Cult of Shai-Hulud
Fremen worship of the sandworm as a living god of the desert.
Fremen religious life orbits Shai-Hulud. The sandworm is no mere predator to them. It is divine power made flesh on Arrakis. That status is confirmed by its role in producing the Water of Life and the melange that keeps the entire Imperium running. Poisoning a captured worm and transmuting its excretion into the Water of Life links the cult directly to the Bene Gesserit's own Reverend Mother rite. The Fremen had worked this connection out in their own religious terms long before outsiders showed up to make use of it. Reverence for the worm touches nearly everything. Crysknives are cut from its teeth. The worm-riding trial marks a young Fremen's passage into adulthood. Paul Atreides rose among the Fremen and was named the prophesied Lisan al-Gaib. From that point the cult's devotion to the sandworm fused with his own religious authority, and the two were never cleanly separable again.
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