God/Increate in the New Sun

Lee Berman · 02 Dec 2010, 19:07 · from 2010-December.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee Berman)
Date: Thu, 2 Dec 2010 14:07:35 -0500
Subject: (urth) God/Increate in the New Sun
Message-ID: <SNT123-W523A5E095A53C567DD04E5CF270 at phx.gbl>

>craig Brewer: All this talk about atheism has me wondering since it's been a couple of years 
>now since I've actually re-read it: are there any passages in New Sun where the Increate acts 
>directly? In Long Sun, obviously, we have Silk's opening vision. But is there anything equivalent 
>with Severian that is (or appears to be) something that wasn't the Hiero's doing?

I will disagree that Silk's Outsider possession/vision  was the work of the Increate. The fairly
clear association of The Outsider with Dionysus in RttW suggests this is a deity operating at a
much lower level than the Increate.  I could consider The Outsider as a possible god of all Briah.
But I don't think he could be the Creator of all universes at all times.

My impression from UotNS is that there is potentially an infinite number of levels of beings between
humanity and The Increate. A being just a couple steps up like Tzadkiel is at a level sufficiently
superior and distant as to make meaningful conversation difficult. The Increate is just too far away
from humanity to communicate directly and must use imperfect translation through intermediaries if
there is to be any communication at all.

I agree with Ryan Dunn that we may conclude that Severian's power derives from a source higher than
the Hierogrammates, explaining why Tzadkiel has been a Severian acolyte and why Tzadkiel cannot 
restore a dead human being (or dead Hierogrammate, his son) back to life. Severian's mating with Apheta 
may have facilitated the creation of the White Fountain star but perhaps only allowed access to a 
higher power for its creation.

I consider that the black hole in the sun and the White Fountain were created simultaneously in Briah.
Sort of like how pulling a plug from a bucket of water creates a sucking hole inside the bucket but 
from outside the bucket, a fountain is created. The time frame of the dying Urth sun was the time it
took for Severian to carry the plug from outside the bucket back inside the bucket and plug the hole.

This may call into question what I think is a bit of lupine gospel: that the black hole was created at
the time of Apu Punchau and that Severian's eclipse was the result of Tzadkiel's ship arriving to install 
the hole. One reason to doubt the gospel is that Tzadkiel's ship seems unable (because of its size
and gravity? or the nature of its sails?) to come closer than Pluto to our solar system. My alternative
theory for the eclipse is that it is akin to the other natural disasters (storm, earthquake) that occur
when Severian is angry or in fear of dying. Rather than Tzadkiel's ship parked in rotation-matching orbit
for half a day causing the eclipse perhaps it was a natural event; and the large body Severian used to 
cause the extended eclipse was simply the Moon.

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