On Jesus in Briah and other dead horses

James Wynn · 30 Dec 2010, 04:07 · from 2010-December.txt.gz

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From: crushtv at gmail.com (James Wynn)
Date: Wed, 29 Dec 2010 22:07:54 -0600
Subject: (urth) On Jesus in Briah and other dead horses
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>> J Wynn-
>> So in Severian's cycle, there was a Christian Church because there was
>> in _our_ universe. The Jesus mentioned in Silk's Holy Book is a figure
>> of myth. Neither Severian nor the Rajan could any more go back in time
>> and meet him than you or I could go back in Time and meet Cinderella or
>> Jason or Thor.
>
> Antonio-
> Unplausible. Again, it's one thing for unconsequential stuff to ripple 
> across universes. Quite another for structured ideas to be imported 
> wholesale. Grooms may dress in black all they want without fear. 
> People don't build churches based on nothing. Myths have a source in 
> real life, even if it's only previous myth (something must have 
> established the first).

There's not much discussion of religion in Green's world, but assuming 
his is ours there is a Christian Church. If there were no equivalent in 
Lara's world, their world would be vastly different or huge 
rationalizations would be necessary in Lara's world to keep the two in 
alignment. But you don't imagine there was ever a Zeus do you? Who had 
his sinews cut and battled Typhon? A Thor who went to the underworld to 
bring back Balder? In There Are Doors people spoke the same languages. 
Based on Wolfe's example of imitation-leads-to-genuity (Long Sun) any 
religion in Lara's world would tend to mimic the _true_ religion and 
thus, by little changes along the way, the world's align. They would 
have rationale for the changes, but the changes would actually occur for 
unrelated reasons (I can give several examples of this in _New Sun_ and 
other stories. But the most obvious example would be CS Lewis' claims 
about why ancient religions bore similarities to Christianity.

>
> The Severian's-cycle-echoes-ours can mean that Severian's cycle's 
> Jesus wasn't God the Son, or that Severian's cycle's christians failed.

It could. But it is totally unnecessary for the to have been a Jesus at 
all. Anymore than it is necessary for there to have actually been a 
Hercules or Dionysus in order for people to keep their feasts.

u+16b9

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