[Bolivar]

As The Judging Eye comes to an end, The Aspect Emperor calls a gathering of potentates in the Umbilicus, and the horrors of Cil-Aujas come to the fore.

Chapter 15:

He sat on one of the lower tiers, and rather than descend, the Aspect-Emperor simply tilted in his floating posture to study him. The rings of light about his head and hands gilded the man’s face and shoulders with a patina of gold. The caste-noble’s dark eyes glittered with tears.

Do Kellhus' halos now cast light? Are they no longer the light of delusion?

When I first read TAE, I thought the irony of this series is a man who comes to deceive everyone and actually becomes a messiah. After our first stretch of the slog, I now agree with Achamian that all of it is a lie. To me Kellhus is now enhancing his deception with sorcery and the Men of the Circumfix simply don't stand a chance. That could explain why his halos now cast light, as we see sorcery do the same for the Skin Eaters  in Cil-Aujas.

Chapter 16:

She has read enough to know these are not just any Men. They are the original Men of Eärwa, the Emwama, the slaves exterminated by her ancestors in the earliest days of the Tusk.

Along with the previous discussion about their guttural language, I think the Emwama might have been another species of hominids and not actually Men. Anthropology teaches us that the primitive cavemen like the neanderthaals were not our evolutionary forefathers but actually contemporaries of early homo sapiens. And the reason humans are the only hominids remaining is because we wiped all the others off the face of the planet.

[MSJ]

See, I don't know. The last we get from Kellhus is the Moe convo. And, he certainly seemed to be showing weaknesses there. His love for Esme, the twig and not wanting to let Moe join with the Consult. And, that's all we really have to go on. I believe he is still deceiving the Men of Earwa, but I believe his intentions are for the best of humanity. That's why I don't believe it's all a lie. Like, what's the difference between Kellhus and Inri Sejenus? How did Inri ascend?  Its all Viramsata, IMHO.

[profgrape]

1.  The tail end of Akka's final dream, conversation between Seswatha and Celmomas:

Achamian placed the scroll-case on the table before him, so that it seemed the prize of the pieces arrayed on the benjuka plate beyond it.  He looked up to meeting his chieftain's pensive gaze, found himself pondering the archaic script. "Doom," it read, "should you find me broken."
[Seswatha speaking]"The inscription ... what does it mean?"
"Keep it, old friend.  Make it your deepest secret."
"These dreams you have been having ... You must tell me more!"

"Doom" for whom, Celmomas?  Can you through us a friggin' bone here?  I agree with Seswatha: you must tell us more!  Seriously, though, this suggests that Celmomas' dreams are what led him to believe that "an Anasurimbor would return..."  It stands to reason that the last thing he told Seswatha was the primary takeaway from his dreams.

As an aside, consider this: Akka is compelled by his dreams to find the map to Ishual.  And here, he dreams that Celmomas' was compelled to build Ishual... by dreams!  There's been a lot of speculation who (or what) is behind Akka's dreams.  But now I also wonder if there wasn't someone (or something) behind Celmomas' dreams as well?

2. As Cleric is overtaken by the Wight-in-the-Mountain:

"I dream," Cleric's voice booms through the wind howling black, "that I am a God."

Assuming that this is Gin'Yursis speaking through Akka, and assuming that he's experiencing eternal damnation in the Outside, it's interesting that he describes the experience as dreaming that he's a God.  Especially as signs point toward the Gods being Ciphrang.

3. Mimara, as she repels the Wight:

I guard them! she weeps, standing frail beneath the white-bleached Seal. "I hold the Gates!"

Assuming (a common theme for this post) that the "Gates" are the series of fortified passes through the Great Kayarsus, why is Mimara able to convince the Wight that she holds them?  One of many awesome-but-confusing moments in TSA.

4. After escaping Cil-Aujas, Akka contemplates the implications of his earlier dream:

"Bury it," the ancient High-King had said. "Bury it in the Coffers ..."
In Marrow, Acamian had mentioned the Coffers the way a trapper baits his snare, as a crude goad meant to drive crude men.  But now...
His lie.  Fate was making his lie true.

The last sentence is a doozy.  For one, it's describing Viramsata more or less exactly.  And it also references "fate", and by association, Anagke.  Finally, the fact that he considers it to be his lie at all.  Consider the conversation he has with Kosoter and co. in Marrow:

Achamian could feel himself wilt.  Wild-limbed imaginings flickered through his soul, hot with screams and blood.  He could feel tremors knock through his knees.
"Go easy now, friend," Sarl murmured in what seemed genuine conciliation. "The Captain here can piss halfway cross the world, if need be.  Just answer his question."
Achamian swallowed, blinked. "The Coffers," some traitor with his voice said.

I'd always thought that the "traitor with his voice" was a metaphor.  But what if he's literally compelled to say this, the lie that the future dream makes true?

[H]

Sorry guys, been battling whatever this sickness is, so I've been largely in bed.

Chapter 15:

And short of heaven how could such an intellect be? Eskeles had claimed that his soul was the God's soul in small, that divinity was the cipher. If a man were to think the thoughts of a god, would not Men be as children before him?

This is the crux of it all, right here, the question of Kellhus' nature, now.  Thing is, nothing has really changed has it?  Sorweel hears of Akka's account, which we know is true.  We know what the nature of TTT is, how it is a lie made to direct the course of culture and history.  Yet, we still find ourselves drawn to "good-guy" Kellhus as if he hasn't deceived us as he has everyone else.

We know that Kellhus spins lies.  We know he manipulates those around him.  So, the question is really, "to what end?"  What does Kellhus want with all this?  Is it really all for the greater good?  What would that even be?

No, I think Kellhus is a false as ever.  His "divine" mantle as false as the halos around his head and hands.  Nothing but the trappings of delusion, a delusion in action, lies made real, even if they are still untrue.

I think Moe might have given us a clue, back in TTT:

“The God sleeps … It has ever been thus. Only by striving for the Absolute may we awaken Him. Meaning. Purpose. These words name not something given … no, they name our task.”

Is this what Kellhus is after?  Achieving the Absolute?  What would that mean?  Is that the point where he would ascend to true God-hood? 

[MSJ]

Great points H, and all you said is true. Again, I'm just drawn back to those things in the meeting with Moe and leading up to it. His feelings for Esme, Serwe, hell the Circumfix in general. I think something has changed in Kellhus, and his goals might be tad bit different than what one would expect from a Dunyain. Does he still deceive? Yes. Is everything Mission, and he'll do whatever needs doing to achieve his goals? Yes. Is he ruthless in achieving those goals? Of course. But, I tend to think that everything he dealt with in PoN, changed him, made him a little bit more Man than Dunyain. He might sacrifice nations, but I still believe his interests lie with mankind.

[H]

Well, while I agree the Kellhus does "crack" in places, before the meeting with Moe in TTT, I think he actually tells us, flatly, what is going on right when he stabs Moe:

“You are Dûnyain still, Father.”
“As are—”
The eyeless face, once perfectly obdurate and inscrutable, suddenly twitched in the ghost of a grimace. Kellhus pulled his knife from his father’s chest, retreated several steps. He watched his father probe the wound with his fingers, a weeping perforation just beneath his rib cage.
“I am more,” the Warrior-Prophet said.

I don't think that Kellhus is a more "human" Dunyain, that would certainly be less, not more.  Indeed, by his own admission, a Dunyain would side with the Consult.  So, what does that mean for Kellhus?  I think it's the fact that he fancies himself a god.  The halos being the biggest clue to that.  He won't side with the Consult, because he wants the god-hood, not just some escape from damnation.

[MSJ]

Well, he just believes he is more. Moe says he's mad and the wilderness has broken him. But, I believe we're arguing two sides of the same coin. Without humanity, he cannot reach God-hood, if indeed that is his goal. If the Consult wins, the Outside is shut. So, that makes me think, in the end he has to side with Mankind and do what's best for them in the long run.

[H]

True, it's something of semantics, but I don't see Kellhus as a savior at all.  Where the Consult wants to seal the world from the Outside, I think Kellhus wants to dominate the Outside like he has the Inside.  The truth is that I don't think either of those options are actually "good" for humanity.

[profgrape]

I think that Kellhus' caring about godhood is why Moenghus considers him "mad".  The idea of being a savior seems distinctly un-Dunyain.  Or, for that matter, really caring about whether the world stays or goes.

[H]

Chapter 16:

In shallow sockets here and there even this layer had given out, especially near the centre, where her stepfather had once hung out of proportion in the sky. There, after dabbing away the white powder with her fingertips, she saw a young man's mosaic face, black hair high in the wind, child-wide eyes fixed upon some obscured foe.

Irni Sejenus?

"Mimara," a voice calls. "What's the matter, girl?" It's Somandutta, the one man here that she trusts, and only then because he is no man.

She already realizes that Soma is a skin-spy?  It doesn't seem like it and yet this line...

And somehow, impossibly, passes through.

She blinks on the far side of contradiction, her face and shoulders pulled back in a warm wind, a breath, a premonition of summer rain. And she sees it, a point of luminous white, a certainty, shining out from the pit that blackens her grasp. A voice rises, a voice without word or tone, drowsy with compassion, and the light grows and grows, shrinking the abyss to a rind, to the false foil that it is, burning to dust, and the glory, the magnificence, shines forth, radiant, blinding...

I think we have discussed this before, but is it Mimarma who brings the wright into the frame by looking into the Chorae?

"I dream," Cleric's voice booms through the wind howling black, "that I am a God."

Is that what it is like to be caught in a Topoi?  The feeling that you are immortal and everlasting, yet, still somehow earning, in a way?

The Gates are no longer guarded.

...

"I guard them!" she weeps, standing frail beneath the white-bleached Seal. "I hold the Gates!"

I always figured that Gates mentioned were a play on the fact that the Gates to Cil-Aujas were not guarded (which Cleric remarks about earlier) and the idea that no one guards the Gates between Hell (the Outside) and the world itself.

Interlude:

The Prince-Imperial fluttered his lids as though overpowered by warmth and weariness. "But he has more power..." he whispered, pretending to fall asleep. He would open his eyes later, when her breathing slipped into the long trough of dreams.

[Alia]

Chapter 16:

"Mimara," a voice calls. "What's the matter, girl?" It's Somandutta, the one man here that she trusts, and only then because he is no man.

She already realizes that Soma is a skin-spy?  It doesn't seem like it and yet this line...

I took it to mean that to Mimara Soma is a boy among men.

[H]

Chapter 16:

"Mimara," a voice calls. "What's the matter, girl?" It's Somandutta, the one man here that she trusts, and only then because he is no man.

She already realizes that Soma is a skin-spy?  It doesn't seem like it and yet this line...

I took it to mean that to Mimara Soma is a boy among men.

Yeah, having finished the chapter now, it makes sense as that.

[MSJ]

I think that Kellhus' caring about godhood is why Moenghus considers him "mad".  The idea of being a savior seems distinctly un-Dunyain.  Or, for that matter, really caring about whether the world stays or goes.

So then, what do you think it means to reach the Absolute? That's the most Dunyain thing possible is it not? We can't have it both ways here people, lol.

ETA: so the Absolute is becoming a totally Self-Moving soul, that which precedes everything, right? Which sounds to me like becoming a god.

[profgrape]

Heh, true MSJ. 

To clarify, it's that Kellhus seems to care about godhood as conceived by Man.

[MSJ]

Heh, true MSJ. 

To clarify, it's that Kellhus seems to care about godhood as conceived by Man.

But that's my point, doesn't the gods need humanity? So doesn't his interest lie with protecting humanity or who will he even be a God to?