Theory: the great other is R'hllor

[Maid So Fair]

Practitioners of the weirwood religion, at least the ones 'in the know' seem to be aware of the duality of magic and the fight between ice and fire. My evidence being the oath Jojen and Meera swore to Bran. It seems like the actual facts are kind of lost to the ages, but BR is def trying to fight off the Others in his WW tree home-cave and maybe even the HotU (with their odd colored Weirwoods) and the Asshai/Quaithe were keeping away the fire magic. At the very least I think these groups know what is going on in the big picture. Maybe he never says "Great Other" but Bloodraven does refer to the white walkers and the "heart of winter".

That's different from saying that one of the aspects is evil and needs to be eradicated and I think that's where Mel/the Red priests get it wrong - ASOIAF is a grey world and when they try to make it fit their black and white view it simply doesn't work. We already see the resentment this brings among the wildlings at the Wall. Ice and fire are both impornat and need to be in balance.

[league of blooDraven]

That's different from saying that one of the aspects is evil and needs to be eradicated and I think that's where Mel/the Red priests get it wrong - ASOIAF is a grey world and when they try to make it fit their black and white view it simply doesn't work. We already see the resentment this brings among the wildlings at the Wall. Ice and fire are both impornat and need to be in balance.

Oh yup, we're in agreement then. Maybe I mis-read your last post :(

[Blazfemur]

hmm.. my initial thought that supports this theory is this: i think frequently, melisandre states, "there is only r'hllor, only r'hllor, r'hllor is the one true god, r'hllor r'hllor oh god r'hllor."

later on she'll tell other people, "it's either r'hllor, or the great other."

if theres no other superpower, isnt she blatantly telling us r'llor IS the great other?

[The Mother of The Others]

Practitioners of the weirwood religion, at least the ones 'in the know' seem to be aware of the duality of magic and the fight between ice and fire. My evidence being the oath Jojen and Meera swore to Bran. It seems like the actual facts are kind of lost to the ages, but BR is def trying to fight off the Others in his WW tree home-cave and maybe even the HotU (with their odd colored Weirwoods) and the Asshai/Quaithe were keeping away the fire magic. At the very least I think these groups know what is going on in the big picture. Maybe he never says "Great Other" but Bloodraven does refer to the white walkers and the "heart of winter".

The Children's magic is broader than the magic of Fire alone. It's They who are probably holding on to the Lightbringer magics Melisandre is crafting a jealous forgery of. Jon will have to get the "real" version of Lightbringer from the Children, not Mel. (The Lightbringer that will generate heat in order to pass Aemon's test of authenticity and actually accomplish..... whatever it's destined to). The reason the Forest Kids have the spell and Mel doesn't is because Nature magic combines the elements instead of emphasizing one. This is a problem for Mel because it makes her religion look like not the best business model, magically speaking. Nature magic is like a symphony of bird calls and her Fire magic is like a one-note operetta that leaves something to be desired ultimately---so she labels this Forest magic heretical rather than be forced to admit it's simply a better magic discipline that the Children practice, more well rounded. She calls BR and Bran agents of this Great Other when really they're just the Greater Operators. Closer to the heart of things.

The "other" option I'm liking is...... there's been Contamination of the magic pool. Look at Mel. She's a shadow-caster who.... claims that Light is the bomb. So why is she all shadowy? She says that line about how you can't have light without shadow.... but she seems LESS PROUD of the shadow baby aspect of her repertoire, you know? As if she's ashamed and knows there's no lie she can tell to fully account for how she's rolling around in the shadow magic like she kind of relishes it. Her personality is become as twisted as the magics that co-exist within her. Contamination. Due to some past events (involving the Others, their origin, etc.), the red priests' light magics got all blended together with Shadow, tarred and feathered basically. Her "god" was besmirched with darkness at some point (meaning the physics of Light & Dark, Fire & Ice magics got all knotted up like an electric cord you can't figure out how to untie, and this crossing of the wires filtered down into the minds of individual spellcasters trying to use the befouled pool of magic. Everything went haywire from this, including the seasons getting out of wack, and maybe even the appearance of the Others & Dragons. It's a blood cancer in the world of magic. It's why the Others are angry and want to strike back at the living for...... something. For this! For how their nature has been messed around with somehow. And this is also why the Firebreathers are blended with shadow substance. Contamination. Everyone's seeking to undo their entanglement with other forces they'd rather extricate themselves from in hopes of reversing the changes that've been wrought in their respective natures.

It's time to

"Throw it down, big man!" --Bill Walton :

Hunting down some "great other" is code for Mel's desire to extricate herself from the Shadow tar.

And if Melisandre knows there's a boogeyman "god" to chase after up north named "the Great Other"....

that means there's some kind of epicenter of tumor growth to find and root out.... and the weirwoods have deep roots, so they're her chief suspects. She's acting on some ancient vendetta or grievance lost to history, but the magical

node she needs to interact with awaits in the land of always winter.

She's aiming to re-simplify her world of magic by striking at the more tangled web of magic she sees up north, hoping to unravel the knot and free the world from this long-standing oil spill.

tl;dr --- for the time being, The Great Other = R'hllor. Because the forces of light & dark have been mingled into siamese twins against their "will". But if Mel gets her way this won't be true for long: she'll want to perform the surgery that severs the Great Other from her beloved Fire. This may or may not be wise, because her wants all come from her twisted vantage point. But if the forces can be harmonized intead of severed, it could also help deliver more regular seasons too.

[league of blooDraven]

@the mother of the others

I think you're right about the CotF trying to keep things balanced. As for the fire magic being "contaminated" idk.. My interpretation of the text is that magic, like the elements, are all needed for human life to exist. However I think keeping them balanced is the most important part.

Basically I don't think that fire magic got "contaminated" exactly but that shadow and ash is just a natural aspect of fire power and that is precisely why you can't have too much of it. There is a SSM saying (paraphrased) that "fire is lust and power and... , ice is revenge and hate and ...)

This can be seen through so many examples in the text. The Nights King messed around with Ice too much, and he ended up sacrificing his children and being destroyed. Stannis uses fire magic all the time while lusting after the throne and Mel and sees a vision of himself burning to ash under the weight of his crown, also each shadow baby sucks more life from him. There are a bunch more examples.

Look at the fallen civilizations we have: the Valyrians dabbled too much in fire magic and it cost them. The Rhoynar were heavy users of water magic and they fell to ruin and the grey plague destroyed even the ruins of their cities.

So based on this I don't think R'hllor is a supreme deity, but that there is a potent magical force that is the "heart of fire" just as there is a dangerous "heart of winter."

I think what caused the last Long Night was the CotF dropping the hammer of the waters and the rise of the Valyrian empire. There was too much magic in the world and it caused unbalance. Every use of magic has an opposite and usually much greater cost to be paid in blood, so the powers of Ice began to push back and came to collect that blood.

[JaimetheConciliator]

http://i.imgur.com/EpMhcEK.jpg

[KaiserTsar]

R'hllor and the Great Other are polar opposites: light v. dark, fire v. ice, Targaryen v. Stark, life v. death, dragon v. direwolf. This leads me to believe that there is one other opposition: male v. female. R'hllor is male and the Great Other is female. What is more, I think we have met her: the Night's Queen. It is another reason why the R + L = J theory is so intriguing. Jon is BOTH.

[Blazfemur]

R'hllor and the Great Other are polar opposites: light v. dark, fire v. ice, Targaryen v. Stark, life v. death, dragon v. direwolf. This leads me to believe that there is one other opposition: male v. female. R'hllor is male and the Great Other is female. What is more, I think we have met her: the Night's Queen. It is another reason why the R + L = J theory is so intriguing. Jon is BOTH.

if the night's queen is the great other, then the night's queen doesnt exist because martin said we wouldnt see any actual deity, as logic would have it.

furthermore, not to sound like a dick, we havent seen her. we havent seen ANY female Other, it's all word of mouth of the night's watch from that 14th lord commander (remember, he destroyed all histories of the 13th lord commander and prior) and-then-on.

as far as we know, his word about there being a female other, is the reasoning that he overthrew and exiled the 13th lord commander. we have no evidence to state otherwise, because he destroyed any (Sam to Jon, night's watch library)

[Blazfemur]

buy into it.

[Pib_Juju]

I don't think it's going to be resolved, personally. Martin seems to prefer keeping the gods inscrutable and not humanized-- or even really definitively proven real. I don't think any god is going to turn out to be 'good'.

I can see it playing out it in such a way that all the 'gods' seem more or less equally duplicitous and unreliable.

[Rohirrim]

All of you are going to be thrown for a loop when it's the drowned god that turns about to be real... :ack:

[Lord Martin]

R'hllor and the Great Other are polar opposites: light v. dark, fire v. ice, Targaryen v. Stark, life v. death, dragon v. direwolf. This leads me to believe that there is one other opposition: male v. female. R'hllor is male and the Great Other is female. What is more, I think we have met her: the Night's Queen. It is another reason why the R + L = J theory is so intriguing. Jon is BOTH.

I think it's a distinct possibility that the Great Other is female and potentially the female in the NK tale or perhaps R'hollors wife.

Along those lines, wolves have important female symbolism e.g. The she wolf who nursed Romulus and Remus. And this tale is full of male/female themes, e.g. Sun/moon, bride of fire, the creation of shadows on and on...

[Blazfemur]

I think it's a distinct possibility that the Great Other is female and potentially the female in the NK tale or perhaps R'hollors wife.

Along those lines, wolves have important female symbolism e.g. The she wolf who nursed Romulus and Remus. And this tale is full of male/female themes, e.g. Sun/moon, bride of fire, the creation of shadows on and on...

lol is Rh'llor Azor Ahai? did he kill his wife to forge or become lightbringer, and his wife became the great other?

"There is only rh'lor, and the great other" - Melisandre.

[Lord Martin]

lol is Rh'llor Azor Ahai? did he kill his wife to forge or become lightbringer, and his wife became the great other?

"There is only rh'lor, and the great other" - Melisandre.

No, I do accept the idea that one Is a god another was once a man.... But the tale of AA is another great example of the male/female dualism themed in the series....

[JaimetheConciliator]

I don't think any god is going to turn out to be 'good'.

I'm not trashing your opinion, but don't you find it interesting that the Old Gods have never been portrayed as anything but incredibly good? In the sum of everything we've been told about them, after five long books, in relation to the world, they are absolutely flawless. That has got to mean something in the long term.

As far as Azor Ahai, I don't think you can put enough stock and meaning into the fact that while he and his sword were supposedly the Last hero, not a soul in the North - ya know, where the war actually *happened* - remembers any sort of AA involvement whatsoever. The descendants of the witnesses of this actual war remember plenty of details about it, but not a thing pertaining to any of the East's proclaimed specifics of AA.

It literally SCREAMS of deception.

[Kharn]

Good and Evil...

You do realize that its not half the world vs half the world and each halves agendas all line up exactly..

Good and Evil are nothing but perspectives, one cannot exist without the other one cannot be judged upon without a secondary or more party (s).

Simply put person A might think they're doing good and person B might think what A is doing is evil.

Neither are right neither are wrong its merely perspective.

Or....Grey :)

[Blazfemur]

Theory: Kharn is an Other

...because he just worked some really intense necromantic magic in bringing this thread back from the dead.

[King Tommen Baratheon]

I agree with the OP, but I also doubt The Red God and the Great Other are real (even if they are the same, or enemies, or whatever). R'hllor and the Old Gods both creep me out.
Faith of the Seven and the Drowned God all the way B-)

[JaimetheConciliator]

Good and Evil...

You do realize that its not half the world vs half the world and each halves agendas all line up exactly..

Good and Evil are nothing but perspectives, one cannot exist without the other one cannot be judged upon without a secondary or more party (s).

Simply put person A might think they're doing good and person B might think what A is doing is evil.

Neither are right neither are wrong its merely perspective.

Or....Grey :)

Personally I think "evil" is nothing more than the animalistic genes embedded within every human, which can't simply be shrugged off in just 20 or 30 thousand years. And "good" is simply civilization, the yearning to follow the Golden Rule, because as soon as you explain it to someone it makes a lot of sense to them. "Good" is the struggle against our own inherent genetic inclinations.

But even if these are truths, they don't necessarily make for good fantasy fiction. In Westeros etc, the others are real and a real threat, regardless of whether they are "the evil" or not.