White-Luck Warrior VI

[Madness]

We don't really know anything about Meppa. And, in terms of sheer power, Meppa is the most equipped man in the Three-Seas right now, to our available knowledge. He could destroy all?

Also, concerning Mimira. I've put forth in the past my extreme theory that Mimira and Achamian walk to the Ordeal and Mimira is just innately recognized and worshiped as a true Prophet of the God and, thus, the World. Mimira subverts the Great Ordeal as Kellhus subverted the Holy War, a true Warrior-Prophetess to his false Warrior-Prophet. Her Word corrects the World's Frame, neh?

[Spring Bass]

We don't really know anything about Meppa. And, in terms of sheer power, Meppa is the most equipped man in the Three-Seas right now, to our available knowledge. He could destroy all?

Also, concerning Mimira. I've put forth in the past my extreme theory that Mimira and Achamian walk to the Ordeal and Mimira is just innately recognized and worshiped as a true Prophet of the God and, thus, the World. Mimira subverts the Great Ordeal as Kellhus subverted the Holy War, a true Warrior-Prophetess to his false Warrior-Prophet. Her Word corrects the World's Frame, neh?

I've always thought that Mimara was the "true" Prophet as well. She can see with the God's Eye (the Judging Eye), and has the mark of the onta. I wonder if she could sing with the God's Voice, without marking or blasphemy.

[Kalbear]

Well, in that case she's as much a prophet as Kellhus is. My suspicion is that it's a bit more nuanced than that. Plus, I don't think that the Great Ordeal is long for this world.

And sure, Meppa could wipe out tons of folks in the three seas. So what? That's not where the real story is. Kellhus isn't there, the sorcerers of rank aren't there, Akka and Mimara aren't there, Sorweel isn't there. Only the WLW and a couple of Kellhus' progeny are there. If he wipes out the kingdom, that doesn't stop the apocalypse. If he takes over everything, that stops nothing.

[Spring Bass]

Well, in that case she's as much a prophet as Kellhus is. My suspicion is that it's a bit more nuanced than that. Plus, I don't think that the Great Ordeal is long for this world.

Is it? As far as we've seen from his perspective, Kellhus has never been able to actually judge sin. He doesn't have the Judging Eye.

[Kalbear]

Right, but he still speaks with God's voice. I don't think seeing with God's eye helps exactly. I think that the ability to see with God's eye allows her to recreate the world in God's original image (and thus acts as a sort of metachorae, which is accessed by using a chorae as a foci), but I still have doubts about her ability to forgive sin and absolve those of sin.

My point being that having it doesn't make you a prophet. It just connects you more with God.

[Madness]

There is absolutely no evidence that Kellhus is anything other than a man with the ability of the Dunyain and the Few. Bakker said on the old Three-Seas that there was an omitted scene of the Warrior-Prophet where Kellhus talks to Cnaiur about his plans, which lessened the ambiguity that the "burning heart" was Serwe's.

He's done nothing of Prophet merit.

Mimira on the other hand has Judged herself as good - wherever the moral compass of Earwa actually points - to the extreme of having a halo. She's forestalled a man's damnation, forgiven his sin. Corrected the World's frame.

Also, Fanayal remember is simply one of many apparent rebels within the Three-Seas. There could be other factions, which join him at Momemn. And he has needed Meppa's Psukhe on at least one POV occasion, where the Fanim would have otherwise been powerless before one old Saik Schoolman. Fanayal and the Fanim are just the largest of multiple insurrections.

[Spring Bass]

Mimira on the other hand has Judged herself as good - wherever the moral compass of Earwa actually points - to the extreme of having a halo. She's forestalled a man's damnation, forgiven his sin. Corrected the World's frame.

So she actually saved Sorweel from damnation near the end? I think I remember the forgiveness, but I didn't think that meant that he was no longer damned.

[Madness]

I think you mean Galian. And not exactly. I read it as that his raping her would be his final, nail in coffin sin, forever putting him over the damnation side of the fence. Mimira somehow wiped the mark of his rape away. Thus, he was karmically balanced... whatever that means? He wasn't totally one or the other.

[Spring Bass]

I think you mean Galian. And not exactly. I read it as that his raping her would be his final, nail in coffin sin, forever putting him over the damnation side of the fence. Mimira somehow wiped the mark of his rape away. Thus, he was karmically balanced... whatever that means? He wasn't totally one or the other.

Galian, my mistake. It's been a couple of months since I read the book.

[Kalbear]

Except...Galian didn't end up raping her, correct? So there was no sin to remove.

[Curethan]

She 'saved him from this final sin' by forgiving him - which did nothing about the fact of his impending damnation.

She tries to tell him, 'it's not too late' (presumably for redemption from his other sins) but she couldn't just wipe them away.

Forgiving trespass doesn't require TJE.

eta; And yeh, the rape didn't happen - but I think we can assume she has the mechanics fairly nailed down because of her perceptions.

Its not clear that what she did with the chorae and the wight had anything to do with that ability either, except as a precursor.

More likely it was some unkown metaphysical branch of sorcery that TJE enabled, the same way that percieving the onta enables the gnosis (and anagosis) and blinding and the third sight enables the psuhke.

For all we know aporetic sorcery might on be practicable for people with TJE.

Don't forget, Akka calls it a curse rather than a sign of a true prophet.

[noshowjones]

So she actually saved Sorweel from damnation near the end? I think I remember the forgiveness, but I didn't think that meant that he was no longer damned.

Yeah, I didn't read it as her saving Galain from damnation either.

As far a Meppa being Moe Sr, I think that tends a little toward the preposterous side considering Cnauir used a chorea to turn him to salt. I don't suspect that is something you just simply resurrect yourself from.

[Happy Ent]

She can apparently bring God's view of the real world to banish the Outside's presence in it.

Oh, very nice. That's the clearest explanation I've see so far. Let me try to chew on it a bit.

Chorae undo the "lie" of sorcery and negate its effect, putting a part of reality back into its surrounding unaltered state by simply denying the sorcerous effect. (They do that by nullifying the semantic significance of sorcery by pointing out inherent paradoxes in language. They're saying "Well, maybe you think your new app is super-cool, but Gödel's theorem says it's all shit anyway, so I don't believe you.")

But Chorae can't work against the wight. He's not a sorcerous alteration of reality (by which I mean "the Inside"). Instead, he is grounded in the Outside. No semantic violation is there to be exposed, nothing to be undone.

Instead, Mimara's looks at the Wight with God's eye. There's a brief conflict between two versions of reality – the circuit between the Watcher and the Watched is currently broken. But since Mimara is level 20, her version of reality dominates the intrusion from the Outside, which needs to collapse so as to re-establish the circuit, i.e., make reality fit the observation of reality.

(This can't be quite right, because Mim needs the Chorae for her trick. Also, normally reality doesn't just re-align itself with her God's Eye view of reality, because people around her don't actually become hoary, shambling wrecks.)

[Happy Ent]

As far a Meppa being Moe Sr, I think that tends a little toward the preposterous side considering Cnauir used a chorea to turn him to salt. I don't suspect that is something you just simply resurrect yourself from.

Melisandre could do it. Moe could warg into one of his snakes during the process.

[lokisnow]

What if we think of Chorae as frame portals or gates, the means by which one can be drawn into or pulled out of the Outside... In the final chapter of TJE, Mimara quite clearly notes that her Chorae has a drawing in effect, but that Kosotor's has the opposite, a pushing out effect. By pushing her sight through the chorae, does the transition effect some way of authorizing her frame and deauthorizing the frame of the wight?

[Curethan]

@ Ent. No man, the chorae didn't work because the wight was draging a 'seal' with him, i.e. he's bring his reality with him - so no contradiction. Akka explains it in WLW somewhere, I'm sure.

eta, actually i dont know if i am disagreeing here. Probably just a different frame of reference.

regardless I think she is using aporetic sorcery.

[Happy Ent]

eta, actually i dont know if i am disagreeing here.

We aren’t.

[Kalbear]

(This can't be quite right, because Mim needs the Chorae for her trick. Also, normally reality doesn't just re-align itself with her God's Eye view of reality, because people around her don't actually become hoary, shambling wrecks.)

That's the other part I thought of - that the chorae acts as a foci in this case. She can't directly bring the power of God's eye to bear directly; she only sees what he sees. But with the chorae, she can go through it's framing mechanism and use it as a lever to objectify the world.

Objectify the world. That's probably the best explanation of TJE.

[Madness]

I would agree that Galian didn't rape her upon rereading the passage. Though there is enough ambiguity to suggest that he had and the rape takes place off-screen while Achamian's POV happens.

However, two things seem to be clear from reading the passage. As Curethan wrote, I think we're supposed to take away that she nailed that mechanism somehow. Whether or not she's just using Standard Earwan Forgiveness + Judging Eye to clearly see who she should talk out of sinning next, who's redeemable, etc, is another story? Still plenty of plot mechanism allowing her to become a religious icon. Also, it seems to me that maybe Intent in Earwa is 9/10th's of the Law. So Galian was planning on raping, would have done it was he not killed, vis a vis, fucked on the Earwan Damnation Gradient.

Btw, Kalbear, I think you've got it. Mimira objectifies the World.

The question for me becomes is she able to do this because the Chorae is linked to God or to the Aporos? Aporic Sorcery is something Bakker said he wanted to flesh out more in the future books.

[Happy Ent]

Btw, Kalbear, I think you've got it. Mimira objectifies the World.

Much better than the world objectifying women!