(urth) Gnosticism in BotNS

David Stockhoff dstockhoff at verizon.net
Wed Apr 8 15:19:08 PDT 2009


Gnosticism was influenced by Zoroastrianism, which is Manichaean, so it's certainly dualistic. But to Wolfe, one way is not better than the other, or any other way. All paths are potential paths to leaving the false and finding the good and true. 
Severian's interest in Vodalism certainly makes him a Seeker for Truth, even if Vodalus himself is false.

The gnostic "option," _I_ think, is simply a powerful way of suggesting that goal directly. That's why I like the sun/stars imagery---we think we see more in the day, but of course we don't see very far. The stars are there---if you look.

Every hero and every human being has to discover for him or herself what is true and what it false, and frequently what seems true is false, and the reverse. So the main point is just that you look---look beyond what is obvious, consider that there may be data you are not factoring into your analysis. 

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Message: 5
Date: Wed, 08 Apr 2009 18:40:48 +0000
From: "Son of Witz" <sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org>
Subject: Re: (urth) Gnosticism in BotNS
To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net>
Message-ID: <W158121153117301239216048 at webmail8>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"



> >
> >This is classic gnostic imagery. Since gnosticism posits a false local 
> >Creator and a true universal Creator, Vodalus seems to align himself 
> >with true knowledge. However. his knowledge is probably to be regarded 
> >as false, if not Satanic, even though the true god is more like the 
> >hidden one than like the light-of-day one. We could probably usefully 
> >compare the libertines' anticipation of sexual experience through the 
> >alzabo with Severian's mastery of self through the alzabo. Severian 
> >supplants and supercedes both autarchs by conciliating between their 
> >desires for Man.
> >
> >Remember the inscription in the mausoleum: Look, and See. God must be 
> >sought, not received. The Conciliator also is associated with gnostic 
> >imagery (the Black Sun). Silk, in promoting the Outsider, plays a 
> >similar role. So Wolfe basically uses gnostic imagery, I think, to 
> >create a tension between failed approaches to the Increate that is 
> >resolved by the "proper" approach. Something like that.
>   



This is the main thing I get out of the Gnostic theology I've looked into. It strikes me that people critiquing it as mere "duality" is a bit off base. I think, at a really simple level, it's saying "Align yourself to the true God, and not this False Creator and his limited creation."  Which definitely jibes with the way Wolfe uses this imagery.  Of course, The Long Sun is a perfect metaphor of this idea.  A false God and his little dominion.

~witz




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