It's oddly ironic that every child such Habbalah 'visit' are, to a one, bad seeds, but the Punishers just shrug and say they're excellent judges of character and know deviant scum when they see it.

Habbalah see themselves as Divine Scourges, punishing the guilty for their sins. There are plenty of guilty people in Hell, all needing to pay for their sins. Demons don't see it that way -- they consider damned souls to be tools or property or currency. But the Habbalah know them for what they are -- convicts in the biggest jail in all of creation. The sentence is for life, and the Habbalah are the guards.

Any demonling involved in squeezing essence out of damned souls has the potential to become a Habbalite, for only the Punishers realize the true purpose of Hell. For Heaven to be paradise, it must have an opposite number; anyone who makes Hell hellish is serving God's will, because if Hell is nothing more than a slightly warm afterlife, then Heaven loses its meaning. And if you're serving God's will, then you're clearly an angel, no matter where you happen to have your office.

- -- Casca, Seraph of Archives

Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1998 10:15:39 -0500
From: Perestroika
Subject: Re: Habbalah (was re: IN> seneschal query)

(snip Casca's excellent summation of Habbalah)

As great as this was, though, it still doesn't answer the question being asked: Why do newly-formed Habbalah all believe that they work for Heaven, when their first memories are of Hell and the Demon Prince they now serve?

My answer is: it's an irrevocable part of their mindset. The Demon Princes watched Elohim fall to become the first Habbalah, looked at each other, said, "Hey, this is a pretty good idea," and started working on duplicating the effect in newly-created demons. Why don't newly-created Habbalah question their sudden appearance in Hell? See below...

But, asked someone else, wouldn't this whole serving God bit be an undesirable trait? Nope. The Demon Princes love it, especially the Balseraphs. Part of the "I serve God" mindset involves the assumption that God's put you where you are for a reason - and if God's put you there, you stay there until God tells you otherwise... and the Demon Princes know (or at least think they're relatively certain) that God's not going to be telling this demon what to do for a very, very long time.

In other words, Demon Princes deliberately create Habbalah with this mindset, because their general fanaticism about punishing the weak (and therefore bringing them to Hell - and you can _always_ find a weakness in someone) is beneficial, and they tend to stick around because This Is Where They've Been Assigned.

So why, faced with no memories of the past and a Demon Prince standing before them, does this mindset hold? Well, obviously God erased the Habbalah's memories before giving him to this *shudder* demon. It makes sense, of course - if the Habbalite had memories of his Heavenly duties, it would distract him from his duty as Punisher.

Hm... can't think of anything else. Comments?

- -EDG
it's all a matter of rationalization...

Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1998 22:44:32 -0500
From: Neel Krishnaswami
Subject: Re: IN> Habbalah

Jo Hart wrote:

The Habbalah seem to be going the same way. Now they all seem to have to want to serve God, and punish humanity. Personally, I think there are plenty of viable character concepts who swing either one way or the other, or are just simple sadists or control freaks. If a fellow Habbalite is doing a competent job of punishing, are the other Habbalah really going to care about its personal mission statement (if there is one)?

IMC, wise demons never assign more than a single Habbalah to a team, since it's highly likely that the set of delusions each Habbalah has are violently incompatible with every other Habbalah's. IOW, they are individuals, with sharp and unique personalities.

Here's a sampling of Habbalah from my game.

There's one Gnostic Habbalah who believes that Lucifer is an Aeon and God the Demiurge, and that her "punishments" are /really/ the rewards due those enlightened -- they just /look/ like suffering to the unenlightened, because they still believe the Demiurge's lie. Only the worthy even deserve her touch; she does not act indiscriminately.

There's one who believes that Christ was God who died on the cross, and that every being in Creation, from the lowliest human to the mightiest archangels and demon princes, deserve to suffer because they let Him suffer, and did not come to His aid when He needed it.

There's another one, who's basically anti-Gnostic. He believes that spirit and spiritual judgements are worthless -- God created the world, and pronounced it good, thus proving the superiority of matter to spirit. He inflicts every form of strong physical sensation, from orgasm to torture, on those who cross his path; he makes no effort to distinguish between pleasure and pain, since that's an intellectual judgement, which is forbidden by God.

Another one believes her soldier (who is as evil as they come) is the promised Messiah, and she gets her morality from observing his behavior. Of course, she also manipulates it, but that's okay -- she's obviously an angel sent to guide him.

Put these four in a room together, and odds are there'll be a big explosion. :) None of them has standards even remotely matching any of the others', and all of them are interesting and colorful.

Personally, I like using Habbalah, because they let me toss off theological quandries without regard for consistency, logic, or even basic good taste. After a Habbalah has shown up, you can be sure that all of the players will remember that this is a game with heavy religious elements.

Neel Krishnswami

Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1998 10:23:53 +0000
From: Kevin Walsh
Subject: Re: IN> Habbalah (Re: seneschal query)

They are no longer their weak chrysilis form. They understand that their *Every Whim* is Divinely inspired. And that they must punish the unworthy, those who must not be allowed to drag Heaven down with them.

As I see it, that particular theory isn't the only Habbalite doctrine, it's just the most popular, since it bolsters the Habbalite's sense of self-esteem, and it probably was the mindset of the first Habbalah, and was hence passed down by peer pressure. Broadly speaking, I divide Habbalah into Punishers, Testers, Healers, Defenders and Traitors. The reason the Punishers look so numerous is that Testers, Healers, and Traitors tend to behave very like Punishers, and Defenders don't tend to get much time to Punish people anyway.

Punishers are those who punish the weak, however weak is defined. Many Habbalah of the Game are Punishers.

Testers are those who test people to find out if they are weak. The testing involves a process that looks superficially very like Punishing, but is in fact completely different. And if you've Tested someone and found them unworthy, you might decide to Punish them, or leave that job to someone else. This is a very popular attitude among Habbalah of Fate, who get to see people's weak points and test how vulnerable they are to them.

Healers are those who teach people to overcome their weakness by the strategic application of hardship. Healers are especially numerous among Habbalah of Nightmares, who frequently refer to themselves as Angels of Fear, recalling their duties before Beleth's Tower was built. Some people don't manage to overcome their fears, but they weren't going to get better anyway.

Defenders are those who keep the whole show on the road. Hell is part of God's plan, and is therefore Good, and they work to ensure it stays that way, by defending it against attacks both internal and external, or by strengthening its defences and infrastructure in other ways. This attitude is naturally very common among Habbalah of the War.

And Traitors are those who don't believe any of this, but who are, in fact, under the impression that they are undermining Hell in preparation for Judgement Day. Rest assured that the Game is ever vigilant when watching for their ilk.

As for why they believe this, my answer is that it's convenient for the Habbalite and (usually) the Demon Prince. Habbalah need to believe they're doing tbe right thing, and if you can convince them that they're angels doing God's work, they'll settle happily into their work. The fact that everyone around them is manifestly inferior means that they are fully justified in unleashing their temper on them. It's very convenient for the Demon Princes because it means that not only will the Habbalite's worst qualities keep them at their work, but so will their best qualities (things like conscience which other demons aren't so bothered with). The character traits that can make other demons Redeem will only serve to make Habbalah more zealous in their duties, which is why it's worth putting up with the odd bit of the kind of flakiness other demons would be skewered for.

It's convenient for both the individual and the Superior, and they're indoctrinated in it from the hour they're created. Possibly a properly socialised new Habbalite wouldn't believe it was an angel, but why bother experimenting? You'd probably have to end up killing it for disloyalty if you did.

Kevin Walsh, Balseraph of Nitpicking, Demon of Off-Topic Trivia.

Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1998 16:23:29 -0500
From: Neel Krishnaswami
Subject: Re: IN> Habbalah

Earl Wajenberg writes:

I gather from your example Habbalah that your rule for them seems to be, "Habbalah gotta punish, and gotta rationalize it as deserved. Individual rationalizations are left as an exercize to the player or GM." Would that be right, or close to it? I find that a very plausible approach to Habbalah psychology.

The rules of thumb that I follow when creating a Habbalah are that it should act to promote evil, that it should nonetheless believe that it is an angel, and that its beliefs should include a weird and heretical variation on standard theology.

Many (but not all) Habbalah consequently believe that their victims deserve to suffer, but there are exceptions. At least a few Habbalah IMC believe that they are doing undeserved evil to their victims, but that they are compelled by the will of an evil and cruel God. (It's an easy way to rationalize wild emotional surges....)

Neel Krishnaswami