How Many Trollics in Shayol Ghul ect.

[RobertAlexWillis]

Here is the source of your problem.

 

The "narrator" of the BWB is not omniscient, nor is that person intended to be. There are things that "narrator" does not know. The text of the storyline books trumps even the BWB, and the indications in the text are consistently that Ishamael was not ever completely trapped.

 

Since you don't know the "internally consistent physics" of the "seal", it is ridiculous for you to say that Ishamael's status as only partially trapped is internally inconsistent. The mechanics of the sealing process were never explained in detail anywhere. Therefore, the methods of partial escape are not explained either.

 

I'm guessing that Robert Jordan knows more about it than you do, though, since it originated in his head. So, I'm going to go with what he said.

[Bob T Dwarf]

Part of what I'm saying is that Jordan has very good about giving us consistent rules and procedures for the way things work in Randland.

 

Women manipulate saidar by first accepting it into themselves. Men manipulate saidin by first wresting it into submission.

 

Weaves are composed of up to 5 but only 5 elements. Assuming one is where the Source can be touched, this combined with that and a pinch of the other always yields the same result.

 

It's all nonsense, of course, but we accept that when we set out to read a fantasy. And, it's always consistent nonsense. It obeys the rules the author has set out. Believable within the framework of the story.

 

Then there's Ishy. He obeys very few of the rules. He seems to be the exception to all rules. Unless, of course he isn't. Unless what we think we know about him, which is, after all, no more than what the characters in the story believe, is false.

 

Sometimes, the greatest lie one can tell is the absolute truth.

 

"The Eye of the World" - The Stag and Lion

"Fool, I have never been bound!" The fires of his face roared so hot that Rand stepped back, sheltering behind his hands. The sweat on his palms dried from the heat. "I stood at Lews Therin Kinslayer's shoulder when he did the deed that named him. It was I who told him to kill his wife, and his children, and all his blood, and every living person who loved him or whom he loved. It was I who gave him the moment of sanity to know what he had done. Have you ever heard a man scream his soul away, worm? He could have struck at me, then. He could not have won, but he could have tried. Instead he called down his precious One Power upon himself, so much that the earth split open and reared up Dragonmount to mark his tomb."

 

It's just as foolish to believe nothing the Forsaken have to say as it is to believe everything they have to say.

 

I think Ba'alzamon was telling the truth here. It's the only way, for me, that the story of Ishy and the Third Age become believable.

[RobertAlexWillis]

It's just as foolish to believe nothing the Forsaken have to say as it is to believe everything they have to say.

 

I think Ba'alzamon was telling the truth here. It's the only way, for me, that the story of Ishy and the Third Age become believable.

 

Just because Ishamael doesn't always lie doesn't mean that this particular tidbit it true.

 

Part of what I'm saying is that Jordan has very good about giving us consistent rules and procedures for the way things work in Randland.

 

Women manipulate saidar by first accepting it into themselves. Men manipulate saidin by first wresting it into submission.

 

Weaves are composed of up to 5 but only 5 elements. Assuming one is where the Source can be touched, this combined with that and a pinch of the other always yields the same result.

 

It's all nonsense, of course, but we accept that when we set out to read a fantasy. And, it's always consistent nonsense. It obeys the rules the author has set out. Believable within the framework of the story.

 

Which rules that Jordan has established does Ishamael's partial freedom violate? Where did he describe the weaves that formed the seal? Or the procedure through which it was created? Ishamael's partial freedom violates your idea of the seal, not anything Jordan has written.

[Wise One]

Also, your wonderful long quote from Ishamael can easily be interpreted as exactly what we claim it is, rather than your narrow perception. "Never been bound" could easily actually mean "never been fully bound". In which case, it fits with the following perfectly acceptable (and logical) timeline:

 

1) The Hundred Companions go to seal the Bore. There they meet the Forsaken, who are inadvertably bound within the sealed Bore. Two are closer to the surface (for no apparent reason, explain the logic there), and so age and experience time: Aginor and Balthamel. Ishamael is not fully bound, but is at this stage. Saidin is tainted.

 

2) Some time (and could be years for all we know, correct me if I'm wrong) later, Ishamael escapes the Bore, and visits Lews Therin as seen in TEotW prologue. After a period of freedom, he is pulled back into the Bore (perfectly within the rules of the world, take being pulled into/out of T'A'R as a similar example).

 

3) Over the next 3 thousand years Ishamael undergoes cycles of being unbound for a time then bound again. During this time he causes numerous problems in the Third Age: The founding of the Black Ajah, the Trolloc Wars, and as advisor to Hawkwing, the siege of Tar Valon, the invasion of Shara and Seanchan, etc.

 

4) The other Forsaken are released from the seal, probably with Aginor and Balthamel being released slightly earlier. Ishamael no longer undergoes the cycle of being rebound.

 

5) Ishamael dies, is transmigrated to a new body and becomes Moridin.

[Bob T Dwarf]

Aran, the Ogier historian, set out to prove just that. He devoted his entire life to finding that proof. He failed. He concluded, that despite the reports to the contrary, Ishamael had never been active.

 

We could choose to believe that version, as well.

 

I simply choose to believe a version that is both the simplest and accords with the known history of the Age. That being that Ishy was never bound.

 

All Jordan has ever said is that Ishy is "a special case." That could mean anything.

[Wise One]

How on earth (or Randland)is Ishamael being entirely free in accordance with history? How did he manage in three thousand years not to totally destroy the world? He seemed pretty good at it in times we know he was active (Trolloc Wars, Hundred Year War, etc). You claim it matches history, but the generally accepted version fits better, as it explains the periodic destruction wrought upon the world.

 

And if he was totally free, how is it all the Forsaken believe otherwise?

 

And I suspect (though have no evidence at hand) that at some point Jordan has explicitely stated Ishamael was partially bound.

[Jellybelly]

If Ishamael had never been bound, he would not be alive today. He would have died before even the Trolloc wars. He is not immortal, only by being held in stasis inside the Seal did he survive up until the present day in Randland.

[KaptainKaos]

I'm just going to repost this since obviously someone didn't read it. Notice the direct quote from a fellow Forsaken Moghedien from The Shadow Rising. "All his pride at being only half-caught, whatever the price." Duh, Moghedien comes right out and says half-caught, come on how can that be argued with, also the information that was given about the Ogier who looked for any information regarding Ishamael being at least partially free was incorrect above ...read below.

 

Was Ishamael really bound?

 

The widespread belief in Randland is that all thirteen Forsaken were imprisoned with the DO when the Bore was sealed by LTT and the Hundred Companions. However, this doesn't seem to be entirely true. Ishamael appears bodily to LTT in the prologue to TEOTW. We know that he must really be there, because he cures LTT's insanity so that he will realize what he has done. From what we know of how channeling works, he could not have done this if he was only some kind of astral projection. That scene takes place shortly after the sealing of the Bore. So, Ishy was not bound right when the DO and the other Forsaken were sealed away.

 

Many events throughout the Third Age bear Ishy's fingerprints-- the Trolloc Wars (the Trollocs invading Manetheren carried the banner of Ba'alzamon), the creation and continued existence of the Black Ajah, the War of the Hundred Years. Ishy claimed to have influenced Hawkwing [TEOTW: 14, The Stag and Lion, 172]. The Third Age shows a pattern of humanity being kept in a state of disarray. Whenever the people showed signs of becoming unified (Compact of Ten Nations, Hawkwing's empire), some cataclysmic event occurred to split things up again. This worked out too well for the Shadow to be mere coincidence. Clearly, Ishy was active and in control of the Shadow's forces for quite a bit of, if not all of, the Third Age.

 

Then we have the research of the post-breaking historian Aran son of Malan son of Senar as described in [Guide: 5, The Dark One and the Male Forsaken, 52]. This person claims that "there were sightings of, even encounters with, Ishamael after the Bore was sealed, in fact perhaps as much as forty years after." The proposed theory is that "it may have taken some years for Ishamael to be drawn fully into the trap with the other Forsaken.... Ishamael might well be thrown out of the prison holding the others and drawn back again on some regular cycle."

 

Next there is the bit in [Guide: 12, The Reign of the High King, 114-5] about Hawkwing's advisor Jalwin Moerad. Moerad was a mysterious, shady character who insinuated himself into Hawkwing's court in FY 973. Moerad exhibited "frequent long absences, a volatile temper, and a temperament that more than one observer recorded as 'more than half insane.'" Shortly after Moerad became a counselor (late summer FY 974), Hawkwing abruptly turned against the AS (who had previously had a very close relationship with Hawkwing). Moerad was contemptuous of AS. After Hawkwing's death, Moerad advised the three nobles who "came the closest to seizing the whole of Hawkwing's empire," and all three of them met untimely deaths. Finally, "Moerad never aged from the day he first appeared to the day he vanished, abruptly, some forty years later." The personality, the lack of aging, and the forty years business, along with Ishy's claim that he influenced Hawkwing make it clear that Moerad was Ishamael.

 

Finally and most tellingly, Josh Hildreth points out Moghedien's musings while holding Nynaeve and Elayne in thrall in Tanchico, after Ny and El tell her about the two Forsaken Rand fought in the Stone of Tear:

 

"So Be'lal is dead. The other sounds like Ishamael, to me. All his pride at being only half-caught, whatever the price - there was less human left in him than any of us when I saw him again; I think he half-believed he was the Great Lord of the Dark - all his three thousand years of machinations, and it comes to an untaught boy hunting him down."

[TSR: 46, Veils, 526] So, it seems like Ishy was somehow "partially bound." That is, he was not completely locked away in the Dungeon Dimension with the rest of the Forsaken and the DO. He was definitely free right after the sealing of the Bore, and was most likely free at various points during the Third Age. Obviously, he was also the first of the Forsaken to be completely freed of the seals, by a long shot.

[Bob T Dwarf]

Moghedien may be saying what she believes is real. She may be wrong.

 

If you read further in the passage you cite re. Aran:

...During his lifetime Aran made observations based on cycles of various multiples of forty years without discovering any indications that one of the Forsaken was loose in the world at those intervals.

 

The last pages of the manuscript suggest that Aran had become doubtful of his own thesis,...

 

So, the whole idea of Ishy being around periodically came from someone who, after a lifetime of trying was never able to substantiate it.

 

Yet, there are records from the testimony of some Darkfriends who claim to have received orders from him long before tEotW begins.

 

So, we see Ishy in the Prologue. We infer Ishy as Hawkwing's advisor. We infer Ishy from the Trolloc Wars. We have testimony that he has been issuing orders for quite a number of years. And lastly we have Moggy musing about "half-caught." We also have Ishy himself yelling, "Fool, I have never been bound!"

 

That's a whole lotta conflicting evidence. Due to the fact that we actually see him in the Prologue, we can be pretty sure he wasn't constrained in any way then.

...His sudden smile was cruel. "But I fear Shai'tan's healing is different from the sort you know. Be healed Lews Therin!" He extended his hands and the light dimmed as if a shadow had been laid across the sun.

That is a pretty clear indication that he still had access to the True Power. Meaning that the DO had not been completely sealed away as had been thought.

 

Yet, the history of the Third Age shows that the DO's influence did wane at some point. But then it waxed again during Hawkwing's time and at the time of the Trolloc Wars.

 

I suggest that rather than being bound, Ishy simply retreated to SG during the periods when the DO's power was lowest. Had he not, he would have died as Jellybelly suggests. It is only the sustenance from the DO that provides any of the Forsaken with their immortality. And, it's pretty obvious that the DO has been able to exert at least a little power within the world ever since the so-called sealing. Sometimes more and sometimes less. When it was more, Ishy was able to work at a distance from SG. When it was less, he had to stay close-by or risk aging and dying.

[KaptainKaos]

What you are describing as Shayol Ghul is just a way for you to avoid saying that he was pulled back to the prison. It doesn't really matter either way because we will either find out for sure in the last book or Robert Jordan will expect us not to question a viewpoint of one of the people who was actually there and had firsthand knowledge of what exactly was happening. Hah, Moghedien got it wrong, she might not be the most powerful Forsaken but come on Jordan doesn't mention anything in the books for no reason. Even saying that the 13 Forsaken were all bound when the Hundred Companions sealed the Bore has a purpose, to set Ishamael apart and to place an emphasis on his position in the series.

[Bob T Dwarf]

Sure it has a purpose. That purpose is to show how inaccurate and distorted the things what "everybody knows" really is.

 

That's true whether we're talking about The Third Age of WOT or here and now.

[Luckers]

Actually i would say that is more along the lines of an accurate description of Aran's work, then the opinions of those people who have have directly interacted with the person in question.