(urth) Re: Increate on trial

[thalassocrat at nym.hush.com]

Roy says inter alia:

>As I've said earlier, the destruction of Urth was largely a 
>symbolic
>punishment; symbolic because Urth was man's ancestral birthplace, 
>and
>mankind was dispersed too far and wide in the galaxy (galaxies?) 
>for the
>Hierogrammates to overcome entropy (135) and hit mankind all at 
>once. 

I feel that "symbolic" and "punishment" must both be wrong, 
somehow. 

If it were a punishment and only symbolic, why then would 
Tzadkiel's son fight and die in the Trial Battle? Why would that 
battle take place at all? Why the whole rigmarole - why not just 
zap a White Fountain into the heart of the Sun?

Similarly, when Alpheta tells Sev that Urth is not impportant, I 
think she is lying, as she lied about humanity not being important. 

It must be that Ushas is a necessary part of the Plan. And it must, 

somehow, be necessary for the victim to consent in the sacrfice, by 

the assent of Sev as Epitome. 

I don't claim to know from the text why this should be the case, 
but if it isn't, I don't think the narrative makes any sense. 

(Personally, I find the idea of one person exemplifying the whole, 
and the idea of a Greater End requiring the death of multitudes, to 

be quite repellant. That's one reason why I prefer to think of 
BOTNS as a complete whole; I don't think it's necessarily the case 
that Wolfe  have had the UOTNS scheme of things in mind when he 
wrote it. Even the description of the end of Urth in Talos' play, 
with continents foundering etc, could have been simply a lie.)

>And if archangels are invulnerable by nature, why was Michael 
>wearing armor?
>(KNIGHT, 274)

FWIW, you also have the story Gabriel and the sparrow, in BOTNS, 
where Gabriel says something like, "If I had known that we might 
die, I would not have been at all times so brave."