What Shai'tain really wants

[MrFantasy]

It seems to me from what I've gathered from reading the Wheel of Time novels prior to number 12 but especially from the almost amiable fireplace conversation between Rand and Moridin from "the Gathering Storm" that Shai'tan's true objective is not to just enslave the world or remake it in his image, but to utterly destroy it. I believe Moridin says something like "the others are fools, there will be nothing left when the Great Lord is victorious" or something to this effect, implying that the other Forsaken are mistaken to think they will rule over anyone in any kind of post-apocalyptic world, but in fact, the world that Shai'tan and by extention Moridin seeks is just the complete and utter destruction of the Pattern itself; anything and everything that exists....

[ChrisTrebing]

Yes... thats basically what is said in front of the fireplace.

[trashbird1240]

What really intrigued me about the fireside chat was that right before reading The Gathering Storm I had been thinking that in all these stories where the basic conflict is good and evil, no one covers what evil's goal is. Obviously it's to do the opposite of good, but where does that get anybody? It has to be inherently nihilistic. Robert Jordan (with Moridin as his mouthpiece) solved what I think is one of the biggest problems of any story about good versus evil, be it the Bible, Lord of the Rings, The Cold War. I felt like Moridin had read my mind.

[doseyclwn]

Dude! Why would you name the Dark One?

[Tom Sawyer]

Ya, the basic message of Moridin's chat was that DFs and the other Forsaken are morons who've sold their souls for nothing. The Pattern is the DO's prison and he doesn't want to rule it, he wants to rip it apart and break free of it.

 

That does, however, raise the alternate question of what's Rand's end goal? Is it simply to pointlessly continue the pointless and endless war so that people can go on living the same pointless and endless lives with no real advancement or purpose again and again and again or does he have some goal with a point?

[Byzantine279]

Rand's goal seems to be to kill the DO and end the battle once and for all. If this is even possible is the problem though...

 

Honestly Moridin just gave up and decided evil was going to win eventually so he myswell have fun while the world came to its end. I'm an advocate of the belief that Moridin is going to turn on the DO when he figures out he was wrong, and that whatever he manages to do before he dies will be enough that it might end things once and for all. I don't think the wheel will break, rather there will simply no longer be a DO trying to destroy the pattern. We know that sometimes the champion of the light has turned-the question is has the nae'blis ever turned on the DO?

[Tom Sawyer]

I don't think that the champion of light has ever turned. Rand said in Falme that he'd never served the DO in any of his lives and that Ishy was just lying when he said that he'd sometimes made that choice.

 

I think that Rand turning is what it it takes for the DO to break free. That's why Ishy was always trying to turn him instead of kill him and then when he realized that Rand wasn't going to do that, he decided to call a mulligan on the attempt, kill him off, rule the world for a few thousand years and then try again when Rand came back. Perhaps the DO gave him a motivational speech about the importance of perseverance and committment to your goals before reincarnating him as Moridin, so now he's giving it another shot.

[Majsju]

Of course, we can not rule out the possibility that Moridin is wrong as well, and the DO just told him the things he needed to hear to be absolutely loyal.

[trashbird1240]

Dude! Why would you name the Dark One?

 

Shai'tan, thank you! Nice going!

 

What I really meant was that RJ found an eloquent way of expressing the basic problem with the "problem of evil." Not only that, but he kept in suspense for many novels ;) I've been thinking about the Cold War a lot lately and even though I grew up in it I still have a hard time believing that both the Soviets and Americans believed the other side was really that wrong that they were ready to annihilate millions of people over it.

 

I don't mean to hijack the thread but I think Moridin's statements are really a brilliant statement that Robert Jordan made about good and evil. You will not find such bold statements in other novels about good and evil (point me to one in Lord of the Rings).

[trashbird1240]

That does, however, raise the alternate question of what's Rand's end goal? Is it simply to pointlessly continue the pointless and endless war so that people can go on living the same pointless and endless lives with no real advancement or purpose again and again and again or does he have some goal with a point?

 

I think this is another brilliant expression of Eastern philosophy by RJ. Good and evil exist so that each other can exist. If the DO, Baalzamon, etc exist to rend the pattern then there must be some force there to maintain it or it would all be over in an instant. We at least wouldn't have such a good story ;)

[ROB_88]

Robert Jordan (with Moridin as his mouthpiece) solved what I think is one of the biggest problems of any story about good versus evil, be it the Bible, Lord of the Rings, The Cold War. I felt like Moridin had read my mind.

 

i'm sorry to take this way off-topic, but i just have to reply to this.

 

you seriously used the Cold War as an example of good vs evil?

at most it was stupid vs other stupid

[Tom Sawyer]

That does, however, raise the alternate question of what's Rand's end goal? Is it simply to pointlessly continue the pointless and endless war so that people can go on living the same pointless and endless lives with no real advancement or purpose again and again and again or does he have some goal with a point?

 

I think this is another brilliant expression of Eastern philosophy by RJ. Good and evil exist so that each other can exist. If the DO, Baalzamon, etc exist to rend the pattern then there must be some force there to maintain it or it would all be over in an instant. We at least wouldn't have such a good story ;)

 

Ya, I think that good can exist just fine without evil and evil would have no problem being around without good.

 

I get that Rand keeps the Wheel of Time going. Given that the Wheel just has everybody just doing the same thing over and over again, this seems to be mainly busy work, though. It would be nice to have humanity advance so that people's accomplishments mean something as opposed to just rehashing the same old shit that they did before. If he ends up killing the DO, does the Wheel stop being a Wheel and become more of a Line or something so that so that people can advance in a manner that their advancements are relevant?

[Lynchgrinch]

Robert Jordan (with Moridin as his mouthpiece) solved what I think is one of the biggest problems of any story about good versus evil, be it the Bible, Lord of the Rings, The Cold War. I felt like Moridin had read my mind.

 

i'm sorry to take this way off-topic, but i just have to reply to this.

 

you seriously used the Cold War as an example of good vs evil?

at most it was stupid vs other stupid

 

 

haha, I lol'ed

[Raynz]

Umm, doesn't Rand discover the reason for fighting to preserve the Wheel and the Pattern in Veins of Gold?

 

Anyway, I just sparked a question. Being that the Pattern is the Dark One's prison, where does he want to go so bad when the Pattern is gone? What else is out there?

[Tom Sawyer]

Umm, doesn't Rand discover the reason for fighting to preserve the Wheel and the Pattern in Veins of Gold?

 

 

Ya, he finds that the answer is to have hope that you can do better in your next life than the previous one and not repeat the same mistakes. My follow-up question to that answer would be the same as my original question - so what? You're still just living the same lives over and over again for no particular reason. Some of those lives will be better and some will be worse, but none will really go anywhere or do anything. There's no particular point to any of it.

 

Better than oblivion, to be sure, but kind of an irrelevant existence. The real hope would be that there's something more available.

 

Anyway, I just sparked a question. Being that the Pattern is the Dark One's prison, where does he want to go so bad when the Pattern is gone? What else is out there?

 

I assume wherever the Creator is and he was before he was imprisoned. Some sort of Super Pattern for the gods or something.

[Demiandre]

Tom Sawyer, trying to fix things, even if you live some miserable life in between, or get things worse or else is no bad mission. You say "there is no particular point to any of it". It is the duty. When nobody cares, someone has to grasp his destiny to make everything better. Even for the ones who don't care. I would even go as far as to say that my life is more pointless than the destiny of the Dragon. The Creator is a God of Creation (silly sentence, I know. Let me finish first :D)

The Pattern is the automatic pilot. It corrects what is wrong, by adding threads to make it right. To preserve the good direction. The Creator created the World (probably just to trap the DO) and the Pattern as his prison. The role of the Dragon is to protect the will of the Light (i.e, the Creator) by keeping the DO out of the way. The cyclic nature of the Wheel is probably the last line of defense against the DO breaking free. There will be a reboot to the first age, where the DO is trapped as he was during the Creation.