Egwene and the Three Oaths

[aevogt]

Does anyone think it's odd that Egwene changed her stance on the three oaths.  For a long time, she was adament that what is best for the Aes Sedai moving forward is removal of the oaths.  She seemed to change her tune on that rather abruptly. 

 

Is it Halima's influence?  Maybe to keep the Blacks hidden since they cannot give up their "Trinity" for security purposes.  Would Halima even care about the BA?

[eol]

I believe it had something to do with Siuans influence. all that separates the from being mere meddlers is the Oaths. still very forward thinking with the retiring into the kin idea.

[Graendals favourite]

I think it is odd. There are reasons for the Three Oaths, but you would think something better could be thought of if it were researched. It seems strange Siuan could have so convinced Egwene. On this, the important thing was freeing Logain, after that Aran'gar could channel without fear of being found out. I don't remember now, did Egwene's turn on the matter come after that? Aran'gar doesn't seem very skilled in it, but nevertheless seems to have managed it, I think. You notice that later Egwene is very adamant about Aes Sedai swearing the oaths, as opposed to other channellers, and Siuan's reasons too were for Aes Sedai, so if in effective compulsion the compelled one should have their own reasons for what is compelled...

[eol]

I think it was more likely Egwene coming to her senses, maturing as a leader. no Oaths, nothing left to lead anyway...

[Graendals favourite]

But Aes Sedai lose half their lives. That could certainly be another reason why there are fewer Aes Sedai, just the normal ones living such a short time. As Elayne thinks/says, paraphrasing she knows she already with the oaths will naturally live some 300 years which is a long time, but she wouldn't want to die before she needs to. With her strength she should easily make it over 500. Can there not be some other common thing devised to keep Aes Sedai together, especially since the Oaths fail in their intended purpose that was to have people trust them. Of course, they work better than they did in Seanchan, where Aes Sedai were eventually bound as slaves due to their power struggles, but with the Sea Folk and Aiel they are respected out of more than fear. Only in the Borderlands and Tar Valon are the Aes Sedai respected otherwise. It is possible to come up with a lesser sacrifice in my opinion. Well, that is what I think, I suppose as an Amyrlin she can have come to appreciate the things that bind people together.

[Charlz Guybon]

Does anyone think it's odd that Egwene changed her stance on the three oaths.  For a long time, she was adament that what is best for the Aes Sedai moving forward is removal of the oaths.  She seemed to change her tune on that rather abruptly. 

 

Is it Halima's influence?  Maybe to keep the Blacks hidden since they cannot give up their "Trinity" for security purposes.  Would Halima even care about the BA?

I think it's definitely Halima's influence.

[Dhaos]

I think, through the course of the series, that RJ has outlined that the Oaths are outmoded.  Where they once were things that were supposed to make the Aes Sedai explicitly trustworthy, they have turned into something that engenders mistrust and suspicion from the general population.

 

An Aes Sedai vows to never speak a word that is not true.  But this has only given them a reputation as the worst of truth benders and dissemblers.  This definitely doesn't help them.

 

There are certainly other things that could bind the Aes Sedai together as an organization.  Honestly, I think they should return to the Age of Legends ideal of being servants of all.  Aes Sedai healers should establish hospitals alongside herbalists and other non-channellers.  Browns, Grays, and Whites should work with the new system of universities being established, adding to knowledge and serving as the ultimate tenured professors.  Greens and Reds could work together to keep an eye on evil after Rand wins at Tarmon Gaidon.

 

Egwene correctly identified the Oaths as something that needlessly set the Aes Sedai outside of society.  And we've seen that this insular way of thinking has hurt the Tower and all of Randland.  Personally, I'm really disappointed that Egwene has backed off of the idea of doing away with them.  She was being built into the outsider with the power to change the prejudiced, close-minded, and ineffective Aes Sedai way of thinking.  Instead, that way of thinking seems to be changing her.

[42Bonzo88]

Dhaos has it perfectly! I don't think they need to get rid of them as much as reevaluating and making different ones. The oaths were needed at the end of the breaking or anyone that could channel (even if they weren't to blame for the breaking) would have been hunted down and killed just from self preservation.

    I hope we see something like this happen after TG, that like Dhaos says, they become servants of all. It would boost thier ranks, suspicion would go down, it would become like the Age of Legends that both sides of the OP could be used for the benefit of mankind. Hopefully, another 'Tower of Babel' (sorry for the Bible reference, but it fits) scene doesn't happen.

 

[Luckers]

I think oaths in general are a silly idea. Aside from suggesting, as Dhaos raised, that the Aes Sedai are all deep down lying, murdering, weapon-mongers, they also do unpleasent things to the Aes Sedai themselves. Instead of not lying because its wrong, they don't lie because they can't, so what is right therefore becomes what is permissable, and we've seen what that causes--they lie as a matter of form, even if its by mis-representation and ommission.

 

It's gotten to the stage that they even practice it as Accepted--institutionalized lying is a requirement for them to attain the shawl. And more than clearly it has had a negative effect. Think of all the things that Aes Sedai simply believe without evidence. I suppose if you cannot lie you will fool even yourself into believing something must true simply be the fact that you say it--even if your aware thats not true.

 

It's led to them all becoming posturers. 

[aevogt]

Thanks everyone, excellent responses all.

 

Which leads me to the second part of my question as yet unasked.

 

Was it the Three Oaths that led to the issues that plague the present day Aes Sedai, or is the Tower itself at fault.

 

More than the Oaths, the very idea that all Aes Sedai are sealed to the Tower and are therefore separate from the rest of society stems from cloistering themselves up the White Tower.  We have examples of sisters that haven’t left the Tower since they put on White. 

 

That is why I'm rooting for the destruction of the Tower, right down to it's foundations, in AMoL.  As they sit like spiders weaving their webs, the Tower separates those women who can channel from the rest of the world, heightening a sense of fear and mistrust even many other women have for them.  Building the Tower was the start of the trouble for Third Age channelers. 

 

Look at what we see when Moraine and Suian are raised.  They are given a stipend and quarters and then...what?  Suian gets shanghaied by another Aes Sedai, and there are plans for Moraine, but other than that it appears that once Suian reaches her full strength, both will do as they please.  I have always had the impression that for all the structure of the Tower, apart from the Ajahs, there is no structure. 

 

Perrin has a wolfdream where he sees Egwene and Amys looking at him in shock while the Tower crumbles stone by stone.  Some have theorized that this is a metaphor for the ongoing division in the Tower or a reduction of it's power but I disagree.  I think (hope) the Tower itself will be destroyed, and my preference would be to have it caused by an explosion as the result of a  picked apart weave in a sub basement.  Undermine it's foundations and watch it crumble.

 

If it must remain, in whatever form, it should be more of a channeling university, so to speak, where men and women go to train, but once they've completed that, expect for the few who reamain as instructirs, they go out into the world and do something. 

 

What it must not do is continue to be a 600 foot tall hidey-hole, perfect for removing channelers from the real world in which they live and in which they should participate.

 

As it is, the job of an Aes Sedai is basically to be an Aes Sedai and that benefits no one.

 

 

 

[Lille]

I believe the way the Black Tower handles "recruits" is better then what the White Tower does, the White Tower burns their clothes to cut them of from what they were before, i really think this helps making the novices even, to make the nobly born be friends with the farmers. But in the end it hurts them, the Black Tower lets the men take their whole families with them. Therefore they still have contact with the "outside" world, a world where people cannot channel.

 

Aevogt, i believe its the tower itself that has led the Aes Sedai to their current situation, and also what makes most sisters feel superior to non-channelers. Galina for example is shocked at Sevannas behavior towars the Wise Ones, just because she cannot channel. And really thinks Sevanna should be afraid of them. To most Aes Sedai the White Tower and being able to channel makes them superior to other people. While in the Age of Legends they mixed with non-channelers and a person who cannot channel wasn't looked down apon by people who could. Everyone was taken for who they were and what they did.

[Dhaos]

Was it the Three Oaths that led to the issues that plague the present day Aes Sedai, or is the Tower itself at fault.

 

More than the Oaths, the very idea that all Aes Sedai are sealed to the Tower and are therefore separate from the rest of society stems from cloistering themselves up the White Tower.  We have examples of sisters that haven’t left the Tower since they put on White. 

 

Yeah, I'm of the opinion that the Tower- as a physical entity- is really to blame.

 

Building the Tower after the Breaking made a lot of sense.  It was a place where the Aes Sedai could rally and defend themselves from a world that still regarded them with suspicion- after all, 'Aes Sedai' broke the world.  It was a shining beacon of civilization in a world reduced to savagery.

 

We all know what happened in the long run.  Rather than coming back out into the world and widely spreading that civilizing light, the Aes Sedai, as an organization, remained holed up in the Tower.  I guess inertia might have something to do with that.  Or maybe it was the siege mentality that led them to build the tower in the first place.  Whatever the case, it was easier for the Aes Sedai to rule from high atop their Ivory Tower (hah!) than to get dirty with the rest of the masses.

 

Having the White Tower as a self-contained city made it too easy for the Aes Sedai to focus only on themselves.  The fact that they lost their 'mission statement' meant that they had no cause to reevaluate what they were doing.

 

I agree that I'd like to see the White Tower crumble.  Get out into the world and live up to your name, Aes Sedai!

[Luckers]

I believe the way the Black Tower handles "recruits" is better then what the White Tower does, the White Tower burns their clothes to cut them of from what they were before, i really think this helps making the novices even, to make the nobly born be friends with the farmers. But in the end it hurts them, the Black Tower lets the men take their whole families with them. Therefore they still have contact with the "outside" world, a world where people cannot channel.

 

Indeed, I agree. And Rand actually comments on this directly, saying he thinks that the Aes Sedai were foolish to seal themselves away from the world, and that it would be hard for men to do that with their wives there.

 

Of course there are other situations where it will be the reverse. I suspect the men of the Black Tower will end up a bit out of control with their ego's... and in a bad way. Aes Sedai may be irritating fools, but they arn't petty tyrants. A strong dose of duty and in a wierdly arrogant way, humility is mixed into them during training.

 

This is, i suspect, one of the things Cadsuane will deal with.

 

Aevogt, i believe its the tower itself that has led the Aes Sedai to their current situation, and also what makes most sisters feel superior to non-channelers. Galina for example is shocked at Sevannas behavior towars the Wise Ones, just because she cannot channel. And really thinks Sevanna should be afraid of them. To most Aes Sedai the White Tower and being able to channel makes them superior to other people. While in the Age of Legends they mixed with non-channelers and a person who cannot channel wasn't looked down apon by people who could. Everyone was taken for who they were and what they did.

 

Well, they hid away from the world, allowing only women already in awe of Aes Sedai--awe enough to risk the dangers of the world at little more than sixteen--to train, then sexluding them for more than twenty years, and after only venturing out with the shawl firmly cutting them off from dealing with others. All the while those others were too timid to actually approach them....

 

It makes sense. They lost a true sense of their position in the world. It's coming back now, i think--between Wise Ones, Windfinders, Asha'men and Forsaken its sort of more being slapped into them than coming back. I think they stand a solid chance of growing out of it.

 

What they really need to do is de-centralize. Were i in charge, i would set up Halls of Servants in (at the very least) all the major cities. Place some Yellows there, some Grays. Greens for the borderlands. Have part of it dedicated to hospices, and make it clear that its alright for people to approach to ask questions, or aid. Perhaps make it mandetory for Accepted to do rounds in all the nations before they can test for the shawl--a period when they must help in the hospices, and cannot hold themselves apart, and learn the lands.

 

They can maintain their positions of respect, but do it as teachers, and aides--Wise Ones heh. Maintain the Tower as the centre of that, but not the singular.

[Lille]

I agree Luckers, and i have to say i never really understood the Yellow Ajah, it seems to me that its mostly Grays, Blues, Browns and Greens thats out in the world, seeing what happens. But the Yellow Ajah are healers, and holed up in the Tower they dont really do anything, i mean, if your sick enough to need an Aes Sedai to heal you, you're probably to sick to make a week or month long travel to the Tower to get healed.

 

Also Aes Sedai always do whats best for the Tower (with the exceptions of Moiraine and Cadsuane that we know of) even the Grays who are mediators do it mostly to increase the influence and status of the Tower. Rand have done more for the world with starting his schools then the Yellow and Blue Ajah has done since Arthur Hawkwing :/

[Asmo]

I don't know. Ever since we learnt of the Oath Rod's after effects, it always intrigued me as a "price" to pay for being recognized as Aes Sedai, unintentional as it was (or maybe it wasn't?). Something to give up for being a part of the White Tower. If un-swearing the Oaths just restored you back to the way you were, that effect would be negated, and the safeguard that limited the Aes Sedai's actions would also fall, since channelers who aborted the status would still retain their strength without the Oath limitations. So yeah, as matters stand now, either allowing the Aes Sedai to un-swear the Oaths and regain their sacrificed lifespan or purging them altogether wouldn't be a very good (plot-wise) idea. Maybe later, once the Tower is healed and restored to what it once was, and peace is made with the Asha'man, it can be done.

[Luckers]

Actually now is, I think, the only time to do it. With Wise Ones, Asha'men and damane all channeling willy-nilly now is the perfect time for Aes Sedai to recind the oaths. Even if people were concerned about it, they wouldn't have time to say anything.

 

Do it once peace is restored and it immediately gains sinister overtones that no one will miss.

 

As for the bit about it being something that signals Aes Sedai out, and is a sacrifice for the role--firstly, other channeling groups hold popsitions of much greater authority and respect without oaths, and secondly there have been by far more Aes Sedai who lived and did what they needed doing without oaths than there have been those with--even after the breaking the numbers exceed the total of those that have lived bound by the oaths.