[Loren]

There's no way to recover other than making backups as you go, the game doesn't save them.

Do you realize you can use "Call God" to get him back, albeit with all of his magic abilities reduced by 1? IIRC it's 40 priest-level-months to get him back. (Thus a level-1 priest on his own would take nearly 4 years. 14 level-3 priests could do it in a month.)