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Matthew doesn’t explain their function. The passage is basically a polemic against Pharisaic Judaism.

If you can find me a reference to phylactery between 200 CE and 1975 (when it was incorporated into the D&D lexicon) which doesn’t apply to tefillin, I’ll be impressed. Because I can’t find one. Gygax would have known them as phylacteries. Probably via Matthew 23. I don’t deny it. I’m not...

Except that the word phylactery has been exclusively and explicitly used by Gentiles for almost 2000 years to apply to tefillin, and the Anglicised version - Middle English Phylactery as opposed to φυλακτήριον - has only ever been applied to tefillin. As I’ve noted, the phylactery of long...

I appreciate your thoughts here, although I'm a bit reticent about the use of "fatalism" to describe my position. Yes, language changes (or is very resistant to it), but pushing against 18 centuries of accepted usage - and its enshrinement in Christian scripture - is no small undertaking. There...

I mean, the association is established. It has been for 1800 years. The use of the word phylactery was dropped in all other contexts a long time ago - probably late antiquity or the early middle ages. It’s only used now to apply to tefillin. You can argue its inappropriateness, but it doesn’t...

I really don’t think it’s all that important which particular term is associated with the item in question - whether it be tefillin or phylactery. In the west - in Christendom, so to speak - the word phylactery has been associated with the tefillin since at least the second century. You might...

I mean, I’m not going to respond to this because of the Board’s rules. But I would have thought that the unvoiced retort should be fairly obvious.

It’s apocryphal in Protestant traditions, yes.

There is so much wrong with this post, I don't even know where to begin. Not based on a religious text, but based on a text of a religious nature - which isn't a religious text because it's not sanctified by the church. Er...which church? Not seeing the difference between a religious text and a...

Pretty much my position.

True. The problem is, we don’t really know what that means. It might be a loan-word and have something to do with Orcus. It’s vaguely Christianised as having something to do with Cain’s offspring. If the Orcus connection holds, then it’s probably some kind of zombie or undead spirit.

Well, I’m not responsible for your inference. I think it is possible to have a rather nuanced position with regard to what is and what is not acceptable in this context. Would I regard magic wands as disrespectful because some modern practitioners of magick incorporate them into their rituals...

Did I write that? Did I even imply that? No. I said the desire to avoid real world modern religions was understandable, and a difficult needle to thread.

3E was pretty shameless in its appropriation of (sometimes outmoded) religious terminology, and often its reassignment. The material accessories of religions (recast as magic items) are no different: hence we have phylacteries (in their particular form, derived from tefilin), chasubles, vajras...

I was being a little facetious; I'm rather fond of the Peloponnese. According to the 1E Manual of the Planes: Sounds awful.

I was about to post something similar before I came across your post. I understand the urge to treat humanoids differently (these sophonts resemble us too much, and we shouldn't de-personize them), but in a sense that is itself more inherently problematic (i.e. it's ok to de-personize and kill...