Shadow, Chapter X

Son of Witz · 19 Nov 2008, 18:43 · from 2008-November.txt.gz

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From: sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org (Son of Witz)
Date: Wed, 19 Nov 2008 18:43:36 +0000
Subject: (urth) Shadow, Chapter X
Message-ID: <W1895127279269321227120216@webmail21>

>Son of Witz wrote:

>> The Increate you mention, is God.
>> though I'm sure you don't need me to point that out.
>
>I think the Increate is more strongly identified with Severian than with 
>out concept of God, and since that identity is behind the stagehands 
>that are behind the scenes, it's not Severian being steered so much as 
>SevIncreate producing a live autobiographical drama starring SevConciliator.

I think one of the only No-Brainers in this whole book is that The Increate = God.  You've surely heard of, in some of Earth's theology, the term The Uncreated.  The Increate = The Uncreated.  IT's THE Source. That which is eternal and uncreated (ie, separate from manifestation).  The Highest being on any ontological scales.  This comes up in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddism.  In Gnosticism it would be The True God, that is, above the Demiurgos.
I'm sorry, but I don't think The Increate could mean anything else.  And, though I don't have time to search the text, I'm certain that the notion of The Increate is voiced apart from Severian.

HOWEVER,

In the Christian Trinity, if I understand right, The Father is The Uncreated, and the source of the Son and Spirit.  Yet they are One.  Severian is clearly a metaphoric analog to the Son, so in a sense Severian is just one hypostasis of The Increate. The Father IS the Son, though we, of seeming necessity, often conceptualize them as separate entities. yet they are one.

So in a way, you are right, The Son (LOGOS) is manifesting as Severian here.
When he's in the Pelerine Tent after recuperating in the Lazarette, he prayers and has a mystic experience that gives him flip flops his perspective in a way that implies this sort of ontological loop that a GodMan would possibly experience.

"I did not deceive myself with the thought that I had it in me to lead
millions. I asked only that I might lead myself; and as I did so, I
seemed to see, with a vision increasingly clear, through the chink in
the universe to a new universe bathed in golden light, where my
listener knelt to hear me. What had seemed a crevice in the world
had expanded until I could see a face and folded hands, and the
opening, like a tunnel, running deep into a human head that for a
time seemed larger than the head of Typhon carved upon the
mountain. I was whispering into my own ear, and when I realized it
I flew into it like a bee and stood up." [Citadel, Chap XIV, Mannea]

Furthermore, I don't really disagree about your notion of SevIncreate to SevConciliator in a personal sense, becuase as far as i can understand Christian symbolism (and Catholics of a non mystic bent usually tell me I'm wrong here, but some Orthodox say I'm right) is that Each One of US is the Child of God, and we are each crucified on the cross of Time (horizontal) and Eternity (vertical) and when Christ says 'no one comes to the father but through me'(sorry, paraphrasing) he means through the LOGOS, that which reconciles God and Man. Reconciliation is what a Conciliator does.

[Cue a bunch of Severian isn't Christ misunderstandings]

~SonOfWitz

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