For every murder, for every sentient being struck down in fear, anger or vengeance, there is a corresponding ripple in the warp, Khorn is the culmination of al those sensations. Every time a life is taken in anger, is the power of Khorne increased.
Skulls for the skull throne
No other of the chaos gods are as direct and apparent in his iconography as the god of skulls. The saying of his followers “blood for the blood god, skulls for the skull throne” is beyond a doubt the more iconic and well known of the franchise.
His realm very much reflects his straight forward nature and philosophy, might is right, and but one single rule “blood must flow”. Khorns realm is a land of red deserts and large volcanic mountain ranges, it is rage and fury made manifest. (Games workshop, 2016)
Here Khorne sits upon his throne brooding over al of his domain. His throne is a huge brass monstrosity, that stands in a mountain of al the foes that has consciously or unctuously been slain in his name. Here the skulls of his champions lays next to their former victims. The land itself is made out of blood and bones of the fallen, and under large volcanos are those warriors who died in their sleep, and a as a result, is not even a peaceful death an escape for those who has once taken the life of another. Here they are forced to toil for al eternity forging weapons for the Blood gods armies. (Games workshop, 2016)
An uncaring god
The truth is that Khorne do not care from where the blood flows, and yours are as good as any other. The god of murder do in other words not care for winners or losers in wars, or why they are fought. Khorne only care that blood is being spilled.
The single goal for Khorne is to one day see al life in the galaxy destroyed and turned in to corpses in front of him. In other words is there no saving, even for the followers of the blood good, for they to must perish for their masters ultimate wish to be fulfilled. To become a champion of Khorne, and his ideals is in other words, also becoming a future inevitable victim to the same deity you yourself serve. To die in the service of Khorne is simply speeding up the inevitable. As mentioned before will not even a peaceful save them from the servitude of the Blood good. (Games workshop, 2016)
Disciples of bloodshed
Every warrior and soldier, every murderous thug and mercenary, knowingly and unknowingly pays homage to Khorn,for his worship is done solely by the spilling of others blood. Every time war breaks out, or another sentient being is struck down in anger, be it from a murder of passion, to a genocide of an entire planet, does Khorns power grow. (Games workshop, 2016)
The blood gods servants perfectly mirrors the straightforward and dogmatic mentality of their patron god.
Most if not al of Khorns personal daemons takes the shape of muscular horned red skinned creatures or slavering monsters hunting dogs. These beasts and creatures, just like their creators lives for little other then battle, murder and bloodshed. They sally forth from the warp killing and maiming everything in their path at the behest of their ever vengeful master. (Games workshop, 2016)
Of al the daemons of the warp we have discussed so far are those of Khorne the closest in appearance to the traditional Christian daemons. Khorne also, much more then his rivals, represents a clear Christian vice, more specificity one of the seven deadly sins, that of wrath. This theme is strengthened by the fact that Khorne is also the patron god of murder and murderers. (Games workshop, 2016)
The concept of Khorne being the embodiment of the Christian sin of wrath also fits well in to our earlier comparison between the Imperial Creed and the catholic church (see The Ecclesiarchy).
War in fiction
As the name of the franchise (Warhammer 40.000) insinuates is war indeed a large part of the setting. This fact comes partly from the origin of the franchise, namely the tabletop wargame forms the basis of the franchise. With this fact in mind do Khorne almost seem inevitable, a representation of raw fighting and combat, a simple narrative justification for the endless war and strife that goes on in the universe, making sure that every players army always have a reason to fight any other players army. He is a obvious and easily understood metaphor for endless and inevitable war. This is indeed a fine read of Khorne, but I believe that we can dig deeper, and find more nuances in the narrative then a simple justification for war. (Games workshop, 2016)
The many faces of war
As we will see as we continue our exploration of the various factions will we find that Khorne is far from the only icon, or even god, of war. Many factions have their own ideas and deities dedicated to war, and each of them corresponds to their specific beliefs regarding war. From the Ork gods Gork and Mork, who revels in the thrill of close quarters combat, and the thunder of guns just as much as their subjects, to Khaine the vengeful avatar of war, destroyer of the unworthy. This leads us to the next question, to who do Khorne belong? (Games workshop, 2016)
The god of human warfare and death
Most readers will not find this answer surprising, but I will argue that Khorne, like the previous Chaos gods, are Khorne the representation of humanities fears of war and senseless murder. As we described in the Nurgle episode are most of humanities lives full of strife and death, from the endless front lines of the many war fronts of the Imperium, to the endless factories and mines that keeps the Imperium alive.
As we have described earlier is the Imperium of man, an empire of endless warfare, for their xenophobic and dogmatic faith and politics allows no coexistence and no peace. Its understandable that humans living under these conditions would start and see death and war as an inevitability, as a grinding and careless machine of blood and broken bone. (Hill 2016) I argue that Khorne, are the culminations of these fears and notions that are deep in humanities collective continuousness. (Games workshop, 2016)
Conclusions
Khorne might at the first glance seem like a very straightforward and simple god to analyse, but I would argue that he represents a lot of themes within the 40k narrative, that we will definitely return to in the future. The seemingly endless and needless warfare and strife is a constant theme in the narrative, and one of the driving motives when it comes to the narrative hopelessness and cosmic horror of the universe. Next time will we discuss the last chaos gods, and one that is not so directly tied to humanity, the deity of pleasure and pain, she who thirsts, the bane of Eldar, Slaanesh.
References
Codex: Chaos daemons (7th Edition), Games Workshop, 2016
Codex: Chaos Space marines (7th Edition), Games Workshop, 2012
Hill, J.D. (2016). Astra militarum. Games Workshop. Lenton, Nothingham.
An Unused Frequency 
One thought on “Warhammer 40k an in depth analysis: Part 2, The Warp: part 5, Chaos: Khorn, The father of murder and war”