White Luck Warrior XI: 11 Hells down, 100 to Go

[Madness]

Rereading the glossary entry in light of WLW's speculation made me think that the No-God could be a something from the Outside?

Francis, it seems that the Consult find the Gods personally irrelevant as target. Why contend with powers that might win at all?

"WHAT DO YOU SEE?

I MUST KNOW WHAT YOU SEE

TELL ME

WHAT AM I?

I CANNOT S-"(TWP, p19)

Egad. So perplexing.

EDIT: Just going to throw this out there now. Nerdanel, where are you?

No-God = Ajolki

[The Pita]

I have a few questions now that I finished the 4000th reread of the books...

1.The Nonman that Kellhus meets after abandoning Leweth - who is he? Is that Nil'Giccas, or do we not have an answer?

2. What was the deal, exactly, with Anaxophus=No-God? In Achamian's dream after talking to Cnaiur, we get Anaxophus saying everything the No-God says, implying that Anaxophus was either possessed by the No-God or WAS the No-God.

3. There appears to be a bit of a continuity error with Achamian and Mimara - did he know her before Esmenet sold her, or not? There are passages indicating both in both Aspect Emperor and PON.

Can't remember anything else I was thinking.

[Maithanet]

I have a few questions now that I finished the 4000th reread of the books...

1.The Nonman that Kellhus meets after abandoning Leweth - who is he? Is that Nil'Giccas, or do we not have an answer?

2. What was the deal, exactly, with Anaxophus=No-God? In Achamian's dream after talking to Cnaiur, we get Anaxophus saying everything the No-God says, implying that Anaxophus was either possessed by the No-God or WAS the No-God.

3. There appears to be a bit of a continuity error with Achamian and Mimara - did he know her before Esmenet sold her, or not? There are passages indicating both in both Aspect Emperor and PON.

Can't remember anything else I was thinking.

1. It was confirmed by Bakker to be Mekeritrig. There is no textual evidence to confirm or deny this statement.

3. Could you provide examples of this? I thought that Esmenet had already sold Mimara when Achamian first met her. But I admit it's been a couple years since I read the trilogy.

[Francis Buck]

I'm almost positive Mimara was already sold before Achamian met Esmenet, though I can't cite the text (well I can, but I don't feel like it).

[dratini147]

I'm still agonizing over why Kellhus' madness, whatever that may be, led him to oppose those who would side with the Consult, starting with Moenghus at the end of the Thousandfold Thought. What have the voices said that would cause him to eschew his conditioning? Kellhus, WHAT DO YOU SEE?

Edit: One option is that "it's madness; there is literally no logical reason for it." However, I think that would be a poor bit of character development, indeed.

2x Edit: Also, why would Moenghus choose to head South, instead of accepting the fact that he was tainted by the outside world and thus had to be eliminated? Surely rebellious tendencies that would oppose the Dunyain experiment would have been bred out ages ago.

[Kalbear]

I'm still agonizing over why Kellhus' madness, whatever that may be, led him to oppose those who would side with the Consult, starting with Moenghus at the end of the Thousandfold Thought. What have the voices said that would cause him to eschew his conditioning? Kellhus, WHAT DO YOU SEE

You assume that he did. You assume that he has. (so does he, for that matter). heck, for all we know he has not sided against the Consult. For all we know his plan was to simply wipe out the Dunyain but take the spoils for himself.

2x Edit: Also, why would Moenghus choose to head South, instead of accepting the fact that he was tainted by the outside world and thus had to be eliminated? Surely rebellious tendencies that would oppose the Dunyain experiment would have been bred out ages ago.

Not sure it's so easy to do that as you think. Rebellious tendencies also imply independent thinking. Dunyain are basically what Bakker wants to be when he grows up - and what he doesn't want is to be a conditioned slave. What he wants is to believe, truly, that everyone is making the absolute correct, rational choice given the same facts and data. Rebellion at that point wouldn't make sense; in a perfect world everyone thinks the same way because they all come to the same conclusions.

This is one explanation why Kellhus rebels and Moe does not - because Moe did not experience the God or the No-God, and Kellhus did. Different experience, different results.

[Spring Bass]

I think the No-God also controls the Inchoroi and Consult somehow when they summon it. The "what has come before" describes the Inchoroi and Consult's creation of the No-God as "making slaves of themselves to save their souls". That also might be why it took the field when it did - it decided it wanted to go on to the field of battle.

[sckma]

Thanks for all the responses guys! Especially those outlining the different theories.

I just reread the end of TJE, where the 'shade' of Ginyursis comes and brings hell with him, at which point mimara does something with the chorae and stops this. So if the place (forgot what it was called) is the place where the Outside blurs with the real:

A. What is Hell? What is the Outside for that matter? Is it the same as we in the real world see it? the judeo-christian-muslim model?

B. How does this change when the No-God comes down? He consumes the souls, and so the souls don't go through to the Outside? Maybe I just answered my own question, because that's the end goal of the Consult right.

Also looking forward to finding out what happened between Moe and Kellhus, one of my favourite moments in the book was between those two. My other absolute favourite chapter is Sorweel travelling with Serwa and Moenghus the second, the whole chapter was just so well written.

[Happy Ent]

Whatever happened w/ Kellhus and Moenghus is still a mystery.

Maybe Kellhus erred in thinking Moe would overthrow him and join the Consult?

No, I think he was quite right.

Even now, we are not quite sure that Kellhus won’t do exactly that: betray humanity, save his soul.

The difference between Moenghus and Kellhus is that Moenghus has not received any revelations. Kellhus has received plenty of those, most notably in Warrior-Prophet. But his conditioning breaks down as soon as Darkness, when he is moved by the plight of Serwë. I am confident that these things never happened to Moe.

Kellhus actually communicates with the God, several times. (And the No-God. Is it the same entity? We don’t know.) Is this all in his mind? Could be. (I no longer believe so.) But Moenghus has never experienced anything like that, if his exchange with Kellhus is to be believed.

Kellhus wants to save us, not because he is Dunyain, but because He is indeed the Chosen Vessel of the God. (Or at least he believes that, which would be equivalent with respect to internal motivation.)

[Happy Ent]

A. What is Hell? What is the Outside for that matter? Is it the same as we in the real world see it? the judeo-christian-muslim model?

We aren’t sure. Not even the scholars of the Three Seas agree on these issues, not even those who (think that they) are in direct communication with whatever godhood they believe in. Witness the exchange between Granny Pat and the Cishaurim in White-Luck.

But, yes, the Christian Hell is as good a guess as any. I have no idea about Jewish or Muslim conceptions of Hell.

Ajencis’s view is summarised on the wikia wiki: http://princeofnothing.wikia.com/wiki/Outside .

B. How does this change when the No-God comes down? He consumes the souls, and so the souls don't go through to the Outside?

We don’t know if he consumes the souls. We’re quite sure that no new ones are brought into the World.

[The Pita]

3. Could you provide examples of this? I thought that Esmenet had already sold Mimara when Achamian first met her. But I admit it's been a couple years since I read the trilogy.

It's mostly in Aspect Emperor - both she and him reminisce to him meeting her when she was younger, giving her an apple. I don't know whether this is false reminiscence, especially since Esmenet recalls a man not selling her an apple because she was a whore, but it clashed quite a bit with PON. A little too much, IMO.

[jurble]

Kellhus actually communicates with the God, several times. (And the No-God. Is it the same entity? We don’t know.) Is this all in his mind?

Eh, he talks to God, but I've never seen any evidence God talks back. He clearly thinks God is there and listening - the whole tell them the truth spiel in TTT indicates he knows something about the reality of the Outside, but whether through divine revelation or just through grasping deeper understanding, I'd lean towards the latter.

I still think Kellhus is legitimately crazy. In that, he knows the Outside is real. He knows damnation is real, and he understands it completely. But he's literally damning himself for eternity the sake of humanity - the craziest shit any human who understands damnation could do. The Mandate claim to do it, but they don't actually comprehend the reality of damnation. Kellhus does, he's as good as looked into the Inverse Fire, and still seeks to keep the Outside open to the world.

[The Pita]

I have to say that if you're right, that makes Kellhus quite possibly the single most heroic character in fiction, and I dig that. It's beyond insanity. It's absolute true goodness, and that would be hysterical coming from R. Scott Bakker.

I vote on him becoming some form of "No God", though.

Has there been any explanation as to why Kellhus brought the Mandate and the Vokalati (I think that's their name) together, even though they would turn on each other? It seems like a big mistake on his part if it was a mistake. But what reason would he have for doing it if it's not a mistake? He doesn't seem to want the Great Ordeal's failure (though his conversations with Proyas are weird...), as he does save the army himself after the schools are demolished, but it seems like destroying two Schools would be somewhat detrimental to his designs.

[Happy Ent]

Eh, he talks to God, but I've never seen any evidence God talks back.

Here’s some internal Kellhus monologue when he’s tied to Serwë:

All is in disarray. And they’ve killed her. They’ve murdered my wife.

I gave her to them.

What did you say?

I gave her to them.

Why? Why would you do this?

For you . . .

For them.

Something dropped within him, and he tumbled into sleep, cold water rinsing bruised and broken skin. [WP, XXIII]

Is he having a conversation with God, with his imagined father, with himself? We don’t know. But I do think he’s quite honest here.

Then there’s the section in TTT XIV, where he talks to the world:

It seemed he could hear someone shrieking his name through frozen forest arcades.

“Kellhus? Kellhuuss!”

How far had he come?

[...]

“I know you can hear me,” he said to the world, dark and sacred. “I know that you listen”.

A sourceless wind pulled the grasses into streamers, drawing them to the southwest. Against the constellations, dead branches clacked and creaked without rhythm.

“What was I to do?” he replied. “They attend only […] things unheard … they trust to you.”

The wind subsided […]

“What was I to do? Tell them the truth?”

and so on (at this point, he can hear maggots hiss and termites chatter.) Then comes the central moment with the twig in his sandal, where he chooses life (“They were not equal.”)

These things can be easily rationalised as the imaginings of a madman. But Kellhus seems to think that the God communicates with him.

I don’t think something like that happened to Moe, ever. (“He wept”, for crying out loud!)

[Sci-2]

I have to say that if you're right, that makes Kellhus quite possibly the single most heroic character in fiction, and I dig that. It's beyond insanity. It's absolute true goodness, and that would be hysterical coming from R. Scott Bakker.

Not the hero we deserve, but the one we need? The Messiah not by destiny, but by choice, falling to Hell instead of ascending to Heaven? I could see Bakker doing that.

One of the best passages in the books is when Khellus tells the Non-men why they should join him, and you do feel like he's more than mortal:

"And why should the False Men lend their strength to the True?"

"Because of Hanalinqu," the Holy Aspect-Emperor of

the Three Seas declared. "Because of Cû'jara Cinmoi.

Because four thousand years ago, all your wives and

daughters were murdered... and you were cursed to go

mad in the shadow of that memory, to live forever, dying

their deaths."

Nin'sariccas bowed yet again, this time deeper, yet still

far short of honouring jnan.

[sckma]

Thanks for the responses guys, I realize I'm quite the noob with some of these questions.

Also liking the idea that Kellhus is wilfully damning himself to save mankind from the consult, would be glad to see what comes of that.

[Rhom]

Thanks for the responses guys, I realize I'm quite the noob with some of these questions.

Trust me... I've been feeling that way for the last few months ever since I finished WLW and finally got into the thread!

[Kalbear]

Also liking the idea that Kellhus is wilfully damning himself to save mankind from the consult, would be glad to see what comes of that.

Well, him and every single Mandate person since the creation of that order. But hey, Kellhus is really awesome, so he is doing it even harder.

[Francis Buck]

Well, him and every single Mandate person since the creation of that order. But hey, Kellhus is really awesome, so he is doing it even harder.

But wouldn't he be the only one actually making a difference?

[The Pita]

I don't believe the text confirms it anywhere, and I don't know how Moenghus could have orchestrated it, seeing as how taxed he was by sending Kellhus the sending, and how no connection is ever made between him and Xunnurit, who was the instigator of the loss.

If Bakker confirms it I wouldn't be surprised, but it seems more like a fortitious Correspondence of Cause than anything else.

ETA - Did I get the term right? My copy of The Thousandfold Thought is like in the next room and there's no fucking way I'm walking that far.