The trouble with what Jeff says, and with what you're saying here, is granting the aliens higher moral freedom based on the assumption that they are closer to God (smarter, more flexible, even a little omnipresent) and therefore should get more exceptions. <br>
<br>It's not God that destroys Urth. Is there actual evidence that the aliens are even doing the will of God, or at least trying to? That would solve a substantial part of the problem. At the moment though, the only reason I recall is the need to have the humans become the Hieros so they can again create the Hierogrammates. Perhaps I've simply not been paying attention, but I actually can't find where God enters into that particular plotline.<br>
<br>However, granting them exceptions simply because they know more, or are more powerful, is silly. There are more and less powerful and wise humans too, but suggesting that one can get away with murder (for a good cause, trust me!) isn't something most can stomach.<br>
<br>Far be it from me to advocate a materialist reading of BotNS, I am simply advocating the evaluation of the spirituality of its characters. <br><br>Paul<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 10:01 AM, b sharp <<a href="mailto:bsharporflat@hotmail.com">bsharporflat@hotmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><br>
<br>
If I understand Paul B correctly, he interprets BotNS without any sense of religious allegory.<br>
Perhaps Wolfe isn't even trying to address the Problem Of Evil? It is just a cool tale about a<br>
gothic hero and some weird aliens in robes and their winged, hermaprhodite leader?<br>
<br>
I couild be wrong, but I think that view is missing something. The bad guys have the names of<br>
pre-Christian monsters and the leader of the good guys has the name of an archangel. If there<br>
is no religion here, why not just name them Zork and Urg and Fred?<br>
<br>
I think Jeff Wilson asks a key question:<br>
<br>
>Would you agree that it can be good for the Increate to do something<br>
>that it would be evil to be done by a man?<br>
<br>
It seems to me Wolfe is giving an affirmative answer to that question. For some reason this analogy<br>
popped into my head- an adult chances upon a small child who found a nest of new born mice<br>
in a field and is smushing them with a rock. The adult might tell the child that the action is wrong and<br>
cruel yet he/she uses a mousetrap in his/her home. Isn't the adult, with greater powers of<br>
perception of the future and of consequences, a superior moral agent to the child? I think the child<br>
would tend to think his/her field mouse smashing is morally equivalent to a mousetrap in a home while<br>
the adult (though not all adults) recognizes a difference.<br>
<br>
Similarly, wouldn't aliens or angels with superior perceptive powers be superior moral agents to humans?<br>
The hierogrammates are described as far away from the Increate but still far closer to Him than humans.<br>
"Yours are a race of pawns" says Tzadkiel, meaning able to move only forward in time, usually one step<br>
at a time. It would seem the Hierogrammates can move forward, backward, sideways and diagonally in<br>
space and time and thus clearly have a superior understanding of consequences to humans and are thus<br>
superior moral agents (in Wolfe's view).<br>
<br>
Additionally, Tzadkiel is unwilling to take genocidal action without consent by a representative of the people.<br>
Tzadkiel has the power and moral authority to do it without consent, so why does he/she feel the need for it?<br>
I think Wolfe adds this to reinforce the moral superiority of Hierogrammates and the Increate (and by allegory<br>
the superiority of God and angels in our world who have done some very destructive things) by adding the very<br>
human moral component of consent that almost all of us readers can agree is right.<br>
<br>
I can see how cynical atheists might have a different interpretation. The consent Tzadkiel wants is just lip service.<br>
Tzadkiel and his ilk had all the time in the world (er..universe..er....universes) to wait for a consent. Any human<br>
representative could seek audience with them but if they didn't give the right answer, they were sent home, with<br>
their balls cut off for their trouble. It seems to me (being something of an atheist myself) to be a reasonable<br>
argument.<br>
<br>
But I don't think that view was Wolfe's intention. Severian seems imperfect yet still brave and heroic, a guy who is<br>
(almost) always trying to do the right thing. I think Severian is clearly Wolfe's literary avatar and I doubt this<br>
transcendent story could have been written by a guy who feels he is a dupe, someone who has spent his life<br>
worshipping a false, deceptive, immoral God.<br>
<br>
(dupe to a kind, caring loving God? yeah, Wolfe might feel that way, like a child who sees through his father's attempts<br>
to trick him into doing the right thing)<br>
<br>
-bsharp<br>
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</blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Paul Borochin<br>PhD student, Fuqua School