Subject: (urth) Damn filthy Hiero-wasp-creatures

From: thalassocrat at nym.hush.com <thalassocrat at nym.hush.com>
Date: Sun, 06 Jan 2008 05:18:36 +0000

In UOTNS, the Hirarchs and Tzadkiel lie repeatedly and harm Sev and 

other humans in ways which range from displays of petty malice to 
near-genocide.

There is no evidence whatsoever that they are part of a holy 
hierarchy with the Increate at its apex. The only reason for 
believing in Hireodudes-as-angels is if one already has a 
conception of a universe structured in such a way, as Sev does.

Sev's perceptions are moulded by the religion which he absorbed as 
a child and youth, and by his training to obedience to authority as 

a torturer. The religion, of course, is the one for which he 
himself provided the founding myth, in Typhon's day. There is no 
connection to the Increate. In Citadel, when he prays at the 
Pelerine altar, he finds the object of his prayers to be himself.

Sev's religion is based ultimately on Sev's own claims to be a 
Conciliator and the "miracles" he performed; of course these 
"miracles" were merely phenomena of a higher technology. The 
"conciliation" is at best an unfulfilled hope, at worst a lie 
deliberately engendered by T. There is nothing anywhere to suggest 
a closer union between humans and Hiero-people or any benefit to 
humans. Sev's career as supposed "Conciliator" ends with him 
sanctioning the death of most people on Urth. 

(Perhaps you could point to the presence of Father Inire and the 
Hierodules as some kind of outcome from the "Conciliation", but it 
is ahrd to see what particualr benefits they bring, and they would 
appear to be dupes themselves. Eg: Inire believes that the coming 
of a New Sun will see the Commonwealth strengthened. Etc etc etc.)

Tzadkiel returns Sev to Typhon's time at least in part so that Sev 
will cause this religion to establish itself, molding Sev's outlook 

in the future in ways favorable to T's agenda. When Sev threatens 
to go off track during his mini-ministry (lasting perhaps a week?), 

by breaking out of his cell, T appears to him in a vision barring 
his way. 

Afterwards, by the brook Madregot, mini-Tzadkiel mendaciously 
implies that she does not know exactly how to guide Sev to return 
to his chosen time. Then she guides him precisely to a re-entry 
which puts him back on Urth when it is too late to do anything to 
help his people survive the flood, but just in time to see it wash 
away his wife and the last of those people. Her (mocking, I think) 
laughter follows him.

On Yesod, T and the Hierarchs display consistent malice and 
contempt towards humans. It starts pettily enough with the 
Hierarchs causing the lander carrying Sev and the crew 
representatives to swoop & loop in a terrifying manner, while the 
Hierachs look on with amusement. 

They promise no further tricks, but the whole "trial" is a trick. 
The humans have been tricked into believing they are there simply 
to serve as jury, in the trial of somebody whom they are tricked 
into believing to be the Autarch. In the event, they are called 
upon to defend their real lives against artificial beings conjured 
from Sev's memories. Not having being indoctrinated with the fake 
New Sun religion, they of course choose Urth over Ushas and 
genocide - except for Gundie, unanimously.

For this, they either die or have their memories taken from them. 
This is no trial, and the crewmen are not jurors. Their "verdict" 
is treated as worthless, and they are punished for delivering it.

As to why T goes through this charade - I think it's probably 
malice, and for the same kind of amusement the Hierachs enjoyed 
from the distress of the humans on the lander. And perhaps to make 
sure that Sev is committed to his role as dupe - if he consents 
still to the New Sun path after seeing it overwhelmingly rejected 
by his fellow humans then I guess nothing is going to turn him away 

from it. 

One of his functions no doubt is to take the burden of guilt for 
the coming destruction away from the Hiero-dudes. As T says in his 
parting words, Urth will be destroyed at *Sev's* command - not T's. 

Look, Increate - clean hands! And I sacrificed my own son! (But did 

he care for this son?)

The Hierogrammates are not angels of the Increate. They appear to 
me to be a species of evolved insect. The Hierachs are their 
"larvae" - they live underground, perhaps in something resembling 
an insect nest, but certainly evoking images of Morlocks. I can't 
help but think of those varieties of wasp which grow their larvae 
inside the bodies of living hosts, which eventually die from it. 

We know nothing certain of what happened to the original 
human/Hieros, but I wouldn't be surprised to find they ended up as 
hosts to the ancestors of the Hierogrammates, and were destroyed. 
Perhaps T's ultimate agenda is to develop humans to the point where 

they are once again suitable for this purpose; not co-evolution, 
but parasite and host.

One of the things not to like about this reading is that in some 
ways it turns NS into a literary trick analagous to those of the 
Hiero-dudes. The reader is duped, just like Sev. If Sev had been 
able to uncloud his mind of all the baggage of vague mysticsm he 
would have seen malicious wasp-creatures instead of angels. If the 
reader can peel back his layers of preconceptions about what kind 
of story this is, he discovers within them a rather hackneyed pulp-
SF trope.

Perhaps this points to another reason for Wolfe including the 
SilkHorn-meets-Sev scenes in SS: the (IMO) far greater work 
expunging or perhaps redeeming the lesser ...

---

From: Stanislaus <sbocian at poczta.fm>
Date: Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:39:52 +0000

Hello thalassocrat,

> humans. ...

> an insect nest, but certainly evoking images of Morlocks.

The Neoplatonic philosophy is hard to understand. The hierarchical part is simple, but the ultimate otherness of the Increate is difficult to understand. Severian, however, undestood it, as far as it is possible. Read again the parable of the cock - the angels are still infinitely far from the Increate, and can only guess at his wishes.

The religion of Urth is much older than Conciliator and in no way depends on his miracles, or in fact on any miracles (although they still happen). It was founded by Theoanthropos. As to the technological explanation for Severian's resurrection - it is not exactly apparent in the books. 

The most important difference is that most religions and philosophies have very different value structures from the modern one. Killing nearly all people on earth certainly was not good, but in the neoplatonic view it was very far from real, important evil. Reading Machen helps to understand that point of view.

http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0601371.txt

Hierogrammates are certainly not angels and do not claim it at all. On the other hand such beings as Tzadkiel are very much different from them.

I wonder whether you did read "Voyage to Arcturus" by David Lindsay? I think it would have interested you.

http://members.aol.com/siure/lindsay.htm

-- 
Best regards,
 Stanislaus                           mailto:sbocian at poczta.fm

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Mamy worek pelen prezentow. Te prezenty sa dla Ciebie.

Sprawdz >> http://link.interia.pl/f1cbf

---

From: thalassocrat at nym.hush.com <thalassocrat at nym.hush.com>
Date: Mon, 07 Jan 2008 09:19:57 +0000

On Mon, 07 Jan 2008 07:39:52 +1100 Stanislaus <sbocian at poczta.fm> 
wrote:
>Hello thalassocrat,
>
>The Neoplatonic philosophy is hard to understand. The hierarchical 

>part is simple, but the ultimate otherness of the Increate is 
>difficult to understand. Severian, however, undestood it, as far 
>as it is possible. Read again the parable of the cock - the angels 

>are still infinitely far from the Increate, and can only guess at 
>his wishes.

There's the cock story, and other bits and pieces also. in Dr 
Talos' play, Nod tells Gabriel that he's only guessing at what the 
Increate wants. G sees he was afraid of that; clearly, the same is 
true for him too. There's also the little story of the angel slain 
by an arrow. Gabriel says: "If I had known we could die, I would 
not at all times have been so brave" - or words to that effect. 

All of these little markers support my view. Thinking of "Gabriel" 
in these stories as a reflection of the real Hierogrammates, they 
tell us that such "angels" are neither spiritual beings (they can 
die) nor the direct agents of the Increate. It may even be true 
that T et al believe they are working the will of the Increate - 
such convenient self-deception isn't very uncommon.

>
>The religion of Urth is much older than Conciliator and in no way 
>depends on his miracles, or in fact on any miracles (although they 

>still happen). It was founded by Theoanthropos. As to the 
>technological explanation for Severian's resurrection - it is not 
>exactly apparent in the books. 

Perhaps parts of the religion, or the framing of the religion, are 
older than the Conciliator - there is no way of knowing - but 
everything suggests that the main focus of the religion is now the 
New Sun/Conciliator as holy hero, perhaps as an avatar of the 
Increate, although that is never made very clear. 

The Pelerines are devoted to Conciliator-worship. The carolyer on 
the scaffold in Saltus starts by addressing the Increate but in 
this fragment clearly addresses a New Sun mythologized from Sev's  
mission in Typhon's day: "You, the hero who will destroy the black 
worm that devours the sky; for whom the sky parts as a curtain; you 
whose breath shall wither vast Abaia etc etc etc". Ditto for the 
Conciliator/New Sun to whom Agia, Dorcas and others refer as an 
aspect of the divine. Ditto for every reference to Urthly religion 
I can recall.

Without Sev's mission, the Conciliator/New Sun figure would not 
exist in the religion of his youth. There would presumably be some 
other divine hero-type, but not this one & not one which would set 
a religious context for Sev thinking that the New Sun was an 
absolutely unquestionably good thing.

>
>The most important difference is that most religions and 
>philosophies have very different value structures from the modern 
>one. Killing nearly all people on earth certainly was not good, 
>but in the neoplatonic view it was very far from real, important 
>evil. 

That for me would be an enormous argument against ever signing up 
for a neoplatonic religion. Really, I think part of Wolfe's 
intention is a critique of those kinds of religious sensibility 
which can lead one to consider genocide as anything but an 
"important evil". He puffs up a cloud of this neoplatonic, gnostic, 
whatever mumbo-jumbo jargon and imagery, but underneath it you have 
a core reality of (maybe) parisitoid wasp creaqtures, demonstrably 
malevolent towards humanity & in no way divine. 

>
>Hierogrammates are certainly not angels and do not claim it at 
>all. On the other hand such beings as Tzadkiel are very much 
>different from them.

Not sure I understand this. T is of course a Hierogrammate. He sure 
doesn't go much out of his way to dispel the angel image. Think of 
the scene in his captain's cabin when Sev & Gunnie are returning to 
Urth, putting on a show of power and majesty to awe the humans. 
Another piece of trickery. Of course, we know that he isn't an 
angelic being; just another creature whom the Hiero/humans moulded 
in some fashion.

Perhaps you're thinking of the Hierarchs or Hierodules?

>I wonder whether you did read "Voyage to Arcturus" by David 
>Lindsay? I think it would have interested you.

I probably will read it, thanks.

---

From: David Duffy <david.duffy at qimr.edu.au>
Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2008 01:59:23 +0000

On Mon, 7 Jan 2008, thalassocrat at nym.hush.com wrote:
> intention is a critique of those kinds of religious sensibility [...]

Unfortunately I am not au fait with theological thought about the 
Noachian Flood, but I suspect it is not usually regarded as an 
evil by RCs.

David Duffy.

---

From: thalassocrat at nym.hush.com <thalassocrat at nym.hush.com>
Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2008 02:29:56 +0000

On Tue, 08 Jan 2008 12:59:23 +1100 David Duffy 
>Noachian Flood, but I suspect it is not usually regarded as an 

I guess the really-truly God gets a free pass to do whatever he 
wants & it is by definition "good", since it's his game. 

I don't think the same applies to creatures, like Hierogrammates.

---

From: Roy C. Lackey <rclackey at stic.net>
Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2008 06:37:27 +0000

Andrew wrote:
>hierarchy with the Increate at its apex.

As you are doubtless aware, I have argued the opposite view before, so I
won't bother to repeat it all. I can't, of course, prove the Increate's
involvement because the Increate never appears on the stage. Just a few
comments.

>"miracles" were merely phenomena of a higher technology.

Sev's abilities to heal and to raise the dead to life again are not the
products of alien high-tech. Even mighty Tzadkiel could not heal Herena's
arm or raise Zama to life the way Sev did, as Barbatus explained when Sev
complained of being brought back to life as a mere high-tech eidolon. (URTH,
359-60)

>parting words, Urth will be destroyed at *Sev's* command - not T's.

And just before saying that, Tzadkiel said, "The death agonies of the world
you know will be offered to the Increate. [. . .] Much that is beautiful
will perish, and with it most of your race; but your home will be reborn."
(153) And that seems to be the point of it all. Bad-ol'-Man needed to be
slapped down -- again. That's how the god-game works. Sacrifice in an
attempt to placate a wrathful god, a conciliation made by a conciliator.
Only Sev isn't the one who had to pay the price, no matter how bad he said
he felt about it all after the fact. After all, torturers are famous for
their sympathetic qualities.

In any event, BF&O thought of themselves as holy slaves, but they were not
Tzadkiel's slaves, even though they had been fashioned by the
Hierogrammates. As Famulimus said, " How could Hierodules be holy, did we
not serve the Increate? Our master is he, and he only." (36) My point here
is that both the Hierogrammates and their helpers seem to believe that they
were serving the Increate when they did what they did, to, for and about the
people of Urth.

>expunging or perhaps redeeming the lesser ...

Silkhorn continued to make sacrificial offerings to the Outsider, even after
he was on Blue and gave up on being just a reader of entrails. You seem to
think Silkhorn a fine, upstanding dude and the Outsider the True God.
Silkhorn did the same thing Severian-the-Conciliator did, only on a smaller
scale; a matter of degree, not kind. If Wolfe's work is any indicator of his
religious leanings, he seems to regard the concept of religious sacrifice in
a favorable light.

-Roy

---

From: Matthew Groves <matthewalangroves at gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2008 12:52:10 +0000

On Jan 5, 2008 11:18 PM,  <thalassocrat at nym.hush.com> wrote:
> ways it turns NS into a literary trick analogous to those of the
> Hiero-dudes.

Speaking for myself, this is the nail in the coffin of this reading.
Calling it a "literary trick" makes it sound like something Wolfe
might do, but really it just turns too much of The Book of the New Sun
into a Big Fat Lie.

On Jan 8, 2008 12:37 AM, Roy C. Lackey <rclackey at stic.net> wrote:
>
> As you are doubtless aware, I have argued the opposite view before

Roy, would it be possible for you to find and post a link to that old argument?

---

From: thalassocrat at nym.hush.com <thalassocrat at nym.hush.com>
Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2008 13:08:13 +0000

On Tue, 08 Jan 2008 17:37:27 +1100 "Roy C. Lackey" 
>complained of being brought back to life as a mere high-tech 

A couple of things. First, I think the Hierodules are dupes. They 
probably believe all this hogwash. (I think Father Inire is a dupe 
also, whether or not he's actually a Hierodule.)

Second, I concede that maybe not everything Sev does faux-miracle-
wise has a Tzadkiel-tech basis. Another annoying but evident 
possibility is that Sev somehow or other has Magic Blood which lets 
him draw & focus energy from external sources in time-twisting 
ways. 

Even if this is the case, it doesn't imply any kind of divine 
origin for this power & it remains the case that it was Sev's own 
miracles which boosted the establishment of the New Sun religion, 
which was my original point.

Sev may be the Hierogrammate's chosen one just because this Magic 
Blood is a necessary attribute of what they want from the Hieros, 
possibly the original source of their own time-twisting powers. At 
least this would provide some better motivation for the question of 
why Sev. Perhaps he's supposed to mate with every female on Ushas 
or something.

>(153) And that seems to be the point of it all. Bad-ol'-Man needed 

>to be
>slapped down -- again. That's how the god-game works. Sacrifice in 

>an
>Only Sev isn't the one who had to pay the price, no matter how bad 

>he said

Of course, as you say, it comes down to whether or not you think 
Tzadkiel actually has any idea of what the Increate might want. I 
think it fits better to assume that Wolfe's Increate is not in fact 
a wrathful Jehovah figure, and Tzadkiel is bullshitting himself 
and/or Sev. 

>Hierogrammates. As Famulimus said, " How could Hierodules be holy, 

>did we
>were serving the Increate when they did what they did, to, for and 

>about the

But obviously, belieiving it doesn't make it true. 

>he was on Blue and gave up on being just a reader of entrails. You 

>seem to

Really, I think Wolfe would indeed see a qualitative difference 
between sacrificing animals and killing off most of a planet full 
of humans, as I imagine most people would. Maybe that's actually a 
bad distinction,  but I don't think Wolfe would aagree. I certainly 
don't think SilkHorn is perfect, and in fact I think sacrifice is 
an area where he's a bit of dunce. He never seems to get the point 
of Oreb squawking "No cut!" all the time. 

But I think Olivine's little communion is supposed to show that 
Silk did decide that sacrifices weren't pleasing to the Outsider, 
the only god. SilkHorn doesn't explicitly remember this decision, 
but think of his "sacrifice" of bread and wine to the Outsider 
after the Battle of Blanko. Also think of his digust at the hordes 
of animals slaughtered in the sacrifice in the Grand Manteion in 
RTTW. 

I wouldn't be surprise to find that SilkHorn would still 
participate in animal sacrifices even if he did remember the 
decision, if necessary. He'd just think of them as rather 
meaningless and distasteful.

And, obviously, I do indeed think that Wolfe intends SilkHorn to be 
a very fine upstanding dude, and the Outsider to be the really-
truly God. (Obviously, that doesn't mean that I necessarily agree 
that SilkHorn is my idea of an exemplar or that I actually believe 
in any kind of god.)

One final thing: Wikipedia says Tzadkiel is supposed by some to be 
the angel who stopped Abraham from killing Isaac. I vaguely recall 
that this is supposed to be the definitive point at which Yahweh 
made it clear that human sacrifice is a Bad Thing. It seems that 
even T's name is a lie. 

But I don't think he always lies. Eg: Mini-T says to Sev beside 
Madregot: "I've many times been called a liar".

---

From: Steven <mcquaryq at comcast.net>
Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2008 17:47:22 +0000

though more confused thoughts about GW's 'real' religious thought.   
It's hard for me to square a number of items in his many books with  
his professed Catholicism.  Normally, I'd just say:  Well, the author  
is a fantasist and has a writing persona and then, separately,  
there's his real life feelings.  But GW seems to purposefully entwine  
the two and it makes me wonder at the value he places on belief.  Or  
am I just a dupe, falling for the seeming veritas of his writing?

	Any thoughts?  I'm a Spinozist myself and have no ax to grind in the  
dogma wars.

On Jan 8, 2008, at 1:37 AM, Roy C. Lackey wrote:

>  If Wolfe's work is any indicator of his

Steven
http://bowenfineart.com/

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From: Lane Haygood <lhaygood at gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2008 18:09:45 +0000

Remember that Wolfe uses narrators to tell his story -- unreliable  
ones. Anything written in the narrative voice should be taken to be  
the thought of the narrator, not necessarily Wolfe himself. That, and  
Catholicism isn't necessarily a monolithic edifice of thought. I can  
certainly see where various philosophical and theological schools  
influence the "mythology" of Wolfe's works, as it were. I don't think  
Wolfe intends to endorse these as a proper system of belief so much as  
he uses them to make his works interesting and meaningful.

Lane

On Jan 8, 2008, at 11:47 AM, Steven wrote:

> 	I've just started Pirate Freedom and have been having similar,  
> his professed Catholicism.  Normally, I'd just say:  Well, the  
> author is a fantasist and has a writing persona and then,  
> separately, there's his real life feelings.  But GW seems to  
> purposefully entwine the two and it makes me wonder at the value he  
> places on belief.  Or am I just a dupe, falling for the seeming  
> veritas of his writing?
>
> 	Any thoughts?  I'm a Spinozist myself and have no ax to grind in  
> the dogma wars.
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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From: Roy C. Lackey <rclackey at stic.net>
Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2008 20:30:51 +0000

>Roy, would it be possible for you to find and post a link to that old
argument?

It's been debated more than once, largely by Adam Stephanides and myself, so
it's not neatly packaged in one place. The last round was in March of '05,
in the "Increate on trial" thread.

-Roy

---

From: Jeff Wilson <jwilson at io.com>
Date: Wed, 09 Jan 2008 07:48:56 +0000

> their sympathetic qualities.

But Severian is also the Autarch, the Epitome of Urth - so it's a 
willing, self-sacrifice as far as that goes. (Severian survives, but is 
no longer Autarch or epitome of anything.)

Or not. All of this, with the "higher" creatures knowing no better the 
Increate's wishes, and with "evil" men actually serving the greater good 
by their parts in the Increate's plan - it makes a pretty good case for 
moral relativism.

-- 
Jeff Wilson - jwilson at io.com
< http://www.io.com/~jwilson >