[What Came Before]

I was flipping through WLW and read past the a conversation between Mimara and the skin-spy that was following the skin eaters.

Why did the thing spend so much time trying to remake itself in Her image? What was the motivation behind their conversations, warning them about the Qirri among other things? Was it really just following orders and following the band, protecting the prophesy or something?

Also, since I'm not exactly sure where there was a discussion about this, I wanted to pick out an allusion:
"Only a soul can hold a paradox," she explains. "Since the true meaning of paradox escapes you, you can only grasp non-paradoxical approximations. In this case, 'strange.' Only a soul can comprehend contradictory truths."
Mimara, WLW p276 USA large edition. my bold.

In 1984 the word doublethink is defined as "The power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them".

I thought this was an interesting similarity. That Earwa defines the soul as something with this ability to see a paradox, but 1984 uses this same idea as the premise behind its own propaganda. The Soul in Earwa being the ultimate truth, held as the ultimate lie in 1984.

[What Came Before]

I've found even in the reread, specifically looking for nuggets, that souls apprehending paradox is *huge*. There was also the recent blog that sciborg2 highlighted a comment on this - might dig this up latros. Makes me wonder on the occasional Sranc with souls, irregardless of the human prejudice.

However, my biggest question here, Wilshire, is why it wanted Mimara to kill the Captain?

[What Came Before]

A Buddhist (at least of the Zen persuasion) might say that the ability to apprehend paradox is necessary to achieve enlightenment. However, he'd also probably say that one way to describe enlightenment is as the abnegation of one's own soul, and point out that soulless entities have no need to achieve enlightenment, because they already possess it. Which would itself be quite a fun paradox.

Just idle musing here; I'm not trying to make any sort of point (other than maybe that I don't view absolutely everything in terms of Warhammer metaphysics ). I came across this koan:

A curious monk asked his master, "What is the Way?"
"It is right before your eyes," said the master.
"Why do I not see it for myself?"
"Because you are thinking of yourself."
"What about you? Do you see it?"
"So long as you see double, saying 'I don't' and 'you do' and so on, your eyes are clouded," said the master.
"When there is neither 'I' nor 'You', can one see it?"
"When there is neither 'I' nor 'You', who is the one that wants to see it?"

and my brain, for some reason, answered "The No-God. He's sounding pretty insistent about it."

[What Came Before]

However, my biggest question here, Wilshire, is why it wanted Mimara to kill the Captain?

Maybe because they thought the captain Kellhus's tool, and in the way of prophesy, which they have some kind of concern for (which is funny - thinking about prophesy must get in the way of dreaming about rape, to some degree. Must be important to them somehow!).

[What Came Before]

Side note: Would they get pleasure out of consensual sex?

Why the captain? Well he was the Incariol's book, and certainly the leader of the whole thing. Maybe the Consult saw an opportunity to get rid of, or at least for a time, one of their great enemies. Its always best to fight one war at a time, they wouldn't want the nonman to unite against them (damnit, not again), imagine how irritating that would be.

[What Came Before]

That's real neat, Duskweaver. Again, its a question that gets shifted to the agency category for me, though. If the No-God has agency, then what you highlight reads like the No-God ultimately rejects enlightenment or wants to view it with unenlightened eyes.

I don't think they would, Wilshire, but then there's all that weird... relationship shit going on between the thing that is Serwe and Cnaiur in TTT... True mouth kisses. Ugh. Disgusting .

The Captain was such a nice throwback to Cnaiur.

And bam, way to go associative brain. These are moments that make this forum beyond awesome. Noospheric zeitgeists.

The Captain is one of two Ciphrang, Kellhus brought from the Outside and trapped them, making them inhabit two bodies. Offered them redemption?!

Who's the other? Would the Consult be able to sense this change and seek to undo such perversion... the Consult?! Do they see the Captain as an uncontrollable variable to be removed?

Could the skin-spy that was Soma actually stand a chance to kill Cleric?

[What Came Before]

Ah, damn. 

So maybe one answer to my "Ciphrang Throughout History" question/thread is The Captain. 

Although Mimara sees him w/ the Judging Eye, and he is damned.  Are Ciphrang damned or just the things that eat the souls of the damned?

[What Came Before]

Interesting thought, maybe this is why he was so... evil... in the lens of the JE.

Good point though Trisk. Would a Ciphrang be damned? Guess it depends on whether the Cish are right or not. If there is one true god, than the 100 could indeed be seen as damned. Probably even more damned than any other thing, since they steal souls from The God and torment them for eternity.

If they are wrong... then there wouldn't be much reason for them to be damned I dont think, considering that the hundred may just be big Ciphrang.

[What Came Before]

Good thoughts.

I think that if Ciphrang are damned, their "souls" wouldn't reveal their form. And if they are damned, they'd just look way more damned than most. I also like the thoughts that the Ciphrang are the Hundred and the SS have just been summoning the much lesser knowns among the Gods. I think it's been suggested that Gnostic Daimos is possible...

My thoughts were more based on the Captain's personality, his individual motivations. I think he might reflect the thoughts of a demon, ensnared in another's mechanisms, in a mortal, human form. If Kellhus could somehow convince a Ciphrang that following his plans might allow for redemption... it would make a Zaudunyani out of him, I'd hazard.

[What Came Before]

That's real neat, Duskweaver. Again, its a question that gets shifted to the agency category for me, though. If the No-God has agency, then what you highlight reads like the No-God ultimately rejects enlightenment or wants to view it with unenlightened eyes.

What I was thinking of was someone who achieved enlightenment (or had it forced upon them) and was horrified by it. If the No-God is, as has been suggested, a soulless entity created from a person or persons who were themselves originally ensoulled, that might fit.

Who's the other?

Not that I buy into the "the Captain's a ciphrang" theory for a moment, but... Sarl? His interest in keeping the Captain's head safe seems suggestive if these are indeed Kellhus' Decapitants.

[What Came Before]

I think Sarl is too chatty for a Ciphrang. Likely someone we've not been introduced to... say, Kellhus' resources in Momemn - if they aren't his children, who are doing a fantastic job of unleashing chaos they feel compelled to manipulate coups and riots.

I'm not sure that horror would be the first reaction of a soulless entity created from a person or persons previously ensoulled. But then I've no real guesses either. Neither do I necessarily intuit your conclusion between statements but the premise is very interesting.

Revelation can be horrifying...

[What Came Before]

The Captain might possibly be a veteran of Kellhus' trip outside, but I really doubt Kellhus would allow someone possesed by a ciphrang as his servant.
Also, there would be no need for Traveller to bring the Captain his orders in TJE if he were, in fact, open to sorcerous communication (Iyokus can communicate directly via thought with his bound Ciphrang).

My speculation was based on the captain's claimed that he would remember hell...  perhaps Kellhus encountered the decapitants as they were feasting on the Captain's soul?
There are many possibilities here, that might not be his original body, for example.  Twin souled indeed? 

Sarl, otoh, is nuts.  Tieing that to Akka's claim that the god's can move the souls of nutters more easily, I speculate that Ajokli has moved into a corner of his mind. 
He looks at the Captain with new eyes and declares "Sometimes the dead bounce!".  Or perhaps Sarl himself should be dead and is speaking of himself.

[What Came Before]

A ciphrang needs redemption?

That's like a torture rack wanting protection from being upon itself.

However, an offer to forfil it's endless hunger somehow...

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I'm not sure that horror would be the first reaction of a soulless entity created from a person or persons previously ensoulled.

I think it'd be pretty horrifying to wake up one morning and find yourself unexpectedly lacking the ability to distinguish between yourself and everything else in the universe. Especially if you now had memories of being a whole bunch of separate individuals, each of whom had believed themselves special and unique (as, deep down, we all do).

And, no, I don't really think Sarl's a ciphrang. I don't think the Captain is, either. But maybe a ciphrang in a mortal body might appear to be a madman, no?

[What Came Before]

This actually ties right back into Herbert's meditations on the pre-born (Dune):

(click to show/hide)

When the pre-born, Aria, Leto, Ghanima, are born, they have all the ancestral memories of their bloodline as well as the, apparently, subsequent selves. They vie for control of the bodily vessel, resulting in the Abomination distinction by the Bene Gesserit. But they don't have any metaphysical concerns, really, they want more of the bodily pie.

It's also interesting that you suggest that the lack of distinction between self and Universe is the collapsed boundary in the No-God.

I've always wondered at what "constitutes" the state of "enlightened," and while there is much historical linguistic expression concerning this, I'd be interested in a modern perspective. Einstein had enlarged, temporal lobes (which is really just a fancy way of breaking the cortex into quarters, it gets much more specific), possibly because he played violin, possibly because he was a lifetime math student.

If we change our bodies, our brains, our minds (if these are causal connections), it reflects changes in our innate pattern recognition. What kind of lifestyle, words, deeds, and thoughts, reflect an "englighted" state? Then I/we might better think on how those lifestyles indicate responses to a situation where enlightenment is thrust on the ignorant.