Board Thread:Warhammer 40k General Discussion/@comment-5.65.81.205-20131002091720/@comment-3258762-20131113160230

While a lot of you bring up great points, as with most things it isn't nearly as simple as you make it out to be.

So, lets break it down to some points, the first being his hostile nature:

The Emperor was born somewhere around 60.000 BC. That is before any established government or religion that we know of. From here, he watched in silence as humanity grew. He always knew of the existance of the Chaos Gods, but he did not know everything, he wasn't a god yet (If he is a god now or not, we cannot fully know) and as such it was impossible for him to be omniscient, so his knowledge of them was "They exist and they are bad." Then, as he progressed through the ages, he, an incredibly powerful psyker, probably felt the gods empowerment through many of the horrible tragedies that have occured. So, there's the theories that he was the Buddha and Jesus and all those figures but lets not think of those as they are not confirmed. Now, however, we reach the expansion of humanity. Now, as is understandable, there is bound to be hostile xenos. Not all are hostile, but some are (Orks, most notably). As the Emperor lived during this time, he would have seen what happened when humanity had come into contact with such violent creatures. Then, suddenly, the Federation collapses as warp storms wrack the galaxy, as Slaanesh is born by the ways of the Eldar (A race of Xenos that humanity has surely met by now) thus making the Emperor Paranoid.

Now we come to the most important thing here: He has seen the first civilizations been crushed by other, more war-like gatherings, he has seen the threat of chaos and the threat Xenos pose, but more than anything, he has seen that peace is not an option anymore. For the safety of the human race, he cannot guide them peacefully from the shadows anymore, he has to take direct control before it is too late, and he cannot allow any xenos to interfere and change his people in ways that could empower the Chaos Gods.

Now, the next point is his utter disdain for Religion:

The Emperor has one sole purpose, he was born from the collective souls of several powerful shamans to do one thing: Defeat Chaos. The Emperor was born not knowing much about it other than the fact that, in the future, creatures of immense power would be born in the warp and bring ruin unto his species. Then he noticed something; Each time there was an epidemic of some kind, perhaps a plague or a massive slaughter, people would pray, and the Gods would be stronger. Now, what makes more sense; That they draw power from worship or that they draw power from this specific event. Thus giving birth to the idea that the Gods are empowered by worship, worship being one of the main points of most (not all) religions.

And, as with everything, there was extreme, illogical fanatics. These exist everywhere, not just in religion, but the Emperor would have had to deal with hundreds of thousands of these when trying to sway humanity peacefully. Thus ensuring he did not have the patience to deal with the same arguments over and over. Now, why could the Emperor not understand the need for religion? Simple, he never faced a question he could not explain, due to his incredible psyche, and as with most highly intelligent people, this caused him to develop problems with connecting with normal people, who thought in different paths and ways.

Worship is a form of attention, and the absolute bane of attention is ignorance. If none know of the Chaos Gods, none would be able to worship them.

And finally, why he did not spend time with his sons:

This really is an incredibly obvious thing. Look at any world leader with a child, they do not have time to spend with their children or families when running a country. The Emperor ran not just a world, but later hundreds, and was also occupied with a way of reducing the risk of Warp Travel, and travel was vital to the Imperium.

The Emperor had probably originally thought to raise his children on his own, instilling in them his views (however bad that may be) but as he discovered them, they were all grown up and socialized on the planets they had been taken too, therefore it was no need to the Emperor, the strictly rational being he was, to re-raise his sons, but just tell them what he intended to do.

Did the Emperor have a part in the Horus Heresy happening? Yes, yes he did. Was it his fault? Absolutely not, it was not Horus fault either, and to a certain extent it was not even Lorgars fault. The entire fault lies with the Chaos Gods, to whom both Primarchs were just puppets.

Ah, truth, thou art the bane of simplicity.