Pretty daunting for a first post, but I hope to acquit myself well. I had read Berserk two years ago, getting most of the volumes at the municipal library. Most—I own about 10 volumes that fill in the gaps, so I can't be the most rigorous with any rereads or citations. The idea for this post was jump-started by a conversation I recently had with an old friend of mine who's currently working on his PhD in Philosophy. Of course the discourse swung to Berserk of all things. We were talking about ways to potentially destroy the dark demiurge that controls most of the antagonists. The syllogism that came out of the discussion ended up looking like this.
1. There was a point in time in the past when ensouled human beings in material reality existed and the Idea of Evil did not exist.
2. There was a point in time in the past when enough ensouled human beings in material reality existed so that the Idea of Evil was born out of the collective gestalt of human unconsciousness.
3. Therefore: there is a direct proportional relationship between the number of ensouled human beings in reality and the Idea of Evil's power over ontological existence. And/or, there is a very specific threshold of ensouled human beings that gives the Idea of Evil conatus.
Our conclusion for destroying the Idea of Evil was basically to have the vast majority of humanity die. Thus negating all control or going below that threshold of ensouled humans that created the Idea of Evil. This sounds rather grim but it is a staple of plenty of eschatological religious traditions or mythology. Ragnarök in Norse mythology, Frashokereti—the final renovation of the universe in Zoroastrian theology, or the Eschaton in Christian theological propositions. The old world has to die for the new world to be born.
We had been musing about the equivalent of the Americas in the Berserkverse, and the polities therein that would have absolutely no way or ability to relocate their populations to Falconia. If the proportion of ensouled beings to the Idea of Evil's power is true, then he's losing hundreds of millions of souls that are powering its engine, as it were. Or it's coming perilously close to that threshold were the Idea of Evil didn't exist.
Our conclusion was that it would be the chiefest of ironies that the God Hand, in their neurotic fixation on dominating material reality, would accidentally wipe out too many humans and "kill" their Master.
The one thing I will confess that I don't fully grasp is the distinction that exists between souls and consciousness in the text. If the Idea of Evil's power is tied to all the souls that exist in the Abyss, then all of this train of thought is moot. But if the Idea of Evil's power is proportional to consciousness or unconsciousness, then for me that entails that it only relates to ensouled humans in material reality and not metaphysical spaces.
Please don't try to grill me too hard, I welcome any dialectic. I also don't pretend to be an expert in Berserk.
1. There was a point in time in the past when ensouled human beings in material reality existed and the Idea of Evil did not exist.
2. There was a point in time in the past when enough ensouled human beings in material reality existed so that the Idea of Evil was born out of the collective gestalt of human unconsciousness.
3. Therefore: there is a direct proportional relationship between the number of ensouled human beings in reality and the Idea of Evil's power over ontological existence. And/or, there is a very specific threshold of ensouled human beings that gives the Idea of Evil conatus.
Our conclusion for destroying the Idea of Evil was basically to have the vast majority of humanity die. Thus negating all control or going below that threshold of ensouled humans that created the Idea of Evil. This sounds rather grim but it is a staple of plenty of eschatological religious traditions or mythology. Ragnarök in Norse mythology, Frashokereti—the final renovation of the universe in Zoroastrian theology, or the Eschaton in Christian theological propositions. The old world has to die for the new world to be born.
We had been musing about the equivalent of the Americas in the Berserkverse, and the polities therein that would have absolutely no way or ability to relocate their populations to Falconia. If the proportion of ensouled beings to the Idea of Evil's power is true, then he's losing hundreds of millions of souls that are powering its engine, as it were. Or it's coming perilously close to that threshold were the Idea of Evil didn't exist.
Our conclusion was that it would be the chiefest of ironies that the God Hand, in their neurotic fixation on dominating material reality, would accidentally wipe out too many humans and "kill" their Master.
The one thing I will confess that I don't fully grasp is the distinction that exists between souls and consciousness in the text. If the Idea of Evil's power is tied to all the souls that exist in the Abyss, then all of this train of thought is moot. But if the Idea of Evil's power is proportional to consciousness or unconsciousness, then for me that entails that it only relates to ensouled humans in material reality and not metaphysical spaces.
Please don't try to grill me too hard, I welcome any dialectic. I also don't pretend to be an expert in Berserk.