(urth) You have the wrong creation you ninny - eschatology and genesis

[Lee]

>Jeff Wilson: If he's in the correct cycle but in a much latter era, 

>then the son of Meschia not being born yet seems like a contradiction. 

>Cain needs to be born before the autarch, doesn't he, esp if he's the 

>firstborn of humanity?


I agree. I find much in the text of BotNS to support the idea that Urth/

Briah was originally intended as a previous iteration of our Earth. The

very name "Urth" implies the past. If Severian's world were a future 

version of Earth, wouldn't Wolfe have chosen to name it "Skuld", for the

Norn of the future. I am loathe to think Wolfe chose the name "Urth"

soley for the funky spelling, ignoring the meaning.


Moreover, everything about Urth says to me "pre-Christian" society. The

giant pagan "gods" running about, the barbarism, the witchcraft, the

absence of a salvation route, etc. There is a Jesus-like figure mentioned

in Short Sun but why is he associated with a Dionysian God rather than a

Jehovian God?


Then there is Severian. Wolfe has said he is a "Christ-like" figure. Is he

the Second Coming? The Third or Fourth? That just doesn't seem right to me.

Severian seems more like an imperfect proto-Christ than a later version of

him . Plus, like the pre-Christian gods, Severian ends up in a mini-pantheon 

of other (false?) gods like Odilo and Thais.


To me, Urth is a socially, historically and technologically advanced version 

of Earth. But it is a spiritually stunted version which has only advanced to 

Earth's Noah level at the time of Severian. It makes more sense to me that

Urth is a previous iteration of Earth than Urth having spiritually degenerated

and all the progress which Jesus brought having been lost.



>Marc Aramini: I think the insistence Urth is a previous iteration is a retcon 

>of the Jordan interview to avoid Prostestant wrath - he isn't going to meet
>Cain in the next iteration.


We must agree to disagree, Marc. In the same interview, Wolfe flatly states his

belief that the pagan gods were real and the ancients were in fact building

temples and worshipping beings that did truly exist. If Wolfe is going to commit

such blasphemy in one part of the interview, why would he tiptoe around

fundamentalist Protestantism to the point of retconning his own work in another

part of the interview. Surely the reality of pagan gods is more heretical and

offensive than the fictional depiction of God breaking his Covenant.


(also, I don't think the concept of time, in years, has any meaning in regard to

universal iterations. I think the idea is that time, as we know it, is reset to

zero at the creation of a new universe.)