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Hephaestus is a lame
god, tossed out of Olympus by his parents Zeus and Hera during a quarrel between
the two. Yet he is also the master
craftsman of the Olympian deities. Not
only is Hephaestus a blacksmith without equal, he is also responsible for
several great feats of engineering amongst the deities.
Dogma
Hephaestus expects
his worshippers not to permit any disability they may have to hinder their
chosen vocation. His teachings are
often centered on the value of hard work and reliability. The virtues of honesty and fairness are frequent topics of
sermons from the forge.
Clergy
It is not uncommon
for a cleric of Hephaestus to have some sort of deformity or handicap. Though they are not required to be blacksmiths, many do so and those that
don’t often work at other crafting jobs. Blacksmith or not, all of Hephaestus’ clerics wear the leather
blacksmith’s apron embossed with the symbols of Hephaestus during ceremonies
and usually during official visits. Clerics
of Hephaestus regularly inspect smithies and may endorse a smithy indicating his
work is of high quality or remove an endorsement if the smithy becomes lazy and
the work is shoddy. They often
counsel young men and women in choosing a vocation and will usually take an
apprentice for themselves to train in both the art of smithing and in the
clergy.
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Symbol: