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Bakker XLVI: Make Eärwa Great Again


Rhom

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Yeah. I'm thinking they are entities that think they are at the top of the pile but aren't and worse, can't even see they aren't.

Off the current topic, I just realized the stone the survivor gave to his son was probably the same stone the son cast to get the skin spy off his trail. Neat! It'd both show the Dunyain neglect of nostalgia (last thing given by a father before the fathers death is just cast away in a moment of utility) and yet it was a moment of nostalgia (and before that, madness) that passed the stone on. The unnecessary burden suddenly become necessary, perhaps like the survivors rescue and raising of his own child. Is the survivors child Golum, to perhaps Mimara's Frodo and Akka's Sam? >:)

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4 hours ago, Happy Ent said:

I have no opinion on what to call the nonexistent thingy that the Dûnyain or Kirkegaard strive to reach. Absolute, God, Nirvana,—it’s all same-same to me, and they are all equally mistaken (in Eärwa) about its existence, let alone how to reach it. In the Survivor example, I prefer the word God simply to echo Kirkegaard’s formulation “leap of faith into the arms of a loving God,” which is hinted at almost literally in the scene where the Survivor jumps (“… into the arms of nothing” or something.)

I find the whole Survivor chapter cute but tangential. It’s merely yet another theory about Eärwian metaphysics that turns out to be false, much like when the Scarlet Spire dude (drunk) must admit that there is an afterlife and he is quite damned.

I went back and reread that part.  Koringhus never actually mentions god specifically, just invokes Zero (seemingly as the placeholder where god would be?).  In this way, I think it could be plausible that his last lines:

"But the leap … Yes. That is his.

That is his …

As is the yawning plummet, the drop …

Into the most empty arms."

Could well be about him joining Oblivion, rather than a god.  I think it is plausible that Oblivion, as the Nonmen conceptualized it, could be possible.  I tend to agree with your position though, we already knew that the Logos was not the "whole truth" via Kellhus and Moe's TTT conversation.  It is another nail in the coffin though, cementing that Kellhus isn't just an exception, the Logos is false all the way around.

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5 minutes ago, .H. said:

"But the leap … Yes. That is his.

That is his …

As is the yawning plummet, the drop …

Into the most empty arms."

Thank you for quoting this. The choice of the words “leap” and “arms” are enough proof for me that the Kirkegaard analogy (leap of faith into the arms of God) is deliberate. The existentialist “That is his” clinches it for me.

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@realAnasûrimborKellhus

The Dûnyain, have surrendered themselves to the Logos, and believe me... its a really, really great Logos to what you would call reason and intellect. No fake news.   #logos #great

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@realAnasûrimborKellhus

We seek absolute, absolute awareness, a really strong awareness the self-moving thought. The thoughts of all men arise from the darkness. And it is so dark people... so very, very dark.  You wouldn't believe how dark.  #dark #bad 

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@realAnasûrimborKellhus

If you are the movement of your soul, and its a beautiful soul, and the cause of that movement precedes you, then how could you ever call your thoughts your own? Very bad.  No movement. #move

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@realAnasûrimborKellhus

How could you be anything other than a slave to the darkness that comes before? And I always said slavery was bad folks.  Only the Logos allows one to mitigate that slavery. So sad, slavery.  #slavery #badnews

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@realAnasûrimborKellhus

Only knowing the sources of thought and action allows us to own our thoughts and our actions, to throw off the yoke of circumstance and these are bad cicumstances.  So bad.  Believe me they are bad.  #badyoke

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@realAnasûrimborKellhus

And only the Dûnyain possess this knowledge, plainsman. The world slumbers, enslaved by its ignorance.  Its like Rosie O'Donnell ignorant. Only the Dûnyain are awake. I've always been told that I'm very wakeful.  Moënghus, my father, threatens this.  Very bad man, Moënghus.  #ignorant #pigface #badhombre

 

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Followed, you gotta get all those ones on there though, they are great.

Going to cross-post this, even though I think it is mostly non-sense, maybe someone actually smart can make something real of it:

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I've been tinking on this and some comments from Westeros spurred these thoughts. A lot of readers more knowledgeable than I, liken Koringhus's leap as one of faith into the arms of a loving God. And, how Koringhus is deceived because there is no loving God on Earwa.

Others, say he joined the Absolute. In fact, this is exactly what Mimara tells Akka, "He joined the Absolute". Well, from RSB we know that neither are true, he joined Zero, whatever that might be. I feel it to be nature, or maybe, as H has postulated, Oblivion.

I think it is a bit of a mistake to equate too closely Koringhus' leap with Kierkegaard's Leap of Faith, in the sense that God for Koringhus and God for Kierkegaard are not the same.  However, there are some possible parallels that might show us some thoughts about The Absolute and Zero-God:

"Like Dostoevsky, Kierkegaard, who plays an important role in the spiritual struggle for meaning on the part of the modern writer, cast off the bondage of logic and the tyranny of science. By means of the dialectic of "the leap," he attempted to transcend both the aesthetic and the ethical stages. Completely alone, cut off from his fellow-men, the individual realizes his own nothingness as the preliminary condition for embracing the truth of God. Only when man becomes aware of his own non-entity — an experience that is purely subjective and incommunicable — does he recover his real self and stand in the presence of God."

This is interesting in the context of Koringhus, because he realizes that the Logos is a lie.  Or at least that it isn't the whole truth, that there is something beyond Logic.

"Kierkegaard describes "the leap" using the famous story of Adam and Eve, particularly Adam's qualitative leap into sin. Adam's leap signifies a change from one quality to another, mainly the quality of possessing no sin to the quality of possessing sin. Kierkegaard maintains that the transition from one quality to another can take place only by a "leap."

This is another interesting parallel because Koringhus is certainly not Adam.  In fact, it is very nearly the reverse, the last of the Dûnyain rather than the first.  In the same way, Adam was born with no sin, where Koringhus has the original sin of the whole Dûnyain society behind him.  In this way, his leap is something of a reversal, ending with him in a state of no sin, rather than a state of sin.

I posit that Koringhus joined Oblivion though, because I do not think that there was a god waiting for Koringhus and he himself adds "into the arms of nothing" as the final word on his leap.  The question of the relation between The Absolute, Oblivion and Zero is pretty open though.

What we are offered as explaination of the Absolute is:

"“Precisely. And what is the solution to the Quandary of Man?”
“To be utterly free of bestial appetite. To utterly command the unfolding of circumstance. To be the perfect instrument of Logos and so attain the Absolute.”"

"In the effort to transform themselves into the perfect expression of the Logos, the Dûnyain have bent their entire existence to mastering the irrationalities that determine human thought: history, custom, and passion. In this way, they believe, they will eventually grasp what they call the Absolute, and so become true self-moving souls."

"The Logos remained true, but its ways were far more devious, and far more spectacular, than the Dûnyain had ever conceived. And the Absolute … the End of Ends was more distant than they’d ever imagined. So many obstacles. So many forks in the path …"

"How does one learn innocence? How does one teach ignorance? For to be them is to know them not. And yet they are the immovable point from which the compass of life swings, the measure of all crime and compassion, the rule of all wisdom and folly. They are the Absolute."

"For a time, it seemed they alone survived, that all mankind and not just the Holy War had perished. They alone spoke. They alone gazed and understood that they gazed. They alone loved, across all lands and all waters, to the world’s very pale. It seemed all passion, all knowing, was here, ringing in one penultimate note. There was no way to explain or to fathom the sensation. It wasn’t like a flower. It wasn’t like a child’s careless laugh.
They had become the measure … Absolute. Unconditioned."

“The God sleeps … It has ever been thus. Only by striving for the Absolute may we awaken Him. Meaning. Purpose. These words name not something given … no, they name our task.”

"Absolute, the—Among the Dûnyain, the state of becoming “unconditioned,” a perfect self-moving soul independent of “what comes before.”

"The whole point of the Dûnyain ethos is to overcome these limitations and so become a self-moving soul—to attain what they call the Absolute, or the Unconditioned Soul."

"The assumption that the Absolute could be grasped through mere thinking, that Men were born with the native ability to grasp the Infinite, was little more than vain conceit. The flesh, they realized.  Their souls turned on their flesh, and their flesh was not capable of bearing the Absolute."

"God.
The great error of the Dûnyain, he could see now, was to conceive the Absolute as something passive, to think it a vacancy, dumb and insensate, awaiting their generational arrival. The great error of the worldborn, he could see, was to conceive it as something active, to think it just another soul, a flattering caricature of their own souls."

"This, Sister … This is why I bare my throat to the blade of your judgment. This is why I would make myself your slave. For short of death, you, Anasûrimbor Mimara, wife-daughter of Anasûrimbor Kellhus, who is also my father … you, Sister, are the Shortest Path.
The Absolute dwells within your Gaze. You … a frail, worldborn slip, heavy with child, chased across the throw of kings and nations, you are the Nail of the World, the hook from which all things hang."

"And so it was with the Absolute. Surrender. Forfeiture. Loss … At last he understood what made these things holy. Loss was advantage. Blindness was insight, revelation. At last he could see it—the sideways step that gave lie to Logos.
Zero. Zero made One."

It is difficult for me to parse all of this.  The Absolute is what the Dûnyain call the state of being Self-Moving.  It is not a place, so when Mimara says Koringhus has "joined" the Absolute, it is not a place, but rather he took an invitation to take the shortest path to being Self-Moving.  Keep in mind, this is his soul we are talking about, not just his flesh, so while he is dead, mortally, his soul, presumably, is still self-moving.

How does this divide from Zero?  Zero is the marker, the placeholder of all meaning:

"Thus the utility of Zero, something that was not, something that pinched all existence, every origin and destination, into a singular point, into One. Something that commanded all measure, not through arbitrary dispensations of force, but by virtue of structure … system …"

So, it the condensation of Everything.  Literally.  That is, it is font of every cause, the sum of every effect, the system and the reason for the system.  It is the whole universe, in one place, or rather, the whole universe as one place.  This is why it is the vantage point for everything, why it is the Cubit, because it is the source of everything but not just the source, it is the destination as well, because it is everything.

What then is Oblivion, if it is not Zero?  Well, Oblivion is nonexistance.  Zero is a condensation.  Zero is a singularity, everything in One place and so in no place.  Oblivion is different, since it is literal destruction.

I wonder if then he did attain Oblivion, or simply a joining with Zero?

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But, this raises a question for me. Can we take the Judging Eye as reliable? Banker has said that the Absolute and Zero are not the same. So, the Eye tells Mimara that Koringhus was invited and joined the Absolute, but this is wrong. So, where am I going with this? Mimara sees Kellhus in a vision in the whale mothers room. He is blasted like nothing she has ever seen. I feel he isn't, and the JE to be unreliable. Not wholly unreliable, but it is fallible just as anyone or anything on Earwa, and yes, that includes Kellhus.

I think the Judging Eye is reliable.  As reliable as anything can realistically be.  That doesn't mean that the vision has to be set in stone though.  Indeed, Kellhus is damned by the original sin of the whale mothers, so the vision then is true.  That doesn't mean things couldn't change.  Indeed, that seems to be what happens to Koringhus though, damned, but then forgiven?

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To H's point:

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It is difficult for me to parse all of this.  The Absolute is what the Dûnyain call the state of being Self-Moving.  It is not a place, so when Mimara says Koringhus has "joined" the Absolute, it is not a place, but rather he took an invitation to take the shortest path to being Self-Moving.  Keep in mind, this is his soul we are talking about, not just his flesh, so while he is dead, mortally, his soul, presumably, is still self-moving.

I think this is confusing because you're talking simultaneously about what the Dunyain define the Absolute to be and are also talking about what the Absolute actually is - and the two are really different (IMO).

The Dunyanic view of the Absolute is what Moe explains and Kellhus kind of thinks about - a way to reach personal enlightenment and to become God. God doesn't exist - yet - for Moe and Kell, but they could become it. As Kor says here:

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"God.
The great error of the Dûnyain, he could see now, was to conceive the Absolute as something passive, to think it a vacancy, dumb and insensate, awaiting their generational arrival. The great error of the worldborn, he could see, was to conceive it as something active, to think it just another soul, a flattering caricature of their own souls."

It is neither passive or active - it is a place. It is the place that encompasses all places. And in order to arrive at that place, you must strip yourself of everything gained from the world. For a soul, that means stripping it of all sin. All sin - and that includes things like believing yourself better, believing yourself different, believing yourself unique. 

I think that Mimara saying that 'he joined the Absolute' is kind of a shorthand, the same way that she declared 'she guards the gates' when it wasn't true precisely either. 

But we can determine at least what Kor's thought process is without determining the actual validity of it, which could be separate. (I happen to believe that Kor is the most right person and Mimara is the most genuinely metaphysically right person, but that is debatable). Kor's thought process is based pretty well in logic:

  1. Everything has already happened and human's perception of time is wrong. (this explains how Mimara can see anything anyone has ever done, even if it would be impossible.
  2. There exists a way for everyone to see anything anyone has ever done, regardless of who else witnessed them, and recall it perfectly. 
  3. Therefore, at least one person (Mimara) has a connection to every single other person. 
  4. Because others have had this ability before her, this means potentially anyone can have this connection, and more importantly it means everyone is connected in this way even if they cannot access it.
  5. It also implies whatever is seeing these things is separate from the seen. 
  6. This thing that sees is what Kor calls the Zero-God. 
  7. He believes that everyone is part of the Zero-God and the only way to truly enter it as a place is not to become self-moving or to become worshipful - the only way is to relinquish all intellect, knowledge, and sin and any grasp of self.
  8. Kor believes he can accomplish this by two ways: having his sin forgiven (which he believes Mimara can do) and then taking qirri and losing his personal sense of self by partially becoming someone else.

So in a very real way the Zero-God is oblivion, because there is no self when joining with the source. Koringhus ceases to exist as an entity at that moment, and instead becomes one with everyone. The damned are the ones who cannot relinquish their selves and are maximally subjective; to be maximally objective in Earwa is to become everyone

In this way I both agree with @Happy Ent in that I don't think that there is a loving God as envisioned by Kierkegaard in the leap of faith, and disagree in that Koringhus never believed that there would be. He is putting his faith - literally, at that moment, the only thing he is - in the notion that there exists only everyone, and the Universe has simply unalterable rules, and souls happen to be a bizarre accident of universal law that deceives everyone into thinking they are singular. 

 

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@Kalbear @.H.

You guys are awesome.

since PLACE is so important in all this let's not forget the words chorae and topos were stolen from Plato/Derrida for their connection to the differing ideas about place, and in world are given representations/descriptions of literal damnation/hell on earth and for chorae as a portal to the god of gods, and chorae are consistently described as singularities throughout the series. The two terms Belong somewhere in your current debate.

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Well Mimara certainly believes it was an invitation from God to join the Absolute....

“You cared nothing about sending his father over a cliff!” She flinched at that, blinked tears. Her eyes fell to the empty ground between them. “That was not my invitation,” she said in a low, even voice. “I watched you give him the Qirri … and I know you knew what was going to happen. You made it pretty clear that you want—” “He jumped the cliff!” she cried. “He accepted the invitation!” “Invit—what invitation? You mean to snort the Qi—” “The invitation to leap!” Now it was Achamian’s turn to stare speechless. “To join the Absolute,” she spat before stalking off.

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I meant to add this quote also, I think it illustrates better as to what Mimara feels and how they JE could be wrong in certain matters.

Do you know why?” he asked Mimara when they resumed their descent, the mute boy in stumbling tow. “Why he killed himself?” she asked, either preoccupied with her downward footing or pretending to be. She was genuinely great with child now, and even with the Qirri, she seemed to find steep descents labourious in particular. The old Wizard grunted his affirmation. “Because the God demanded it,” she offered after several huffing moments. “No,” he said. “What were his reasons?” Mimara graced him with a fleeting glance, shrugged. “Do they matter?

"Because the God demanded it". But we know this isn't true through Koringhus's POV. It was his leap, his choice to join Zero. So, either the Absolute and the Zero are the same, which is highly unlikely  (Bakker even confirmed as much), or the Eye other Mimara's conclusions are wrong. Now, I don't believe the Eye to be wrong on all accounts, but there is conflict in this. From what Koringhus says, to Mimara's interpretation. 

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