Are Jon's Vows Fulfilled?

[Protagoras]

10 hours ago, Sensenmenn said:

This is wrong, the first part "It shall not end until my death" is stating when the oath is fulfilled/ends then there is visual separation between this part and the second part. The second part "I pledge my life and honor to the Night's Watch, for this night and all the nights to come" is talking about where this oath holds within the life/time of the first part. This means when Jon dies his oaths will have been fulfilled any new life he gains after death will not be bound by the oaths of the old one. Also  a reason the NW oaths end at death could be to prevent the undead from using NW related thing such as the black gate.

This sonds like a very unrealistic take.

The watch is a glorified prison. The oath reflects this and has been created with the purpose to allow no "out"

And again - if you have been resurrected, you are no longer dead. Therefore the first part doesn´t apply to you, but the second (all nights to come) do. An undead creature who is unaware of self (And you don´t want Jon back at such a state, right?) counts as dead too. Look at the wights - what they were as humans is clearly not there anymore.

In comparison - LSH or Beric certainly would count as alive since they have a sense of self.

But this point is moot - the lords of Westeros (and with good reason!) won´t allow such blatant rulebreaking to exist. Still waiting for that speech.

[Sensenmenn]

10 hours ago, Protagoras said:

To quote myself from an earlier thread...

Night gathers, and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death...I pledge my life and honor to the Night's Watch, for this night and all the nights to come.

If Jon is resurrected, he is not dead anymore. Therefore, his watch is not over. He will break his oath if he leaves permanently. "Nights to come" means "all nights in the future".

Sure, some might think those rules doesn´t mean much and should be broken for the greater good, yada, yada. That doesn´t make them any less broken. I mean - how will you convince the great lords about this? That Jons resurrection somehow should able him to leave the watch without lost honor or consequences? I would like to hear that speech.

This, in short, is bad fanfiction. GRRM won´t make it this easy for him. Nor will he hand Daenerys the Iron throne on a silver platter. It simply doesn´t work like that.

This won't be an issue, what's going to happen to Jon is not a resurrection like cat and barrick or undeath like the whites it's a rebirth. A rebirth tends to include physical changes(such as being taller, red eyes, white hair, and more targ like features), changes in character/personality, and new knowledge(like seeing visions of the past and speeking to deceased family such as Ned, Rheagar, and Lyanna ) plus he will probably go by his real name Aemon Targaryen(yes I subscribe to this). So it will be immediately apparent that he's not the same person.

[Starfell]

4 hours ago, Celebriel82 said:

Also Jon wouldn't be stealing Bran or Rickon's inheritance, if you remember, Robb legitimatized Jon and made him his heir before the Red Wedding.

See, this is half the reason why I don't like the position that Jon is a free agent now. He can't be dead enough to escape his vows but not not dead enough to lose his titles (which he was ineligible for anyway) to the next person in the queue.

 

[The Broke Howard Hughes]

Anyone who sees him dead, then return to life, can't possibly call him a deserter. Calling dying and being resurrected a loophole is just looking for an excuse to back your own point. Til death means just that, the moment he dies he's fulfilled his vows. If he decides to stay that's his choice. But him leaving isn't some trick. He met the requirements and now he's free to go. Whether anyone believes it is another question.

[John Suburbs]

The thing is, will his brothers believe that he actually died? Even many of Beric's followers think that Thoros is just a good healer, so if reports start to circulate that Jon is dead and then he shows up walking and talking, well the reports were just premature -- Melisandre pulled him back from the brink.

If his brothers do believe he died but is now a wight, I doubt they would let him "live" much longer.

A more interesting question is, as a former corpse that has been reanimated, will this allow him to walk amongst the wights unmolested? Does he now have a chance to join up with that side and get close to the great Other or whatever is leading them, perhaps to kill him or at least have a chat...?

[Trigger Warning]

I don't think a technicality would appeal to Jon's own sense of honour. 

 

[Minsc]

19 hours ago, Sensenmenn said:

This won't be an issue, what's going to happen to Jon is not a resurrection like cat and barrick or undeath like the whites it's a rebirth. A rebirth tends to include physical changes(such as being taller, red eyes, white hair, and more targ like features), changes in character/personality, and new knowledge(like seeing visions of the past and speeking to deceased family such as Ned, Rheagar, and Lyanna ) plus he will probably go by his real name Aemon Targaryen(yes I subscribe to this). So it will be immediately apparent that he's not the same person.

If Martin does that then he owes one J.R.R Tolkien an apology.

[Greg B]

How could it possibly matter to anyone? He already went rogue and publicly declared himself in open rebellion against the crown with the intention of leading a wildling army against the lawful lord of the Dreadfort and heir to the Warden in the North. After that, what possible difference would these technicalities make following his resurrection?

[Minsc]

19 hours ago, Starfell said:

See, this is half the reason why I don't like the position that Jon is a free agent now. He can't be dead enough to escape his vows but not not dead enough to lose his titles (which he was ineligible for anyway) to the next person in the queue.

 

Thank you, I hate this attempt to allow Jon to have both his cake and eat it at the same time.

[JonCon's Red Beard]

I think that rather than asking if his vows are "fulfilled", we should ask what the consequences of such should mean for Jon. Like, ok, he is brought back... is he going to say "fuck off, I'm outta here"?. Loophole or not, I don't see Jon Snow abandoning his post, even if Marsh actually gives him a document saying "you're out". He knows what's the real danger, and he won't abandon the Wildlings or the North.

A more possible scenario I see is that Jon is eventually offered Winterfell again, and he has to debate on whether he should leave the Watch or not. I'm sure whatever he decides, he will be supported by his many friends, specially because I'm sure they will realise that Jon being Lord of the North would mean he can bring more help to the Wall to fight against the Others.

At the end of the day, vows are just fancy words. Jon knows is his duty to protect people and he will do it if he can. Even if the Watch ceases to exist, he won't say "well, I'm free agent now, someone else please take care of the Zombie Invasion".

[The Great and Mighty Poo]

3 hours ago, Minsc said:

If Martin does that then he owes one J.R.R Tolkien an apology.

This is exactly why it won't happen as the person you quoted said, also because a hero has to change with each and every conflict that gets in their way. Every wall they climb has to make them stronger or cost them something. If not the reader will feel cheated, unsatisfied.

Omg ninja'd by @JCRB's Honeypot and said much more articulately then I did

[JonisHenryTudor]

On 5/4/2016 at 10:59 AM, Chris Mormont said:

If Jon is resurrected by Melisandre like Beric Dondarrion then are his vows with the Nights Watch fulfilled?  Can he leave without losing honor or being a deserter?

 

The thing is, even if Jon "left" the NW, it isn't as if he is going to say well the Others are not the problem...on the other hand this Iron Throne.. 

 

If anything, Jon and his support will execute the traitors. They will combine their numbers with the wildlings, and then he will find a way to draw support from the north. As a "Stark", Jon's voice will carry some weight--not much perhaps--and he could probably convince the northern lords, or some of them, to join him in the fight against the Others. Jon may take an unconventional route, but until the final page of his story he will continue to defend the realm...whether in black clothing or in Stark Armor (I don't think he will adopt Rhaegar's colors). 

[JonCon's Red Beard]

22 hours ago, Sensenmenn said:

This won't be an issue, what's going to happen to Jon is not a resurrection like cat and barrick or undeath like the whites it's a rebirth. A rebirth tends to include physical changes(such as being taller, red eyes, white hair, and more targ like features), changes in character/personality, and new knowledge(like seeing visions of the past and speeking to deceased family such as Ned, Rheagar, and Lyanna ) plus he will probably go by his real name Aemon Targaryen(yes I subscribe to this). So it will be immediately apparent that he's not the same person.

Why will Jon have a rebirth and not a resurrection? For once, we don't even know if he's indeed dead so far.

3 hours ago, Minsc said:

If Martin does that then he owes one J.R.R Tolkien an apology.

He has already portrayed two characters that have returned "different", but he has given good explanations for it: first, we don't really know Beric's original state after he was brought back once (he could have been normal), and we've seen that Catelyn remembers everything perfectly (or so it looks like) but she seems to have lost a bit of her sanity because she already lost it before she died. So, in "Martinverse", your life continues from the moment you died. In Jon's case, he didn't have the traumatic death Cat had. There is a chance he returns exactly the same because his own death wasn't that bad. If he's dead at all.

And BTW, Gandalf didn't exactly return "the same"... :/

[Lord Lannister]

If Jon starts going around saying "But I didn't dishonor my vows, I died and then came back... really!" people are going to think he's crazy. Instead of looking for some contractual loophole, he'd have a better case arguing that you can't have an honorable vow to a group of people so dishonorable they murdered their last two lord commanders. If several knives to his gut weren't a severance package for him on general principle then some loophole in the wording of his vow isn't going to be either.

[Slowpoke Martin]

First of all, there are no instances of a Nights Watch member dying then coming back to life, so the people saying that Jon would still be bound to his oath are talking out of their asses.

The vow is very clear cut that his oath dies with him, stop trying to twist words to fit your opinions.

Jon deciding to stay with the NW even though hes not bound to it, is another story all together.

[The Broke Howard Hughes]

3 hours ago, Slowpoke Martin said:

First of all, there are no instances of a Nights Watch member dying then coming back to life, so the people saying that Jon would still be bound to his oath are talking out of their asses.

The vow is very clear cut that his oath dies with him, stop trying to twist words to fit your opinions.

Jon deciding to stay with the NW even though hes not bound to it, is another story all together.

But it wouldn't be HONORABLE for Jon to leave the Nights Watch. I know he actually died, and those guys tried to kill him, but HE can't leave. He has to be stupid and stick around!

[JonCon's Red Beard]

As someone said before about the topic, then any Ironborn can request to take their vows in some Drowned God fashion and say "ha ha! I died!" and get out. makes no sense.

I agree that Jon can be release from duty due to technicalities but I think this is something that many Jon fans are trying to use so he can't be an "oathbreaker", like that matters. For example, Jon was never Ygritte's husband, nor they sired children. Yet, Jon DID FEEL he was betraying his vows, that's what matters, even if "technically", he never actually broke his vows. I honestly don't get what's the obsession with keeping Jon pure and clean, like he's somehow better than the other characters. The guy fucked Ygritte fair and square for months and enjoyed it. They were pretty much husband and wife in everything but in some minor technicality. Deal with it.

At the end, as I said, it doesn't matter that he's "free" or not. Jon won't leave the Wall nor will abandon his friends, the North and the rest of Westeros to their luck. Even if he's somehow offered to be the King for some reason, his main priority will be protect everybody from the Others invasion. And I doubt someone from the Watch will tell Jon "See, you can't leave and take a position of power that could indeed be more helpful, because you have vowed to stay here until you die". If I were a member of the Watch, and I know any of them can be the King or anything similar, I would be the first to tell them "please, go and send help"

 

[norwaywolf123]

Never, as long as he live in some form or another the oath counts untill you forsake it or break your oath like the kingslayer did with the mad king

[Maxxine]

If Jon has died then he has fulfilled his oaths. Once he comes back he will have no a new life thus not tied to the vows. Yes, it's a technicality but it is still a valid interpretation. The biggest reason I subscribe to this interpretation is because Jon has to be able to leave the Wall at some point. He's obviously an important character and being so geographically removed from the other important characters can't work for the entire series. He's going to have to interact at some point. Yeah he'll come back to the Wall at some point to fight the Others, but it doesn't seem like the rest of the important characters will be coming to him so he'll have to go to him. 

[Drogo_1]

On 5/5/2016 at 2:00 AM, StarkofWinterfell said:

Bloodraven wasn't allowed to leave though, he disappeared. 

Where did the books reveal that?