How could the very first member of the God Hand be born?

jackson_hurley

even the horses are cut in half!
Pedro-kun said:
I mean, if he/she was the first, who was there to ''judge'' the ceremony? :???:

There is a speculation in a thread here (I'm pretty sure) about the wiseman (that I think is Void, waiting for a flashback to confirm if I'm right or not :serpico: ) descending in the astral world in the deep deep layers (the abyss, again if I'm not mixing stuff) and meeting the Idea of Evil, thus then somehow sacrificing or something. (try to search for that thread in speculation)

As for me I have no idea. I thought that speculation was cool but other than that we don't know.
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
Pedro-kun said:
I mean, if he/she was the first, who was there to ''judge'' the ceremony? :???:

Obviously, the very first member of the God Hand was not reborn like Femto was. There are many ways in which this could have happened, but what matters is that they all involve that first individual communing directly with the Idea of Evil. You may not know of the Idea of Evil if you're a casual reader. It appears in the manga at the end of episode 82 (in the middle of volume 13), when Griffith's soul descends into darkness. He witnesses the creation of beherits, and at the very bottom, he meets... God. The title of that episode is appropriately "The God of the Abyss".

There was originally another episode after that, episode 83, that depicted the encounter between Griffith and that god. It calls itself the Idea (the Greek word, not English) of Evil, and is effectively the source of all evil. It is a part of mankind's collective consciousness, a being born from humanity's desperate need to find reasons for the pain, suffering and death it endured since time immemorial. It is the true master of the God Hand, apostles and beherits. The puppeteer who orchestrates things behind the scene. A part of it exists in every man and woman, for it embodies all of the dark aspects of the human race.

Miura decided to remove episode 83 from the story because he felt it revealed too much about the world too early in the tale, which he believed could be a limiting factor for the story's growth. That's why you haven't read it. If you're curious, a translation of the episode's dialog is available here. Episode 83 (commonly referred to as "the lost episode") isn't canon anymore, but it remains pretty informative and can help give you a idea of how the world works. The Idea of Evil has remained elusive since then, but its presence can be felt if you look hard enough. For example, the last three episodes of volume 20 are titled "Shadow of Idea", and what happens in them is an example of how that entity manipulates the world to achieve its ends. Another case is when Flora tells Guts and the world and beherits in volume 24, explaining to him who truly controls them.

jackson_hurley said:
There is a speculation in a thread here (I'm pretty sure) about the wiseman (that I think is Void, waiting for a flashback to confirm if I'm right or not :serpico: ) descending in the astral world in the deep deep layers (the abyss, again if I'm not mixing stuff) and meeting the Idea of Evil, thus then somehow sacrificing or something. (try to search for that thread in speculation)

As for me I have no idea. I thought that speculation was cool but other than that we don't know.

It's nice of you to reply Jackson, but I think putting more effort into your post would have made it a lot more useful.
 
Good question.

I think he/she could be some kind of an ancient sorcerer, craving for an answer "Why is world such an evil place?". Seeking for an answer, he/she learned how to descend into deeper layers of the world (kinda like Flora and Schierke), where evil creatures lived. Hoping for meeting with the very source of whole the evil, he descended deep, deep into realm of ideas, deeper than other sorcerers, deeper than interstice, so deep, that not a single soul was around, only darkness (whoa, I floated. sorry for this little fanfic). And that darkness spoke out, and answered his question. Having this knowledge, he stayed in the abyss. And as he went out, he was not a human anymore.

Clearer: A mage didn't need any ceremony. His magic abilities let him travel into Abyss on his own, and then IoE done rest. He even could be Void himself, though taking in concern that previous 4/5 God Hands probably got killed during disaster in Gaiseric's capital, I don't think so.
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
slothqueen said:
Seeking for an answer, he/she learned how to descend into deeper layers of the world (kinda like Flora and Schierke), where evil creatures lived. Hoping for meeting with the very source of whole the evil, he descended deep, deep into realm of ideas, deeper than other sorcerers, deeper than interstice, so deep, that not a single soul was around, only darkness

Just to clarify, the Interstice is the shallowest layer of the Astral world. And the Idea of Evil is supposed to be nestled within the Vortex of Souls (so there are souls around).
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
First of all, who knows...? There are dozens of unanswered questions about events 1,000+ years ago, and this one is even less easy to speculate about. However, it doesn't mean that it's inexplicable.

Because there were likely no previous God Hand, it would make sense for that very first occultation to have been exceptional from the one we saw with Griffith. I do think the first member was probably a magic user, going deeper into the astral world, eventually making "first contact" with the Idea of Evil. I think that's part of the reason we've been introduced to the dangers of ethereal bodies in the way that we have -- to orient us for when we're introduced to a scenario where that goes really bad.

slothqueen said:
Clearer: A mage didn't need any ceremony. His magic abilities let him travel into Abyss on his own, and then IoE done rest. He even could be Void himself, though taking in concern that previous 4/5 God Hands probably got killed during disaster in Gaiseric's capital, I don't think so.

I agree with everything here except the end. There wasn't necessarily a previous God Hand. Those "4/5 angels" could have been a lot of things, considering that this is a story passed down for 1,000 years by people unfamiliar with that aspect of the world, including the 4 Kings of the World failing to protect the city during its destruction by a fifth force. I think presuming there was a previous God Hand actually complicates the explanation of that portion of the series beyond its current challenges.

Furthermore, Void being the leader of the God Hand -- and thus the first -- is actually an extremely viable theory, given that the other members treat him with seniority and authority.
 
Ugh...

I kinda cling to the idea, that there were previous God Hands, and that they were killed. It was giving me hope for seeing Femto and his fellow demons dead at the end of the series, without need of some fetched, unbelievable situation to occur (like Guts Avatar Of Good, or intervention of Four Kings). Before I came up to a conclusion, that 4/5 angels were God Hands, I thought that Femto is immortal in typical, demonic way - you can destroy his temporary body, but his soul will come back to abyss and wait to be incorporated in a mortal body again, with no virtual harm for him.

It would be awful :sad:
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
slothqueen said:
I thought that Femto is immortal in typical, demonic way - you can destroy his temporary body, but his soul will come back to abyss and wait to be incorporated in a mortal body again, with no virtual harm for him.

It would be awful :sad:

I don't think that's going to be the case, though. Femto's incarnation was a very special ceremony, cramming the existence of Femto into a physical shell. If that shell is damaged, particularly by something like the Dragon Slayer, then it stands to reason his astral body would also be damaged.
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
Walter said:
Femto's incarnation was a very special ceremony, cramming the existence of Femto into a physical shell. If that shell is damaged, particularly by something like the Dragon Slayer, then it stands to reason his astral body would also be damaged.

To what extent remains to be seen though.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Aazealh said:
To what extent remains to be seen though.

Of course, like everything else God Hand-related, speculating with certainty about them in this regard is folly. My reasoning is based on the special circumstances of the ceremony and how I sense the narrative going. I can't foresee Femto NOT getting ultimate retribution by the end of the series because of something like "ah ah ah! you missed my real body!"
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
Walter said:
I can't foresee Femto NOT getting ultimate retribution by the end of the series because of something like "ah ah ah! you missed my real body!"

He'll say just that, then we'll get a close-up of Guts clenching his teeth and swinging the Dragon Slayer right into his face.

griffscream.jpg
 
Top Bottom