SkullKast 143: Wizard General (Vol 31-1)

[Walter]

Episode 143: Wizard General (Vol 31-1) (1h33m)

Daiba makes his grand entrance at Vritannis, after Guts goes Berserk to carve through hordes of the pischacha invaders. We also discuss this new look for Guts when he and Schierke work together to overcome the armor's control.

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[Aazealh]

After we recorded I started thinking about "Blaze Rod" (ブレイズ・ロッド) again and had a bit of an epiphany: I wonder if it's not just a pun on a "hot rod" (ホットロッド), what with the flaming wheel theme. Feels like the least unlikely interpretation given what it describes.

 

[Keratos]

After we recorded I started thinking about "Blaze Rod" (ブレイズ・ロッド) again and had a bit of an epiphany: I wonder if it's not just a pun on a "hot rod" (ホットロッド), what with the flaming wheel theme. Feels like the least unlikely interpretation given what it describes.

Huh. Can't say it's the first thing that comes to mind when reading "Blaze Rod", but it is more likely that it being a simple mistake.

It referring to Schierke's staff still seems the most likely to me.

 

[Walter]

Huh. Can't say it's the first thing that comes to mind when reading "Blaze Rod", but it is more likely that it being a simple mistake.

Keep in mind the visual of the flaming road that trails behind the wheel. I like it as a possibility!

 

[Keratos]

Keep in mind the visual of the flaming road that trails behind the wheel. I like it as a possibility!

I just re-read the episode while making tire screeching noises in my head as the wheel ran over all the daka.
It's perfect.

 

[araiso]

After we recorded I started thinking about "Blaze Rod" (ブレイズ・ロッド) again and had a bit of an epiphany: I wonder if it's not just a pun on a "hot rod" (ホットロッド), what with the flaming wheel theme. Feels like the least unlikely interpretation given what it describes.

Sorry for bumping this thing.

Back than in 2006 (mama kak eto been long ago) one girl, who name is Keishiko, translate Bureizu Roddo (ブレイズ・ロッド) into Russian like “Бич огненный” (Literally “Blaze birch” or “Blaze whip” if back translate into English. Rod also have meaning of whip, birch). When I touch the translation, I recheck it and think: “Hmmm , maybe it makes sense”, because if thinking in context of episode about word rod, like fishing rod, then for me its not much make sense, soooo I’m go in World Wide Web for searching. And I found Kabbalistic ritual Pulsa deNura (Literally “The lashes of fire”)! And I think maybe Miura talking about it in this episode?


And now about Paramarishiya (パラマリシヤ). Could it be a mistake by the person who designed the volume and it should say risha (リシャ) rather than rishiya (リシヤ)? I’m about Parāmarśa (Paramarsha) which mean self-consciousness, that is, the feeling, unfolding of the inner atman. Its from Shaivism, if I’m not wrong. I found it in book Bhagavad Gita. BUT Its very weak thing, just food for though.


Also, something about Beherit Apostle. I found Tikkun olam (Literally “repairing of the world”) from Judaism and Kabbalah: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tikkun_olam


AND One More thing. About episode 155. There is a short story by Japanese writer Ryunosuke Akutagawa called The Spider's Thread (蜘蛛の糸), I would recommend reading it, it's small.

Spoiler

Outlaw's story is similar to Mozgus, so I think it's not a coincidence and Miura was inspired by that story and the title refers to it.

 

[Aazealh]

Back than in 2006 (mama kak eto been long ago) one girl, who name is Keishiko, translate Bureizu Roddo (ブレイズ・ロッド) into Russian like “Бич огненный” (Literally “Blaze birch” or “Blaze whip” if back translate into English). When I touch the translation, I recheck it and think: “Hmmm , maybe it makes sense”, because if thinking in context of episode about word rod, like fishing rod, then for me its not much make sense, soooo I’m go in World Wide Web for searching. And I found Kabbalistic ritual Pulsa deNura (Literally “The lashes of fire”)! And I think maybe Miura talking about it in this episode?

I really don't think so. What happens in the episode has nothing to do with that ritual save for the word "fire". The word "rod" also doesn't really relate to whips, and that doesn't fit what happens either.

And now about Paramarishiya (パラマリシヤ). Could it be a mistake by the person who designed the volume and it should say risha (リシャ) rather than rishiya (リシヤ)? I’m about Parāmarśa (Paramarsha) which mean self-consciousness, that is, the feeling, unfolding of the inner atman.

Sorry, I don't think so either. Miura was the one writing the titles, and this specific denomination appears in three different places. Besides, what does this have to do with anything? Daiba's title translates to "Wizard General". No relation to self-consciousness.

Also, something about Beherit Apostle. I found Tikkun olam (Literally “repairing of the world”) from Judaism and Kabbalah: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tikkun_olam

Ok but... what about it? He wasn't trying to repair the world around him, he sacrificed it to create a new, "perfect" one. Pretty big difference.
If I may, you seem too eager to find hypothetical sources of inspiration Miura might have drawn on. Not everything is a reference to something else.

AND One More thing. About episode 155. There is a short story by Japanese writer Ryunosuke Akutagawa called The Spider's Thread (蜘蛛の糸), I would recommend reading it, it's small.

Outlaw's story is similar to Mozgus, so I think it's not a coincidence and Miura was inspired by that story and the title refers to it.

I'm sorry, I don't really see a relation. How is the sinner's story similar to Mozgus? It seems unrelated to me.

Clearly the episode's title refers to the fact the beherit apostle descends like a spider on its thread. I guess you could argue he's giving Mozgus a second chance by transforming him and his disciples, but the two scenarios are still dissimilar. Equating them is quite a stretch. Overall I don't think you can conclusively say the episode title is a nod to that story.

 

[araiso]

The word "rod" also doesn't really relate to whips

I’m about these. Please, look here, points 4 and 5: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rod

Even if its not this Pulsa DeNura, maybe its just metaphorical “blaze rod”, like punishment or something? Because Schierke mentions hellfire and purgatory here and Daka its a demons.
(Yeah, literally she drives a wheel through them, borrowed powers from the spirits, through shamanism, as was the case in Enoch.)

Sorry, I don't think so either. Miura was the one writing the titles, and this specific denomination appears in three different places. Besides, what does this have to do with anything? Daiba's title translates to "Wizard General". No relation to self-consciousness.

Copy that. As I wrote, it's just a “what if”. I'm sorry.

Ok but... what about it? He wasn't trying to repair the world around him, he sacrificed it to create a new, "perfect" one. Pretty big difference.

So, if anything, I will explain only as I understood and interpreted it.

In this process (Tikkun olam), after the world has lost its harmony, there is a “repairing of the world” that will be handled by the Messiah and divine light (light is the instrument here).

Now to the manga, I'm sorry. I don't mean that Beherit Apostle literally wanted to repair the world himself. Yes, he sacrificed the world that was ugly to him (aka “lost harmony”) so that this "Messiah" (Griffith) could come and “repair” the world with his “divine light” (even though it is darkness at the same time). To create a “perfect” one.

Again, this is just how I understood it and interpreted it.

I'm sorry, I don't really see a relation. How is the sinner's story similar to Mozgus? It seems unrelated to me.

Clearly the episode's title refers to the fact the beherit apostle descends like a spider on its thread. I guess you could argue he's giving Mozgus a second chance by transforming him and his disciples, but the two scenarios are still dissimilar. Equating them is quite a stretch. Overall I don't think you can conclusively say the episode title is a nod to that story.

Yes, of course it is obvious that the title of the episode originally refers to Beherit Apostle himself, I didn't deny that.

To begin with, I will try to summarize the story.

The Buddha in paradise by the shore of the Lotus Pond looks down at hell and notices there a robber who had done many bad things, that's why he is in hell, but he had one good deed on his account. One day he took pity on the spider and did not crush it and Buddha decided to try to save it from hell and lowered a spider web to the bottom of hell. He saw this web and started climbing up, but there was no end in sight. Other sinners started climbing up after him, the thread rips and they fall back down into that dark abyss, hell.

Now to the manga. Mozgus did a lot of bad things too, though mostly not with his own hands, but still. But once upon a time he also did a good deed and took in people who were rejected by the world (those weak little spiders).
Next. Beherit Apostle here plays the role of both "Buddha and spider, and he himself goes down into “hell”, if I may say so, and “stretched out his web” to Mozgus. But at the end he fell back into “hell,” into the dark abyss, as the others began "to cling to him". (Aside from the Nietzschean theme here).

Of course the story isn't one-to-one, which I sort of didn't claim, but are there similarities or is it just my imagination playing out?

I wrote all this from memory, if I got it wrong, I apologize.

 

[Aazealh]

I’m about these. Please, look here, points 4 and 5: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rod

I'm well-aware of what the word "rod" means in English.

Even if its not this Pulsa DeNura, maybe its just metaphorical “blaze rod”, like punishment or something? Because Schierke mentions hellfire and purgatory here and Daka its a demons.

If anything it could refer to Schierke's staff, which was our first interpretation, but I don't find it very satisfying. What you're suggesting is even less likely though. I really don't think Miura was making such an oblique reference to purgatory.

In this process (Tikkun olam), after the world has lost its harmony, there is a “repairing of the world” that will be handled by the Messiah and divine light (light is the instrument here).

Now to the manga, I'm sorry. I don't mean that Beherit Apostle literally wanted to repair the world himself. Yes, he sacrificed the world that was ugly to him (aka “lost harmony”) so that this "Messiah" (Griffith) could come and “repair” the world with his “divine light” (even though it is darkness at the same time). To create a “perfect” one.

Again, this is just how I understood it and interpreted it.

The problem is that there is no reference to this ritual in the story and that what it describes does not fit what actually happens. You're twisting both to the extreme (using a partial definition and bending its meaning beyond the original intent) to try and make them fit, but there is no reason to do so in the first place. What happens with the beherit apostle doesn't need to be explained in such a way. It simply doesn't require a connection like the one you're trying to make, and doing so would lessen it.

Mozgus did a lot of bad things too, though mostly not with his own hands, but still. But once upon a time he also did a good deed and took in people who were rejected by the world (those weak little spiders).

Mozgus is a clergyman, and is himself the one passing judgment on others throughout that whole segment of the story. He's a bad man, but suffers no consequences from it until Guts finally kills him. In fact, as chaos erupts at the tower, he's transformed into a mockery of an angel and becomes revered by the mob below. In short, Berserk isn't a moral story for children.

Next. Beherit Apostle here plays the role of both "Buddha and spider, and he himself goes down into “hell”, if I may say so, and “stretched out his web” to Mozgus. But at the end he fell back into “hell,” into the dark abyss, as the others began "to cling to him". (Aside from the Nietzschean theme here).

Why do you say he goes into hell? He just stings Mozgus and his disciples (and the dude wearing a goat head in the cave), then escapes. He doesn't fall anywhere, he goes back to his lair but that's because SK is pursuing him and he wants to tell Luka about his life. Then he goes back and dies peacefully at the top of the tower, and no one's clinging to him or dragging him down. It also doesn't make sense for him to be both the buddha and the sinner who gets cast into hell (which was supposed to be Mozgus)... So yeah, this basically just doesn't make any sense at all.

Oh and just because there's a hole in the ground doesn't mean there's "a Nietzschean theme" either. Nietzsche didn't invent canyons, nor the concept of an abyss.

Of course the story isn't one-to-one, which I sort of didn't claim, but are there similarities or is it just my imagination playing out?

There can be similarities with anything as long as you're willing to make it so. Just remove the context, bend things a little, blur them out, stretch and voilà! You know Michael Knight, from the show Knight Rider? He's got a car, right? You know who's got a car too? Fred Flintstone. Now Fred has got this famous catchphrase "Yabba-Dabba-Doo!" right? Well it inspired Hoagy Carmichael to make a song. "Car michael", like Michael Knight with his car? See the connection here? It runs deep.

I'm just having fun here but I hope you get the point.

 

[araiso]

Sorry, going back to episode 270 again. I looked up Puella's explanation that I had missed the first time. :3 I think I found what I needed this time.

From what I found, she's right, except that Ṛṣi (Rishi) is not the plural, but the singular. If this site is to be believed: https://www.wisdomlib.org/sanskrit/grammar/riṣi#masculine, the plural would be Rishaya.

For example look at this character name: Ṛṣyaśṛṅga (Rishyasringa), here this Ṛṣi comes in the front instead of at the end and is modified into Ṛṣya (Rishya). Therefore you get Paramarishya (not ia) Senani (High/head sage/hermit General). Paramarishya is pronounced as Paramarish'ya, this article works here as in the name Jeanne d'Arc.

 

[Aazealh]

From what I found, she's right, except that Ṛṣi (Rishi) is not the plural, but the singular. If this site is to be believed: https://www.wisdomlib.org/sanskrit/grammar/riṣi#masculine, the plural would be Rishaya.

Actually that's exactly what she said at the time: that "rishi" is the singular and the "-ya" form is the plural. The difference is only in the exact spelling, which seems to have a number of possible variations.

I found something interesting about the title "仙将(paramarishia senânî)". "Parama" means "the best/first" (apparently often used in combination with "guru", yielding "paramaguru") and "Rsi" (it's pronounced "rishi") means "仙人(sennin)" in Sanskrit. [...]

We already know what "senânî(senAnI)" means: commander/general, and "rishia" is the plural form of "rishi". So I guess it could be parama + rishia ("the top sorcerers", referring to the Kushan magic users controlling the Pishacha, Makara and Daka) as in "commander of the top sorcerers". Anyway, I'm not completely sure about this (especially since the meaning would differ from the kanji title), it's really just a guess.

I want to stop for a minute here and point out that it's pretty amazing that Puella nailed all of this two days after the episode was released back in 2006, and that almost 20 years later it's basically still the go-to explanation on the topic. She really is the best.

That being said, as she pointed out, using the plural here would be a little strange given the way it's written in Japanese. The phrasing in kanji implies Daiba is the wizard/hermit, not that he's commanding wizards (even though he sort of is). Besides, if it were "Paramariṣayaḥ Senānī", one would expect the katakana to be different: パラマリサヤー. This leads me to believe it is not meant to be the plural form of the word.

For example look at this character name: Ṛṣyaśṛṅga (Rishyasringa), here this Ṛṣi comes in the front instead of at the end and is modified into Ṛṣya (Rishya). Therefore you get Paramarishya (not ia) Senani (High/head sage/hermit General). Paramarishya is pronounced as Paramarish'ya, this article works here as in the name Jeanne d'Arc.

I don't think that's right either. This guy's name translates to "stag head/horns", and it turns out he was "a boy born with the horns of a deer" in the scriptures. That's what "ṛ́śya" means here: a stag. A quick check also shows that there are no articles in Sanskrit, so your comparison to "Jeanne d'Arc" doesn't work.

More importantly, another quick search reveals that "-ya" and "-iya" are common suffixes that turn a noun into an adjective, which seems quite likely to be what's going on here. It makes sense with how it's written in Japanese, and it doesn't fundamentally change the meaning of the phrase (Wizard General). And it would still sound like パラマリシヤ・センアーンイー which we transliterate as "Paramarishiya Senani". So I think that's just it. No big mystery.

Now, while this has been an interesting topic, I want to conclude with a word of caution. I think we need to stay mindful of the limits of our language abilities. I get the desire to understand what Miura was referencing, but it seems you've been trying to reverse engineer the way Sanskrit works based on its Latin transliteration, which is not a good idea. Sanskrit is a complex language that none of us speak, and that Miura most probably didn't speak himself! Let's not forget that.

Moreover, we should keep in mind that, while they're definitely based on Sanskrit, Daiba's words are technically spoken in a fictional Kushan language from Berserk's fictional world.