Chakrana

Chakrana

Total Population
68,400,000
Founder
Unknown
Origin	D'Runia Date: Unknown
Type	Semi-Organized
Theology	Polytheism
Scriptures	Various
Branches
Eastern Western
Significant regions with adherents
Chaska Ayawantin Huilcasonco
Languages
Remana Wariano

Chakrana is the general term used for the polytheistic customs and practices on the continent of D'Runia used prior to the arrival of religions from elsewhere. In one sense, Chakrana is a mere 400 years old, dating back to a codification in the middle years of Huilcasonco's empire; in another, it is 22,000 years old, dating back to the first religious beliefs on the continent.

Key to Chakrana beliefs are two different, and sometimes diametrically opposed, principles. The first is that of ayni, representing a sense of "collective reciprocity"; the world is interconnected, and all things one does creates an exchange of energy between oneself and the universe. Sometimes the balance is in one's favour, sometimes it is not, but all things are returned. One must therefore work, and love, and learn, and live. But this may not be easy without guidance. This is where the second principle comes in: kama, "noble action", the path shown to one by one's god that teaches how one might best work, and love, and learn, and live, in order to ensure ayni flows truly.

To a Chakranar, kama may well change depending on culture, but ayni is universal. What goes around must come around.

Etymology

Chakrana in the Remana language of Chaska means "tool for inheritance"—a physical means of passing on information from one generation to the next.

History

Although Chakranar worshippers have occasionally been prosecuted by followers of other faiths, they have for the most part been largely left to their own devices. The exception to this relates to followers of Kunkata.

Attempts at codification came after colonization efforts elsewhere, with the government of Ayawantin seeking a unifying force against the new practices such as Orkanan which were being introduced into the region. To this end, a number of philosophical and religious texts were deemed "canon", and propagated whenever possible—although this was not to say that older or less widely-known texts were destroyed or even dismissed, merely confined to their own particular temples.

Deities

Champila

Champila promises a proper cycle to the world, a predictive quality to nature, and a sense of karma within one’s own lifetime. He is also the god of seasons and agriculture, and there are harvest festivals dedicated to him each year. His followers paint their foreheads with two white dots, one atop the other.

Kunkata

Kunkata demands discord—not to destroy a community, but to test and temper it, to make it stronger. This has not, by any means, made her followers particularly popular over the centuries, but they do ironically tend to maintain a certain continuity of spirit. Her followers paint a yellow-orange triangle on their foreheads in recognition of her "overturning the bowl".