Hi! I'm Ron! I'm relatively new to the Magic: The Gathering macrocosm, having learned to play in mid-2021. Compared to the folks who have put in decades of time and experience with the game, I am but a toddler in terms of knowledge, so I should warn you my opinions come from a place of limited experience, but a lot of love and passion. I learned to play using the Silverquill Pre-con Commander deck from Strixhaven. For my first year and a half, I played EDH/Commander exclusively, but have since expanded into other formats like Pauper, Limited, and Standard.

Today, I would love to discuss a topic that certainly has been discussed before... and if you know anything about my dating history, you'll know two things about me: I have a history of both celebrating mediocrity and beating a dead horse. However, I think some topics are worth revisiting over time as the meta and public perception change. Of course, due to my brief history with the game, it is still a relatively new topic to me. One of the first Commander decks I built on my own, which became a labor of love and remains a staple for me, is Traxos, Scourge of Kroog - a colorless Commander deck. In its first iteration, I used only cards I had on hand. One of those cards was the land, Temple of the False God. I was rapidly bombarded with comments from well-meaning helpers in my LGS groaning, "That card is soooo bad." Stubborn as ever, I used it anyway. In my experience, having used the card in multiple decks since, I have only found a defiant love for the thing, and I would love to explain why.

Temple of the False God: Add 2 colorless mana. Activate only if you control 5 or more lands.

• To start, Temple of the False God taps for 2 colorless mana. This, alone, can pay for the command tax on the recast of a commander, a value that is often only needed past turn five when you should have five lands anyway. Two colorless mana is also excellent at paying for mana rocks, activation costs, and equip costs.
• Scryfall advanced search for lands legal in commander that add 2 colorless mana yield 60 results. Of those 60 cards, Temple of the False God is the 10th cheapest option at roughly $0.10.
• Temple of the False God can help you recover from a missed land drop, provided you already have at least four other lands.
• It is itself a FREE Sol Ring. Yes, it is less valuable in your opening hand, but by the same logic, Sol Ring has less value late game, and many, many, many players refuse to cut it. You have the same likelihood of playing a late game "useless" Sol Ring as you would an early game "useless" Temple.
• Most decks do include some high mana powerhouse cards (8-cost or higher) that are intended to be played late game. By the same logic above, these cards are useless in an opening hand. However, Temple of the False God could assist in casting them late game. When paired together, they are cards that do not need to be cut just because the benefit arises later than opening hand. The argument of "exclude because it's useless in the opening hand" seems to go hand in hand here with learning when best to mulligan/keep.
• Temple of the False God helps a player catch up or rebuild after removal and board wipes.
• Can be used in multicard combos for infinite mana and infinite tokens
• Many lands that tap for two mana require some inconvenience, like entering tapped, bouncing a land back to hand, discarding a land, dealing damage to use, requires the presence of other cards for added benefit (ie Urza lands), can only be used to cast a specific type of creature (ie. Eldrazi Temple), etc, but Temple of the False God is limitless as long as you have 4 other lands in play.
• More mana on less cards benefits you if you're running cards that favor you having less lands. This theme is heavy in Mono-White in cards like Keeper of the Accord, Gift of Estates, Discerning Financier, Deep Gnome Terromancer, Archaeomancer's Map, Boreas Charger, Knight of the White Orchid, Land Tax, Loyal Warhound, Priest of the Blessed Graf, Scholar of New Horizons, Scouting Hawk, Space Marine Scout, Stoic Farmer, Weathered Wayfarer, Tithe, and Verge Rangers. While this is a primarily White ability, there is one card in Red that reaps the same benefit: Spiteful Repossession.
• If you intend to win by turn five, this card is likely not for you. However, in any casual deck that intends to begin to show it's shine on or around turn five, then there is no reason this card can't be in your deck. In some cases, you can benefit from the card earlier than turn five with the right early game card combinations. For example, casting early game low mana cards that allow you to play extra lands like Weathered Wayfarer in White or Exploration, Explore, Azusa's Many Journeys // Likeness of the Seeker, or Summer Bloom in Green, you could get a useful Temple of the False God in as early as turn two! Imagine an opening hand of Temple, Three lands, a Sol Ring, a zero-mana rock like Lotus Petal, and a Summer Bloom (a $0.40 card)? You could cast a commander turn one and have a useful Temple on turn two with seven mana available on that turn without even using higher cost/higher power cards typically found in faster games. While this scenario is extremely unusual and unlikely and very much "the perfect storm," it is not impossible and there are many cards that can get you a similar effect or value to make Temple useful early game.

Okay. Okay. As a primarily Mono-White player, and an appreciator of Selesnya, I may be biased. Does Temple of the False God belong in every deck? Absolutely not. Yet, it doesn't deserve its bad reputation. Too many people ignore it just based on what others say instead of trying it out in the right decks. Temple is a potential powerhouse in colorless, White, and Green decks. As the game changes and new cards get printed that could potentially increase its value further, it's worth revisiting the debate. Is it the best land ever printed? Of course not, but there is hidden potential that has only made my games with it feel fulfilling and satisfying. In short, play what makes you feel good, regardless of what other people think about it! The experience is yours to have! Who knows? You might change someone's mind about it with the right play someday.