The Morality of Necromancy

[Nightshadow]

The Morality of Necromancy

Before anyone goes off saying that I am biased, or that I myself am a necromancer. I will tell you here and now that I have no arcane or divine talent to speak of. I am a simple scholar of Oghma who has spent a few years now studying the specifics of Necromancy, though I do not practice it. I write this now in part because I have heard that Necromancy will soon be banned and made illegal, I wish people to think hard on such a thing before they make peoples' life professions suddenly illegal.

I have accepted that the school is evil and unnecessary for much of my life, but lately I have begun to question that, and have read up on many different tomes and books on Necromancy, to try and learn of it. I have spoken with druids, paladins, necromancers, and other people with strong opinions to see what their views are and to get the whole picture. I now offer to you my unbiased findings.

Necromancy in General: Necromancy is a form of magic which Mystra does not ban or oppose, otherwise such a thing would be impossible, but as many of us know, many liches and necromancers choose an arcane path, not a divine one, and so gain their power from Mystra herself. Necromancy, through magic of the weave or divine magic of the gods, calls upon energy from the Plane of Negative Energy to do its work. The most obvious and direct uses of negative energy are Rays and Bursts of it, which launches pure negative energy at a foe (or sometimes an allied undead). Slightly more complex is creating shields of negative energy, otherwise known as the Death Armor spell, curiously, though, the damage inflicted by this spell is purely magical, similar to a magic missile or missile storm, and is not affected by Protection from Negative Energy to my knowledge.

Fear spells are complex; you must sort of 'soak' the mind of the opponent with negative energy, causing them to feel cold dread. After that comes Animation spells, which imbues a corpse with negative energy, allowing the animator to control it. In the end, I find that Animation of the dead is not too different from the use of Golems, though we'll get to the specifics on that later. Death spells are not necessarily complex, but actually require the most energy to pull off. They tend to be short range, usually a touch is required, or using them from a distance of no more than ten paces, they work by drenching the target with enough negative energy that any and all traces of positive energy (and therefore, life) are removed from the body.

Rays and Bursts: I find that the application of rays and bursts of negative energy is an extremely responsible, ethical use of Negative Energy. The rays are accurate and rarely miss the intended target, they cause minimal bodily harm, and only the most powerful of rays can cause instant death to the target. A burst of negative energy is relatively weak in that it does not cause as much damage as a fireball, but is able to weaken an opponent, and causes no additional damage, such as how fireballs are known to start forest fires.

Shields of Negative Energy: These shields are often employed by many people, I have even seen holy warriors such as paladins use such. They simply make it so that if someone hits you with a melee weapon, such as a sword or hammer, they will be injured as they hit. This is purely a defensive spell which is good for making an opponent think twice before hitting you.

Fear: Fear spells are similar in nature to how a priest uses their ability known as 'Turn Undead', in that it uses large amounts of negative energy (goodly priests use positive energy for turning undead, other priests use negative energy) to make the subject of the spell feel cold dread to an extreme degree. If you make the spell strong enough, they could wind up nauseous for a while, lose bladder control, faint, or even go into a seizure. Beyond these unfortunate side effects, there is little if any lethal damage done (unless they are clumsy and trip, fall, and break their neck as they flee from you). In the end, someone skilled with these spells can bring about a painless, quick, and nonlethal end to most conflict.

Animation: This is the big one; the power to animate gives the power to create more permanent bodyguards for a spellcaster or caller of blessings. These undead are tough, durable, strong, there are a wide variety which may be summoned, and they are all easily increased in strength many times over if properly enhanced with transmutation. Regardless of the obvious advantages to animating the dead, the drawbacks can outweigh the benefits. First of all, one must have a supply of corpses, as once a zombie has been destroyed, that corpse can no longer be used for further animation. Second, there comes the risk that those around you will take offense (and usually great offense) to your animating the dead.

A common misconception is that animating the dead tears a soul from either their god or from being judged by Kelemvor, should they be faithless or false. However, I say here that this is false superstition. I have found no evidence in my extensive studies which suggest such, no examples which point to this. There is zero factual evidence which points to the soul as the power behind the animation. Only the most insane, uncaring, and chaotic of gods would allow their dead faithful to be torn from their side in death, and it is likely that the followers of those gods are also willing. What is more, gods have the power to stop our weak magics from working in such ways as this, so why would they let us commit this sin, this torture, upon their followers?

It is also important to note that the use of a zombie does not differ very much from the use of a golem. One druid told me that the reason zombies and undead are a threat to the balance is because they have already died, and now are moving once more, capable of fighting and killing at random. It is important to note that golems are formed from various types of materials that, along with zombies, should not be moving on their own, except that magic gives them the ability to move. Golems, especially those used for defense, when not cared for, are known to become violent, attacking and killing at random. I am not attacking golems or their makers with these comments; I am simply saying that we are perhaps judging one type of person too harshly without looking at the big picture.

There are many various uses for animated corpses in society. Whether it is a guard that is always alert and never needs to eat, sleep, or drink, a messenger that can travel night and day without rest, never peeps at the letter, and doesn’t annoy you about a tip. Imagine smiths who could outfit an entire army many times faster than normal humans, so as to keep us safer. The uses are infinite and capable of ending almost all problems in today's society.
 
Spirit Summoning: While similar to animation, it is different in that it does indeed call upon the dead; it is the summoning of spirits. I am not yet sure whether or not this is truly Necromancy, as a conjuration spell, the Summon Monster spells are used to do this. As we all know, Summon Monster is a Conjuration spell, it is used to open a portal between where you are and where another creature is somewhere else in the realms, and then this creature is pulled to your location for a short amount of time. There are two possibilities here…

First, there are various spirits and ghost which are restless and haunt places here on Faerun, none of the gods have any interest or caring for them. These ghosts are tortured, insane beings with some power. It is possible that these spells which summon spirits are actually calling to the caster one of the restless ghosts who wanders Faerun. Keep in mind that such a usage of the spell is Conjuration, not Necromancy.

Second, there is the usage of this spell which would make it more a mix between Necromancy and Conjuration. It is well known that Necromancy harnesses the power of the Plane of Negative Energy to do its work, so it is possible that the Spirits and Ghosts we see are actually beings of pure Negative Energy which are summoned from the Plane of Negative Energy. I believe this to be a possible case because of all the necromancy that these spirits tend to use, things such as Rays of Enfeeblement, Negative Energy Rays, and I believe even Negative Energy Bursts and Death Armor.

With these facts in mind, I hereby declare that the Animation of the Dead and the Summoning of Spirits to not be immoral, nor torturous or a sin, but simply another form of magic which is less pretty to look at.

Death Magic: Another big one, death magic aims at simply killing the target without them having the chance to surrender during a fight. It should be noted that there are very good uses of this magic. For instance, there have been cases where an executioner must use two swings of his axe to kill the doomed criminal, leading to a bloody, painful, and gory death compared to a single clean chop. Death magic leaves the corpse fully intact and unharmed, while killing the person quickly and as far as we can tell, without pain, or at least with less pain than an axe going through their neck. However, one must be extremely careful in the usage of such, if there is the chance that an opponent might surrender, such magics should not be used. Death magic is also better to use to kill someone than a fireball or similar spell due to the fact that it is a much quicker, cleaner, less painful death than blowing someone up or burning them alive.

I also have a story to tell you, one I found most intriguing. I met a Priestess of Velsharoon by the name of Valerie Lifeshadow, who has had a rather rough life, but makes the best of it and, from what I can tell, seeks to use what she learns about Necromancy to better the lives of all of us. I have watched her every now and then as she goes about her daily life, she is considerate to others; should she be coming along on travels around the island, she always asks first to make sure everyone is fine with who she is and what she will be doing during the journey. I asked her about her story, about how she came to worship Velsharoon, and this is what she told me, word for word…

“Well, about me… I grew up in a small village near Mirabar, which is to the east of Luskan. My brother, Erebes Lifeshadow, and I were orphans, living on the street and stealing what we needed to survive. The guards were always looking for excuses to give us a harsh time.

The village was a logging community, we supplied lumber to neighboring cities and villages. One day, some insane druids,” (a note to the reader, I asked Valerie about this comment later, and she says that she does not mean that all druids are insane, but that these druids in particular were part of an odd minority that shows up in every society) “I suspect Malarites, gathered up a large pack of wolves and lycanthropes, and attacked our village for us cutting down the trees. A large group of faithful and priests of Velsharoon was hiding among the villagers, as these wolves viciously attacked and killed unarmed men, women and children, even some of few fr-…” (Valerie choked up here, and needed a moment before she could continue the story) “a few of the… friends that my brother and I had made. These people, who eventually became my mentors, fought valiantly to try and save the village, their home, from destruction. The warriors and battle priests among them fought off the wolves and werewolves, while the clerics stood back and animated any of the fallen, to keep the lines held. One cleric in particular ran to my brother’s and my aid, taking down three wolves that were chasing us with some undead wolves of his own that he had animated.

After the battle, most of the clerics and warriors defending the village, as well as all of the city guards were dead. A majority of the civilians fled or died. Were it not for Velsharoon, were it not for Necromancy itself, my brother, myself, and everyone else in that village would have also died. The surviving faithful of Velsharoon took a major role in rebuilding the village, and most of the survivors, me and my brother included, converted to worshipping Velsharoon. I went on to become a Priestess, and am now skilled in the art of Necromancy, my brother became a fine warrior, skilled with most weapons, though died a few weeks ago in defense of the Colony.”

That is all she had to say on her past. If we are all trying to be good and holy, why do we seek to harm these people? It is my opinion that demanding that someone else change their ways to conform to your beliefs, without offering evidence, and in some cases threatening to harm or kill them, is at the very least borderline slavery. I say NO to banning animation or necromancy.

-Kufeas Enustav, Scholar of Oghma