Ishamael and Mordeth

[Thanatos]

Hey everyone, just something I noticed in my latest re-read.

 

His clothes were certainly nothing like any Rand had ever seen before either.  Tight black breeches and soft red boots with the tops turned down at his ankles.

tEofW pg 282-283

 

I may be reaching here but the black and red are Ishamael/Moridin's colors.  Could it be that Ishamael played a big role in Mordeth bringing down Aridhol?  It could just be coincidence, but with him never being sealed, and the story behind the fall of Aridhol, it sounds exactly like something that he could have done. 

 

Feel free to prove me wrong, just never registered in any of my other re-reads and figured I would see other peoples thoughts.

[Thorum]

Nice theory. Too bad he was busy elsewhere:

 

The beginning of the Trolloc Wars following an attack on Barsine. Hordes of Trollocs advance from the Blight to wreck havoc on the Ten Nations' date=' which had enjoyed relative peace for almost 800 years. The Trollocs are lead by a man calling himself Ba'alzamon, who is in reality the Forsaken Ishamael. [TEOTW-H-171-668 / TWORJTWOT-52 / LOC-H-112']

[The Fisher King]

Thorum, Ishy certainly was busy elsewhere, but uh....Im thinking he could Travel at will to keep bouncing around?

 

Thanatos...usually I would discard this, but, knowing what exsquisite detail RJ paid to clothing...who knows... you may just have yourself a nice catch here on this one ;)

 

 

Fish

[Thanatos]

The reasoning behind my theory here is fairly simple.  We know that Ishamael is almost solely responsible for bringing down Manetheren and destroying the Second Covenant.  Why not take the time to destroy Manetheren's greatest ally?  It would be much easier to destroy the fragile alliance by destroying the two most powerful nation's in said alliance.

 

Not to mention that when Manetheren made the call to the Covenant for aid when the Trolloc hordes closed in on them, how come nobody answered the call?  Wouldn't their ally (Aridhol) come to aid?  Well, they couldn't, because Ishamael had already set in motion the self-destruction of the city. 

 

And Ishamael was always one for letting people destroy themselves, much like Mordeth did in Aridhol.

[OptimusPrime]

The reasoning behind my theory here is fairly simple.  We know that Ishamael is almost solely responsible for bringing down Manetheren and destroying the Second Covenant.  Why not take the time to destroy Manetheren's greatest ally?  It would be much easier to destroy the fragile alliance by destroying the two most powerful nation's in said alliance.

 

Not to mention that when Manetheren made the call to the Covenant for aid when the Trolloc hordes closed in on them, how come nobody answered the call?  Wouldn't their ally (Aridhol) come to aid?  Well, they couldn't, because Ishamael had already set in motion the self-destruction of the city. 

 

And Ishamael was always one for letting people destroy themselves, much like Mordeth did in Aridhol.

 

I like this theory.

[Manel Rochaid]

Is it not accepted though that the evil of the DO and the evil of Shadar Logoth are two different evils? for example, the wounds in Rands side seem to attack each other. Aridhol fell because it was tainted by the evil born to fight the Shadow.

 

It just seems unlikely that Ishamael would have any role in helping a power totally opposed to the DO to rise up, an evil even Myrdraal fear.

[Nightstrike]

Yes, it's an opposite evil to the Dark One. Mordeth was initially meaning well, but he turned evil anyway. Opposing the Shadow.

 

Matt: Ok. You mentioned that Mordeth was a man that had "power". You are reported as saying that his power was that "which he got by seeking out all of the evil things that weren’t related to the Shadow"…

Brandon: He was seeking things that were related to the Shadow. I think that that might be a misquote. He was looking into the power of the Shadow in order to defeat it, was his goal. He was looking into everything. He was looking into things that were not necessarily related to the Dark One as well. He was looking for everything that he could get.

Matt: Previous to him arriving to Aridhol?

Brandon: Yeah.

Matt: Before he went to the king and became the counselor, Mordeth was this guy that went around searching for power?

Brandon: Yeah, he wanted to defeat the Dark One and he felt that he could find other ways to do it. He originally was good. He did not…he wasn’t this terrible person to begin with, but he was looking to defeat the Dark One, to find a way to defeat the Shadow. And he looked into a lot of things he shouldn’t have looked into. There are evils that are not necessarily directly related to the Dark One, though everything evil kind of has…just as there are goods that are not related necessarily to the One Power…we are talking much as Perrin runs with wolves. This is a thing older than…there are other evil things that are old in a similar way.

Matt: Is the assumption then that he found one of these?

Brandon: He did.

RJ's blog 4 October 2005 "ONE MORE TIME"

 

I think you’ll find this covered elsewhere, but here goes.  The evil of Shadar Logoth and the evil of the Shadow might be considered positive and negative poles.  They attract, as do the positive and negative poles of two magnets, but if they make contact, the result is more like making contact between the positive and negative poles of your car battery.  Big sparks.  Really big sparks.

 

I don't know anything about Ishy having anything to do with this.

[NARISMA]

Now you got me interested with that quote from Brandon.what kind of evil did he find that didn't belong to DO.In this quote from RJ blog is maybe part of the answer what is the role of Mordeth in Last Battle.Big sparks-meaning to opposite evils will meet and destroy each other.

[Thanatos]

While I understand where you are coming from, and have quotes from very reliable sources, I still think I have to disagree.  Just because the evil that tainted Shadar Logoth and the evil of the DO are different, doesn't mean that Ishy didn't have anything to do with it.

 

We have seen in the past that Ishy is not afraid to go renegade style and do things that the DO doesn't necessarily approve of.  Case in point, when he tells Kisman to kill Rand if he must, but he needs his possessions (i.e. the CK).  This is in direct violation of the "Let the Lord of Chaos Rule." 

 

I am not saying that he intentionally unearthed this different evil.  I am just saying that he had a role to play in the downfall of Aridhol.

[MikeRiley]

Given the quotes above, I have to disagree. The only thing that links Mordeth with Ishamael is the clothes Mordeth wore. There has been a lot of time for something linking the two to develop in this way and so far we've seen the opposite of that. The two are enemies. While I do believe Mordeth will fight with Ishamael eventually, I don't believe Ishamael was the cause of him (just of Fain).

[Garat Jax]

I think I have read somewhere (can't think where though) that Ishamael did some tampering in the periods he was free due to not being completly caught in the seal of the bore. One of the things he was credited with in his little jaunts was the corruption of the prophecies of the dragon held by the Sanchen *spelling* which is why their version of the prophecies include the dragon reborn kneeling before the crystal throne. Another was him having a vauge influance over Arthur Hawkwing leading to the seige of Tar Valon. The other one I remeber (the one that's relevent) is him having some sort of influance in the court of Aridhol. Now if Mordeth had uncovered a "different" evil to combat the shadow it seems to me that rather than openly face it a little wispering in the right ear from Ishmael could quite easily turn the evil inwards resulting in the eventual downfall.

 

Now I've just got to hope that I did actually read it somewhere and haven't made it all up in my head!!!

[Cillian]

I think I have read somewhere (can't think where though) that Ishamael did some tampering in the periods he was free due to not being completly caught in the seal of the bore. One of the things he was credited with in his little jaunts was the corruption of the prophecies of the dragon held by the Sanchen *spelling* which is why their version of the prophecies include the dragon reborn kneeling before the crystal throne. Another was him having a vauge influance over Arthur Hawkwing leading to the seige of Tar Valon. The other one I remeber (the one that's relevent) is him having some sort of influance in the court of Aridhol. Now if Mordeth had uncovered a "different" evil to combat the shadow it seems to me that rather than openly face it a little wispering in the right ear from Ishmael could quite easily turn the evil inwards resulting in the eventual downfall.

 

Now I've just got to hope that I did actually read it somewhere and haven't made it all up in my head!!!

 

Ishamael did do quite a bit of interfering during his holidays away from The Bore, but meddling in the Court of Aridhol wasn't one of them.

[chrisbren]

I believe Ishamael always found it hard to 'be/ manifest' in the real world.  Hence, he was always oparating through TA'R/ dreams/ vocoules.  This is why he possibly could have played a part in Mordeth and in other events.

[Thanatos]

I believe Ishamael always found it hard to 'be/ manifest' in the real world.  Hence, he was always oparating through TA'R/ dreams/ vocoules.  This is why he possibly could have played a part in Mordeth and in other events.

 

My point exactly.  He accessed dreams throughout the years.  We see that he was in Rand, Perrin, and Mats dreams early on in the series.  Who is to say that he could not also have had access to Mordeth or the King of Aridhol (sorry, don't remember his name).  He could very easily have told the King to listen to Mordeth, which would explain why Mordeth rose to power so quickly in Aridhol.

 

The fact that the evil of the DO and the evil that lies in Shadar Logoth are opposite is irrelevant.  Destroying Aridhol would definitely further the Shadow's power by taking down a powerful ally of what tEofW specifically called "The thorn in the Dark Ones side" (Manetheren).

[bronnt]

Ishamael was able to break free and walk the earth every 1000 years or so-he did right after the breaking, when he visited LTT.  We know he was completely free at that moment.  Then he broke out at the start of the Trolloc Wars, and led them directly.  Then he once again broke out to live as Jalwin Moerad, who served on Artur Hawkwing's council.

 

As for having directly tainted Aridhol, I don't believe it.  The evil is the polar opposite of the Dark One, and I don't think Ishamael would have turned them in that direction.  He culd have done much better by turning the whole city to the Shadow itself, rather than providing a new enemy for himself.  Anyway, since he could only walk free by about 40 years at a time, he was probably sealed away by the time Aridhol was corrupted, as it was a process that started in the middle of the Trolloc Wars, which lasted over 350 years.

[Thanatos]

Like I said in previous posts, It does not matter if Ishamael is free to "walk the earth" for him to influence things.  Using dreams while he is still partially sealed is still completely possible. 

 

I am not arguing that he was only able to walk the earth and lead the hordes during the Trolloc Wars and such times.  But we never saw anything stating that he could not have some type of control without being in physical form. 

 

As was previously stated earlier in the post, RJ played major attention to detail in clothing.  Everyone seems to accept the fact that Mazrim Taim is connected to Moridin because of the Red and Black tiles in the BT.  Why is it not also possible that Mordeth's red and black clothing is because of some connection to Ishy?

[Mr Ares]

If all we had to go on to link Taim and Ishy was a liking of the same colour scheme, that theory wouldn't be as popular as it is. Hell, I wear red and black, does that make me Moridin? Yes, RJ payed attention to clothing, but if all you have to support a theory is a similarity in clothing your theory is rather crackpot.

[Thanatos]

If all we had to go on to link Taim and Ishy was a liking of the same colour scheme, that theory wouldn't be as popular as it is. Hell, I wear red and black, does that make me Moridin? Yes, RJ payed attention to clothing, but if all you have to support a theory is a similarity in clothing your theory is rather crackpot.

 

That is not the only thing I am basing my theory on.  I just think that RJ had too many hidden meanings in his writings to just throw this away.  Hey, I MAY be wrong, I just am trying to find someone to prove me wrong or right either way.  I just find it hard to believe that Ishamael couldn't have something to do with this.