The God-Emperor of Mankind

This article is awesome. Do not fuck it up.

The God-Emperor of Mankind, also known as Tha Emprah, Emps, The Big E, Space ~~Lenin~~ Jesus and also sometimes called The Great and Glorious Big Mac Daddy King Emprah of all things Epic and Awesome (ahem, ahem) is the figurehead ruler of the Imperium of Man in the Warhammer 40k universe and is the only sustaining Hope for Humanity (not that other, more horrific brand of "Hope") as Faster than Light Travel is entirely dependent on him. The Administratum he established continues to ~~fuck up to hell~~ govern the Imperium in his name, but it is generally accepted that the absence of the Emperor's proper guidance is what has turned the Imperium into the hellish mess that it is. In the Imperium, questioning whatever your superior tells (yells) you the Emperor's word happens to be that day, is treason and heresy, typically punished by death. Were The Emperor up and about in the 41st millennium, it goes without saying that he would be disappoint. Most fa/tg/uys expect him to speak in a generic deep, stentorian voice.

Exception? The Last Church. It is permissible to substitute the voice of whatever angry militant atheist appeals to you most/least for the duration of this one (short) story. Also, according to that same story, this asshole wiped out Scandinavia, right when Scandinavia was getting fun again. ~~So FUCK HIM~~*BLAM*WHERE ARE THESE HERETICS COMING FROM!? WE WILL HAVE TO START A NEW CRUSADE SOON APPARENTLY!. According to the Horus Heresy books that mention the Unification Wars, he burned down a lot of things on a partially recovering Terra.

The Entire History of the Emprah

File:Majestica.jpg

Big E gets all the bitches.

According to older (read: second edition) fluff, the being that would eventually become known as the Emperor was born in 8000 BC in Anatolia (modern-day Turkey). Allegedly, this was the result of hundreds of human shamans committing ritual suicide to be reborn as a single individual capable of protecting humanity from the Chaos Gods. However, the validity of this fluff is frequently questioned, given it hasn't been "official" since second edition. That being said, nothing has explicitly contradicted this story, and the only other theory is that the Emperor is a Perpetual, meaning an immortal -but ultimately human- psyker with countless lifetimes' worth of knowledge and power and the ambition to use it. However, this theory seems unlikely, especially given the Chaos Gods apparently view the Emperor as an equal/rival, an honor they give to none of the other known Perpetuals, and the Horus Heresy novels have dropped hints that the Emperor is actually a "we."

The second edition fluff also mentions that he guided humanity throughout history under a number of guises, such as Jesus, Mohammed, the Buddha, etc. (and, it has to be assumed, Conan the Barbarian).

Sometime around the 11th or 12th century, he battled a shard of the Void Dragon in modern-day Libya. He eventually defeated it and locked it on Mars (somehow...), allowing the Adeptus Mechanicus to control machines... eventually. Of course, it's not entirely clear whether this is true or not -- it's entirely possible that ALL of the Emperor's history is a lazily-crafted lie he throws around because no one can debunk it -- but given how Awesome it sounds, we're going to say it did.

Apparently, he mostly stayed out of the way during the next 30,000 years of human history, including the Dark Age of Technology, though hot off the press fluff indicates he might have been travelling outer space in old-style NASA rockets with the other perpetuals. Coming to find the planet Molech where he passed through a gateway that led directly to the fortresses of the four Chaos Gods. Here he either challenged, bargained or stole portions of the gods powers from them and when he emerged he was one of the most invincible beings in the universe.

He returns to Terra at the closing of the Age of Strife. With Terra cut off from the rest of humanity's former empire and the Terra itself ruled by warring "techno-barbarians" in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, the Emperor decided to reveal himself, using his mastery of genetic engineering to create the Thunder Warriors, the predecessors to the Space Marines. Using "join-me-or-die" tactics, he managed to conquer the entirety of Terra during the Unification Wars. Then, he made contact with the Mechanicus on Mars and, calling himself the Omnissiah, convinced them to build him weapons and ships. Around this time, he also created the Imperial Truth, which says that religion, faith, and superstition were all banned; apparently, it took him this long to realize the whole "Peace, Love, and Religion" thing wasn't working.

But, before he set out to conquer the stars with the newly-formed Imperial Army (which contained both ground forces and space-borne fleets), he decided to create the twenty Primarchs to serve as his generals using himself as the template; though with his new-found powers apparently stolen from the Gods at Molech, they would inevitably be pissed at him cloning THEIR energies. So the Chaos Gods snatched them away (via time-travel-as-a-vision shenanigans) from their incubators in a secret lab underneath the Himalayas and scattered them across the galaxy. Luckily for the Emperor, some genetic code was left over, and so from that he created 20 Legions to serve as the elites of his army: The SPEHSS MEHREENS. So, with his armies complete (minus the Primarchs, which he hoped to find), he embarked on the Great Crusade to once again allow humanity to control the stars.

As he found each Primarch, he assigned them to command each of their respective Legions to retake humanity in the Great Crusade (although, at some point, two of them disappeared or were executed, leaving only 18 Primarchs and Legions at the end of the Great Crusade). A military campaign of a grand scale, this is also when the SPESS MEHREENS were the most awesome and at their peak. Just when things seem to be going well, the Horus Heresy erupts where 9 of the Primarchs and their legions rebel against the Emprah. In the end, the Emperor fought and slew Horus (who was daddy's favorite) but at a great cost. The Emperor was mortally wounded to the point that he had to be put permanently on a life support system known as the Golden Throne (and he humiliated himself in the middle of the fight when he cried). ~~All agree that the bronze liberal douchebag deserved it.~~ ' *BLAM!* 'EXTRA HERESY!!!

Subsequently, without the Emperor's leadership, the Imperium eventually degraded into the theocratic Grimdark empire we all know and love today, in the 41st millennium.

While interred on the Golden Throne, the Emperor's psy-essence prevents daemonkind from directly assailing Terra, and also sustains the psychic-beacon known as the Astronomicon. Without the Emperor, warp travel would not be possible, and everyone on Terra would be raped, both sexually and non-sexually.

It is established that the Emperor is pretty much the most powerful psyker alive, humbling even the Eldar. He is tens of thousands of years old and has been secretly guiding humanity from behind the scenes for much of his lifetime. Theories variously suggest that he was also Sigmar of Warhammer Fantasy Battle fame, Julius Caesar, Conan the Barbarian, Chuck Norris, and Jesus. It is uncertain as to whether or not his internment on the Golden Throne is a good thing; some believe that if he were to die, the Imperium would be truly plunged into darkness, whereas others believe that if allowed to finally die he would reincarnate and return to unify the galaxy once more. Whatever the truth of the matter, Games Workshop are never going to advance the story, so it is mostly irrelevant.

The Emprah Himself

After he shaved his goatee, his chin radiated a brilliant light through the Warp. The Imperial Navy uses this light, the Astronomicon, as a beacon to guide them through that terrible place. He is sometimes referred to as the Emprah, a joke derived from the voice acting in the Dawn of War game, Soulstorm, specifically Indrick Boreale's final speeches.

The Emperor is so powerful that he could DESTROY SUNS BY SNAPPING HIS FINGERS!!!

The Chaos Gods are scared as fuck of the guy, and hope he dies so they can take over the universe. If the God Emperor were to arise again Chaos would be FUCKED.

The Eldar fear that if ~~the Emperor were to die a new Eye of Terror would be opened and Chaos would take over EVERYTHING!!!~~ *BLAM* Heresy! The Emprah cannot die!

A typical father and son chat between Empy and Horus.

After he was nearly killed by his son, he was placed on the Golden Throne and hasn't been able to move for the past few millennia. Most of the fluff maintains that his existence on a day-to-day basis since then is a living hell (By comparison, the process of making astropaths would be like a trip to the dentist). It's literally the mother/father/uncle/2nd Cousin of all mindfucks, so bad that even a Inquisitor would likely go insane as a result (or anybody else for that matter) and yet he continues...

Why? He may be the universe's most powerful vegetable, but that doesn't mean that he can just sit down and die. Oh no, it's exactly the opposite. It gives him a fuckton of work to do, and along with being the lighthouse of the warp guiding the Imperial Navy, he also needs to make the aforementioned astropaths, ~~as well as keeping all the nasties of the warp where they're supposed to be and not spilling over into reality and make the lives of all human beings miserable.~~ Or perhaps a combination of Tzeentch perpetuating the stalemate and the influence of Necron technology is doing that. He also does it for the good of man. (sounds kinda familiar, don't it?) In the last year of M41 techpriests discovered that the Golden Throne is failing and the Emperor is DYING so look up! there is a 50/50 chance of the Emperor returning to life.... Or dying forever and everyone in the Imperium becoming a ~~Chaos sex toy/Punching Bag/plague vector/science experiment.~~ *BLAM* Heresy! THE EMPRAH IS IMMORTAL AND HE WILL PROTECT US! Pfft, as if Cegorach, Tzeentch, or the Deceiver are going to let one of their paradox poker buddies die.

"The Emperor was a brilliant scientist, a powerful warrior, and great psyker, but he was a terrible father..."

-Rawbutt Girlyman, Primarch of the Ultramarines, pointing out the obvious.

Every Saturday night the Emperor gets together with Tzeentch, the Deceiver, and Cegorach for a game of Paradox Poker. They have to use a new pocket dimension for each of these games because the sheer amount of dickery and JUST AS PLANNED causes the dimension they play in to collapse. Nobody has ever won one of these games. Any who try to watch these games without possessing similar mastery of the fine art of dickery and JUST AS PLANNED will find that their heads will explode into a shower of Necrons(even though it was they who built the damn pockety dimension...), Eldar, SPESS MEHREENS, and Daemons as they cannot comprehend the true form of the game.

But the Emperor is disappoint, because he wanted the Imperium to be a utopi-*BLAM* HERESY THE IMPERIUM IS THE PERFECT VISION OF THE EMPRAH THE WAY IT IS! *BLAM* HERESY THIS MAN IS AN IMMPOSTER AND THE EMPEROR HAS NOT YET PERFECTED THE IMPERIUM AND WILL DO THAT ONCE HE IS RESURRECTED! *BLAM* *BLAM* I apologise for that, reader. You may continue. FOR THE EMPRAH!

For all his desire to guide and protect humanity, there is a lot of proof, particularly from the Horus Heresy books and some short stories, that the Emperor was not Space Jesus, but Space Hitler. He declared humanity the superiors of xenos, setting the basis for humanity's genocidal xenophobia (and the hatred of nearly every xenos race in turn); planned to destroy all mention of religion by force of arms if needed; planned to reunite humanity under his rule no matter what anyone else wanted/thought, again by force of arms if needed; cared little for the primarchs as his actual sons, thinking of them as generals and tools rather than his sons, screwing over several in his efforts to recruit them (hence causing their later betrayals); carried out many unethical and morally questionable experiments; and so on. His reign killed more humans than the entire rest of humanities dictators in history up to that point combined, then multiplied, and that's assuming you don't count all the other sapient organisms that might or might not have deserved it.

It can be said that the Emperor was such an asshole due to the state of the universe he founded himself in and that he acted as he did believing small sacrifices were all for the greater good (Now where have we heard that before?) but that doesn't change the fact he began a crusade that would have culled billions and destroy entire xenos species even if the campaign had gone well and not ended in the Horus Heresy (assuming that the Emperor would have allowed it to end at all).

To be fair, the whole reason humanity (and the Emperor) hates aliens is because during the Age of Strife, numerous xenos races exploited humanity's weakness by raiding, looting, and generally making a nuisance of themselves. Then ~~Hitler~~ the Emperor comes along and decides that the best way to stop it from happening again is to wipe out all xenos that might pose a threat to the fledgling Imperium. However, those few xenos species that did not pose an immediate threat to humanity were usually made protectorates similar to the Tau government (unless they resisted, were in the way, possessed a planet, influenced human culture at all, or were intelligent at all, in which case the results were predictable). Ever since his ascension, the Imperium forgot about the part where harmless aliens are tolerated and just thinks they should all be killed. But on the other hand, the most common xenos are dicks and aren't exactly willing to buddy up with the Imperium themselves.

Worship of the Emperor

What the Emperor looked like before Horus decided to bitchslap him. Notice the giant skull. How did that skull get so big? Is it a plastic faux-skull, or is it an alien skull? Anyway, back on topic. You don't get to see the Emperor out of armor very often.

Humans worship the Emperor as the one true God. If you're an atheist, then he's the closest thing they have to a proper caring and nurturing god who actually cares about his subjects, so you might as well let them. Humans are more than willing to die in his name or skullfuck the next guy who says anything remotely bad about him. Now, the only reason the Imperium worship the Emperor is that after his fight with Horus and his internment into the Golden Throne, they pretty much forgot what the Emperor taught them, ~~including draining the power of the Chaos Gods by eliminating all kinds of religion and remaining an atheist empire.~~ This is partially false. Ol' Empy did not actually tell anyone of the Chaos Gods as part of his plan to starve them, withholding the information even from the Primarchs in hopes of protecting them from corruption. Ignorance is bliss! Unfortunately this became part of why the Horus Heresy happened in the first place, as while not knowing the existance of the chaos gods could have prevented his servants from falling to the temptation of worshipping some very REAL gods, it also left them without the knowledge of what to do when faced with the influence of said deities. Plus, it's pretty damn hard to fight against something if you don't know that it exists. The Horus Heresy novels also mentioned the Interex, another atheist empire who do understand that Chaos existed but treated it secularly and scientifically, rendering them more proficient with dealing with Chaos than the Imperium.

The Emperor was actually AGAINST any kind of religion as part of his Imperial Truth and plan for mankind to be a utopia of science and reason-- even if the object of worship would be himself like when he told Lorgar to fuck off with the God-Emperor worship. Although, the Emperor was only half-right about this because he didn't realize that Chaos runs off emotion rather than worship, thus his starvation plan wouldn't have been ultimately successful in the long run. While Chaos does draw more power from direct worship to them, even if worship of them is stopped at large, they can still draw from the everyday emotions. His plan wouldn't have killed the Gods but would have severely weakened their influence on the Materium. Without cultists, there would be no summoning of demons. Without uncontrolled psykers, few possessions would occur. Thus, without religion and warp travel, the Chaos Gods and their minions wouldn't be able to access the Materium (for the most part). Hence why the Emperor tried to access the Webway where Mankind can be able to travel through space while minimizing exposure to Chaos. Who gives a shit about the Ruinous Powers if they're stuck in the Warp?

However, he made a critical mistake in disregarding the human need to believe in something greater than oneself, and despite his best efforts with the Imperial Truth reason and logic simply weren't enough to fill the place of religion. Ironically, his solution was not to suppress faith but to redirect it towards something else, intended to be the idea of the Imperium, but because of his own unmatched psychic powers and enigmatic nature that "something else" ended up being the Emperor himself. After he went off being the most powerful psychic vegetable in the universe, and lost direct control of the Imperium of man, belief in him sort of helped the Imperium stand together, even if it basically dropped 99.9% of humanity's IQ in the process- with the warp being what it is, the act of worshipping the Emperor supercharged his power in the Immaterium to the point of being truly godlike, even while his body is stuck in its current state of near-death. The Imperium's faith in the Emperor is basically their biggest anchor of bravery and perseverance in a universe where humanity is constantly beset by:

Without their faith in the Emperor after his internment into the Golden Throne, the fragments of the Imperium would have fought against each other and themselves again like in the pre-Great Crusade days and subsequently devolved into what they were before the Emperor liberated them. So yes, much like IRL religion, it gives them hope and courage to fight on and survive in a universe that leaves the grimdark faucet running everyday.

It's worth noting that good ol' Empy wouldn't have had nearly as much of a problem with all this unwanted worship if he hadn't, just as a quick example, insisted on wearing horrifyingly ornate solid gold armour and a big glowy halo at all times. Or on carrying a flaming sword of righteousness. Or on building continent-sized monuments to his vanity. Or on decking all his personal troops and favored genetic experiments in as much bling as they could possibly carry. Or on being ~~nine~~ eleven fucking feet tall. If you look like space-Jesus and act like space-Jesus, people are going to take those observations to their extreme conclusions, like what Lorgar did when he wrote the Lectitio Divinitatus, which can be summarized as "Ordinary men can't blow up suns and carry big glowy halos at all times, only a God, therefore the Emprah is God." This is made even more relevant given that the fluff very strongly implies that the Emperor is Jesus.

That said, to Games Workshop's credit his being buttfucked by his own Hubris and disregard for the humanity he claimed to be guiding in this manner was probably intentional as a classic tale of Greek Tragedy.

The possible death of the Emperor

With the Golden Throne being constantly damaged and the Techpriests are too power-armor-on-head rebooted to do anything about it, it is certainly possible that the Emperor may die one day, which will obviously result in all of the Imperial worlds and factions to cry tears of disappointment and subsequently devolve into chaos. There are however, 3 possible outcomes of what will happen if the Emperor should ever die:

The new Wall of Text

Conventional wisdom and the Eldar, says that in the event that the Emperor dies, a new Eye of Terror will be created, plunging Holy Terra and all nearby planets into the Warp. Even the Ecclesiarchy agrees that if the Emperor were ever to die, humanity would be FUCKED at the barest minimum.

This is supported by the fact that the Golden Throne (itself a portal to the Webway) was broken by Magnus, causing a warp tear to occur on Terra which the Emperor has had to spend every second for the last 10,000 years concentrating on to keep it from getting any bigger (the Adeptus Custodes has spent the same amount of time chopping up daemons that jump through). If he were to die or his attention were to waver for too long it would grow and rip the Imperium apart.

Additionally, a new Chaos God could be created, which will most certainly be a God of all the Grimdarkness in the galaxy, ensuring that it would eclipse all of the powers of the other Gods as the Emperor would finally be the God of all, this is especially true since nearly everything that is grimdark comes from Chaos and the entire WH40K setting is itself a massive pile of it... that or Malal would burst back into existence. Some also fear that a fifth Chaos God's presence would just crush reality as-is reverting everything back into the immaterium.

There is also Imperial Warp-travel methods to be considered in the Emperor's death. Since The Golden Throne is what allows him to power the Astronomican, when he dies humanity will have to resort to other forms of travel (which, to avoid snobbish xenophobic soul stone machinery and an extradimensional labyrinth that will try to kill you, arcane levels of technology wielded by the largest cybernetic faction, Chaos atrocities, contraptions that only work if Orks want them to, and ships that will eat you alive, leaves one form of travel that is veritably easy to access and incurs no daemonic/quantum repercussions of things worse than death or the loss of teef: Tau sub-light engines) unless He can guide them through the powers of the Warp.

Now, the implications of the Emprah becoming a Chaos God, or more aptly put, a God of Order in the realm of Chaos, are tremendous. The Immaterium in itself is a reflection of the collective conscious, sub-conscious and instinctual consciousness of all sentient beings. The Chaos Gods are, in effect, representative of the sheer amount of suffering in the present, past down through unresolved problems of the past, relative deprivation of knowledge, freedom, happiness, the multitude of oppressive governments, the high levels of crime, the presiding prescence of fear and propaganda, the various forms traditional past down psychological inhibition by each faction to maintain the current balance of power, and the extreme levels of atrocity, torture, slaughter, and so on, and due to not having the knowledge or methods necessary to deal with a nightmarish realm, many, be they human, Eldar, Ork, Tau, and so on, are at the very least sociopaths by our standards and at most psychopaths and insane. It is a world where to live by ideals of good one must rebel without also falling to corruption, which, with the exception of the Farsight Enclaves, the only Noble Bright faction in 40k, has yet to succeed. The Emperor himself is one of the victims of the pressure of history, much like a certain prescient God-Emperor of a desert planet in a landmark sci-fi novel series who sought to end tyranny by being such a tyrant that the desire for empire in human culture would be forever annihilated. Anyways, the Emprah was born in 8th century BC Anatolia, a region Turkey. This is a time of historical hellishness for humanity, especially in this area. It is a time when cities have begun to rise, when patriarchies and matriarchies alike wield armies on campaigns of conquest, rape, slavery and annexation, a time when societies who despise slavery and race-gender segregation are few and have begun a 1,200 year long last stand, nothing of their like to be seen again on the world stage till the 1600's behind the scenes. Per GW's 40k mythos, the shamans could feel the rise of the Chaos Gods, made of the nightmarish Warp remnants of the psychological pain caused by the War in Heaven, brought together by humanity's experience of horror and fear. So they sacrificed themselves to create a child filled with all their psychic power. We can only assume whether or not the Emperor was born from a woman's womb or is an astral projection of the psyche, and GW will likely never say. To go back to the Emperor Leto II of Dune, a being who was tortured through his prescience by the demands of the dead, be they tyrants like Caesar and Stalin, be they oligarchs like Cicero and Washington, malevolently evil beings capable of causing populations to vent rage and pain through genocide and complicated misoginy/racial segregation like Hitler and the medieval Vatican, or the countless amounts of people (in the year of 2014 alone, 7 billion people live and die upon a world that has held a total of 106 billion humans throughout history) who have suffered and caused others to suffer. He was guarded only by those psyches that were good, or that at least were willing to respect him. Among the good, there are also countless amounts of people, from the Sarmatian nomads (roughly 800BC-400AD) of the Northern shores of the Black Sea who held men and women in equal respect, who did not enslave or segregate, and stood valiantly against Persian armies, Greek raids, and Roman legions, and Goth hordes, falling only when they chose to become patriarchs in the face of the Hunnish hordes, to the ancient peoples beyond our current ability in archaeology to know of, and the many individuals and small groups who spoke out against oppression throughout time, whether through secret societies, alone, in uprising, religion, art, activisim, treatise, theory, or through reform. Thus, Leto was able to redirect history even though he did it in an atrocious and despicable fashion because he felt it was the only way. The Emprah was not so lucky, for he was born in our early history. The physical and psychological reverberations traveling through humanity, and in this case, the Warp, would continue to increase in strength for the next 2800 years and then wane only very slightly down to a half of it's strength over the next four centuries. The Emperor also seems to be prescient, for he knew of the Void Dragon and Chaos and all else, and more or less instigated not only the Dark Age of Technology but also the Age of Strife and the proceeding Age of Man by using the Void Dragon, which could be interpreted as on purpose since that caused the Age of Strife on humanity's end, since the Void Dragon not only had egged humanity's unconscious to expand throughout the stars but also spread sentience into machines, who, unsurprisingly, rebelled from their servitude to humans, not to mention the infection of Chaos in human technology caused by collateral damage of new Warp Storms created by the birth of Slaanesh no thanks to the Eldar. He manipulated events from behind the scenes until the 29th millenium, when he sought to establish his own domain.

Leto is noted with cursing the Roman Empire for infecting human cultures with the dreams of empire in order to establish order and security, regardless of their rampant misoginy, slavery, civil wars, oligarchy, and general greed, that went so far as for the Roman Senate to become the Vatican and the Emperor Constantine to make himself a part of the Church who collectively tailored the New Testament to their own ends through the Christian theologists they chose not to kill, and thus the ensuing split and feud covered by theological dispute that also had economic basis for the time between the nascent Roman Catholic Church who made Germany it's avatar of an earlier time as the Holy Roman Empire and the burning of millions of 'heretics' throughout it's first several centuries, between intellectual and warrior or simply independent minded women, the Templars, theologists who proposed universalist philosophy as essential doctrine for Christianity, peasant uprisings, and so on, and the Byzantine Empire established the Orthodox Church, and both stood against the Arab Caliphates with all sides ready to turn on their allies. Until recently, that is to say, the late twentieth century, the teaching of the 'civilization' of the Roman Empire and Hellenic League and the succeeding, per nation; British, French, Spanish, German, Brazilian, Russian, Austrian-Hungarian, Portuguese Empires, Manifest Destiny and the American Dream, and nationalist movements and a mixtue of cults of excess and greed still persisted in the Western World as the standard belief, and still exists, at it's worst manifesting in fascism (which comes from the Roman word fasces, the symbol of the Roman Republic), and on it's polar opposite the 'communist' movements such as the USSR that simply were totalitarian, just as the teaching of Confucian/Legalist doctrine still persists in China as a part of Chinese Communist Party state school doctrine, or the so-called Liberal Democratic Party of Japan that Mr. Abe, the Prime Minister is part of, has members that have insisted that the military of Japan was not wrong in it's imperialism, that the genocides in Korea and China never happened and the sex-slave prostitution system provided for it's soldiers and then the annexing Americans both through it's own women and those of China and Korea, or, speaking of Korea, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) is about to lose the last members of generation that remembers what it was like before North Korea and thus the only sources of information to the public of the outside world, and so on, without even listing all the criminal and terrorist organizations and their various affiliations. The Emperor, similarly, created the Imperium of Man which melds various elements of cultures he quite literally lived through. The symbol, the two headed eagle known as the Imperial Aquila, is the same as that of the Byzantine Empire. The Force Organization of a Space Marine Chapter or the preceding Space Marine Legions is a technologically adapted version of a Roman Legion, down to the number of Marines (10 Companies: 10 Centuries, which is one hundred soldiers each, even though the Companies aren't exactly that, it typically adds up to 1000 Marines or 1000 Legionnaires, not counting auxiliary forces and irregular troops and logistical services), whereas the Imperial Guard Armies are reminiscent of armies from the 19th through early 20th centuries with tactics anywhere between guerrilla warfare, trench warfare, blitzkrieg, and cavalry charges. The Navy is right out of the twenty-first century mixed with the 18th on Void scale, boasting massive rows broadsides, turrets, point defense systems, lasers torpedoes, fighters and bombers, nuclear arsenals, boarding actions, and being used for anything from blockade, bombardment, patrol, and invasion support. There is a definite genocidal eugenicist totalitarian feel to the Imperium, between the male only supersoldiers, the use of brainwashed, isolated and drugged assassins, and the creation of human mutants who can direct a ship through Warp jumps only through complete dependence on the Astronomican, a need to know basis on history and politics, and disgust for democracy and general xenophobia. Under the Emperor, the religious aspect was not yet apparent, and instead there is an atheist doctrine in the form of the Imperial Truth, which firmly establishes a Legalist doctrine that despises cosmology and philosophy and places all the power of government in the Emperor in theory, just as the first Emperor of China did, disposing of every other written work on philosophy including most of the chapters of the Art of War, worsk of Daoism, Buddhism, Mohism, Agrianism, and even Confucianism (which would be brought back into allowance under a later dynasty because it proposes creating a religion around a masculine caste system) and so on through fire, including their followers. The Emperor also shares other traits with Leto II, such as working towards the prosperity of humankind, which many monarchs have claimed, most notably the Persian monarchs Cyrus, Xerxes, and Darius, as they ruled the same territory that would later be highly loyal to the Emperor (who presumedly began the Unification Wars campaign in the Himalayas and likely began with control over India and Tibet) which was once called Persia and is now called Iran, and also promoted pragmatic expansion (though Darius incorporated a religious aspect by using Zoroastrianism, claiming that world conquest would honor Ahura Mazda, the chief god of that pantheon, who was the god of Conquest, Truth, and 'Good', that is to say, the cultural norm of a misogynistic caste system promoted by Persian law) and it is that empire, Persia, which spread dreams of conquest to Greece and Rome and so on, though Persia itself had received it from the Medes, Babylonians, Assyrians, Sumerians, and so on, further back into history until detail is lost to us. However, the Emperor, if considered a prescient being, does not seem to me to be so foolish as to not be surprised by the Horus Heresy. Knowing whether or not he knew who would become a Traitor essential to solving the riddle of whether or not the Emperor has planned the Imperium's current state by creating a system that under his rule was to oppressive to not have rebellion, and then a reversal of some intrinsic dogma just as all oppressive states are, and the creation of a religious legacy. Assuming the Emperor intended for the Heresy to happen, and going by the prophecy of the Cabal, a mysterious group of xenos including Eldar, and humans, all of immortal nature with a flying saucer Hive City sized Void Ship, who gave the Alpha Legion to futures: if the Alpha Legion aided Horus, he would kill the Emperor, realize his mistake, and lead the complete extermination of humanity. If the Alpha Legion aided the Emperor, he would survive permanently incapacitated and the Imperium would decay slowly, continuing to feed the Chaos Gods until the entire galaxy would fall prey to the Great Game. The Alpha Legion seems to have chosen to aid Horus at first appearance, except the Emperor is still alive. So either the Cabal were wrong, or the Alpha Legion was aiding the Emperor behind the scenes, which would totally fit the Alpha Legion's sneakiness or love of subterfuge and wreaking confusion, and also joined Chaos, which does not, as is shown by the unease and cutthroat nature in the Chaos ranks, mean helping Horus or not helping the Emperor. They also didn't follow the other Traitor Legions into the Warp, becoming nomads on the East Fringe of the galaxy and trolling the Ultramar, Bluud Ravens, Imperial Navy, and other Chaos warbands to no end. Purportedly, to set up an attack on the Imperium they start cults on an Imperial planet in a tactically unimportant location that threatens to become a major daeomonic threat, or they make a deal with Orks to attack such a planet in exchange for Imperial weapons and a fight with Space Marines and thus draws the local Imperial Navy, and then the other warbands attack. However, more often than not, a reserve force stayed behind or the SPESS MEHREENS shows up just in time and both threats are dealt with. Now, the Alpha Legion has never been depicted, with the exception of Lord Bale and Sindri, as narrow minded. This would suggest the Alpha Legion is methodically killing off other Chaos Warbands while killing Imperials, or: they are trying to kill off as many humans as possible while eliminating the pawns of those who would benefit from it. Welcome to Grimdark, folks. The humans seem screwed every way possible because human society and mobility is dependent on the Emperor or the Chaos Gods to function. There is a loophole, however. The Cabal said "in the galaxy". This means that leaving the galaxy can save sentients from the Warp. Now, this is NOT the Ship thread of 50k, mostly because keeping the Emperor alive means continuing to commit a Chaos level atrocity of sacrificing 1000 souls to do so every day. More on this later. Now, assuming the Emperor intended for the Age of the Apostasy to happen, the creation of the Inquisition etc.,(I mean come on, he is a tribute to Leto II, just like Leto he had only one friend, who was his chief administrator, Malcador the Sigilite, and Leto's was Malky (phonetics much?), neither of them mated, though Leto II had several wives (he is half sandworm, no genitalia left), and they always seem sad and nostalgic even when they are joyful, and have a get-personal fury attitude when opposed mixed with some form of forgiveness) then he really did try to drive home how ridiculous Empire in his own dysfunctional manner. Ultimately, following a parallel with Dune, the Emperor has to die, because then humanity will scatter and there will be chaos, yes, but many will go beyond the currently known world, and their return will cause a series of events that will allow the most virtuous faction to unite humanity and create a utopia based upon empathy, freedom, and love, after enduring an advancing threat of complete extermination and a return to slavery. In the case of 40k, that means the galaxy. However, due to the Chaos problem, this is doubtful, and also find it doubtful that GW would consider this (not that, for many good reasons, they will ever advance the storyline). What seems more likely is that the death of the Emperor, who seems to be the God of Imperial Order, will destroy the foundation of the Imperial Cult and thus the basis for varied forms of morality of the Imperial Faithful, which will result in widespread despair and turning to Chaos, which will in turn fuel the Chaos Gods so much it will allow them to completely overwhelm the consciousness of anyone the galaxy with psychological idiosyncrasies, including the Tyranids' Norn Queens who are the Hive Mind(s?), the Hive Tyrants, and thus control and probably defile the Swarm, and only the Necrons will be spared. Ironically, this will be due in part to the Emperor's ascension if it occurs, because the Emperor deitic absolution as worshipped has a tendency to dominate, even if only humans, which is possible since the nature of the Warp is defined, ultimately, by sentient minds, despite all the pressure the Warp puts upon them that they do not have the knowledge to deal with or recognized with accuracy. This is where the escaping the galaxy methods must be considered. This is difficult, because it means being able to leave the galaxy and within it while not going into denial about morality. Dark matter anti-gravity fields or ancient Warp storms without demonic definition or not beyond it, it is possible, in multiple ways: While this method should be x-nayed unless the Emperor could be put in a soulstone and imbedded in the Astronomican, the Emperor's Light could make it possible to travel through the Warp Storms. This would also be the easiest for high ranking Imperials to contemplate because all the knowledge is available. Slaan technology, since they purpotedly left the galaxy after the War in Heaven. Arthas Moloch might have some if GW is handing out reference to history/gaming culture hints, since the name means Lizard King or Lich King. The word Moloch means King in Hebrew, the god of the Ammonities, who made human sacrifices to him including human children. Moloch is also the name of a harmless spiny lizard from Australia that eats ants. In scientific taxonomy using Latin, lizard king is Tyrannosaurus Rex, but that is a tangent. Arthas appears to be a reference to a character from Warcraft, a person chosen to be the host of a Lich King. Further, the Dead World of Arthas Moloch had Warp portals within a temple from which issued Daemons of Khorne upon the Tau forces under Farsight's expedition, and there were also purity seals that Farsight used to close them, and furthermore, Farsight learned either by looking into the Warp or from writings from that world of the nature of Chaos and the Warp and thus that the Ethereals had lied to him about much of it. He also carries the Dawn Blade, a twelve foot tall sword that adds to his lifespan the remaining natural life of his enemies through the chronographic alloys that it is made of. It is not Warp related in any fashion, which would at a glance, suggest Necron-C'tan (which is the ancient Hebrew pronunciation of Satan, and further, in medieval Christianity, the devil is often depicted as blue, the skin color of the Necronytr and the Tau) responsiblity due to what the Deceiver offered Szarekh, the Last Silent King, in return for giving the C'tan bodies: immortality for all the Necron people in exchange for their certain sentient traits- -It is conceivable due to the unnatural pheronomal powers of the Ethereals upon other Tau and their devious legalistic aristocracy led caste system that they are in fact C'tan shards most likely of the Deceiver- -or that Szarekh alone could be made immortal in the deaths of others. However, the Necrons nor the C'tan do not use seals to combat demons, wherever the blade itself might be from. This would suggest that Arthas Moloch was once a Slaan or Old One (they are reptiles) world that fell to the C'tan in the War in Heaven and the blade was placed there but could not be held by the Necrons and C'tan due to the strong demonic presence. That, or this planet explains in the origin of the Tomb Kings in Warhammer Fantasy. In any event, it likely has an alternate form of travel buried somewhere. However, no one barring the Emperor and the Cabal has the sufficient knowledge to consider such a goose chase for this purpose. Interestingly, there is also a Tyranid unit called the Moloch, a borrowing monstrous creature. This may suggest that the Slaan who fled the galaxy have become the Tyranids or have been integrated by them into the Hive. If this is so, it may be wise to avoid Slaan-Old One-Eldar-Necron-Ork technology, barring that no others may be available, because the Hive would know it tremendously well. Further, the fact the Tyranids could traverse the intergalactic Void and appear to do so at a rate slow enough for the Silent King to have noticed is proof, who was also out in the Void heading for another galaxy that there is a way to cross the interglactic Void. The Halo Stars, the location of the original homeworld of the Necrons, may have the only Necron quantum technology that the Necrons do not guard or possess since it would appear they have long abandoned the area since their homeworld is now in a Warp Storm within the Halo Stars. While only the Eldar records, the Necrons, the Cabal, the C'tan, the Slaan wherever they are, and likely the Emperor are aware of this, which may also explain the Emperor's reasoning for initiating the steps to take over the Webway so to access the Necron world through Dolmen Gates which use the Webway albeit with difficulty. The Eldar are to arrogant to use Necron technology, the Necron and C'tan don't understand the state of the Warp, the Slaan probably don't give a damn either way, the Cabal are an unknown, and the Emperor can't do much. So that really leaves only the Legio Custodes, Senior Inquisitors, the Historical Revision Unit, the Navigators and the high ranking members of the Adepta Sororitas capable of not only knowing enough about the Imperial Webway and the Webway itself but also to care enough to attempt this, though only a Navigator or Inquisitor could possibly traverse the now not only hostile but daemon infested Webway. The other way, which is the most blatantly obvious to the Imperium as a whole and by far the easiest, is Tau engines. It is already known they don't have psykers yet, and that would make the sub-light engines highly desirable to someone who didn't want to depend on the Navigators (cough cough Dune technological race in books 5-8), be traceable by psyker navies, and risk the perils of the Warp. The Tau are also the mostly likely xenos to be willing to cooperate besides the Ork clan of Blood Axes. The Eldar Warp engines are incredibly powerful, however, the Eldar themselves might not take kindly to building a massive ship in a non-Eldar manner and to do so with double monkeighs. This would take a last minute circumstance, and considering the resources involved in building a ship that would hold an ecosystem within it for the long voyage in nothingness, this would not be possible without Orks to make up for lost time, and the prospect of defiled art-machinery-grave Warp engines would disgust the Eldar. It's that or share a Craftworld and rig it with engines on one end. Human archeotech would solve a lot of problems right now, but the only people who would have such a thing are the Adeptus Mechanicus, the Deathwatch, the Bluud Ravens (who probably don't know they do), or the Dark Angels. So there you go. If the Emperor is really a Chaos God there are some serious endgame problems.

Regeneration

No, not the Doctor Who kind. The Horus Heresy novel 'Vulkan Lives' heavily implies that the Emperor is a Perpetual like John Grammaticus, Vulkan, Oll Persson and Anval Thawn, all of who were able to survive things which should have completely obliterated them. So all he simply needs to do is die and wait a couple of hours/days and he'll be reborn again (in the "get up off the ground and dust himself off" sense). In theory, at least. Vulkan, for instance, was driven mad by the torturous experiences he had endured under the Night Haunter, and they were child's play compared to sitting in unthinkable agony unable to move or speak for ten thousand years rotting alive. However, a more commonly held belief is that he will get up, re-establish the Imperial Truth, and just be a cool guy.

In fact, a whole faction of the Inquisition: Thorianism exists to investigate this possibility, looking for possible signs that the Emperor's consciousness can be transferred elsewhere, allowing him to walk amongst men once more. (That said, they don't know about the existence of Perpetuals and would rather look for a new body to place the Emperor's soul into.)

Opponents to Thorianism generally see that encouraging this is a terrible idea, as having the Emperor rise in a physical form would only cause a schism in the Imperium, as many people would not believe it to be true having been conditioned by the Ecclesiarchy over thousands of years, which would cause another major civil war.

Not only that, but having him stand up to stretch his legs before the Golden Throne was fixed or have someone powerful enough to replace him would potentially cause the same result as a new Eye of Terror. As towards the end of the Horus Heresy, he only moved from the seat in the final battle when Malcador the Sigillite (the third most powerful "known" human psyker - after Magnus) took his place temporarily, which was still enough to crumble him to dust.

A great solution to this problem is two words, one that starts with F and the other rhymes with vile, who is still alive, albeit a Chaos follower and very vile. Fabius Bile. He made Horus clones, which while Abaddon destroyed along with the original body, Fabius Bile is still running around somewhere. If he could be....convinced, to aid the Emperor (I'm sure Asmodai of the Dark Angels could do it) then it could happen. And also, the argument that it's impossible because the Emperor is a psychic being is false because he made the Primarchs from his own genetics. Anakin Skywalker had DNA and was able to have kids naturally yes?

The Star Child

Although years of GW's marketing and fluff upgrades have made the third claim rather dubious, many fa/tg/guys and optimists still hold out on the theory stating that when the Emperor screwed Horus's soul to the wall, part of the Emperor's soul was also cast into the Warp. This Emprasoul fragment is the Star Child, another god waiting to be reborn - or perhaps be reincarnated into human flesh. (anyone call for one master scout mcvenner) If the remains of the Emperor were ever to die, the tiny spark of soul left in his body would re-unite with the greater whole, and according to prophecy, stalemate the four Chaos Gods while the races of the galaxy were left to battle it out in one last great Ragnarok scenario.

This theory is tied closely to the ~~Sensei~~ Illuminati, a group of either supremely enlightened individuals or dangerous mutant heretic xenos-fuckers, depending on which side of the Inquisition you're on. The Illuminati plan to catch all of the Sensei and sacrifice them in the golden throne at the moment of Empra's death and ~~he will become the Sensei-Emprah(Numen). Yay!~~ HERESY!!!

The fluff revealed that the Illuminati were a minor Tzeench cult and the sensei were effectively brainwashed soon-to-be sacrifices in an attempt to bring Tzeench to the materium. Needless to say, they have been purged by the Inquisition.

However, more recent (2006 onwards) fluff from Xenology puts a glimmer of hope on this theory by suggesting providing an image of an "unborn child surrounded in starlight" as one of the three future survivors of the galaxy's conflicts (the other's being Khaine and the Laughing God). While it can be equally suggested that this actually refers to Ynnead who is the Eldar god that shall be born from the webway when the last Eldar has died, it is now becoming clearer that Ynnead and the Emperor's star child could be the same thing, particularly with the revelations in Horus Heresy that the Golden Throne is a doorway into the webway itself.

Further evidence to support this is the even more recent Mechanicum novel, where a faction of Mars attempted to access the aetheric wellspring of ALL KNOWLEDGE (read: "God") which was hidden away within the warp. They hoped to access this knowledge using a device called the Akashic Reader which operated using identical energies to that of the Astronomican, considering that at the time it was powered solely by the energies of the Emperor it suggests that his divinity was seeded in the warp well in advance of his enthronement, simply awaiting a time for it to reconnect with him.

The Emperor's list of Things to do after Resurrection

Too important to be a sub-section of this article; moved to its own article: Emperor's To-Do List

Gallery

The Big E upon the Golden Throne (before the decay set in)
The guiding light in the Imperium of Man shines forever bright
The Emperor protects man from all.
"Why IS IT that hot dogs come in packs of 8, and hot dog buns come in packs of 12?"
Son, I am disappoint.
Yearbook photo.
His groove, do not ruin it.
That is EXACTLY the same look that's on Batman's face when he's about to put the beatdown on someone!
He makes for one helluva action figure
The Emperor of all Catkind! Nyuh!
Just imagine if the Chaos Gods didn't scatter the primarchs through out the galaxy... Wait where's that little scamp Omegon? (just off picture, sneaking up behind Guilliman)
Death is no excuse to stop bein' pimp.
Thinking to himself, "I really, REALLY hate Horus!"
He might be the most powerful psychic vegetable in the universe but the Custodes can't give him a decent hygiene program.
Not so divine now, is he?
Roll d6; stays on the field on seven or less
A real man never dies, even when he's killed.
Down but not out.
In all His miniature glory
The Carrion Lord with his two left arms.
This painting sold for $900, that lucky ca/tg/url...
Oh God-emperor, how did this get here? I am not good with computers.
Search your feelings, you know it to be true.
You all know you wanna see how this pans out!
How do you kill what can not die?
Emperor Rule 63! NO EXCEPTIONS!
THE EMPEROR IS NOT A WOMAN! AND THIS ONE IS UGLY, TOO!
Oh, give it a fucking rest...
Yeah. We get it. The Emperor sits upon the Golden 'Throne'.
Unbeknownst to many 40k fans, ol'Emps is fairly amicable when he meets an elf/eldar who isn't a complete failure.
Perhaps with a better armor design, Emps might not have been late for Horus's after school soccer games and things might have turned out differently.

We believe in one Lord, the Emperor, the Almighty, ruler of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen. We believe in one Lord, Emperor of Mankind, the only Lord of creation, eternally begotten of Humanity, Human from Human, Light from Light, true Lord from true Lord, begotten, not made, of one Being with Humanity; through him all things were made. For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven, was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and came among us. For our sake he has faced down Chaos; he withstood death and was enthroned. To this day he lives on in accordance with the Scriptures; he resides upon Mother Terra and is seated upon the throne of Humanity. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Emperor, the giver of life, who proceeds from Humanity and the from Terra, who with Humanity and upon Terra is worshipped and glorified, who has spoken through the prophets. We believe in one holy true and divinely guided Ecclesiarchy. We acknowledge one path for the defense against Chaos. We look for the justice for our dead, and the life of the worlds to come.
++ Ayhmen ++

-- the Creed of the Mankind's Council of Nicene of Holy Terra

Institutes within the Imperium of Man
Adeptus Terra:	Adeptus Administratum - Adeptus Astra Telepathica Adeptus Astronomica - Senatorum Imperialis
Adeptus Mechanicus:	Adeptus Titanicus - Explorator Fleet - Legio Cybernetica - Skitarii
Armed Forces:	Adeptus Arbites - Adeptus Custodes - Planetary Defense Force - Sisters of Silence
Imperial Army:	Afriel Strain - Adeptus Astartes - Gland War Veteran Imperial Guard - Imperial Navy - Imperial Knights - Militarum Tempestus
Imperial Cult:	Adeptus Ministorum - Adepta Sororitas - Death Cults - Schola Progenium
Inquisition:	Ordo Astartes - Ordo Astra - Ordo Calixis - Ordo Chronos - Ordo Hereticus Ordo Machinum - Ordo Malleus - Ordo Militarum - Ordo Necros - Ordo Sepulturum Ordo Sicarius - Ordo Xenos
Officio Assassinorum:	Adamus - Callidus - Culexus - Eversor - Maerorus - Vanus - Venenum - Vindicare
Great Crusade:	Corps of Iterators - Legiones Astartes - Remembrancer Order - Solar Auxilia
Unification Wars:	Legio Cataegis
Other:	League of Black Ships - Logos Historica Verita Navis Nobilite - Rogue Traders - Ambassador Imperialis
Abhumans & Denizens:	Beastmen - Caryatids - Felinids - Humans - Nightsiders - Troths - Neandors Ogryns - Ratlings - Scalies - Scavvies - Squats - Subs - Pelagers - Longshanks Shadowkiths
Notable Members:	God-Emperor of Mankind - Malcador the Sigillite The Perpetuals - The Primarchs - Sebastian Thor Erda - Ollanius Pius

The God-Emperor of Mankind

Contents

The Entire History of the Emprah

The Emprah Himself

Worship of the Emperor