{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/whorl/1247", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "whorl", "thread": { "id": 1247, "subject": "BotLS/BotSS Christian themes", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "2001-03-01T17:46:55+00:00", "last": "2001-03-02T08:29:35+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Endymion9", "address": "endymion9 at mindspring.com" }, "date": "2001-03-01T17:46:55+00:00", "subject": "(whorl) BotLS/BotSS Christian themes", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "First of all let me state that I am a Christian. I was raised in the\nBaptist church and switched to a Charismatic church later.\n\nI've been reading but avoiding jumping in the Christian themes discussions\nbut wasn't really sure why I had an aversion to thinking of the LS/SS books\nin this light. On the way to work I felt some thoughts formulate and now\nfeel ready to join in.\n\nThe LS/SS books do not work for me as a story that parallels the trinity and\nthe progression of a Christian towards Christlikeness.\nI can buy Silk being a Christlike figure in LS. He shows great compassion\ntowards his enemies (The Ayuntmiento, the Travagaunti) and encourages people\nto be the *best* that they can be. He does some questionable things but so\ndid Jesus in some people's minds (Overturning the moneychangers table,\neating and drinking with sinners, etc.).\n\nI can buy Horn being a disciple of the Christlike figure. He aspires to be\nlike Silk. He has compassion for his people (New Viron). And in OBW he is\na very human person trying to live up to what his \"god\" desires of him. He\nhas failings but is striving for the *best* life.\n\nIn IGJ, Horn has already been \"filled with the spirit\" of Silk and continues\nto display more Christlike attitudes. He loves his enemies as Silk did (The\ninhumi, the citizens of Soldo, etc.). He tries to inspire the citizens of\nBlanko to live the *best* life.\n\nIn RttW this all falls apart (for me). If the end of RttW preceded IGJ I\ncould see it. I could see Wolfe telling the story of how it really feels to\nbe possessed with a god or \"filled with the spirit\" and could see it as the\nstruggles to give up your human failings and allow the \"god\" to begin to\ncontrol your life, maybe even with some violent rebellings.\n\nBut what kind of Christ/Holy Spirit figure is this we get in the end?\nA Christian nightmare. The love of the inhumi is gone as\nJahlee is kicked to death, inhumi are lured into a slaughter. Also\nSilk/horn\nwrites off the people of Blue/Green as not worth saving and deserts them.\n\nSo, I can buy this as a great science fantasy (what the publishers used to\nlabel TBotNS when I first bought it), or as a story trying to merge\nChristianity with Greek Mythology and all other world religions to show that\nthe Christian God is nothing special, just one of many or an ancient\nastronaut etc. But not as the true Christian story in the Holy Bible. It\ndoes not work in that regard for me. The creature we get at the end of the\nstory is less Christlike than either the earlier Silk or Horn IMHO.\n\nDennis/Endy\nhttp://home.mindspring.com/~endymion9/index.htm\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "ddanehy at siebel.com" }, "date": "2001-03-02T08:29:35+00:00", "subject": "RE: (whorl) BotLS/BotSS Christian themes", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Endennis wrote:\n... But what kind of Christ/Holy Spirit figure is this we get\nin the end? A Christian nightmare. The love of the inhumi is\ngone as Jahlee is kicked to death, inhumi are lured into a\nslaughter. Also Silk/horn writes off the people of Blue/Green\nas not worth saving and deserts them." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Let's take a step back for a moment, and see if I can't allay \n_some_ of your concern. Regarding his most blatant \"Christ-\nfigure,\" Severian, Wolfe has repeatedly insisted that he is \n_not_ a Christ-figure but a _Christian_ figure. That is, Wolfe \ninsists (and I take him seriously on this) that because Christ\nwas the unique Son of the Father, it is a fundamental error\nto equate any real person or fictional character with him.\n(Though I wonder how he would apply this to, say, Aslan.)\nIn regard to his characters, specifically, he comments \nthat Severian -- again, as an example -- is not living out \na version of the Christ story but the Christian story ... \nwhich, by its nature, involves some imitatio Christi.\n\nThis is probably easier for me, as a fellow-Catholic, to \n\"get,\" for we use symbolic identification far more freely\nthan most Protestant and Evangelical churches*. So it's\nvery easy for me to see events in my life which I can\ncompare to Christ's temptation (as we are so explicitly\ninvited by the event to compare Severian's temptation by\nTyphon); what is terribly important, then, is for me to \nsee how many times I did not reply as Christ did.\n\n-----\n* I'm not quite sure where in this spectrum to place\nthe Charismatic churches. Frankly, they frighten me,\nnot because I think \"they're a bunch of snake-handling\nnutters,\" but because deep inside I wonder if something\nis wrong with my own faith when I see the kind of stuff\nthe Charismatic movement produces. OTOH, there's also a\nstrong Charismatic movement within the RCC these days...\n-----\n\nSilk, too, is not ultimately a Christ figure but a \nChristian figure. We can use him in constructing interesting\nanalogies to the Trinity, but in the end he's not a perfect\nGod-Man, but a mortal trying to be better; and as such,\nwe see him sin repeatedly -- as you point out. Nor is Horn\na Christ figure, nor is Silkhorn or Passilkhorn, a Christ\nfigure. Each of them is a bad man [or at least a far from\nperfect man] trying to be better (though Silk, to be honest, \nstarts out pretty darned good, for a bad man).\n\nI suspect that Wolfe realized how many people considered \nSilk a blatant Christ-figure at the end of LONG, and \ndecided to shove it up our noses that he was still an \nimperfect sinner.\n\nAs to your last specific point (\"Also Silk/horn writes off \nthe people of Blue/Green as not worth saving and deserts\nthem\"), that's not how I read the ending at _all_ -- rather,\nI read it thus: he realized that there could never be a home\nfor him on Blue. He realized that he could no longer pretend\nto be Horn, wife of Nettle. He realized that his presence was\na constant temptation to the people of Blue to set him up as\na Rajan, a Caldé, or, worst of all, a strego; to view him with\nthe awe properly reserved only for the \"Outsider.\" And all \nthis being the case, he decided that he must leave.\n\nI'm more concerned about the decision of Nettle and Seawrack\nto accompany him. (Marble/Moly/Rose/Whatever makes sense, and\nof course Oreb goes wherever \"Good Silk!\" goes.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "So, I can buy this as ... a story trying to merge Christianity\nwith Greek Mythology and all other world religions to show that\nthe Christian God is nothing special, just one of many or an\nancient astronaut etc. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "No; absolutely not. Quite the opposite. It (and likewise the\nSOLDIER books) begins with the assumption that there might\nwell be powers in the world which are _not_ God, but which we\nmight mistake for gods and worship. It shows how, fooled in\nthis way, the honest devotion due only to God might be spent\non beings unworthy of it. Finally, it shows that there is,\nnonetheless, the one God (whom Silk and those of his world\ncall \"the Outsider\"), who is far more different from Pas and\nhis ilk than they are from the people of the Whorl; who made\nPas and everything else; who is \"the only god for me,\" as\nSilk says to him; who, as we learn in some detail in SHORT,\ndoesn't desire the guts of animals, but in some mysterious\nway communicates with us through shared bread and wine; who\nwills to save all, despite our sinfulness, our foolishness,\nand our devotion to any number of created things.\n\nThat, I think, is what Wolfe is getting at.\n\nSo when you say it is not" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "...the true Christian story in the Holy Bible. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I can agree completely; it isn't intended to be. It is,\nrather, an _application_ of the Christian world view to\nan imagined situation.\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] } ] }