| The term "Gehenna" is a
Hebrew word, supposedly adapted from "Hinnom", a valley outside Jerusalem which
was variously a garbage dump and a place where unwanted babies were sacrificed by burning.
(Jeremiah 7:31 -- the Bible's wonderful "Temple Sermon" against the worst
aspects of organized religion). The words appears in the New Testament in connection with
punishment after death. What it meant to the first Christians, and how its meaning may
differ from the other New Testament Greek words for hell (Hades, Tartarus), remains
controversial. If the derivation of the word is correct, the ugly face of organized
"religion" in the Hinnom infanticides reminds us of our own world's "Evil
with Lawful Tendencies." Bad cults, gangs, crime-syndicates, petty dictators, and
robber-barons are examples of the loosely-organized evil that is symbolized here. In our
era as in Seneca's time, most pretend to virtue -- "promoting excellence and
discipline", "building character", "promoting security", and
"striving for what is best." They are enormously vain, though not so
well-organized as their neighbors in Baator. Expect to find much ostentation and display
of wealth and status. Gehenna is worlds of slippery mountains, some glowing with lurid
flames. All gravity is at 45 degree angles to the surface. (Bring your mountain-climbing
equipment.) These planes are the spiritual homes of organized robbers and tyrants, gangs
of criminals, heartless warlords, and all who were corrupted by power. Regardless of the
kind of evil they have chosen, they never show charity of any kind. Because evil is so
powerful here, the locals lack even the ordinary loves of our world -- family, friendship,
romance. These instead become ways in which a stronger being preys on a weaker being. The
people of Gehenna are disgusted by the idea of unselfish love. Open-faced evil is poor
politics. Instead, the locals will present themselves to outsiders as an "honored
society", syndicates led by people of oustanding ability to provide stability under
difficult conditions. The locals will talk about cruelty only as a way of "building
character" or "promoting peace and development". There are many models for
this in the non-ideological dictatorships of our own world. The spiritual powers here seek
to corrupt souls through the quest for personal power and authority. Here power-grabbing
is addictive, and those who sample it will find no simple joy in anything else. Other dark
addictions are surely available as well. There is probably sexual slavery, but there is no
real love here. All laughter and music are forbidden except in the service of the rulers.
Primitives will find ongoing human sacrifices. Mottos are the slogans of gangs. Public
portals between the layers and to remote planes are heavily-guarded fortresses. The locals
may know a great deal about visitors' un-repented crimes, and misbehavior may transform
perpetrators. The barghests make their lairs here, orc and goblin heavens are here. In
some liturgies, worshippers renounce, or reaffirm their renunciation of, "the glamour
of evil." On Gehenna, the glamour of evil takes the forms of crime-syndicate elegance
("Nothing personal, just business"), and the pleasures of belonging to an
effective gang. In our own world, some people think this is what they really want. Khalas, "the gentle land", is a temperate universe
inhabited by exiles from next door, and innumerable goblin caves. A city features people
tattooed with their life stories, who will wish to buy bits of your own most precious
experiences, which become tattoos on their skin as you forget them. Waterfalls along the
river Styx dominate the landscape. Maroon pools to the astral appear among the cave
waters, and can be moved only within this water. Portals to the Outlands, Baator or the
Gray Waste are often chasms with over-arching natural bridges.
Chamada (Greek chamadis, on-the-ground), "the
molten", is a universe of lava flows, where the atmosphere is a permanent stinking
cloud. The air in the caves is more breathable, but the caves are prone to melt
unexpectedly. Somewhere there is an entire city floating above the landscape. It is a
mimic, which controls the locals. "The General of the Furnaces", an ultroloth,
is the most powerful creature here, and service in his army is sought by many. The tower
of the arcanaloths is full of records of evil deeds, recorded in the blood of the dead who
suffer here.
Mungoth, "the burning ice", is a universe
of icy ash fields and corrosive snow. Avalanches and mudslides are constant perils, and
the mountains still quake with volcanic activity. There is an ice-bound realm of
carnivorous caribou, where torturers are trained. In the town of Portent, those who resort
to violence unwittingly do the damage to themselves, dying when they reach zero hit
points.
Krangath, "the dead furnace", is a burned
out universe, with no heat or light. The most cold-hearted suffer here. In "The Night
Below", the realm of the orcish undead, no light goes beyond five feet, and only
those in charge can see in the dark. |
